Reformation Sunday
John 8:31-36 Then Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, "If you continue in my word, you are truly my disciples; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free." They answered him, "We are descendants of Abraham and have never been slaves to anyone. What do you mean by saying, 'You will be made free'?" Jesus answered them, "Very truly, I tell you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin. The slave does not have a permanent place in the household; the son has a place there forever. So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.Let me begin this morning by thanking you for going along with me as I wore this 16th-century style pastor garb this past month as we celebrated Lutheran Heritage month at Risen Lord. And thank you for going with the flow and humoring me as we invited you to all wear these Martin and Katie Luther hats. You look very Reformation-like. You look very Luther-like. You look, shall I say, different.
The reason we wear these hats and I wear this 16th century pastor cassock today is the same reason the NFL occasionally breaks out the throwback uniforms. It is to remember and show our connection to the past. It is to show that we don’t take ourselves too seriously. It’s a little tongue-in-cheek, to be quite honest, a way to poke fun at what can be an overly serious subject, to walk to the beat of own drum, to dance to the tune of our own music. Odd and unusual, we do our own thing.
It’s kind of like Gary Larson, creator of the Far Side cartoon. He is a Lutheran, of course, and has such an odd sense of humor. I’ll never forget the birthday card I received from a church friend when I turned 22 – a little over 10 years ago. It was a Far Side cartoon card with a scene of what looks like a bunch of penguins on an arctic beach somewhere, crowded together, all looking the same, standing the same. You couldn’t tell one from another, except for the one penguin in the middle of the frame, singing out over all the others “I gotta be me, oh I gotta be me.” Larson’s humor is not for everyone. But he walks to the beat of his own drum. Some see marching to the beat of your own drum as just weird, odd, unusual. Others see it as a way to change the world. Another Lutheran who walked to the beat of his own drum was Steve Jobs, the founder and creative genius behind Apple. If there was anyone who didn’t conform to the mold, it was Steve Jobs. And the world has never been the same since.
Almost 500 years ago Martin Luther was the Steve Jobs and Gary Larson of the religious world. He couldn’t quite conform, couldn’t quite fit in, couldn’t quite get with the program. Not that he didn’t try, mind you. He did. From his very depths he wanted nothing more than to do what was expected of him. As a boy, he had a deep desire to please his father, to do what would be acceptable in his eyes, to rise to his father’s expectations. And his father expected a lot. He saw in young Martin something special. There was potential. There was a spark. And Martin’s father, Hans Luther wanted to give the boy the opportunities that would put him position to make his mark on the world. So Hans worked from sun-up to sun-down in the copper mines of Germany to scrimp and save to get Martin an education. He did back-breaking work so that Martin could stand tall in the world and rise above all others.
Then you know the pride and joy of Hans Luther as he saw his boy destined for greatness. But you also know the pressure that comes with that. The pressure on Martin Luther, that is. He was on the spot to perform. He was on the spot to produce. His father expected great things of him. So he sent him to law school. But one day on the way back to school from visiting his parents, something shook Martin up. He got caught in a storm that could have meant life or death. His life flashed before his eyes. It’s amazing, isn’t it, how near death experiences get your attention? Give you a new perspective? Change the way you see things around you? It did for Martin Luther, and as a result he began to march to the beat of his own drum.
He dropped out of law school to go into the monastery and become a monk. You talk about disappointing his father! Is this what he had slaved for all those years in the copper mine? So that his son could run off, shave his head, put on a robe, and assume the position of a holy man? I don’t think so! Actually, Martin never really expected anything different from his father. He was regularly disappointing him. Never quite measured up. Becoming a monk was just the latest in a long string in a long list of failures. Luther experienced nothing else, from his earthly father . . . or his heavenly Father.
But once Martin entered the monastery, he set out to prove them different. He set out to prove that he was not a failure, that he was not a bum, that he was not a dud. He poured himself into the monk business, nose to the ol’ spiritual grindstone. Religious elbow grease was flying all around. But he could never escape the feeling that, in the end, he was a disappointment to all around him and above him. He went to confession so often that his confessor told him to stop coming around so much, because every time Luther “cut the cheese” he felt the need to go to confession.
Luther was down on himself in the worse way. Nothing he did or touched was ever good enough. Some of you know that I have a brother who was a band director. He is a gifted musician and teacher. From a very early age he knew what he wanted to be when he grew up. In 7th grade he joined the band, picked the trumpet as his instrument, and began his career. He practiced so much in our small house that my father said “Son you are doing great. But I think you will find it sounds much better when you practice into the closet.” My brother became the best high school trumpet player in Texas and later the best band director in Texas. He was driven to excel. It was his goal to have the best bands in the country, in the universe. And they were. Award winning, jaw-dropping, ovation-getting, tear-provoking, CD-recording performances. No one was better. But he didn’t believe it. They were never quite good enough for him, because, as he tells it, he was never quite good enough. One thing he says about his days band directing was that he needed his bands to be the best so that he could feel good about himself. He had this “ideal self” that he was trying to be, but always fell short.
This was Martin Luther’s struggle. Like my brother, he was trying to become his “ideal self.” And with it, came impossible expectations. Christianity in his day thought it knew exactly what it meant to be a good Christian, what it meant to be acceptable to the heavenly Father, what it took to be claimed by the Father. It was spelled-out, written-down, and passed-around. Everyone was expected to know it, agree to it, and sign-off on it. If you don’t, there will be hell to pay.
This struggle drove Luther to a crisis, where he hated everything about his life. He hated himself. And he hated God. How could God ever love him when he fell so short all the time? And how could Luther ever love a God who always was disappointed in him?
But then something happened. He was studying the Bible, today’s second reading, in fact. As he read it he began to hear something different. These words had a different cadence, a different rhythm. And they freed him from trying to live up to other’s expectations. That’s why the gospel reading from today is always read on Reformation Sunday. In Luther’s life, God broke through the chains that had bound him in misery. God freed Luther and released him to walk to the beat of a different drum, to the beat of freedom in Christ. And the world has never been the same.
Jesus frees you and me from having to slavishly live up to some ideal version of your self. Frees you from having to live according to other’s expectations. Frees you to live according the rhythm of his beat in your life. Where forgiveness and love prevail.
May the beat of Christ’s love move your feet in new directions. May the rhythm of his grace carry you to new places. And may the world around you never be the same.
See Steve Jobs Stanford Commencement Speach 2005.
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