August 30 ~ to be the wind of change...

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Sermon by Bishop Halmarson

Jeremiah 15:15-21

Psalm 26:1-8

Romans 12:9-21

Matthew 16:21-28

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, our strength and redeemer. Amen.

Today the ELCIC Summer Sermon Series takes us to the place I served as a pastor and bishop, the Saskatchewan Synod. And to a person who started her ministry with me as a staff person for youth ministry in the synod. So I have known today’s preacher for many, many years! And she is a deacon in the ELCIC. The ministry of Deacon requires theological education, like a pastor has, but also knowledge and skills that intersect with life around the church. It’s a ministry of Word and Service – proclaiming the gospel in preaching and teaching and action, within both the church and in society.

Deacon Gretchen Peterson serves as the Assistant to the National Bishop for youth and leadership, and also as one of the Assistants to the Bishop for the Saskatchewan Synod, for the Saskatoon Ministry area. On behalf of the ELCIC, she works with youth and adult leaders to coordinate the Canadian Lutheran Anglican Youth gathering every two years, a national youth project, the Luther League Legacy Fund, and a host of resources for youth ministry in congregations and synods.

Deacon Gretchen writes:

Grace and peace be with you! I am grateful for the invitation to join you for worship today and grateful that you are using the ELCIC Summer Sermon Series.

As you gather for worship today, wherever you are on Turtle Island, I invite you to take a moment to acknowledge the land and the waterways where you find yourself. For myself, I’d like to give thanks for the ongoing stewardship of this place, the city I call home— Saskatoon, which is on Treaty 6 land and the Homeland of the Métis. I am grateful for the care of this place by the people who have come before me and commit to work towards right relationship as I play, work, and live here.

As we are making our way through the Gospel of Matthew this August, perhaps you are noticing that many of our readings involve a certain disciple. Peter. He has played a prominent role in the last few Sundays.

Going back a few weeks, we heard the reading about Jesus sending the disciples out on a boat, while he himself retreated to the mountaintop to pray, after feeding more than 5000 people.

When Jesus returns, and walks out on the sea to find the disciples, during a raging storm, the disciples think they are seeing a ghost. Jesus calls out to them and they recognize him. Peter is invited to walk out on the water to join his Teacher. He does, and for those first few moments all goes well. But then the winds roar and Peter gets frightened and starts to sink. Jesus reaches out and grabs him.

Last week, we read about Peter’s declaration that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of the Living God. Upon hearing Peter’s declaration, Jesus has one of his own. Jesus says, “Blessed are you, Simon, son of Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you but my Father in heaven. And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church.” Peter exhibits great faith to proclaim who Jesus truly is, and Jesus seems to show great trust in Peter’s ability to be part of the leadership of the movement that is afoot.

And now we come to today’s part of Matthew.

Let’s take a moment to think about where we are in the timeline of Jesus’ life. He has been travelling around—performing miracles, curing sickness, raising the dead, feeding people. He’s been sitting at dining room tables with mischiefs and tax collectors. The Roman Empire and others have started to take note of this troublemaker.

The end of his life is coming near, and Jesus knows it. But he has only just started to let those around him, his closest friends, in on what the future is going to hold. Jesus is starting to ease them into the not-so-good news that his violent death is imminent.

And today, we have this story that takes place between Jesus and Peter.

Peter—the disciple who has shown great faith…and great doubt. Peter, who Jesus identifies as a significant enough one of his followers to name him as the rock on which the future of the church will be built. A human who had the faith to step out of the boat when Jesus beckoned and yet started to sink when the waves grew too high. Peter—a disciple of importance, and also just a human being. A follower who cried out “you are the Messiah!” a couple chapters ago. And then in this chapter Jesus calls him a hindrance.

So…a messy human being, who doesn’t get it perfect all the time.

Sound like anyone else you know?

I love the stories in the Bible where the disciples show up as messy human beings. Because it reminds us that to be a follower of Christ, we don’t have to have it all together 100%...or maybe even 50%...of the time.

