The Meyer Minute

The Meyer Minute for August 14, 2020

Dr. Abjar Bakhou tells about Jason, a committed Christian who witnessed to a middle eastern taxi driver. Jason failed, and the reason is important as pastors prepare sermons and Bible classes and we all seek to grow in knowledge and witness. Jason failed because he used our normal way of presenting Jesus, that Jesus earned forgiveness for our sins. There is right and wrong, there’s sin and punishment but, thank God! Jesus offers us forgiveness. You’re familiar with this way of presenting the Gospel because you’re a product of western culture, but the taxi driver, like an increasing number of people Americans, see life in terms of shame and honor, not in terms of sin and forgiveness. 

In Sunday’s Gospel, Matthew 15:21-28, a non-Jewish woman cries, “Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David; my daughter is severely oppressed by a demon.” Jesus’ response isn’t about sin and forgiveness but about shame and honor. “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” AKA, you should be ashamed of yourself because of who you are. “Lord, help me,” she pleads, but Jesus stays on His talking point. “It is not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.”  Look at her comeback! “‘Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table.’ Then Jesus answered her, ‘O woman, great is your faith! Be it done for you as you desire.’ And her daughter was healed instantly.”  

“The majority of shame researchers and clinicians agree that the difference between shame and guilt is best understood as the difference between ‘I am bad’ and ‘I did something bad.’   Guilt = I did something bad. Shame = I am bad.” (Brene Brown, Dare to Lead, 128). Jesus used the human sin of shaming people to draw out a statement of faith. The woman’s faith was rewarded, and the disciples were taught the paramount importance of faith in Jesus. “The honor is for you who believe” (1 Peter 2:7). 

Shame and honor easily relate to the forgiveness of sin, which indeed is the heart of biblical faith. When you honor God, you’ll seek to obey Him. When you dishonor God, you’ll disobey His commandments, you’ll sin and need forgiveness. How rich the fullness of the Gospel! Jason discovered that, and awareness of shame and honor can enhance our faith and witness to Jesus. 

The Meyer Minute for August 12, 2020

Church jargon can weaken faith. When specialized church words aren’t explained, we lose the impact of the Gospel. For example, “born again.” Jesus told Nicodemus, “Unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God” (John 3:3).   

When you go to the visitation for someone who has died, you say nice things about the deceased. Maybe he or she was truly a fine person but sometimes not. Whichever, speak no evil of the dead. You know what? That person before you has stopped sinning. “One who has died has been set free from sin” (Romans 6:7). Death, the ultimate horizontal, is when you’ll be freed from sin. 

Enter God’s vertical. “You were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked…But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ” (Ephesians 2:1, 4). Pause now. The last paragraph said you won’t be free of sin until you physically die. Ephesians says death and new life can happen now, before the funeral home. Huh? “Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death…” Note: Paul is not talking figuratively, Baptism as symbol. No, a real, admittedly mysterious death happens, and a rebirth as well. “…in order that Jesus as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life” (Romans 6:3-4). As in Genesis, so in baptism: God creates out of nothing. “You have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God” (1 Peter 1:23).  

“Proleptic” is a little-known word that means anticipating an objection. The new birth of Baptism is proleptic. Before physical death, while we struggle in the paradox of being saints and sinners at the same time, Baptism overcomes the despair and nihilism of sin with God’s present and unending gift of life.  “Oh, that day when freed from sinning, / I shall see Thy lovely face; / Clothed then in the blood washed linen, / How I’ll sing Thy wondrous grace” (Lutheran Service Book, 686:3). “We shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his” (Romans 6:5). Now and not yet. How gifted you are!  

The Meyer Minute for August 11, 2020

That in these gray and latter days / There may be those whose life is praise 

Each life a high doxology / To Father, Son, and unto Thee. 

 

Martin Franzmann describes our common life today, “gray and latter days,” but they also prescribe how followers of Jesus live, “each life a high doxology.” Taking a cue from the word “high,” we want to think vertically as much or more than horizontally. We tend to think of God as up, vertical, and human relations as straight ahead, horizontal. That’s natural; we’re space and time bound creatures. I, for one, need to discipline myself to think more vertically all through the day. A medieval writer, Brother Lawrence, called it “The Practice of the Presence of God.” 

Farther back in history, Origen was a church father (about 185 to 253). In one sermon, he comments on Leviticus 5:5. “It is necessary for everything to be revealed, for everything to be confessed. Indeed, it is to be confessed by that one who is the accuser and inciter of sin. For now, this one urges us to sin and also accuses us when we do sin. If, therefore, in this life we anticipate him and are ourselves our own accusers, we escape the wickedness of the devil, our enemy and accuser.” This is more than Sunday morning’s general confession. This is vertical every moment, bowing my heart before the Most High and listing my sins. Do it now or wait for the devil to accuse you on Judgment Day. 

