Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father,
our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and from the
Holy Spirit. Amen. Special welcome to those of
you watching online. If you are watching live
via Facebook, do us a favor, hit like, hit share.
That is a way to invite all of your friends to
worship today. Let's go to our God in prayer.
Lord God, Heavenly Father, Lord, thank you for
this chance to worship today. to be together,
whether here in person or online. Lord, help
us to be present with you. Lord, I thank you
for the chance to share this message, and Lord,
let it be your message. Speak through me, speak
in spite of me as I submit myself to you, and
I pray that we all would be willing to do the
same, to submit ourselves to the power of your
Holy Spirit, to speak truth to us, even if it
convicts. Lord, let that be spoken to us. In
your name we pray, amen. Some two months or so
ago, the congregation of Emmanuel Lutheran Church
in Hood River, Oregon, voted to extend divine
call to me. And thus began weeks and weeks of
worry. of trouble, of discernment, of lots of
prayer, and one of the most difficult decisions
of my entire life. But in the end, it really
wasn't about my decision at all. You'll see why
in a minute. But first, let's back up to give
a little context. So, Christ Memorial is part
of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, LCMS.
That's a particular flavor or sect of the Lutheran
denomination. There are other different synods.
There's the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod
Wells, as it's often called. There's the Evangelical
Lutheran Church of America, ELCA. There's even
LCMC, which is Lutheran Congregations and Mission
for Christ. You don't hear about that one quite
as often, a little smaller. But these are all
kind of different flavors, different doctrines
of Lutheranism, if you will. Well, as an LCMS
pastor, that means that I went through training,
got a graduate degree at one of two seminaries.
There's one in Fort Wayne, Indiana, and one in
St. Louis, Missouri. And that's where I went
was Missouri. And that's why we're called the
Missouri Synod, by the way, because the headquarters
are there in St. Louis, right? And coming out
of seminary, that first call, that four -year
education included a year of intensive, basically
being an intern. It's called a vicar. And they
tell you where to go. You don't get to pick.
You get to go to some church somewhere across
America. I actually got the chance to have mine
right there in St. Louis, so I didn't have to
move. But when you graduate from seminary...
They have this big ceremony, big pomp and circumstance.
They call you up to the front and they give you
a little envelope with your name and the name
of a church on it. And that church is your first
call. It's an arranged marriage in every sense
of the concept, right? And that is where you
go. That is where you serve as pastor at your
first call. Well from there, actually, the pastor
does have a little more say for the next place
to go, right? And the way it works is, so we
have the LCMS, that is the governing church body.
Underneath that, there are districts. They're
regional, geographic, though there are some non
-geographic districts. And then underneath that,
there's circuits and regions and whatever, but
ultimately it's the congregation. So the congregation
finds themselves in need of a pastor whether
their pastor has retired moved on or they're
looking for a second pastor They contact the
district and the district gets to put on the
fiddler on the roof soundtrack and and do a little
matchmaking Somebody might get that reference
matchmaker matchmaker fine. You're fine. Catch
me. That's right a musical theater They didn't
let me sing with a microphone though. Strangely
enough. Anyway, put me in the back But so they
get to play matchmaker. They essentially, they
get a little profile from the church that says,
this is the demographic study. This is the history
of the church. This is kind of the personality
of the church that is looking to call a pastor.
And the district reps flip through their digital
Rolodex, their big national database, and they
pull out some 15 or so names. of pastors that
they provide to this congregation, that then
that congregation usually sits down with, whether
it be a call committee, which is a group of people
within the congregation, or board of elders,
whatever, and they go through these profiles
and they say, this one, not this one, maybe that
one, and they end up with a list of five to seven
names or so, and then somebody, head of call
committee, congregational president, is in charge
of calling those pastors and saying, hey, Would
you be interested in having the conversation
about this call? Up to this point, the pastor
has no idea that his name has been submitted
to a church. Now, my personal policy, as these
churches would call, is I'll always have the
conversation, right? Because it is a process
of divine call. We believe that God is at work
in the call, right? So I always have the conversation.
Usually what that looks like is one or two, whether
it be that first one with that call, congregational
president, or later on with another group, they
come to know me, I come to know them, and eventually
we just kind of go, yeah, I don't know that it's
a good fit, right? Because let's be honest, I'm
not a normal LCMS pastor. I'm not wearing a suit
and tie. I've got kind of a youthful energy about
me. If I were an ice cream flavor, I'd be pistachio,
right? Like, some people love it, some people
just not their thing. And that's fine, I'll take
a no thanks, that's perfectly, I'm mature enough
to handle that, right? Now, this is a process
that usually doesn't happen all that often. Usually
a pastor, maybe we'll get one or two conversations,
call in inquiries per year. However, in the midst
of COVID, as I've talked about, the LCMS clergy
are aging. Right? We're getting older. The vast
majority, percentage -wise, of LCMS pastors are
nearing retirement. And then as we went through,
I don't know, a global pandemic, where months
felt like years, especially in ministry, where
there was no right answer. Right? You had people
in a congregation saying, if you do this, I will
leave this church. And then you had other people
saying, if you don't do that, I will leave this
church. And you're going, we can't win. So all
these poor pastors that were nearing retirement
probably had a number of good years left in them.
