pdf127

pdf126

(My Father was born in 1897, so that would be 111 years ago. He died in 1977.)

Family Sayings, Mostly from my Father:

1. „Wenn es Heute regnet, wird das Leder billiger.“

(„Wenn es Häute regnet, wird das Leder billiger.“)

When you get it: „Nun ist der Groschen gefallen.“ (“Now the coin dropped.”)

2. „So lange diese Rose blüht, wird uns kein Geld verwelken.“ (“So long as this cherry blossoms, no money of ours will wilt.”)(My father said this when he lit up a cigar.) Maybe this is just poetic. I don’t yet understand it.

3. „Ein Kater haben wir gehabt; eine Katze wollten wir nicht mehr haben.“ (On discovering we had a female cat, while we thought it was a male.) I never got this one either.

4. „Wat der Buer nit kennt, dat fret er nit.“ (“What a farmer or peasant doesn’t know he won’t eat.”)(When we refused to eat some novel food.)

5. „Schieb ‘leine.” (“You can push it by yourself!”)(This was said when one became angry at the other, while as refugees, we were pushing the wagon with all our belongings.)

6. Greek: Ής ήδώνης, Ής ήδώνης, Ής έστιν. (Long A and O: Has hadonas, has hadonas, has estin.) (“Hedonism” comes from the Greek word.)

(“What happiness, what happiness, this life is!”)

7. Your room is a TOHU WA BOHU! (complete chaos)

8. „Wenn nicht Heute, denn Morgen, Übermorgen ganz gewiss.“

(When we were caught procrastinating.) (“If not today, then tomorrow; the day after tomorrow I’ll do it for sure!”)

9. „Abends wird der Fauler fleissig.“ (Putting things off) (“In the evening lazy people get busy.”)

10. „Arbeit macht das Leben süss!“ (The only part we heard. When our relatives from Germany visited us we heard the second part of the saying: “Aber Faulheit stärkt die Glieder.”) (“Work sweets up your life. Laziness strengthens up your limbs.”)

11. Fritz Reuter: “Morgen, Herr Av’kourt. Mi is do wat passiert….“ (This is the beginning of a funny narrative poem that my father always began when we appeared in the morning.) (“G’mornin, Sir Advocate, something just happened to me!”)

„I know you had a blow-out!“ said my little brother, who didn’t realize that the poem was about being bitten by a dog. (I’ve translated this poem from the Mechlenburg Plattdeutsch and it’s in my poems now.)

12. „Wat recht ist, muss auch recht bestahn

Un sollt’ die Welt in Stücken gahn.”

(“What’s right is right so right increases

or else this world will go to pieces.”)

(From the same poem)

13. „Ach, er hat die Welt belogen,

dass die Erd-achs sich verbogen.”

(“Oh he lied to the world,

Till the earth’s axes bent and curled.”) (From another poem about having been to the North Pole [or the moon?] I believe.)

14. „Immer heiter, Gott hilft weiter.” (“Keep being cheerful, God will keep on being helpful.”)

15. „Da gehen die A,B,C, Schützen.” (On seeing the little folk going to school.) (“There go the little hunters chasing the A, B, C’s.”) (The little ones learning the alphabet.)

16. „Wenn es dem Esel zu gut geht, dann geht er auf das Eis und bricht ein Bein.” (”If things go too well for a donkey, it goes skating on ice and breaks a leg.“)

17. „De Kreih, de kreeg een vun de achtersten Been” (A refrain: “and the crow gets one of the hind legs.”)

To find this song see: http://www.plattmaster.de/matten.htm

18. „Sing man tau, sing man tau,

von Herrn Pastor sien Kauh, jau, jau.
Sing man tau, sing man tau,

von Herrn Pastor sien Kauh!”

To see this hilarious song in Plattdeutsch that my father used to sing, see: http://www.plattmaster.de/kauh.htm

19. Fritz Reuter: „Wat den einen sin Uhl is den andern sin Nachtigal.“ (“What for one is an owl, is for another a nightingale.”)