In Jesus’ parable of the unmerciful servant, Matthew 18:21-35, a man was threatened with slavery because he couldn’t pay off a big debt. He begged the king for mercy and was forgiven, but then the blockhead went and imprisoned someone who couldn’t pay off a much smaller debt. End of the story: blockhead put in jail. Jesus is obviously teaching that the vertical, living in confession and forgiveness, impacts our horizontal relationships. That prescribes the “high doxology” of the Church “in these gray and latter days” (Lutheran Service Book, 834:4). Christians are not hesitant to say there is right and wrong, but constant awareness of our sins and forgiveness tempers our judgment about others. “Beloved, let us cleans ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit, bringing holiness to completion in the fear of God” (2 Corinthians 7:1).  

If you want a great vision of Satan accusing us, read Zechariah chapter 3. 

The Meyer Minute for August 10, 2020

Immigration is a contentious issue. Read what one politician said in a public speech. “Once you have given citizenship…  I mean, do you think there will be any space for you, like there is now? Don’t you realize they’ll take over everything?”  

What American said that? None, it was actually a Roman. “There is nothing new under the sun” (Ecclesiastes 1:9). The year was 122 or 121 B.C. The highest elected official of the people, the tribune, was a man named Gaius Gracchus. He was a reformer, today we might say “progressive,” and proposed granting citizenship to the people of Italy. Citizenship then wasn’t universal. Only people in the city of Rome had it. Outside the city, there were many Italians who fought for Rome, supported it economically, but couldn’t vote. Gaius’ citizenship reform was opposed by wealthy, privileged aristocrats. “Don’t you realize they’ll take over everything” typified their opposition. Their highest representative, the consul, a man named Lucius Opimius, gathered a mob. Since Rome had no police force as we do today, the mob was able to go on a spree of violence and kill Gaius Gracchus. There are similarities and dissimilarities between the debates then and our debates today, but one cautionary word is in order. Thirty years after Gracchus was assassinated, civil war broke out. And 77 years after the assassination, Julius Caesar was declared dictator. The Roman Republic was over. 

One purpose of committed Christian living in society is “that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way” (1 Timothy 2:2). “I’m but a stranger here, heaven is my home” is popular but doesn’t mean Christians have no public responsibilities. Yes, “Our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior” (Philippians 3:20), but while we’re waiting, we love our neighbors as ourselves (Matthew 22:39). “Live as people who are free, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but living as servants of God” (1 Peter 2:16). 

Opimius celebrated killing Gracchus by restoring the temple of the goddess Concord. Someone took a chisel and carved this quip: “An act of senseless discord produces a Temple of Concord.” Citizens of heaven have a lasting peace to offer our country. “Let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven” (Matthew 5:16). (Mary Beard, SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome, 237, 233). 

The Meyer Minute for August 7, 2020

Dr. Kou Seying, our sainted and greatly missed Concordia Seminary professor, said people have “lenses” through which they see reality. One lens is fear and power. Sunday’s Gospel lesson is about fear and power. 

After feeding the 5000, Jesus sent the disciples back home in a boat and went up on a mountain to pray. He had come to this side of the Sea of Galilee for some quiet time with God, but people kept intruding. He served them, but then got back to meditating with His Father. That done for the time being, Jesus went toward the disciples’ boat, “a long way from the land, beaten by the waves, for the wind was against them” (Mark 14:24). “When the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were terrified, and said, ‘It is a ghost!’ and they cried out in fear” (verse 26). This is fear, primal, gut fear.  

You and I know fear, everyone does. Maybe not a ghost, but threatening things come at us. The doctor says, “I’m sorry to tell you this but…” You get a call from the police about your teenager. Your spouse leaves a note, “I’m leaving you.” Your financial house-of-cards begins to collapse. Fear and power is one lens through which people see things; another is sin and punishment. More fear. “We must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil” (2 Corinthians 5:10).  

“But immediately Jesus spoke to them, saying, ‘Take heart; it is I. Do not be afraid’” (verse 27). Here’s hope, the Gospel in Sunday’s Gospel. “‘I will never leave you nor forsake you.’ So we can confidently say, ‘The Lord is my helper; I will not fear” (Hebrews 13:5-6). Cast “all your anxieties upon him, because he cares for you” (1 Peter 5:7). “Take heart; it is I. Do not be afraid.” 

“Precious Savior, still our refuge – Take it to the Lord in prayer. In His arms He’ll take and shield thee; Thou wilt find a solace there” (Lutheran Service Book, 770:3). When you do that, what do you call your new emotion? The Bible calls it “the fear of God.” His power comes to you in your fear. God for us, not against us. “Come, O children, listen to me; I will teach you the fear of the Lord” (Psalm 34:11). “Take heart; it is I. Do not be afraid.” 