They were burned through in the midst of COVID.
So there were a lot of churches that have been
looking for pastors. All that to say that over
the past six months, I have been contacted by
seven different churches. And most of those conversations,
again, pretty cut and dry. However, the church
in Hood River, Oregon contacted and it just kind
of stuck with me. And there was something there
that God just kept kind of drawing me back to.
Now why am I telling you all this? Apart from
just kind of helping you to understand the process
and the polity and how things work. Because I
look at our gospel reading. I look at our New
Testament reading. And I see God challenging
us as Christians into being uncomfortable. I
see Jesus talking to His disciples and saying,
stop thinking about things of man and start focusing
on things of God. Because see, when this church
in Hood River extended me the call, that's when
things get serious, because that's something
to take seriously. That's when you sit down and
you write out your pros and cons and you do all
your budget sheets and housing costs and all
of those things, right? Your future planning
and all of that. Jesus is telling his disciples,
stop focusing on the things of man and start
focusing on the things of God. Be willing to
bear your cross. And the reason that this church
in Oregon kind of kept popping up is I was told,
so right now, here in Texas, we're part of the
Bible Belt. You guys know that, right? You know,
the southern kind of swath of the United States,
the Bible Belt, right? And of course, that's
kind of eroded a little bit culturally over time
in the past couple years, decade or so. It's
gotten a little less potent. It's still there.
There's still kind of this cultural understanding
that church is probably something that you should
consider, right? Well, there's another part of
the country that is often called the unchurched
belt. And that is Northern California, Oregon,
Washington, Idaho. I was told that Oregon is
the second least religious state in the country.
And Hood River, as a tiny little town, 8 ,000
or so, per some survey, is the least religious
city in Oregon. This is a mission field. And
I've shared before that I have a passion for
the unchurched, the de -churched, the people
who've been wounded by church. And I look at
this and say, God, what are you leading me towards?
God, what are you calling me towards? I've preached
so many times about how we, the church, capital
C, not Christ's memorial, the whole church, the
priesthood of all believers, that we are called
to be uncomfortable. And so as this call came
in, my response was, you know what, I've got
a pretty nice house. I like the neighborhood
that I'm in. I really love the church that I'm
in. I'm comfortable now. I think I'm good. I
don't want to respond to this call. If that was
my response, I would feel like a hypocrite. I
would feel like I'm turning my back on what I
have preached for so long. God is calling me
and has gifted me to be able to share the message
to this place where there are so many who desperately
need to hope. I look at my life and I see that
my siblings aren't in church. Some of my closest
friends are non -believers and outspokenly so.
I've said before that God has gifted me to be
able to speak the language of the atheist. And
unfortunately, in the LCMS, that's a language
and a culture that a lot of pastors struggle
with, through no fault of their own. And so I
see God is calling me into this mission field,
and truly it is a mission field. It's the closest
you can be to be a missionary and still be in
this country. And so I had to respond. My life
verse comes from Isaiah chapter 6, where God
says, who will go for us? And Isaiah says, here
am I. Send me. And it's not safe, it's not comfortable,
it's scary. I said earlier, it's bittersweet.
I'm waiting for the sweet part to kick in, but
I trust in God. Now again, why am I telling you
this? What does this mean for you? Well, first
of all, earlier somebody asked me, what does
this mean for Christ and Memorial? My goodness,
it's never been about me. It's not about me.
It's not about your pastor. It is about the church.
It's about the priesthood of all believers. It's
about this community. And there are incredible
things happening in this church, in this school.