20. Sag mal: „Der Hahn, der Hahn und nicht die Henne!“ (“Say after me, the rooster the rooster and not the hen.”) (A way of confusing children. They think they have to repeat the whole phrase, but he wants them not to repeat “the hen.”)

21. „Vorsicht ist die Mutter der porzelan Kiste.“ (“Caution is the mother of a porcelain object.”)

22. „Nun ist der Groschen gefallen.” (When it finally clicked and someone understood something.) (“Now the coin dropped.”)

23. „Wenn zwei dasselbe tun, dann ist es doch nicht dasselbe.“ (“If two people do the same thing, then it is not the same thing.”)

24. “Is it heavy? Take two trips!” (Whenever someone carried something heavy, my father would use this expression. Now if what you carried consisted of many items, it made sense. But he used it, when it was one heavy item, which merely spelled double the work.) Evidently they said it in the Ambridge, PA steel factory in which my father and others had to carry heavy pipes to the railroad cars. The blood would spurt from some of the worker’s shoulders, the pipes were so heavy.

25. “Warum leichter machen, wenn’s schwerer geht?” (“Why make things easy, when they can be more difficult?”) The idea for this expression might come from Kierkegaard.

We used it in a superficial way, while working together. Like we were putting heating pipes under the house and while one of my brothers was chiseling a hole into one of the rafters for a pipe, the other said, “Cut that out!” wanting him to stop. But the first said, “That’s what I’m trying to do!”

Kierkegaard had a much more subtle meaning. We always try to make life easier for ourselves, but the authentic life is full of difficulties and suffering. In addition, self-knowledge, so hard to attain, is avoided, for the most part, by us all.

26. Yehi Or, va yehi Or. (Hebrew) “Let there be light and there was light.” (While switching on the light in a room.)

27. „Mit Vielem kommt man aus; mit Wenig hält man Haus.“

(“One barely makes it with a lot. With a little, you can run the household.”)

28. „Hättest Du geschwiegen, wärst Du Professor geblieben.”

(“If you had kept quiet, everyone would still think you were a professor.”)

29. „Der Mensch denkt, aber Gott lenkt.” (“A Human being reflects, but God directs.”)

30. „An Gottes Segen ist alles gelegen.” (“Everything depends on God’s blessings.”)

31. „Zu gut sein ist halb Leichtsinn.” (“To be overly good is half thoughtless.”)

32. „Was macht’s? Nachher die Sintflut!” (“What of it? The deluge will come after my life!”) The saying has classical roots, but mostly today gets ascribed to King Louis XV of France (1710-1774): “Après moi le déluge.”

See http://tradicionclasica.blogspot.com/2006/01/expression-aprs-moi-le-dluge-and-its.html

33. „,Guten Morgen’ segt der Buer wenn er in die Stadt kommt.” (“A peasant, a farmer, is supposed to say, ‘Good Morning’ when he enters the city.”) My father said this if we failed to say “Good Morning” when we came down and joined the family in the morning. In my imagination, I see a farmer in his wagon coming into the Holzentor in Lübec.

34. „Aller Anfang ist schwer.” (“All new beginnings are difficult.”)

35. „Mit Sorgen und mit Grämen und mit selbsteigner Pein

lässt Gott sich garnichts nehmen, es muss erbeten sein.“ („With groans and self castigation, we won’t get anywhere with God. We’ll only receive it by prayer.”)

This is a beautiful Paul Gerhardt verse from his song: „Befiehl du deine Wege.” Charles Wesley has a translation of some verses of this song in the old red Service Book and Hymnal, # 579, but not of this verse. What is so daunting in Gerhardt’s verses is the acrostic, where the first word of every verse reads: “Commit your way to the Lord, trust in Him, He’ll do it all.” Psalm 37:5. To work on it a bit:

“With groans and heavy grieving, self-torture and despair,

we will not be receiving, what God only grants by prayer.”

36. „Studiere nur und raste nie, du wirst es nicht begreifen. Ende aller Philosophie, ist dass wir galuben müssen.”

(Keep on studying and do not rest. But after all our Philosophy we end up having to believe.)

