Listen to this service here
Click here to jump to sermon
REFORMATION SUNDAY
GREETINGS & ANNOUNCEMENTS
- Food Pantry Sunday
- Communion Next Sunday & All Saints Sunday. Please give names to Marcia. The UCC will be hosting an online denominational memorial next Sunday evening you can also watch online.
- Association meeting Saturday 10 to noon on Zoom via your computer or your telephone if you’d like to listen or participate.
CALL TO WORSHIP
(United Church of Christ Statement of Faith)
One: We believe in you, O God, Eternal Spirit, God of our Savior Jesus Christ and our God, and to your deeds we testify:
Many: You call the worlds into being, create persons in your own image, and set before each one the ways of life and death.
One: You seek in holy love to save all people from aimlessness and sin.
Many: You judge people and nations by your righteous will declared through prophets and apostles.
One: In Jesus Christ, the man of Nazareth, our crucified and risen Savior, you have come to us and shared our common lot, conquering sin and death and reconciling the world to yourself.
Many: You bestow upon us your Holy Spirit, creating and renewing the church of Jesus Christ, binding in covenant faithful people of all ages, tongues, and races.
One: You call us into your church to accept the cost and joy of discipleship, to be your servants in the service of others, to proclaim the gospel to all the world
Many: And resist the powers of evil, to share in Christ’s baptism and eat at his table, to join him in his passion and victory.
One: You promise to all who trust you forgiveness of sins and fullness of grace, courage in the struggle for justice and peace, your presence in trial and rejoicing, and eternal life in your realm which has no end.
All: Blessing and honor, glory and power be unto you. Amen.
Hymn – #440 Savior, Like a Shepherd Lead Us
PRAYER OF INVOCATION
Reforming God,
we give you thanks
for your forgiveness and your blessing.
We pray for ourselves and your church throughout the world.
Fill us with a spirit of openness to your Spirit,
to hear and receive your promises
and to keep our covenant with you.
Where we are corrupt, purify us.
Where we are in error, direct us.
Where we are in need, provide for us.
Where we are divided, reunite us.
And where we are close-minded,
Come reform us and make us new.
We pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.
Gloria Patri
JOYS AND CONCERNS
Pastoral Prayer
Abiding, patient God,
In these days of knowing, not knowing,
We, like the buds on the trees,
Are eager to burst forth into the world.
Hold us gently in place
Until we are certain in the ways of loving our neighbor.
And we seek blessing upon all people
no matter our opinion, our ideology, our hardship, Lord.
These, we hold in our care as neighbors.
Help us to hear that caring for one another
is your command on our lives.
Open our ears to hear the tragedy in this time of coronavirus,
and not only our own anxiety and grief
that may come on blustering words and tired rhetoric.
Instead, let us think on how we will make the world a better place.
Instead, let us think on what kindness, however small,
we might offer someone.
Instead, let us remember that our life is not our own,
but belongs to you.
Instead, let us dream how we might enter our communities
to be a beacon of hope for those living in disorder
to come alongside them while they find order;
alongside them while they reorder their lives.
Help us always, Lord, to remember our promise to you
that we will care for our neighbor as ourselves.
In Jesus’ name we pray for each other….
….
In Jesus’ name, we pray as he taught us to pray saying…. OUR FATHER
Amen.
~ Based on a prayer by Reverend Brenda Torrie
TITHES AND OFFERINGS
Food pantry … Hunger in the USA …
“Even before the pandemic hit, some 13.7 million households, or 10.5% of all U.S. households, experienced food insecurity at some point during 2019, according to data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. That works out to more than 35 million Americans who were either unable to acquire enough food to meet their needs, or uncertain of where their next meal might come from, last year.
For about a third of these households, access to food was so limited that their eating patterns were disrupted and food intake was reduced. The rest were able to obtain enough food to avoid completely disrupting their eating patterns, but had to cope by eating less varied diets or utilizing food assistance programs.
The coronavirus pandemic has only worsened the problem. According to one estimate by researchers at Northwestern University, food insecurity more than doubled as a result of the economic crisis brought on by the outbreak, hitting as many as 23% of households” (NPR September 2020.)
