This sermon was delivered in two congregations on the same day:  May 25, 2008.  In order of appearance: Faith Lutheran Church (Eaton, CO) and First Lutheran Church (Ault, CO).  Thus parts of it will make sense only if the reader realizes the setting changed.  It is – more or less – they way it was preached in these two congregations.

First, let me introduce myself.  I am Pastor Ben Larzelere from Christ Lutheran Church in Santa Fe, and I am here this morning at the request of Pastor Karas and Pastor Converse.  Pastor Karas and his wife I have known for the several years that we served together in the North New Mexico Conference of our Rocky Mountain Synod, he in Albuquerque and myself in Santa Fe.  Pastor Converse and his wife I have known since the time he began his ministry at First Lutheran Church in Ault, when my wife and I made a hasty journey from Santa Fe following Christmas a year and a half ago, when a dear friend of ours was dying.  Pastor Converse was so very kind to allow me to participate in her funeral which was held at the church in Ault.

But I am here this Sunday because First Lutheran Church in Ault is celebrating their Centennial, the 100^th year of their ministry as followers of Jesus in this part of Colorado.  And in this Centennial Year they have invited the clergy who have been part of their life in the past to return and preach on one of the Sundays of this special time.  

I served my internship at First Lutheran Church in 1970-1971.  In our church one prepares for the Ordained Ministry by going to Seminary for 4 years after finishing 4 years at a college or university.   The 3^rd year of Seminary is the year of internship, where a seminarian is sent out to live with a congregation as their student pastor, to learn from that congregation as in a classroom for they are the teachers, to learn what it means to be a pastor, how to do the pastoral ministry, and in short become equipped for a life of ordained ministry in the church.

And so it was in July of 1970 that Bev and I drove west from Gettysburg, Pennsylvania to Ault.  [We were newlyweds, and this was where we began our married life.  If you subtract 1970 from 2008 that means that we have been associated with this wonderful congregation for 38% of your life!  We have been fortunate to be able to visit at least one or two times a year for those 38 years, and I speak for both of us when I say that it is nothing but a blessing, a gift, a cherished treasure that you are to us … so I am deeply honoured to be here this Sunday.]

I would be most remiss if I were not to bring you greetings … so I do that now, in the name of Jesus our Lord, I bring you greetings from all your brothers and sisters of our Rocky Mountain Synod (for we have just finished our annual Assembly in Denver).  You are part of a territory that includes Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, New Mexico and El Paso, Texas.  174 congregations of men, women, children, pastors, associates in ministry, and diaconal ministers who together as the body of Christ and who individually in their congregations tell the story of God’s love and share the sacraments of Baptism and Holy Communion, following Jesus by doing what Jesus told us to do, love God and love our neighbor.

You are part of that ministry, you are part of that loving community of faith … and so am I … and so are the people I serve.  So now I bring you their greeting as well, your brothers and sisters at Christ Lutheran Church in Santa Fe [some of whom have been with us when we have come to visit here in Ault]… they send to you their love and blessing for the ministry you have been called to do in this place [and especially on this 100^th anniversary] and offer prayer for ministry you are yet called to … the ministry that stretches out into the future, the formation of a loving community who is a blessing to those in need, who brings understanding to those who are distress, who offers healing to the sick and comfort to the dying, who binds up the broken, who carries joy to those who are sad, and who in a word works for the healing of the world.

In a very real way this weekend, you do that … as you reach out to your very close neighbors who have lost so much in the recent tornado that ran through this very part of the State, and as you share your lives and your resources with others through the many ministries of our Church in our Synod and beyond our Synod in our Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, and beyond that in the world reaching out through the ministries of the whole church to the neighbors who are not so very close, whom we do not even know by name, but who are related to each of us and all of us through our common life within this body of Christ that we call the Church.

But … in a very real way you do that each week of your life as a church, beginning each Sunday when you gather for worship.  Because you see, it is in the liturgy, in the time of worship, in the hour that we spend together hearing the story, singing the hymns, offering the prayers, blessing each other with the greeting of peace, [sharing the bread and wine], and leaving with the blessing of God to be sent into the world as a blessing to all people.

That’s what happens each week as we gather to be the church.  It’s what we do.  It’s who we are.