We can show up, just as we are, each and every day. And Jesus loves us.

Remembering this is especially important I think when we have Bible readings like today’s. Matthew 16, verses 24 – 28 can seem particularly daunting.

What does it mean to take up the cross and follow Jesus? Throughout history, we have examples of great people of God who have done this. Who have taken up the cross to follow Jesus. Who have literally given up their life, for the sake of the Gospel, just like Jesus says in verses 24 – 25.

“If any wish to come after me, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.”

In my Lutheran Study Bible, there is a sidenote referencing these verses, in which it mentions Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the famous German Lutheran pastor who dissented against Hitler and the Nazis. The sidenote says, “For Bonhoeffer, the call to ‘come and die’ proved literal: he was executed as a martyr for opposing the Nazi regime during the Holocaust.”

Reading these verses and then reading the reference to Bonhoeffer can seem daunting indeed.

Is it our calling to die, if we take up the cross of Jesus? Must we all be willing to commit to dying a martyr if we say we follow Jesus?

Perhaps we need to consider not just the Gospel this week as we think to direct our lives as followers of Christ. We should also take into consideration the Romans text.

The whole passage in Romans 12 is entitled “Marks of the True Christian.” Last week, you possibly heard the previous verses in this chapter, which speak about the One Body and the different gifts each person brings to the One Body. And in this week’s verses we hear about what makes a Christian.

“Let love be genuine; hate what is evil; hold fast to what is good; love one another with mutual affection; outdo one another in showing honor. Do not lag in zeal; be ardent in spirit; serve the Lord. Rejoice in hope; be patient in affliction; persevere in prayer. Contribute to the needs of the saints; pursue hospitality to strangers.

Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them. Rejoice with those who rejoice; weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with one another; do not be arrogant, but associate with the lowly; do not claim to be wiser than you are. Do not repay anyone evil for evil, but take thought for what is noble in the sight of all. If it is possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave room for the wrath of God, for it is written, “Vengeance is mine; I will repay, says the Lord.” Instead, “if your enemies are hungry, feed them; if they are thirsty, give them something to drink, for by doing this you will heap burning coals on their heads.” Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

When we read through these verses, we might have a few reactions, similar to our reactions to the Gospel.

We can’t live up to this! How could we possibly show love to those who hurt us? How could we feed our enemies?

Following Jesus is not an easy task some days. Following Jesus can be difficult. It can be frustrating in a world that seems to only care about greed and individualism. But it's clear that our call to follow Jesus is about empathy and care.

Our call to follow Jesus is about risking things. It's about risking the comfortability in our lives sometimes.

Our call to follow Jesus is about finding the people around us who desperately need to hear about the love and grace that is offered to each and every one of us. Sometimes taking up the cross and following Jesus doesn't have to be the biggest, grandest thing. Sometimes taking up the cross and following Jesus can be quite simple.

It can be looking for those around us who need a bit of food. It can be looking for those around us who need some care.

So, as we consider the Gospel of Matthew and the text in Romans, we ask ourselves: what do we hear God calling us to do in terms of thinking about our lives as a Christian? Where do we see that God is urging us to speak up for those less fortunate, for those downtrodden? Where do we feel God nudging us to show these marks of a true Christian—to show genuine love, to feed those who need sustenance, to think differently about the people who we disagree with?

Not everything about being a follower of Jesus needs to be big or grand. Being a follower of Jesus can sometimes mean that we are the quiet wind of change that can help make the people around us have a better life. We can be the quiet wind of empathy, that moves through our communities, bringing about kindness and care for others.

For that, too, is a type of dying to oneself, I think. It’s the dying to one’s greed and individualism. And it’s a way to live out our faith—to live out care and compassion for those around us, because that’s what Jesus would be doing too.

So, take a walk around your community or your church community. Look for ways to put aside your own ideas for what betters you or your family or even your church. And brainstorm about what you could do to better those around you.