37. „Wer einen Pfennig nicht ehrt, ist einen Taler nicht wert.” (“Whoever doesn’t value a penny will also not be worthy of a dollar.”) I thank Priscilla for this one!

38. „Du hast kein Sitzefleisch!“ (How to translate that? “You have no flesh to sit on!”Father would say this when we squirmed on a chair and could not remain still and seated.

39. „Ich muss mal gehen wo der Kaiser selbst zu Fuss geht.“ (“I have to go, where the kaiser himself has to walk and do it himself,“) that is, go to the bathroom.

40. My father would stroke his mustache and say, „Nur eine Kleinigkeit!” (“Just a detail!”) I’m not sure what he meant by it.

41. „Noch einen Spatenstich!“ (“Dig one spade more!“) My father always said this when my youngest brother was digging the garden and he didn’t dig a full row.

42. „Acht Tage Schwanheim!“ (“Eight days of Schwanheim!“) Whenever we did not like our food and complained or did not eat it all, someone would say that. We starved so much in that UNRA camp in Schwanheim, that baby James died, and we would eat anything we could get our hands on. I remember eating apple peals thrown into a hole behind the guard house at the entrance of the camp.

43. „Nichts ist schwerer zu ertragen als eine Reihe von guten Tagen.“ (“Nothing is harder to endure than a series of good days.”) This saying my father said often. It’s a little like Lake Woebegone.

44. „Studenten Jahren sind keine Herre Jarhen.“ (“Student years are not the years of Lords.”) My father said this to emphasize that being a student was hard work, poverty, drudgery, slavery. In graduate school they said, “If you live like a lawyer when you are a student, then you’ll live like a student when you’re a lawyer.” That referred to taking out student loans. What happens if you take out such loans and you remain unemployed? Sigh!

45. „Ich bin ein geplagter Eheman!“ (“I am a tormented husband!“) When my father had to do housework or deal with criticism from my mother. I say this to myself when I do the dishes.

46. „Andrer Leuten Fehler sind angenehme Lehrer.” (I’m not sure of the wording on this one.) (“The mistakes of others are precious instructors.”)

The mistakes of others are pleasant teachers, because they suffer and we get instruction from them.

47. „Wie ist dein Wettkampf gegangen?“

„Sehr gut. Bald lag er oben, bald lag ich unten.“

“How did your wrestling match go?”

“It went very well. Sometimes he was on top

and sometimes I was on the bottom.”

(This was one my father’s jokes.)

48. (Another one:) A student comes into his dorm room, while the other is already in bed.

„Du, schloppst Du?“

„Nein, ich schlopp nicht.“

„Kannst Du mir ein Dollar Pumpen?“

„Nein, nein. Ich schlopp.“

“Hey, are you sleeping?“

“No, I’m not.“

“Can you lend me a dollar?“

“No, no, I’m sleeping!“

49.  A beggar has a sign saying,

“Please help me. I’m deaf.”

A fellow, putting something into his cup, asks,

“How long is it you’ve been deaf?”

“Since my birth.” He answers. „Seid meiner Geburt.“

50. „Er /sie hält kein Blatt vor dem Mund!“ 
            (This means a person is very outspoken, blunt.)

51. „Bestellt aber nicht abgeholt.” (“Ordered but not picked up.”)

(When people or children just stand there somewhat forlorn and in disarray.

52. „Nun hat die liebe Seele Ruh!“

(“Now finally your soul will get some rest.”)

When you finally received something you really wanted, but my father resisted your getting it until he gave in.

53. „Bist Du nicht recht beim Trost?“ (“Are you crazy?“)

54. „Da bleibt einem die Spuche weg!“ (“That takes away a body’s spit!”)

i.e., it’s so outrageous, you can’t believe it.

55. „Von links nach rechts ist schlecht, von rechts nach links gelingst.“

(“From left to right is blight, from right to left is deft.”)

Evidently this is about superstition. When a cat crossed your roadfrom the right to the left,
what you set out to do would be successful. When the cat went from left to right, you would not,
so you might as well return home.

56. „Bist du nicht ein Strampelman?” One of Mom’s little sayingsto babies, when she exercised them

and they threw their arms and kicked their legs with delight. How would I translate “Strampelman?”