…. So 1 in 4 households are using food banks right now. 1 in 4 people you meet are needing a little or a lot of help to have food, toiletries, and basic needs covered.
OFFETORY & PRAYER
Generous God, You have written Your law of love on our hearts. Out of love, we offer these gifts to each other, our church, and our community. Bless the time we give. Bless the food we give. Bless the money we give. Bless the prayers we give. Bless our work with your Love and let love heal the hurts of the world. Amen.
Hymn #461 Breathe on Me, Breath of God
SCRIPTURE
God speaks to the Israelites while they are in exile. When they have suffered much. And God speaks of comfort through the prophet Jeremiah by saying the new covenant of God’s abiding love is now written on the hearts of everyone. You are always loved.
Jeremiah 31:31-34
The days are surely coming, says the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant that I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt—a covenant that they broke, though I was their husband says the LORD. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, “Know the LORD,” for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the LORD; for I will forgive their iniquity, and remember their sin no more.
…
Jesus and the people about him have been debating about who Jesus is. This debate has led Jesus to redefine many religious terms. Today, we read how he redefines freedom and truth to be not objects out there to come through by logic, but states of being experienced.
John 8:31-36
Then Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, “If you continue in my word, you are truly my disciples; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.” They answered him, “We are descendants of Abraham and have never been slaves to anyone. What do you mean by saying, ‘You will be made free’?”
Jesus answered them, “Very truly, I tell you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin. The slave does not have a permanent place in the household; the son has a place there forever. So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.
These are the words about God for the people of God.
Prayer
Sermon: The Truth Sets Us Free
It is Reformation Sunday, 2020. Let’s step back and look at how we got here.
503 years ago, in 1517, the priest Martin Luther has set forth his 95 Theses. His 95 arguments and proposals on the way the church could be reformed. This you know. And you know it went over like a lead balloon.
Did you know that 3 years later, in 1520, Pope Leo X issues an official letter, a Papal bull, listing 45 errors in Martin Luther’s works. “The Reformer was warned unequivocally that if he did not publicly renounce these errors and submit himself to the authority of the Roman Church that he would be excommunicated. For those living in the sixteenth century, excommunication was far more serious than to simply being shunned by the institutional Church. Excommunication more often than not carried with it the penalty of torture and death at the hands of the civil authorities.”
Luther had 60 days to comply. But on the 60th day… Luther declared, “whoever wrote this bull, he is Antichrist”, and affirmed that he dissented “from the damnation of this bull, that I curse and execrate… as sacrilege and blasphemy of Christ”. He and his fellow reformer Melancthon then burned the Papal letter, “along with a copy of the Code of Canon Law. He told his followers (who had gathered to observe this event) that in condemning his teaching the Satanic Pope had condemned the Gospel itself.
(www.lutheranreformagion.org/history/the-diet-of-worms)
Well, after publically calling the Pope the Anti-Christ and Satan Incarnate, Martin Luther was publically excommunicated as a misguided”, “debased”, “depraved”, “damnable… heretic”.
That’d be 500 years from about today.
Luther was ordered to appear before the Emperor to explain his heresy and speak, directly, with those whose authority he was taking. But… that’s a dangerous thing to do. The last person dragged before the Holy Roman Emperor and the Pope for challenging the church was Jan Hus, the Bohemian Church reformer… who was trialed and burned about 100 years ago. So Luther’s Prince steps in and offers his name as protection over Luther.
So in April of 1521, Luther appears before the court of political and religious leaders. This is known as the Diet of Worms, (pronounced Deet of Vorms.) Luther was asked, now in person, if he would revoke the heresies in his writings and theses.
He asked for a day to think about it.