We have record enrollment in the school. That's
amazing. This church is growing. It's triple
the size that was when I arrived here. There's
so many exciting things happening here, and it's
not about me. There are so many things that you
can be proud of, be part of Christ's memorial,
but more than that. What does this mean for you
individually? What does this Scripture mean for
you individually? For me in full -time ministry,
to bear my cross, to bear the cross means to
go to places where I'm uncomfortable. To proclaim
hope to those who maybe are straight -up adversarial
to it. That's what it means for me. What does
it mean for you though? What cross is Jesus calling
you to bear? What uncomfortable situation is
God asking you to be in? I don't know what it
is for you, but I'm gonna guess you do. I'm gonna
guess when you're hearing this, there's something
that's rising to the front of your mind and you're
going, oh, he's talking about this. Because that's
how the Holy Spirit works. Maybe it's a conversation
that you need to have with your neighbor to invite
them to church to talk about faith. Maybe it's
a conversation with your kid about faith. Maybe
it's a conversation with yourself about leaving
behind a habit, leaving behind an addiction,
a behavior, an attitude. Maybe it's about finding
a new path. Maybe it is about ministry. Maybe
God is calling you to do more when it comes to
the church, when it comes to helping out in the
community. Maybe God is calling you to leave
behind the comfortable. Because man, it'd be
easy to stay safe, wouldn't it? It'd be easy
to stay comfortable. It'd be easy to say, this
is familiar. This is my happy area. I'm good
here. But God says no. Pick up your cross and
follow me. And when I preached on Psalm 23, if
you remember, this is one of my first sermons
here, that though God is leading you on the paths
to greener pastures, what's along the way? The
valley of shadow of death. You're going to pass
through difficult times. Don't abandon your message.
Don't abandon your path. Don't abandon God's
guidance during that time. Trust in Him in all
things, and here's why. We don't just do this
out of obligation. We don't just do this because
we have to. Because the Bible says so. Because
the preacher says so. No, we do this because
we have a God who knows what it means to be uncomfortable.
We have a God who didn't just sit back in the
throne room and shout down to people, hey, figure
it out. Hey, I told you what to do. What are
you doing wrong down there? They never get this
right. He didn't just stay in paradise. We have
a God who entered into our lives in the first
century, like before air conditioning, in the
desert, wearing sandals. You guys ever gotten
a rock in your sandal? Well, Jesus did. He knows
what it means to be uncomfortable. He walked
around among His people. He mourned. He wept
at the loss of His friend. He went through such
anxiety and panic and fear that it says that
he was in the Garden of Gethsemane preparing
for what lay ahead. His sweat poured out of him
like blood. He was so anxious about it that he
went to his friends and said, I need support
during this time. And they kept falling asleep.
And he just was getting angrier and angrier.
Guys, why can't you stay awake during this time?
And yet, he was able to pray the prayer. not
my will, but thine. Every time we pray the Lord's
Prayer, thy will be done. May God's will be done,
even if it draws us out of our comfort zone.
We have a God who was willing to leave his comfort
zone and go to Golgotha. And even from the cross,
even in the midst of the pain and torture, He
says, forgive them, for they don't know what
they're doing. We have a God who knows what it
means to be uncomfortable. That's why we can
be bold enough to walk into the uncomfortable.
Because we know that this world isn't it. Take
your mind off the things of this world. You're
off your mind off the things of man. Start focusing
on the things of God. How is God calling you?
I want to share a story. And I share this. It's
not even necessarily topical to to the message,
but it's so powerful. And it reminds us of why
we do what we do. It reminds us of who we serve.
It reminds us of who we follow. See, we've been
praying for months for Kimberly Hare's mom, who
needed a lung transplant. And she, mid -week
or so, got the call that there was a potential
donor, there was a potential lung available,
and so they rushed to the hospital, and it turns
out it was a match. And that lung has been installed?
I don't know what the right term is. It's in
there and it's working and like she's up and
walking around now. It's astounding what the
medical world can do, right? But what Kimberly
called and she was just overjoyed and she shared
this. She said the doctor told them when they
take the lung out of the donor, which like out
of tragedy comes a miracle, right? Out of pain
comes life. And she said that he holds this lung,
which is flat, in his hand and he just massages
it. And if it's a good lung, if the muscles are
right in there, it actually inflates. And that
song that we just sang, she quoted that to me.
It's His breath in our lungs. Every breath that
we draw in is a gift. from God. It is a miracle.
We overlook it because it happens every second
of every day and yet what a powerful gift it
is from our God. May we never lose sight of that.
Maybe that breath gets a little restricted at
times. Maybe panic sets in and gets a little
faster and we're having a hard time catching
our breath and yet it's still there. May we remember
that every moment is a gift from God. No matter
where we are, no matter how we are serving, no
matter who is there with us, it is a gift from
God that we can rejoice and be glad in. May we
find peace in knowing that as we get uncomfortable,
we have a God who's been there, who got uncomfortable
for us. May we know that no matter where we go,
no matter who we serve, no matter how we serve,
no matter how we respond to God's call, He will
never leave us nor forsake us, never abandon
us. Our God is so much bigger than anything we
have in this world. Praise Him for that. And
above all else, know that we have a God who is
with you, no matter what. Our God is with you.
Amen.