57.   „Hop, hop Reiter,
Wenn er fällt - ‚er’ schreit er.
Fällt er in den Graben,
so fressen ihn die Raben,
Fällt er in den Sumpf,
dann macht der Reiter plumps.“

      This was a poem my mother recited while bouncing one of her children up and down on her knees and then letting
them fall backward, holding their hands, of course,for the infant's thrill, which was pure delight.
It is of course problematic in content, like “Rock-a-bye baby”.“If he falls in the ditch, then the ravens will eat him!
”Maybe part of it is mindless rhyming („Reim dich oder fress dich!”)when one rhymed simply for the sake of rhyming,
 even if it made no sense. 

58. “Just think that everybody out there has cabbage heads.” Mom said this when we did public speaking and had stage-fright.

59. „Das sind Geschichten des Lebens, die im Tode nicht mehrvorkommen.“ My father would say.

(These are stories in life that no longer take place in death.)

60. „Hunger treibst ‘rein.” (I only eat it because I’m so hungry. It was not a meal that my father liked, particularly.)

61. „Das ist mein Leibgericht.” (That is the meal I love the most. It’s food that keeps the body and soul together. That’s another saying.)

62. „Willst du eine Ohrfeige?” („Do you want your ears boxed?” or “Do you want a slap in the face?”)

63. „Knüppelst Dir hinter den Ohren?” („Are you trying to get your ears cuffed?“ or “Are you trying to get a slap in the face?” or „Der hat es knüppeldich hinter den Ohren!” (To my mother this meant the person could not be trusted.)

64. „Es braucht nicht so viel Philifanz.” (“It does not have to be so ornate.”)

65. „Bumalacka!” This meant „Goodbye!“

66. „Du verrücktes Huhn!” (When one of my sisters were being funny and mischievous, my other would say, “You crazy hen!”

67. „Der hat was am Schlawickel!” (That person was up to something.) „Schlamauck” „Schlamauckel” (This referred to chaos or noise.) A Schlamingel referred to a very mixed group of people. A Schlingel was a Bengel, both words meaning a brat or mischievous boy.

68. „Bist du meschuge?” (“Are you crazy?”)

69. „Weine nicht! Deine Mutter wird doch kein Soldat. ”

(“Don’t cry! They can’t draft your mother and make her a soldier.”)

70. „Witte West und nichts im Bauch!” (“Wearing a white vest, but with an empty stomach.”)

71. „Icke, ditte, Kiekemol, Ogen, Flehsch, und Behne.” A little Berlin street urchin would say.

„Nein, mein Kind, so heisst das nicht. Augen, Fleisch, und Beine!“ the teacher corrected him.

72. One of my sisters to be funny would say, “Hit me on the head with a frying pan and call me Dick Tracy!”

73. „Der hat Köpschen!” (“That person is really smart!”)

74. „Sie hat die Ruhe weg!” (That person is really laid back, mellow, or low key.)

75. „Na, so was!” or „So was lebt nicht!” or „Na, so was lebt und Schiller musste sterben!” (You don’t say! This is an exclamation. “That can’t be possible!” (“Now something like that exists, while Schiller had to die!”)

76. „Ach, Kwatsch!” This was my mother’s way of saying, (“That’s nonsense!)

77. „Die hat was auf dem Herzen.” My mother would say that about someone who talked in circles because she did not dare to bring up a request. (“She has something on her heart.”)

78. One of my sisters would say, “Ich muss auf die Klo.” My mother would correct her, „Es heist das Klo.” Sometimes they would call the toilette, die Klikla.

79. The Berlin dialect places j’s in for the g’s: „Eine jutte jebratene Janz ist eine jutte Jabe Jottes!“ “A well roasted goose is a good gift of God.”

80. „Allet Käse, ist mir wurscht!” It was a pun I would say in Berlin. “Everything is cheese but its sausage to me.” But “cheese” meant “rotten” and Wurscht came from “Es ist mir wurst-pip-egal! “It doesn’t matter to me in the slightest!” Thus, (“Everything is rotten, but it doesn’t matter to me!”)

