Sermon Tone Analysis

Today we wrap up our series on the ‘Masters,’ people who have radically helped to define what Christianity means for the world.

We first looked at Augustine and his Confessions of both praise and guilt.

Next we looked at Martin Luther and his declaration that “faith alone” can save us.

Then last week we heard the story of Mother Teresa, and the deep doubt she struggled with.

We found that doubt is not the opposite of faith, and, in fact, doubt can help us have better faith.

As we wrestle with our conception of God, of what God is and is not, what God does and does not do, we get better at living a faithful life.

Mother Teresa was an incredible example of this; despite her sense of separation from God, she continued to faithfully care for the poor, blessing the world with her work.

Now we look at our final ‘master’ and I have to admit, I struggled with who to end the series with.

There are so many incredible people that have impacted Christianity and some of you have told me by name some of your favorite modern masters.

They all have something good and valuable to bring to the table, but I thought we would end with someone you probably aren’t familiar with.

I want to share with you about Jurgen Moltmann.

Charlene/Karen is going to read for us our scripture for today about the creation of the world.

This is probably familiar to many of you, but I want you to listen for faint notes of what is missing.

What is absent from this world that God so beautifully created?

That will help launch us into a discussion of our topic for the day - suffering and hope.

This is Genesis chapter 1, verses 1-4 and chapter 2, verses 4-9.

Hear now the word of the Lord.

and from Philippians 2:5-8

Philippians 2:5–8 (NRSV)

Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness.

And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death— even death on a cross.

This is the word of the Lord for the people of God.

Thanks be to God.

Let’s open with a word of prayer: God, may we be an inclusive community passionately following Jesus Christ.

Open our hearts to what you have for us as we consider our own suffering and yours.

Reveal to us the hope we find in Jesus Christ.

In your name we pray, amen.

Jurgen Moltmann is a name not many are familiar with, but he continues to impact a generation of Christians with his incredible insights.

At 95 years old, he is a force when it comes to what is called ‘systematic theology.’

That’s a way of talking about how all the different pieces of the Bible and how they fit together.

His ideas stem from his childhood.

He grew up in Germany, he loved mathematics and idolized Albert Einstein.

He had no religious background at all and describes his upbringing as ‘thoroughly secular.’

It wasn’t until world war 2 that his life began to change.

He was drafted in 1944 as a soldier and sent to the front lines against the British.

Six months in he encountered his first enemy combatant.

He was in Belgium at the time, and instead of using any kind of force against this enemy, he immediately surrendered.

He was put in a POW camp, first in Belgium, then moved to Scotland, and finally to England.

In these camps Moltmann saw how his fellow prisoners would give up hope inwardly.

At times they were tortured, not with words or actions, but by pictures that were posted in the camp from Auschwitz and other concentration camps.

They were confronted with the suffering so many had faced at the hands of their own government.

It wasn’t the conditions of the camp, or the food they were provided that caused them to die; it was that they had given up all hope.

Moltmann even said himself that he wished he could have died along with his comrades, rather than having to face what their nation had done.

But his experience was very different in those camps because he had met an American chaplain who gave him a Bible.

For the years he was imprisoned he read it initially out of sheer boredom, but the more he read, the more it impacted his imagination and emotions.

He didn’t have an outright religious conversion, though.

He says God seemed to evade him even as he tried to experience God’s presence.

He says, “All that was left was an inward drive, a longing which provided the impetus to hope."

I’ve never heard of this before, but apparently they had educational camps available to the POWs, and Moltmann was able to go to one while supervised by the British military.

He studied theology while a prisoner at a camp run by the YMCA.

At the end of the war, in 1948, he returned to Germany and continued his studies, now at a university, and got a doctorate in systematic theology.

As he has studied, taught and written over these last 60 years, perhaps the most important idea he’s contributed is that theology, our understanding of God, is not some set of rules.

Its not a creed or one statement from the Bible versus another.

Theology is a voyage of discovery into an unknown country.

Knowing God is a creative act, that needs a spirit of curiosity at its core.

Even in his own pain and suffering from the atrocities of world war 2, he understood how complicated the picture was.

People he knew and loved were not monolithically good or bad; they were a mixed bag and understanding that, working out the implications of people who did both good and bad, had to be done with a curious spirit.

He is an adventurer out to understand how God relates to the times we live in.

This is not some far off thing settled a thousand years ago that we gaze at and wonder about in a museum.

No, today, right now, there is an adventure God has for us.

When we hear about the creation in Genesis we get a sense of that.

As the creation story begins God is creating out of a formless void; literally out of nothing.

There is no design, no function, no difference anywhere in the universe.

But then the spirit of God comes; God speaks light into existence.

And this distinction between light and dark is good.

There is now a design and a way to differentiate between two things.

In chapter 2 God creates humans, and as the underground streams water the planet, a garden is planted for these humans.

Trees sprout, fruit is born, and a tree of life is placed in the midst of the garden.

I can just see God conjuring these ludicrous creations.

When you go to the zoo, especially with children, if you go through it slowly enough, you’ll notice how unique some of these creatures are.

My boys, they love to hear about bizarre animals.

I remember last year when the Spinosaurus was declared the first and only true swimming dinosaur and we all sat and watched with fascination a youtube video that recreated the look and feel of this enormous dinosaur swimming in the water.

What imagination; what creativity!

If you go where nature is raw and wild, you’ll see the same thing.

It would take such inventiveness to come up with this world of all possible worlds.

Along with this artistry, as all these incredible things are created, and the differentiation that happens, is a particular act of Jesus.

We find it described in the passage from Philippians, chapter 2. It says that Jesus emptied himself.

That probably doesn’t mean much to you on its surface, but think about God.

God is boundriless, borderless; God can be whatever God wants to be, or do, right?

There is infinite possibility with God.

But in order for God to be something to us, for God to connect with human beings, God needs to become a reality to us.

So God empties himself and becomes Jesus.

God has taken on flesh.

That’s the story of Christmas and why Christmas is always a big deal around here.

Jesus is God taking on a “real form.”

Of all the infinite possibilities of the form God could take, he chose Jesus.

Maybe you wonder sometimes like I do…why is the world the way that it is?

Why do we have pain and suffering?

Why does God let bad things happen in this world?

And I’m not sure we have a good answer for that other than....it is what it is.

This is what God chose.

I think its sort of like the creative process people go through.

Every week I’m sitting and writing out a sermon.

Maybe you create when you cook food, or paint, or play.

Just a night out when the kids stay with the babysitter can feel like overwhelming possibilities!

Now you may feel differently when you get home and pay the sitter a hundred bucks and think “was that worth it?”

But before you go out, with all those possibilities before you, a few hours of freedom - it is definitely worth it!

When I was little I always loved to make up new games; it was my creative act.

Why did I make the game I did?

I just did.