The following day he told the court, “They are all mine, but as for the second question, they are not all of one sort.” Luther went on to place the writings into three categories: (1) Works which were well received even by his enemies: those he would not reject. (2) Books which attacked the abuses, lies and desolation of the Christian world and the papacy: those, Luther believed, could not safely be rejected without encouraging abuses to continue. To retract them would be to open the door to further oppression. He said, “If I now recant these, then, I would be doing nothing but strengthening tyranny”. (3) Attacks on individuals: he apologized for the harsh tone of these writings but did not reject the substance of what he taught in them.
Luther concluded by saying: “Unless I am convinced by the testimony of the Scriptures or by clear reason (for I do not trust either in the pope or in councils alone, since it is well known that they have often erred and contradicted themselves), I am bound by the Scriptures I have quoted and my conscience is captive to the Word of God. I cannot and will not recant anything, since it is neither safe nor right to go against conscience. Here I stand, I can do no other. May God help me. Amen.”
In other words, using today’s scripture… Luther felt the truth of our Holy Scripture, and the truth God writes in our hearts as our conscience… these truths stand outside of church rules and church authorities.
We in the UCC might be pretty used to this idea now. We affirm that the truth of love is not limited to this denomination or that. We affirm that God doesn’t love only Christians and only Christians can know God’s Truth. We affirm our Holy God is still speaking, still revolutionizing, still causing the Earth to spring forth with praise for God and writing the law of love on all hearts and these things are not heresies.
Are not Christian teachings gone wrong.
But even today there are denominations who would and do call us heretics. And 500 years ago? That’s exactly what Luther was charged with: heresy.
The theologian judging Luther chastised him, “‘Martin,’ said he, ‘there is no one of the heresies which have torn the bosom of the church, which has not derived its origin from the various interpretation of the Scripture. The Bible itself is the arsenal whence each innovator has drawn his deceptive arguments.”
In other words… Even Satan can quote scripture.
And so Luther was declared a heretic. Now killing him is a good deed which could earn one a hefty heavenly and earthly prize. And now 500 bloody years of Western Church schism between the protestors and the whole. Old German and old English and old Latin give us these words as Protestants, which means those who protest. And Catholics, which means the whole or universal.
As the years progressed, the stories of what the other side was up to just kept getting larger and larger. You’d think you can get worse than calling each other Satan or the Anti-Christ… but you can. Wars. Burnings. Drownings. Beheadings.
By the 1800s we KNEW the Truth to be not only the Pope is the Anti-Christ, but also that Catholics worship Mary. They’ve witches. Lustful priests, cruel abbesses, immured nuns, and sadistic inquisitors. Churches full of idolatry.
By the 1800s we KNEW the Truth that not only are protestants not Christian, but they listen to the Devil’s bagpipes. They’re Bible-thumpers. Holy rollers. Full of in-fighting. They also have witches. And hypocritical, undereducated pastors. Ugly dour churches.
The louder each side screamed—and still screams — at each other, the more they imagined the other side as infernalists. As demon-worshippers.
But… love finds a way… and the Truth sets us free. The actual Truth.
After Vatican II, a group of Lutherans and Catholics sat and talked. And listened. And listened. And realized, bit by bit…
There are no witches in the other’s ranks. There are no devils. Luther… is not the Anti-Christ. And the Pope is not the anti-Christ.
The huge issues Luther had with the Church the Catholic Church did end up reforming and changing on their own. The indulgences and abuses of authority were reformed.
Luther wished the Bible to be in a language people could understand, for their own reading and understanding. And eventually, so did the Catholic Church.
The huge issues the Catholic Church had with Luther was his insistence that with faith, alone, we are justified before God. Before we’ve ever done a single good thing – with faith, we are saved. From this faith comes hope in God, and comes the joy to do good in the world.
Taken to the extreme, this means death-bed confessions of Jesus is Lord is all you need to be right with God.
If all it takes is faith, then a person super convinced in God can continue on being a horrible sinner because…. All that is required is faith.
The Catholic teaching, however, is that these three things working together are salvific. Not one of them alone.
From Luther’s perspective, 500 years ago, the Church was only focusing on deeds. Faith can be replace with excessive good deeds. Hence – the indulgences and deeds in the name of the dead to reduce purgatory that Luther hated. Your dead sinful aunt? Just save her with deeds and hope. Her faith doesn’t matter as much as your goodness on her behalf.