The Meyer Minute for August 6, 2020

Yesterday, as we always do, Diane and I sat down for happy hour. First discussion: “What day is this?” Diane said, “Tuesday.” “No, I think it’s Wednesday.” “Huh?” “Well, Monday I was going to go to the Seminary but didn’t. I went Tuesday and that was yesterday. So, today must be Wednesday.” 

“Well,” she asked, “what day did I go to Home Depot and buy a stove?” “A stove? It was supposed to be a clothes dryer!” (Our 15-year-old dryer gave up the ghost). “Oh, yeah. I hope that’s what they deliver, not another stove.” “That was yesterday; I remember you texted me at the Sem.” So, we established that yesterday was Wednesday. Is there any nurse out there who can come and write on our whiteboard, “Dale and Diane, today is Thursday”? 

A month into retirement, we’re struggling to get into a routine. Routine organizes life. It’s part of God’s creation. “And there was evening and there was morning, the first day,” and so on (Genesis 1:5). “While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night shall not cease” (Genesis 8:22). “Six days you shall labor and do all your work” – I know, I can hear you: “I’m so busy in retirement, I don’t know when I found time to go to work” – “but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God” (Exodus 20:9). It doesn’t help our new routine that there’s no get-into-the-car-and-go to church, which used to be a marker each week. “The years of our life are seventy, or even by reason of strength eighty” (Psalm 90:10). 

Routine isn’t the goal; it’s the means to a goal. “You observe days and months and seasons and years! I am afraid I may have labored over you in vain” (Galatians 4:10). The goal is living in the freedom of the Gospel. If your routine is largely determined by work and the demands of children, your goal is to see the busyness as your opportunity to share God’s love and service with others. When busyness has slowed down, as it has for Diane and me, the goal is what Paul said, “now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God” (Galatians 4:9). “Teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom” (Psalm 90:12). 

“Justa is coming tomorrow,” said Diane. “I thought she’s coming on Friday.” “What day is today?” 

The Meyer Minute for August 5, 2020

“You did a nice job,” I often say after a student has preached his sermon in class. Then I share what he did well and how he might improve. Every now and then I add, “One more thing. You left Jesus dead.” The student looks puzzled. “You did a nice job of saying He died for our sins, but you never said He’s out of the tomb.” Without Jesus’ resurrection, ascension and return in the forefront of our lives, we have a weak Gospel. 

Job #1 for my retirement is writing the Concordia Commentary on 1 Peter. In three major passages about Jesus (1:18-21; 2:18-25; 3:18-22), Peter presents Jesus’ death for us but doesn’t stop there. Throughout the epistle we’re told Jesus is alive and will soon come again for us. “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you” (1:3-4).  When Jesus visibly returns, your faith “may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ” (1:7). So, “Set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ” (1:13). God “raised him from the dead and gave him glory” (1:21). Baptism gives us a good conscience “through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, with angels, authorities, and powers having been subjected to him” (3:21-22). “The end of all things is at hand” (4:7). Finally, “The God of all grace… has called you to his eternal glory in Christ” (5:10).  

We pastors are not curators of a museum. “Look at the wonderful things Jesus did for you 2000 years ago.” Jesus’ death is indeed eternally important. One of our church’s confessions says we are righteous before God “when we believe that Christ has suffered for us and that for his sake our sin is forgiven and righteousness and eternal life are given to us” (Augsburg Confession, Article IV). “Eternal life” because the One crucified for us was raised from the dead, is glorified, and will come to take us to heaven. Let Jesus out of the museum! He’s alive today and soon we’ll see Him. 

The Meyer Minute for August 4, 2020

With grateful thoughts and a loving heart, I’m enjoying childhood memories today. Today would be my father’s 100^th birthday. I remember sitting on his lap as he drove the McCormick Farmall H, plowing for Uncle Er. When we got to the headland, he let me steer and turn the tractor around, though I’m sure he had his hand on the steering wheel; a child needs help learning. A few years older, I’d ride with him on the milk truck when I had a day off from school. I was so proud, helping him work. Father grew up on a farm and started his working life at Wardway, a factory in Chicago Heights. A few years later he went to work for Dixie Dairy, where he worked forty-some years. He started with house-to-house delivery, did well, and became a supervisor of wholesale routes. I spent eight summers delivering milk, $90 a week, big money, but best was pride that I could work with my dad. How sweet the memories! 

Savoring memories is a sign that life is narrowing. Our grandsons are making memories now but not taking the time to enjoy them. That’ll come later. Our recent graduates are getting ordained and installed, filled with hopes for what they’ll do in ministry. That’s as it should be. “Like grass that is renewed in the morning: in the morning it flourishes and is renewed; in the evening it fades and withers” (Psalm 90:5-6). In youth the horizon is far away, but sooner than we ever expected, “the golden evening brightens in the west.” Dad died at age 65, 35 years ago this month.    