The part of the story that we hear today comes from a story of Jesus life and teaching that was written somewhere near the end of the 1^st Century … sometime between the year 80 and the year 90.  We call it the Gospel According to Matthew.   The writer or writers of this story, of this Gospel, tell the story of Jesus’ famous sermon to his followers.  We call that the Sermon on the Mount.

Now, I have to share something with you.  For the longest time, indeed, my whole life until July of last year, I understood the story this way:  Jesus goes up onto a little mound, or part way up a small mountain and his followers are at his feet and he begins to teach them.  “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of God.”  

My whole life I understood it that way … that is, until last year, when my wife and I and my dear friend who is a Rabbi and several of our Jewish and Christian friends made a trip to Israel.  And on part of that trip we went to the very northern part of the Sea of Galilee near the ancient village of Capernaum, and near that ancient village is a church which supposedly marks the spot on the top of the hills that rise out of the northern part of the lake, where Jesus preached this famous sermon.

But our guide taught us something.  As we stood outside the church, he asked us to look down the hillside a bit to a place where there is a rather natural amphitheatre, it begins a little bit up from the lakeshore and goes up the hill.  Then he asked us to consider how the story is told about Jesus going up to the hillside, and it says, “He looked up and began to teach them saying …”  Aha!  He looked up!  They were sitting up above him in the natural amphitheatre and he was below them speaking to them.  (Sort of like going to Red Rocks to hear a concert … the audience is above the performers, the performers are below playing up to them.)  Of course, they could hear because of the way the natural landscape made it possible!

Well that’s what happens in church.  We come into the church and with ourselves we bring along everything that is in our heart, everything that is in our soul, everything that is going on in our lives … it is joyful, it is , sad, it is sorrowful, it is broken, it is in need of healing, it is all this and more … and when we come here into the church we find ourselves listening to the story … and then all of a sudden we see it for what it is … we understand it for what it is … it becomes part of us, it changes us, it makes us whole.

[Think of the story of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount having been told here for the last 100 years … think of the power it has had, think of the healing it has brought, think of what those words have done to make faith happen, to teach little children what is really important, to remind adults what is really important.  Think of Jesus’ words that have healed, comforted, made better, bound up, put back together.  What a ministry that you celebrate!  What a gift you have been given!  What a gift you are!]

In the portion we hear today, Jesus speaks to his followers and tells them … not to worry.  Not to be anxious.  Not to be upset.  Not to give up.  Not … to be afraid.

Isn’t that what we call the Good News, the Gospel? 

Do not worry about your life … what a thing to hear when we come into church!  Listen! 

Do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink … or what you will wear …Look at the birds of the air, they do not sow, they do not reap, they do not put a harvest into a barn and yet your heavenly Father feeds them … aren’t you worth more than a bird?  Can you add one more hour to your life by worrying about your life?  Look at the lilies, the flowers … they do not make their own clothing and yet doesn’t God make them more beautiful than Solomon ever was? So … do not worry about tomorrow … tomorrow will have enough to worry about when it comes.  Today’s issues are enough for today.

I don’t now about you, but that’s what I need to hear.  If you ask the people who know me best what my middle name is, they will say, “Anxious” … Benjamin Anxious Larzelere … the Third.  I am the Third in a serious of Anxious Larzeleres … it’s part of our genetic mix I think.  I am not by nature a non-anxious person, I am by nature a fretting person … I have a masters degree in fretting … in worry.  I need a story to teach me that there is another way, and that I am not alone in that way, and that the way is healing and life-giving.

So, when I come into the church to meet Jesus in this Story, he doesn’t tell me, “Good morning, Anxious.  Guess what?  You have more to worry about than you could ever know.  You are a miserable, wretched, un-forgiven sinner.  There is no hope for you.”

No.  Not at all.  When I come into the church, when you come into the church, to meet Jesus in this Story, he tells me, you, us: Do not worry.  God cares about you, and you, and you, and you …God cares about all of you. 

It’s the Good News.  It is what has gathered you [has gathered you for 100 years and far more than that] … will gather you on into the future.  It is not a time to worry about what may be, what could be, what might be … it is a time to gather in the amphitheatre of the church high above the teacher and listen to his words rising up to meet those of us who have come to hear him, who follow him, it is a time to find comfort and healing and strength and love and hope in those words.