A Celebration. AND a Warning.

What follows is an expanded version of a paragraph from our Sunday bulletin, as we began worship in our new building last Sunday (May 10).

Why does this congregation exist?  People want to think this all began with two factions holding profoundly different beliefs.  It did not.  This has little to do with failed votes to leave another denomination, hostilities between warring factions, two hermeneutics, or methods of operation and interpretation, at work within a denomination that, as former ELCA Bishop Mark Hanson said "were opposed to one another and yet equally valid."  It is not about people.  Not about buildings.  Not about denominations.  Not about personal practices.  It's not about us at all.

Rather, It began with the establishment of the church with the apostles’ commission to go and make disciples and baptize – all in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  Much has happened in the nearly two millennia since:  Empires and kingdoms have arisen, only to fall again.  Kings, emperors, tyrants, and despots have come and gone.  The church has formed, only to be under constant assault by the ancient adversary:  the devil.  Congregations have begun, only to disband once again.  Magnificent buildings have been erected, only to crumble into the depths of history.  Wars have been fought, sometimes on a global scale.  Competing ideologies have led to all of these.  But the one constant in all of this was and is the Word of God, that often stands in stark contrast to the troubles of our past and present. 

Of course, pointing out the troubles this world has is nothing new, and warnings of the conditions today have been given.  "But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God— having a form of godliness but denying its power." (2 Ti 3:1–5).  Even Thomas Jefferson said "God who gave us life gave us liberty. Can the liberties of a nation be secure when we have removed a conviction that these liberties are the gift of God? Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just, that his justice cannot sleep forever."  (quoted on the Jefferson Memorial)  Here he indicates that we will either be one nation under God, or apart from God, simply one nation going under.  It doesn't become any more of a warning than that.  And the warnings from Scripture demonstrate that little has changed in 2000 years, or even 4000 years, where the common practice of history is that affluence breeds apathy.  These are the things the warnings attempt to direct us away from.  They also attempt to direct us toward the one constant:  God's Word.

Its all about the message.  This world needs it.  Mother Basilea Schlink (a Lutheran nun from the Evangelical Sisterhood of Mary) was firmly convinced that the rise of natural disasters since the 1980's is God’s wake up call for us.  Max Lucado wrote a book about 10 years ago called “It’s not about me.”  But the reality of the world is that self interest is all that matters, and little else.  And while we celebrate the building, mothers’ day, and so on, its not about any of them either.  Or look at the disciples.  They are in the presence of the Messiah, and what does Jesus catch them debating?  Which one of them is the greatest (Mark 9:33ff).  Nothing has changed since the time of Christ.


The world is indeed crumbling.  Mother Basilea witnessed the destruction of Germany first hand as allied forces bombed it to dust in the effort to eliminate the evil of the Nazis and Hitler.  We see today that the rise of affluence breeds not only apathy, but an appetite for more satisfaction of self interests.  It is time to, once again, recommit ourselves to the pure word of God and its proclamation.  It’s not about us, or about this building, or anything but the love of God, given to us.  It is the only thing that can rescue us from this dark world, and the only thing to proclaim without ceasing to others.  

It was in recent history that a handful of people set about the task to establish a small congregation in a small town in a small portion of the Great Plains, with the intent to carry out the commission given to those first apostles.  What you see here today is but the beginnings of that commission, despite that this building is now nearly complete.  In the grand scheme of history, it is doubtful that this “Trinity Lutheran Church” will even be remembered.  But that is not what is important.  What is important is found buried in the entrance slab to the right of the front doors:  A Bible.  And in that Bible?  A commemoration:  “The Bible in this foundation is placed as an eternal reminder that all who enter should hear nothing else than the Word of God, and all who leave this place should do nothing else than live by it.”

Though nearly complete, it is not complete yet.  And it will not be, until such a day as those conditions are met:  where nothing BUT the Word of God is proclaimed within its walls, and the people who leave these doors do nothing but LIVE by that same Word.