81. That’s so sour, it’ll pull the holes in your socks together!

82. „Owa, owa, schreit der Bauer. Was sind die Äpfel sauer.” (“Ouch! These apples are sour!”)

83. „Willst du ein Apfel? Puff. Da fliegt er!” If you wanted to tease a child, you asked if he wanted an apple. You blew up your cheeks, poked them, and pointed upward, (“There it goes, flying up there!”)

84. „Spurlos verschwunden!” (“It disappeared without a trace!”) Looking For car keys, for example, that you can’t find in the house.

85. „Ein schöner Rücken kann auch entzücken!“ (When a man is transfixed by a woman’s beautiful back).

86. „Ich werde mich von innen bekiecken.” (When my father was about to take a nap, “I have to take a look at myself on the inside.”)

87. „Nun, husch die Lerche!” (“Now, hurry up!”)

88. „Ein Wetter wie in Schleswig-Holstein!” (On a very rainy day, “A weather like in Schleswig-Holstein!”)

89. “All roads lead to Georgetown!” When we were driving to the beach in Massachusetts, usually to Salisbury or Crane’s Beach, we wanted my father to make a stop at a Wasmacco Ice cream stand in Georgetown where the scoops of ice cream were extra large and the ice cream truly delicious.)

90. “What a rigmarole!” This is actually not the private language of our family. It is in the dictionary meaning “an elaborate or complicated procedure.”

91. „Kannst Du schweigen?” (“Can you keep a secrret?” My father would ask when we wanted to know some secret. Very quietly he would whisper in our ear, “Me, too.”) „Ich auch?” That was very frustrating!
92. „Komm mal gut hin mit deinem Koffer!” (This was an angry statement: “Hope you make it with your baggage case!”)

First Sunday after Christmas, December 28^th, 2008

Isaiah 61:10-62:3, Psalm 148, Gal 4:4-7, Luke 2: 22-40

“When did you stop believing?”

—————————————————————————————————————

Isaiah is very poetic. I thought I would continue along his lines:

I will greatly rejoice in Jesus my Lord,

My whole being will exalt in my God,

For Christ has clothed me with garments of grace,

Given me a suit of salvation,

Covered me with a robe of righteousness:

as a bridegroom decks himself with a garland

and as a bride adorns herself with jewels.

Yes, because at the birth of Jesus,

the bridegroom from heaven

has come to the bride of the earth

to take her to his Father’s House

for the marriage feast that has no end. Amen.

That is another way to speak about Christmas. Because of God’s great love for the world, God sent Jesus Christ, the Son of God, to fulfill all God’s promises once again. We of course always break our marriage vows, but God is faithful. [This part was not preached.]

—————————————————————————————————————–

Today is the fourth day of Christmas. It’s four-calling-birds day of the twelve days of Christmas. With our lessons this year, we have not stayed with the church calendar. On Christmas Eve, we had the Epiphany lesson from Matthew, and on Christmas Day we had the Christmas Eve lesson. The actual day of Christ’s birth on the calendar does not necessarily match the actual day Christ is born for us, born in the cradle of our hearts, which is the most important thing. In any case, all our lessons are filled with the glad tidings of Christmas.

This year we also started singing Christmas carols early in Advent. Let’s not allow the needs of the department stores and their need for us to do Christmas shopping, undermine the reason we sing Christmas carols. I believe it is better to wait with singing Christmas carols until at least the fourth Advent and then keep on singing them after Christmas until Epiphany, little Christmas on January 6^th. When we sing them all before Christmas, we may be singing them for the sake of Christmas shopping. When we sing them after Christmas we can sing them for the sake of Jesus’ birth:

For unto us a child is born,

Unto us a son is given,

And the government shall be upon his shoulders,

And he shall be called wonderful counselor,

the Mighty God, everlasting Father, Prince of Peace (Isaiah 9:6). Jesus, the light of the world!

Those are Jesus’ throne names, because he is the long awaited Son of Promise who will reign on the throne of David forever. Just like other kings, the Pharaoh, for example, had them, I think Isaiah gave these four throne names to Jesus, the Messiah.