Even this seemingly simple task can actually be quite hard for us to do these days. Because it requires effort and time. And it requires us to open our eyes to others.

In doing so, we can be vessels who bring God’s love to those around us. And just like Peter was tasked to do the same, and he didn’t get it right all the time, we too can attempt this task. And we know we won’t get it right all the time. But we are called to try—as followers of Christ. Called to try to bear Christ’s love and grace to those around us. To be agents of change. To show love and kindness, even when it’s difficult.

May God bless our endeavours to try to be Christ’s presence in the world! We won’t always be successful, but we will plant seeds and only God knows what fruit those seeds might bear. Amen.

Deacon Gretchen wrote: Being a follower of Jesus can sometimes mean that we are the quiet wind of change that can help make the people around us have a better life.

She and other deacons have been a wind of change in the ELCIC, encouraging us to be an outward-looking church, looking for points of contact with our neighborhoods and communities where the gospel can be “preached” in action. Today we have a group from our congregation putting this into practice by walking in Ottawa’s Pride parade. It’s not a step everyone wants to take. But through the presence of our friends and fellow congregants, they are witnessing to the love of God that reaches out past the door of the church into the community where we live, to declare God’s gracious love for each and every person, and to stand with those who have suffered persecution and pain for who they are.

May God bless each one of us to know unconditional love and to share that love with those we meet this day and every day. In our own imperfect ways.

May God make it so. Amen.

August 23 ~ Who do you say that I am?

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Sermon by Pastor Nelson

Twenty-First Sunday in Ordinary Time

August 23, 2026

Turtle Island

True North, Strong and Free

Isaiah 22:15-23, Psalm 138

Romans 11:33-36, Matthew 16:13-20

I will begin by making two confessions, which is always good for the soul. I started writing this sermon on June 4, 2026.

There are several versions of the lectionary. The one I am following today uses lessons from Isaiah and from Romans that are different than the ones you will find in your ‘Evangelical Lutheran Worship’ [cranberry] book.  Somebody much smarter than me made the set of the three-year lectionary - others keep fine-tuning it, and here we are. Ideally the Old Testament lesson compliments the Gospel and the second lesson adds some theology and the psalm compliments them all.

Looking at today’s Gospel lesson, it would be interesting to know why this congregation was named St. Peter’s?  I would think it was a staunch Lutheran who would have said, “We are going to name it St. Peter’s and then defend the meaning of Matthew 16:18 (part of our Gospel lesson today), versus the Roman Catholic meaning.” In the same vein, the location today on Sparks St. is great, and yet just like the name, I am sure the location also gives you some problems.

I hope you forgive an old guy who was given new life a few months ago, for digressing. So let us get back to the lessons for today. Are you old enough so that when you hear the ‘William Tell Overture’, you think of the Lone Ranger? Likewise, can you not listen to Matthew 16:18 and think of the Roman Catholic Church saying Matthew 16:18 says, “Peter was the first bishop of the Church.”  Even good Roman Catholic scholars will admit that this is a poor proof text for the papacy. By they/we using it as a papacy proof text they/we miss the real message. Have I got your attention? Now if you think I am anti Roman, two of my favourite gurus were Bishop Remi De Roo and Fr. Roger Karban Sad to say, they are now both dead.  The main problem is that we take today’s Gospel lesson out of its original context of a first century Jewish/Christian community and put it into our 21st century ideas. [Sadly something we often do with Scripture.] Remember, the writer of Matthew, as well as all the early writers of the Bible, thought/believed that Jesus would return very shortly in the ‘Parousia’; that is “Jesus would return shortly and we would hopefully all be in God’s Kingdom.”  Add the word ‘Rapture’ to that idea and it still sells lots of books. For Matthew and other such writers, they did not worry about setting up a ‘Church.’ The writers realized this former Galilean carpenter was more than just one more Jewish prophet in a long line of Jewish prophets like Elijah or Jeremiah.