For me, the mystery of God gets bigger as my life gets smaller. It’s obviously not that way for many Americans today. Some were never steered to faith life and participation in church. Others were but have “grown up” and dismissed the simplicity of faith. I wonder who’s really simple. “One who is faithful in a very little…” (Luke 16:10). In remembering the small things of family life, we have recurring glimpses of the unfathomable love of our Creator. And with memories hope, hope for family life in America. 

“Our Father, by whose name / All fatherhood is known, 

Who does in love proclaim / Each family Thine own, 

Bless Thou all parents, guarding well, / With constant love as sentinel,   

The homes in which Thy people dwell.” (Lutheran Service Book, 863:1) 

The Meyer Minute for August 3, 2020

“If thou but trust in God to guide thee / And hope in Him through all thy ways, 

He’ll give thee strength, whate’er betide thee, / And bear thee through the evil days. 

Who trusts in God’s unchanging love / Builds on the rock that naught can move.” 

Reduced to trusting God’s guidance is a good place to be. Yesterday’s introit or entrance psalm said, “He spread a cloud for a covering and fire to give light by night” (Psalm 105:39). That was the psalmist’s reminder how God had led ancient Israel through the wilderness. Here’s the historical account. “Throughout all their journeys, whenever the cloud was taken up from over the tabernacle, the people of Israel would set out. But if the cloud was not taken up, then they did not set out till the day that it was taken up. For the cloud of the Lord was on the tabernacle by day, and fire was in it by night, in the sight of all the hose of Israel throughout all their journeys” (Exodus 40:3-6-38). 

We’re in our own kind of wilderness, disease, weather, social unrest, political chaos and God only knows what else. He really does! Add in your personal problems. Would it make any difference if you knew why these things are happening? I don’t know that God explained everything to ancient Israel. He simply asked them to follow His guidance to a promised land. 

”Be patient and await His leisure / In cheerful hope, with heart content 

To take whate’er thy Father’s pleasure / And His discerning love hath sent, 

Nor doubt our inmost wants are known / To Him who chose us for His own.” 

Today no cloud or fire leads us. Jesus’ words do. “Do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat? or What shall we drink?” (or whatever is paining you today). “Your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you” (Matthew 6:31-33). We don’t ask God “why?” As obedient children, we trust our Father’s love and guidance. He “chose us for His own.”  

“Sing, pray, and keep His ways unswerving, / Perform thy duties faithfully, 

And trust His Word; though undeserving, / Thou yet shalt find it true for thee. 

God never yet forsook in need / The soul that trusted Him indeed.”  

(Lutheran Service Book, 750: 1, 3, 7). 

The Meyer Minute for July 31, 2020

“You give them something to eat.” 

If I had been there, I would have said, “What?!” Oh, excuse me. Getting ahead of myself. I’m thinking about this Sunday’s Gospel lesson. Jesus went off for some time alone with His Father, but a crowd wouldn’t let Him, 5000 men, plus women and children. “He had compassion on them and healed their sick. Now when it was evening, the disciples came to him and said, ‘This is a desolate place, and the day is now over; send the crowds away to go into the villages and buy food for themselves.’ But Jesus said, ‘They need not go away; you give them something to eat’” (Matthew 14:15). 

“If I had been there….” Thinking about it, I am there. I am in that story. This happens to me all the time. I think, “I don’t have the wherewithal to deal with this.” How about you? The Gospel lesson is about hungry people, but there were villages where they could have bought some food. America is in the midst of a graver crisis. Many in the crowd have lost their jobs. Many in the crowd face losing their homes. Many in the crowd are sick. 5000? 30 times that have died. “You give them something to eat?” 

Spirit, give me more trust in Jesus! Sometime later, Jesus fed a crowd of 4000. Then they got into a boat and, wouldn’t you know it, the disciples had no bread! Jesus: “‘Why are you discussing the fact that you have no bread? Do you not yet perceive or understand? Are your hearts hardened? Having eyes do you not see, and having ears to you not hear? And do you not remember? When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you take up?’ They said to him, ‘Twelve.’ “And the seven for the four thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you take up?’ And they said to him, “Seven.’ And he said to them, ‘Do you not yet understand?’” (Mark 8:17-21).  

Yup, I’m in the boat with them. I’ve seen and learned wondrous things from God, but when I face trouble, I forget all Jesus can do. I need to live more in the Bible, to time travel into those stories, to see myself as a disciple who usually doesn’t get it, to see myself in the crowd needing a miracle. Jesus is my wherewithal. You know?