In the reign of Jesus Christ we await a whole new world, because God loved the world so much, he sent his only son, not only to die for us, but also to be born for us, so that we should not perish but receive everlasting life. When we allow Christmas to be used merely to jump start our economy, the glad tidings can become lost. Not that this by-product of the self-giving of God that carries us away to become much more self-giving ourselves, is so bad. It only becomes a problem if it causes us to forget the real message of Christmas or if this real message becomes buried. Christmas is about the promises of God to mend this torn and tattered world and bring consolation to Israel by the Messiah’s light to all the nations, and that by our renewal.

So we dare not let the world bury the real message of Christmas. To hear John three-sixteen once again, “For God so loved the world that he sent his only son” to die for us and that means Jesus, the Christ child had to be born for us too. Thus the Gospels of Luke and Matthew include Jesus’ birth narratives. So to reword John three-sixteen once again and also use the words of Isaiah: “For God so loved the world that he sent his only son” to be born for us, as a child to be given us, so that all God’s promises to us would become fulfilled. “Believe and receive it” as Luther used to say. Believe it and you’ll have it. “Don’t believe it and you won’t receive it.”

There is a billboard that a visitor in our pastors’ bible study told us about. All the cars passing by it could read: “When did you stop believing?” Now what that means to me is, “When did you stop believing God’s promises to you?” After a time children stop believing in Santa Clause. His name comes from St. Nicholas, who was a bishop of Myra, which is now in Turkey. (The end of the name, “Nicholaus” in German gets shortened into “Clause.”) He was a good hearted and generous old saint, who was known for giving gifts in secret. Of course our stories have made him live at the North Pole, given him a sleigh and eight tiny reindeer, that, of course, can fly, and given him Rudolph “the most famous reindeer of all.”

These stories all have a point to them and they are not harmful to children. The way Santa gives gifts to everyone points to the way God gives each and everyone of us gifts, and God’s gifts are not only spiritual. The story of Rudolph is another ugly duckling story, where the ugly duckling becomes a swan and the rejected Rudolph becomes the most famous reindeer of all. These stories are not harmful unless, when as children we stop believing them, we also think the birth of Jesus is another story like them.

No way! Do not stop believing in Jesus. That story is real. I recited the Christmas story from Luke last year in Philadelphia and a woman said, “You told that story like you believed it!” Well, I do and I hope you all do too. The story of Jesus is true and it brings God’s reality into ours. Jesus is born for us, which means that we receive a new birth as his sisters and brothers, and God becomes our very Father and the Virgin Mary becomes our very mother, and the world becomes marvelously changed in the twinkling of God’s eye, to a place where angels descend and ascend over shepherds that keep watch over God’s people by night so that no harm befalls them, so that they grow and increase, not so much with money and wealth, but with an increase in maturity of faith, hope, and love.

The precious carol, “O Little Town of Bethlehem” needs to get into your hearts in this little congregation called Bethlehem. In the fourth verse, Phillips Brooks wrote:

O Holy Child of Bethlehem

Descend to us, we pray

Cast out our sin and enter in,

Be born in us today.

Jesus was the first born and that is why Mary and Joseph present him in the temple. By the way, they must have been poor because they could not afford to offer a lamb, but merely “a pair of turtle doves or two small pigeons.” But as you see their poverty has made us very rich, rich in grace, rich in God’s favor.

When Jesus is born in us, then we all receive the first born status in him, and what’s more, growing and increasing in the measure of our faith, we ascend with the angels into the nobility of the spirit. We become princes and princesses, kings and queens; and the angels carry us higher into becoming the priesthood of all believers, where we are allowed to stand before God and intercede and pray for others; and we are carried even higher still into being Christs for others and becoming those who live out of the strength of God.