I would think if we were honest, Many of us today would have similar thoughts. The Gospel of Matthew writes, Peter said, “You are the Christ, [the Messiah], the Son of the living God.” The one who we believe to be our earliest Christian author, Paul said in our second lesson. Once Jesus’ disciples discovered the uniqueness of this carpenter, they could only stand in awe of Jesus.  You see God seemed to have done things through Jesus that no person of faith could have anticipated. Paul said, “how unsearchable are Jesus’ judgements and how inscrutable are his ways.” Paul was telling the Romans that no one could have predicted what happened in Jesus’ lifetime and seemed still to be happening with the risen Jesus.  But in fact, we only have to look at our first lesson to see that the Jewish people had already felt God had worked through other people. Just look at our first lesson from Isaiah. The prophet presumes it was God and not just politics that had replaced Shebna with Eliakim. For the Hebrew people, God never hesitated to get involved in everyday Jewish life. Thus, the writer of Matthew was convinced that the same divine involvement carried over into his day and age, especially through Jesus and those who followed him. Thus, Peter’s ‘faith’ in Jesus was transformed into the rock for our faith even today. The faith, that Peter the fisherman had in God, is the “rock” on which our Church should still be operating under. As Lutherans we still should thank Martin for trying to bring this biblical faith back into our way of thinking. But the struggle continues. Jesus’ promise was/is that if we fall back on our faith in God, the forces of evil will never prevail.  Peter, just like us, did not fulfill his promises immediately or flawlessly. Peter continued to dispute Jesus’ predictions about suffering, And he also wanted to put limits on forgiveness. Peter begged and argued with the other disciples. The writers of both Matthew and Mark probably summed up Peter’s discipleship with the sentence, “Peter followed at a distance.”

Mark 14:54, Matthew 26:58. Now being “good” Lutherans does not mean we come down hard on Peter. You see, for Peter to have been following Jesus even at a “distance,” Would have meant Peter was continually risking his life. Peter had said Jesus was the Christ and he/Peter would strive to live that commitment for the rest of his life.  When Jesus responded to Peter’s words with, ‘How blessed you are, Peter!” “You could not have figured this out on your own.”, Jesus recognized, ”It takes a village to raise a believer.” Too often we have thought ‘this faith thing’ was personal. If you were to read the lesson for the semicontinuous reading for today, my least favourite, you would find it took five women to help deliver Moses at his birth, and then they had to hide Moses because the ruler wanted to kill him.  Yes, we often give credit to someone like a Moses or Peter but we fail to recognize the number of people who help us in our faith. I personally will never forget Viola Ness, a Sunday school teacher, and Pastor Peter Onstad - both at Grace Lutheran, Erskine, MN. Peter, like us, did not figure out this idea of Jesus by himself, and he could not have lived it by himself. Peter’s religious heritage, his relationship with Jesus, his praying, his companionship with the other disciples – All these people and experiences were included in God’s revelation to him/Peter. All of them enabled Peter to keep growing into the commitment he had professed.

All of the above and much more is what we need in order to continue to have faith in someone beyond ourselves. So we get back to Ron’s favourite word, ‘Metanoia’, Peter did not have the wisdom or the strength to believe in God, Peter had metanoia. That is, Peter was willing to change and learn, Peter was willing to cultivate an even-larger vision.  Peter was able to grow into his commitment. That ability, that willingness/metanoia to change, is what becomes the rock of our faith. Peter’s faith allowed him to weep for betraying Jesus.

