Historic First Lutheran Church of Pasadena

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

“They knew He had spoken this parable against Him” [Luke 20:19].

Those words were written by St. Luke about the “teachers of the law and the chief priests,” but when you stop to think about it, Jesus’ Parable of the Tenants is really spoken about each and every one of us. Oh, we may certainly not lie in wait and kill the messengers sent to us out of a greedy motivation to get the landowner’s property, but there are certainly many times in each of our lives when we do not properly receive the One Whom God has sent, namely Jesus Christ.

I think that’s why this particular Gospel is teemed up with the assigned First and Second Readings today. I have to admit that the interrelation between today’s three assigned lessons puzzled me for a while. Most often, there is a very strong, instantly recognizable connection between the First Reading and the Gospel. Sometimes the Second Reading also adds a richness as part of a trilogy. Sometimes the Second Reading is simply part of the lectio continua, the reading of all the New Testament Epistles over a three-year period of time. However, at first glance, today’s First and Second Readings seemed closely connected to each other, with today’s Gospel just kind of hanging out there on its own. That is, at least until that phrase from the Gospel stuck out for me – “They knew He had spoken this parable against Him” [Luke 20:19].

That phrase needs to be teemed up with the phrase “Forget the former things. Do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing” from today’s First Reading [Isaiah 43:18-19] and with the phrase “I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord” from today’s Second Reading [Philippians 3:8]. Those three phrases together unlock the mystery of how today’s three assigned readings fit together.

As your pastor, I am going to tell you that THE toughest part of being a pastor is that I am so often considered a psychiatrist or psychologist. People dump their problems on me. I am often the one who hears the real story of what’s going on in people’s lives. I am the one who is told secrets and asked not to share them with anyone. I am the one who hears about job cutbacks and job losses. I am the one who hears about relationship problems and pending divorces. I am the one who hears about family dysfunction. I am the one who hears confessions about all kinds of sins. I am the one who hears about incredibly intimate medical issues and diagnoses and surgery. I am the one welcomed into any trauma room or emergency room or hospital room at some of the worst of times. I am the one who hears about deaths. I am the one asked to be with families at the moment of death, or to be with them when they have to identify a body. I am the one who stands on lonely hillsides and sees the tears and feels the pain and sometimes even gets blasted with anger. I am the one who hears about abuse. I am the one who hears about addictions. I am the one who hears about criminal charges. I am the one asked to sit with someone in court – wearing my clerical collar. I am the one who hears about unplanned pregnancies. I am the one who hears about fears. I am the one who hears about stress in all forms and varieties. I am the one who deals with broken, hurting people every single day – whether I am at the office or whether I am at home – and every single one of those things I have just mentioned I have had happen to me.

The real bizarre thing is that, even though that’s THE toughest part of being a pastor, it also is often the most rewarding part of being a pastor. I say that not because I have some sick illness myself that just likes to collect all that macabre bizarre brokenness, but because each of those times of pains and problems is an opportunity for me not to be a psychiatrist or psychologist, but an opportunity to represent Jesus Christ. Each of those times of pains and problems is an opportunity to remind people of Who Jesus is and what He can do. Each of those times of pains and problems often allows me the privilege of seeing a “before” and an “after.”

When is it that Jesus’ Parable of the Tenants is also spoken about each and every one of us? It’s whenever Jesus attempts to come to us – sometimes directly on His own; sometimes through an intermediary like a pastor – and we turn Him away or even “kill” Him altogether, when we “rob” Him of what is rightfully His and when we fail to allow Him to give what He may want to give us.

You’ve heard about giving up something for Lent. Well, we’re a little late in the Lenten season, but we still do have a couple of weeks for me to challenge you to give up something during Lent and start a whole new existence on Easter morning. I would encourage you to work it out of your system our natural human tendency to push God away during times of pains and problems.

The entire message of Easter, the message of our daily lives as the people of God is “Forget the former things. Do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing.” Yes! He can! In 2010!

The things that have happened to each of us are precisely the things that nailed our Lord Jesus to the Cross – our sins, our brokenness, our failures, our pains, our problems, our cares, our concerns, our anger, our hurt. Whatever it is, take a careful, long look at that Cross and see it there. Give it up for Lent! Leave it there at the Cross.

If you are able to do that – if you allow God’s Holy Spirit to empower you to do that – you will be able on Easter morning – and every moment of every day after that – to join St. Paul in joyfully proclaiming, “I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord.”

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

Pastor Christopher Schaar
Historic First Lutheran Church of Pasadena