But love makes us descend with the angels once more down in the all-powerful and humble love of God through Christ, through his priesthood, through nobility, down to become the servants of the very least of these, always willing and able to help – able to change the diapers of a baby or even those of an elderly man, bed-ridden in a nursing home; able to bend down and tie the shoe laces of a little child; able to serve the hungry and homeless getting their meals in a food line. And you won’t only see the poor there anymore. You will also see those who have recently lost their homes and their jobs. The angels even carry us all the way down into real suffering for others, where our lives become endangered because of our witness and service to the poor. Even way down there rejected and experiencing death threats, we rejoice in our suffering, because we know we are baptized and therefore we know to whom we belong. We are God’s children and belong to God because of the birth of Christ for us and there is no way that we can be separated and taken outside of God and God’s love.

When people have stopped believing the real Christmas message, if they have thrown out their faith in God, disparage the birth of our Christ and the promise of the redemption of the whole world, then they have thrown out the baby with the wash.

You’ll notice that Luke always speaks of men and then women or children in his gospel. He makes it a real pattern. Thus he is speaking of the sons and daughters of God, the children of God. First he records the words of Simeon, but then those of Anna too. Both are presented as prophets, the man and the woman. Look how the angel Gabriel is sent to Zechariah, but also to Mary. The parable about how a shepherd loses one sheep out of a hundred and sets out searching for the lost one, is followed by a woman losing a coin and who then turns the whole house upside down to find it. Luke’s Gospel celebrates men, women, and children and illustrates St. Paul’s verse: “in Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek, male nor female, rich or poor,” we are all one. Because God’s eye is on the sparrow, we are the apple of God’s eye, whether we are from one race or another, one sex or the other, of one sexual orientation or the other, whether we are poor, middle class, or rich, we are all one and hear the glad tidings proclaimed by St. Luke: that because of the birth of Jesus for us, God is the Father of us all and we have now become his beloved children.

In the oneness that comes about in the birth of Christ for us and his growth and increasing maturity in us, we make our ascent with the angels into an increasing power of faith and make our descent in the increasing power of our love and service.

That’s why Simeon exclaims:

Now you dismiss your servant in peace,

because mine eyes have seen thy salvation,

which you have prepared

before the face of all peoples:

A light to enlighten the Gentiles

and for the glory of your people Israel.

Simeon had been promised that he would not die until he had seen the Messiah.

Then in the words of the Prophet Anna,

Praises to God for we will all look

to this child for the redemption of Jerusalem.

At this time Israel and the Gaza strip are going to war again. Very ineffectual Hamas rockets flying into Israel, deadly accurate Israeli bombs killing Hamas militants as well as other Palestinians. There is no peace in Jerusalem yet. But we need not talk of the physical place, which may end up the last place redeemed. Bethlehem could become Jerusalem, if it became a capital of faith.

In a similar vein we exclaim:

Praise God, because our eyes will see Bethlehem become so much in love with God’s world and all the people living around this church and where we live that we will initiate one mission after another for them, because they are the people that God loves so much. And this church will become filled with children. There will not be enough seats in the church for the crowds of people who want to know and love God. Bethlehem will have to start daughter congregations, so that all those whom God is calling can become Part of the glorious number.

So don’t stop believing. “Believe and receive.” Seeing is not believing. Believing is that kind of seeing, which grasps the marvelous things that God can do through his Son, Jesus Christ, when he is born unto us. Amen.

This is a sketch that Joshua drew while Nora and I were relating Zapata and Krey family narratives. Mark thought it was a man in a stop sign who suddenly raised his right hand in victory and all the fragments exploded outward from there. Joshua thought the right hand was a victory sign and all the family fragments came together pressing in from around it. Do you have any interpretations?

Fourth Advent, December 21, 2008

Bethlehem Lutheran Church, Oakland

2 Sam 7:1-11, 16 Psalm Luke 1:46b-55 Rom 26:26-38 Luke 1:26-38

Our Forever King

In our first lesson we heard the promise that God made to David that his house should rule forever. In Advent we celebrate the fact that God kept that promise, God fulfilled that promise through a lowly and humble, I would have to say little girl, because commentaries claim she could have been twelve or thirteen years old! God does not see those who consider themselves something, who are great in their own eyes and place themselves along-side God or feel themselves to be above others. God’s eye is on the sparrow, that means God sees the humble and lowly and when we are way down there, God sees us best of all, that’s according to Martin Luther. Luther once compared himself to great theologians, saying if he would be allowed to mix himself, poor mouse-dirt with pepper.[1] That is pretty humble. “God brings down the powerful from their thrones and lifts up the lowly” (Luke 1:52).

