SERMONS > August 3, 2025

For the Life of the World

How’s your week been?

I’ve had a rather unusual week. Through the wonder of technology, I have been traveling back and forth between Holliston, North Easton, and Phoenix, AZ. While I have kept one eye on my responsibilities at home and one eye on my responsibilities at Holy Trinity as your transition minister, I have also kept my eyes and ears and heart and mind and soul open to the work being done by our siblings in Christ at the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America’s 2025 Churchwide Assembly in Phoenix.

As a reminder –  the ELCA is comprised of 3 interdependent expressions of the body of Christ – Congregations; Synods; Churchwide. Holy Trinity Lutheran Church is one congregation of the New England Synod which is one Synod of the ELCA. All 3 expressions are connected; we are all church together. What happens in one part of the body effects all parts of the body.

Churchwide Assembly is the primary decision-making body in the ELCA; it meets every 3 years. In essence, it’s a gathering of kinfolk – all kinds of faithful Lutheran people from across the ELCA coming together for the week, gathered around the cross of Christ and the baptismal font, in prayerful discernment to do the business of the church. The theme for this year was For the Life of the World  These words come from the last line of the Third Article of the Nicene Creed. We believe in the Holy Spirit…We look for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come. Amen. These words express our hope in Jesus Christ, with whom we have been raised and renewed through our baptism.

It’s been a rather amazing week for the ELCA, as the power of the Holy Spirit has been blowing through the church at this Assembly in unexpected and life-giving ways (which is what the Holy Spirit does when we let her).

I want to call your attention to some of the actions approved and adopted at this Churchwide Assembly:

  • The Rev. Yehiel Curry, Bishop of the Metropolitan Chicago Synod, was elected to the Office of Presiding Bishop of the ELCA for a 6 year term.
  • The Rev. Lucille “CeCee” Mills, Assistant to the Bishop in the North Carolina Synod, was elected to the Office of Secretary of the ELCA for a 6 year term.

Both Presiding Bishop-elect Curry and Secretary Mills are of African descent. They will join Vice President Imran Siddiqui (Asian descent) and Treasurer Lori Fedyk (European descent) in leading this church. This means that three quarters of the ELCA Leadership Team are People of Color; they are people of the Global Majority (We white people are the Global Minority).

The power of the Holy Spirit is blowing through this church…for the life of the world.

  • A Memorial (resolution) on “Stand for Palestinian Rights and End to Occupation of Palestine”, which had been submitted by the New England Synod and 10 other Synods, was adopted by 95% of the voting members. This strongly worded Memorial directs the Office of the Presiding Bishop and others in the ELCA to write to U.S. leaders, calling on them “to recognize and work to end the genocide against the Palestinian people”. The Memorial calls on all of us in the ELCA “to advocate for human rights, justice and peace for all Palestinians and Israelis”.

The power of the Holy Spirit is blowing through this church…for the life of the world

  • The Social Statement “Faith and Civic Life: Seeking the Well-being of All” and the Implementing Resolutions that come out of that Social Statement were both adopted by 98% of the voting members. The primary theme of this Social Statement is this: God intends for civic life to seek the well-being of all persons in a community. I look forward to reading and studying this Social Statement and I invite you to join me in doing so.

The power of the Holy Spirit is blowing through this church…for the life of the world.

I want to call your attention to one more action that happened this week. On Tuesday, Bishop Nathan Pipho announced that the New England Synod, ELCA has joined a coalition of faith groups (including 4 other ELCA Synods; Society of Friends (Quakers); Baptists; and the Metropolitan Community Churches, an international LGBT-affirming mainline Protestant Christian denomination) in filing a lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security and its Secretary, Kristi Noem, and its current policy of allowing ICE agents to enter churches.

Bishop Pipho describes this legal action as an expression of our commitment to live out our baptismal promises to God to “serve all people, following the example of Jesus, and to strive for justice and peace in all the earth.”

The power of the Holy Spirit is blowing through this church…for the life of the world.

In our gospel reading this morning, Jesus warns the people in the crowd gathered around him to “Take care! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed, for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.” Then Jesus tells the story of the rich landowner who makes plans to save his abundant crop for his own future use. Notice that the rich landowner makes these plans after speaking only to himself; he doesn’t talk with any of his neighbors to see what the community might need; he doesn’t ask God to help him discern how God might desire him to use his abundant resources for the life of the world. The rich landowner is isolated; alone; cut off from community and from God. His greed is killing him.

Then Jesus says “So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich toward God.”

As followers of Jesus, our treasures are not of this earth; they cannot be stored in larger barns or bigger bank accounts. Our treasure is hidden in the rich, life-giving relationship we have with God, given to us by grace alone through faith alone in Christ Jesus alone. Through our baptism into the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, we rise each day clothed…with the new self…which is being renewed …according to the image of its creator. (Col 3:10). We rise each day seeking to prayerfully discern God’s will for our life for this day. We rise each day committed to live differently; ready and willing to publicly share with all our neighbors the gift of this amazing and abundant life we have been graciously given by God.

The good news for today is that we do not do this work alone or in isolation. Holy Trinity Lutheran Church of the New England Synod  is one part of the body of Christ formed together in this time and place as the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. Within this body, we recognize that our faith in Jesus Christ is personal but not private. We are church together for the sake of the world that God so dearly loves.

The power of the Holy Spirit is blowing through this church…for the life of the world to come.