When I was ordained into the Church we were told we were to be “the keepers of the keys of the Kingdom”.  The ‘keys’ are the keys for forgiveness. Matthew 16:19. The ‘keys’ are the authority of the word of God to forgive sins. We heard it in our first lesson, and we heard it in the Gospel. All of today’s lessons and the words “Do this in memory of me,” that we hear at communion, are said to shake us up.  Today we find ourselves called to answer Jesus’ question for ourselves. We do not need to figure it out alone, we do not need to live it alone. God’s revelation comes through a community, a village, a congregation, through the word and sacrament. This is the awesome faith we have.  Incidentally, the word for “Church” occurs many times in the epistles but it only occurs here and in Matthew 18:17 in the gospels. Look around you and see things being bound and others being loosened. Where do you see freedom and liberation emerging, Even in small and seemingly insignificant ways?  How does this community fight the forces of death that seek to engulf us? In every thoughtful gesture; in every supportive word; in every prophetic denunciation of injustice; in every meal cooked; in every day of work, we might just catch in this community, a glimpse of the power Jesus promised in our Gospel today.  Lives will speak louder and more truthfully, and more effectively than words. On this rock we shall not build a prison nation, a nation where millions of children are homeless and hungry. On this rock we shall not build churches where the poor and women are oppressed.  Yes, if we do it right, in all that happens here, we might just find the answer to that awe-inspiring question, “Who do you say that I am?”.  On this rock, let us build congregations that demonstrate belief in a living, and speaking God; a God of freedom and not of oppression; a God of justice, love, and peace.

But you see on that day, Peter’s mind was not on a new testament Messiah who would be arrested, tortured and killed. Instead, Peter saw Jesus as a political, exclusive Messiah, one who would put an end to the Roman occupation and fully establish the glory of God’s people.  Even though that was a clear misunderstanding, Is that not what we would all want? For me it is like good news. Despite all the information I have access to today, I still do not truly comprehend who God is. Though I surely will fall short of any declaration about God that will do God justice, God patiently continues to uplift me - as long as I sincerely continue to seek more of the nature of God.  In my life as a believer, I hear God say, who do you say that I am? And as incomplete and tainted as it is, I hear God say, you did not come up with an answer on your own. You are just one rock in my living Church or, as Grundtvig said a few years ago in his hymn “Built on a Rock.” [652 In our red book.]  “This is the ‘rock’ the Church shall stand on, even when the steeples are falling.”

Seek ye first the Kingdom of God

And its righteousness,

And all these things shall be

Added unto you.

Ask and it shall be given unto you,

Seek and you shall find,

Knock and the door shall be

Opened unto you.

Alleluia,

Alleluia.

[W & p 122]

Amen.

August 16 ~ What comes from the heart, can breath God's justice into the world.

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Sermon by Bishop Halmarson

Isaiah 56:1, 6-8

Psalm 67

Romans 11:1-2a, 29-32

Matthew 15:10-28

Gracious God, may the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, our strength and redeemer.

Today the ELCIC Sermon Series brings us the reflections of two staff members of our own Eastern Synod.

The Rev. Katherine Gohm provides the second part of our sermon today. She serves as an Assistant to the Bishop in the Eastern Synod. She works with Youth and Young Adult Ministry, and as a Congregational Liaison, and Program Facilitator for By Living Waters Ministry School, a program of Martin Luther University College in Waterloo. Katherine serves as a Council member of the Lutheran World Federation and is vice-president of the North America region.

The first part of the sermon is provided by Rafael Rodriquez, Director of Public Policy, Eastern Synod. Katherine and Rafael are mother and son.

Rafael Rodriguez writes,

Chapter 15 of the gospel of Matthew opens with a pivotal question from the Pharisees to Jesus: “Why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? For they do not wash their hands before they eat.” It is important to contextualize this in the fuller context of the gospel. Jesus has performed miracles: feeding the five thousand, walking on water, and healing the sick. Yet the Pharisees question his authority and his faith on the basis of allowing his disciples to eat without cleaning their hands first. We can see in the verses immediately preceding our reading today that this breeds a harsh rebuke from Jesus, with him stating:

⁷ You hypocrites! Isaiah prophesied rightly about you when he said:

⁸ ‘This people honors me with their lips,

but their hearts are far from me;

⁹ in vain do they worship me,

teaching human precepts as doctrines.’

