Dear Family of Our Redeemer’s
Most of us would not choose to be labeled a “slave”. We value freedom and independence. We rejoice in the fact that we are able to make choices in most areas of our lives. If someone suggests that we are not free, we object loudly. But, listen to the statement of Jesus: “Very truly, I tell you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin.”
This coming Sunday, October 31, is called Reformation Sunday. We celebrate the great truths of Word alone, Grace alone, Faith alone. All the scripture readings for the day are familiar, rich with good news, life-giving, and “freeing”. They give us hope! They invite us to dance! They make us sing loud with enthusiasm! “So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed”.
Most Sundays we begin our worship service with some form of the confession: “We are in bondage to sin and cannot free ourselves”. Our list of failed endeavors is always long. Each week there are new regrets in the accounting. We are not happy with the broken resolutions. There is embarrassment, regret, and despair because we have been in this situation too many times. We feel some degree of hopelessness, discouragement, and shame. We do not like to be here again and again and again.
The Gospel reading from John 8: 31-16 wipes the slate clean and sets us on our way having heard the Good News: “So if the Son make you free, you will be free indeed”. Yes, we have been set free from sin, death, and the power of evil. Life can begin again. We can sing and dance. Shouting is allowed and welcomed. It is new day. The failures no longer exist. The future is full of exciting possibilities. “We go walking and leaping and praising God!”
Strangely enough, this “Good News” is usually not well heard and experienced when we just tell it to ourselves. It is more powerfully felt when it comes through others. We do need each other. Our ears need to hear the Gospel from a mouth other than our own. The powerful experience of the “communion of saints” is real. Together, we are the Church. A single member of the body does not have life when it is cut off from the rest. Isolated and disconnected, we die.
Our Redeemer’s Lutheran Church is a gift, not a duty or a burden. God has designed our existence in such a way that we get life from our Creator and from each other. We are not able to create or sustain ourselves in isolation. God has given us the Church! God has given us the “Gospel through the Church”. You are always welcomed and cherished in God’s Church. You are valued. “SEE YOU IN CHURCH!”
Blessings on your journey in “freedom”,
Interim Supply Pastor, Fred Mai