Do you hear how close this argument is? They are very, very similar. The only way they make great difference is if you take them to the extremes… and both sides took these to the extremes.
Both Lutherans and Catholics have abandoned these extremes. Those have become their own denominations. Instead, they have come together – especially in the last 50 years – to speak and listen to one another with truth.
The truth… Lutherans emphasis faith that leads to good deeds. Catholics emphasize all three hope, faith, and works… BOTH agree, however one approaches the Christian life – it is one filled with hope, faith, and good works. Which comes first is a bit of a chicken and an egg argument. And something that can be honored as similar and yet different.
Seeking the Truth of God’s Love has meant admitting the sins of the past… Truth has meant speaking our own truth, even if it is poorly received. Truth has meant valuing another’s truth without forcing it to mold to our own.
And this truth telling, truthful listening, soul sharing… has set the denominations free.
Together, the Roman Catholic Church and the Evangelical Lutheran Church have issued a joint statement on justification… agreeing, where 500 years ago, there was such disagreement they called one another servants of Satan.
This is revolutionary. This is God still speaking. This is admitting faults, seeking understanding, and working out a future in love.
Listening. Speaking truth. Hearing truth. Changing our minds when presented with new evidence.
It is hard, hard, hard work. Our minds are wired to avoid ever admitting to ourselves we are wrong. It physically hurts! A lot of us were also trained to say nothing if we have nothing good to say. But that leads us to never sharing our truths but to others who share the same views. It means we never learn to dialogue with those who are different than us. It means we don’t learn to be in communities that are authentic. Vulnerable. Truthful. Real. Strong because there are no secrets or lies – white or otherwise.
God’s Truth is truly written on each of our hearts. In the language of love – the language of God. Accessing that truth means being willing to face ourselves that lovingly. And listen to another’s exposed heart that lovingly.
In dialogue, in soul sharing, we live as the People of God. We are known by our love.
Truthfulness is very important as we go through this election season. You will not know who our president in 2021 will be on Tuesday. It is okay. Wait. You will hear of liars. You will hear of cheats. You will hear of schemes and scams. It is okay. Wait.
Things will shake out. Votes will be counted, and recounted. And bit by bit, we will know the truth of who our democratic process has selected.
In that waiting season, prepare yourselves to be a gracious winner – someone who speaks their truth humbly and welcomes to hear others’ opposite views humbly. Prepare yourselves to be gracious losers – someone who speaks their truth humbly, and welcomes to hear other’s opposite views humbly.
Be set free by hearing the truth of the beating hearts of your brothers and sisters. Of your fellow Americans. Of your fellow humans. Of all who have life.
The truth of God’s love is our lives. The Law of Love is written into our DNA – carried in our blood finger tip to finger tip. It is the love that knits us together bone to bone. It speaks to the wonder that is God’s abiding presence with us our entire lives, and beyond.
When you are anxious – remember you are loved, there you stand with God, and you can do no other.
When you are fearful – remember the hope of Christ that love is the final word. We are not given the spirit of fear! But hope.
When you are frustrated – take heart in your faith. What hard times we’ve been through in the past, and God stuck by us. God will see us through again.
When you are hopeless. Confused. Angry – do something senselessly kind. Extravagantly wonderful. This is a coping mechanism. A way to coax ourselves back into community. Back to see a surprised face at the kindness and back to feel the wonderful connection with humanity.
Reformation times are scary. Changing times are scary. There’s so much unknown! Yet, hope remains. Faith remains. Love remains.
The Lutherans and the Catholics are making peace after 500 years of suspicion, war, death, fear, and accusations. What hope! We’ve only been through a few months, a few years or decades of mistrust, dear, and accusations. We can knit back together again. We will knit back together again.
We are United in Christ. And we are One, from Many, in our country.
Amen.
Hymn #530 Faith of our Fathers
Benediction
Hymn #559 Here I Am, Lord – chorus only
Pastor Whitney Bruno Sermons 