We can feel Jesus’ frustration building here, a frustration that seems to carry through all the way to verse 26 of our gospel reading. Jesus goes on to emphasize his point against the Pharisees by saying “Listen and understand: it is not what goes into the mouth that defiles a person, but it is what comes out of the mouth that defiles.” This statement seems clear enough, yet upon conversation with his disciples the response he receives from Peter is one of confusion. “Explain this parable to us.” It hardly even seems a parable, more so a truism. Here again we see the frustration of Jesus. “Are you also still without understanding?” It’s almost as though Jesus is asking “what are you not getting here?”

This past Wednesday, August 12th, marked International Youth Day. It is in this context that something dawned on me. It had never occurred to me before in all my thinking of and interpretation of Jesus: he’s really quite young here. If the historical record of Jesus is accurate, he would have been somewhere between his mid-twenties to early thirties at the time of this scene. That puts Jesus in a context where I can reimagine and relate to his words far more deeply than if I hold them up as solely the divine teachings of an older man. In many ways I empathize deeply with this young, frustrated Jesus. I can’t count the number of times I’ve been speaking or even arguing with older peers, teachers, my own mother, and having the thought of “what’s not clicking for you here? Are you also still without understanding?”

More broadly, I think I can speak with a relative amount of certainty that this is largely the feeling of youth worldwide. We have grown up in an incredibly turbulent time. Large-scale, long-lasting wars have become entrenched and normalized again, the climate aches and groans under the weight of centuries of industrialism and exploitation, economic opportunity seems to escape us at every turn as youth unemployment grows steadily across the globe. Children, young workers, and students have been banging at the doors of power for decades now. Whether it be the Youth Climate Movement founded over two decades ago, the student encampments that popped up on university campuses in opposition to the ongoing genocide in Gaza, or the millions of Indian youth who have banded under the banner of the Cockroach Janata Party, taking on the insult of the word. We have been screaming “Are you also still without understanding? Don’t you see what’s flowing from your heart and how it is defiling the world in its entirety?” I think a young, frustrated Jesus would feel right at home in any of these spaces.

For far too long, these cries have fallen on hardened hearts. What has come from the hearts of our older, adult, leaders? What has come from following the traditions of the past? What we are witnessing now is increased funding for weapons of war and destruction, billions in government subsidies for oil and gas pipelines, the gutting of social systems in favour of corporate welfare and greed.

If what comes from the heart is what defiles, as Jesus teaches, it must also be true that what comes from the heart can breathe God’s justice into the world. We may live to see this, when we can open our own hearts to the youth. In the words of Indian author Arundhati Roy, writing in regards to the aforementioned Cockroach Janata Party and their solidarity protests against corruption in their country: “The young have given us a gift. It is up to us all, every one of us to make what they have done matter.”

Rafael’s mother, Katherine Gohm writes,

And so, this religious debate between Jesus and the Pharisees on what defiles is an interfamilial argument; differing viewpoints on what defiles. It’s a debate, however, that cannot stay there. Religious faith and understanding are to be lived out, in the world, through daily encounters. The scene shifts in Matthew’s gospel today, but the topic stays the same. The meeting between Jesus and his disciples with the Canaanite woman in the area of Tyre and Sidon is where, pardon my use of fossil fuel product imagery, the rubber hits the road. A mother’s desperate plea to find healing for her child is where Jesus’ own teaching about defilement, about what comes from the heart, must be lived out.

As preacher Barbara Brown Taylor writes in a sermon on this same text, all the talk about clean and unclean, about what defiles, is really talk about barriers and lines drawn. The gospel hands them to us: it is a woman who approaches Jesus, a Canaanite, a common ancestor “othered” through occupation and force, a pagan worshiper of Baal and other gods, an outsider, separated through ethnicity and religious practice.

We hear her desperate plea: “Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David.” What she receives is silence. Yet her anguished words keep ringing out - so much so that the disciples are irritated by her and want her sent away. But she keeps shouting into that barren space, out of love for her child. This mother, this Canaanite woman, is the conclusion of Jesus’ debate with the Pharisees.

In this scene shift are we getting the same frustrated Jesus? Because only when Jesus’ disciples say something to him does he respond - not to the woman’s desperation - but rather to lecture her on his mission: “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” Her sad plight does not seem to be enough to move him. Recognizing who he is, this insistent mother kneels before him, praying, pleading. Then, we hear some of the harshest words that leave Jesus’ mouth: “It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” Not only does he not respond to her desperate appeal; he insults her while remaining untouched by her circumstance. Children, that is the Israelites, are to get the food, to be included in the community of God. Dogs, this woman and her kind, are not meant to fed and are excluded from the community of God.

It’s hard to understand this Jesus. I would prefer this encounter between Jesus and the woman to be a literary device by Matthew; tension which drives the narrative forward. That way, Jesus’ reputation, in my eyes, would remain intact: that is, his response to people was always compassionate and inclusive, as I’ve both preached and proclaimed.

But what if Jesus is frustrated? What if we consider that a very human Jesus also struggles with who is in and who is out, with barriers erected and drawn lines?

The Canaanite woman keeps pushing. She takes on the insult (much like the students in the Cockroach Janata Party) and says, “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.” More than a smart comeback, she is saying, “I know who you are and I believe in what you can do.”

Jesus hears. He hears her faith. With her unrelenting urging, Matthew tells us that Jesus steps beyond the traditions of his religious understanding and moves across seemingly barren spaces to encounter her and her need.

With this year’s International Youth Day theme, Different Contexts, Common Aspirations, I cannot help but think about the youth and young people in our church and across the globe. Are we listening to their pleas? Do we understand what it means for them to be young today? Do we trust our younger selves and remember what we dreamed of and hoped for? Do our encounters across generations open our hearts to what they dream and hope for? Or are we too caught up in lines drawn, barriers erected, to invite young people fully into our shared life together? To incorporate their experiences, wisdom, and understanding into our common life - both in and outside of the church. Perhaps the rubber of our faith hasn’t always hit the road of the gospel. Perhaps we have not let ourselves be shaped by the encounter.

Pastor Nancy Kelly wrote a book entitled Here be Wonders: The Gospel’s Pulse in Unsettled Times. To paraphrase her story called “The Laneway”, she writes about a shared laneway in Kitchener that existed behind St. Mark’s Lutheran Church and the neighbouring high school, Kitchener Collegiate Institute, or KCI. The shared laneway mapped out encounters between the people who found themselves there: “congregation members, students, hospital visitors and community groups like AA.”

In the story, Kelly writes about a student, angry because the taxi Pastor Kelly was in was taking up space in the laneway. The student shouted insults at her and the taxi driver, then flicked a cigarette butt at them. Someone must have witnessed the interaction. A few days later a letter arrived at the church written by the KCI Student Council addressed to Pastor Nancy and St. Mark’s. They had written an apology on behalf of the school and the student body, saying how much they appreciated the relationship they had with the church. Their apology was accepted. Kelly writes that the church “thanked the high school for teaching the church something about forgiveness and mending damaged bridges.” She writes further, “Contested and congested spaces, rough spots in hearts, in communities and in the world are places for bridges, built, broken and mended.”

This is the gift of healing wherever and whenever hearts are opened to listen and understand.

Mother and son have gifted us with their insights into this scripture, a challenging snapshot of Jesus’ ministry in conflict with religious authorities, in confrontation with a foreign woman. And their own dialogue reminds us that age and experience and family relationship give each person their unique perspective on life. No one has an exclusive claim on truth or understanding. Our society, and indeed our church in this congregation, the ELCIC and the Lutheran World Federation, benefits when we open our ears and hearts to viewpoints different from our own. And when we listen with love, especially to those most different from us, hearts can be changed, and we can join in pursuing the good that Jesus does, bringing healing, hope and justice to broken and divided world. For, as Rafael wrote:

“If what comes from the heart is what defiles, as Jesus teaches, it must also be true that what comes from the heart can breathe God’s justice into the world.”

May God make it so. Amen.