That’s why we sing, “I’m so glad Jesus lifted me!” But how can Jesus lift us, when we won’t get off the high horse we are riding? “God opposes the arrogant but gives grace to the humble” (James 4.6).

“So we have to be as humble as the dust,” in the words of the Mahatma Gandhi, “in order to do the work of the truth.” That is the forever way in the forever Kingdom under the forever King, and this lowly virgin, Mary is his mother, the one chosen to bear Jesus.

In the world of that day and most often still in this one, as my sisters used to say, “It’s a man’s world!” The men were important and women were not. History is filled with the exploits of men and not one man could have lived, moved, or had any being if they had not been born from a woman: but they wrote history as if women did not exist.

Thus it is beautiful the way the Gospel features women here and even reckons time, measures time, by the pregnancy of Elizabeth, Mary’s kinswoman. It says that the angel Gabriel comes to Mary in the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, that is, the end of the second trimester.

Now we just hear another verse in the same song of the forever Kingdom. “O Lord, hear our humble-cry.” Elizabeth, like Sarah of old, was barren and already quite aged. To be a woman was lowly enough, as orthodox men prayed in those days, “Thank you God that I was not born a woman!” But on top of that, Elizabeth was barren, which was a real stigma, an embarrassment because she could not even fulfill the reason for her existence, as most men thought in that day. So she was considered a failure and even all the women looked down upon her. Not God. God fulfills the promise made to David through her, just like through Hannah of old, who was the mother of Samuel: because God makes the barren woman the happy mother of a house-full of children and the mother of many children, lonely and forlorn.

When the young Mary asks the angel Gabriel how she could become pregnant, if she did not know any man, Gabriel gives her the sign of Elizabeth: the barren woman, your kinswoman, your relative, is pregnant. And if God can open the womb of a barren woman already way along in years, “then nothing is impossible for the word of God to do. The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you, and therefore the child born of you, will be holy and will be called Son of God.”

That Elizabeth should become pregnant was a miracle. That Mary should become pregnant with the Holy One of Israel was a greater miracle still.

Mary surrenders and submits completely in the way of a virgin, to use that definition of a virgin. “Here I am. Let it be with me according to your word.” Let me become what you have called me to be, the mother of God! Mother Mary is a model of faith for us, even greater than father Abraham. She shows us how to submit to God and say, “Let me become what you have called me to be, that is a child of God, and do whatever you have called me to do, O God, no matter the obstacles.”

You can’t take faith to mean merely believing a few statements about God to be true. Faith is dreadful struggle a person goes through, trusting God through it all. After all, the messenger of God is telling Mary that she will be pregnant. Bringing a baby into this world is hard enough, but she is going to get into real trouble with her betrothed, Joseph, who is waiting the year before he will take her in the wedding parade to his own house. And that might be the end of her wedding and her marriage. Joseph could reject her and she could also forfeit her life for this pregnancy outside of wedlock.

But the righteous Joseph covered her with his righteousness and God spoke to Joseph in dreams just like God spoke in dreams to the old Joseph, who ruled Egypt under the Pharaoh. Both Josephs were guided by God through their dreams. Thus Mary and Joseph called their child Jesus, just like Elizabeth and Zechariah called their son, John.

The sign that the angel gave Zechariah, when he did not believe God’s word, was worse than the one he gave Mary. When Zechariah asks Gabriel, how he could know that his promise would be fulfilled, “because I am an old man and my wife, too, is getting on in years,” the angel replies, “I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and bring you this good news. But now because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their time, you will become mute, unable to speak, until the day these things occur” Luke 1:20). Imagine that! Zechariah is in the middle of a service and he has to motion and make signs to the congregation.

It is quite a punishment to make a pastor mute. Speaking is what a pastor is about and usually they love to speak the most. Taking away a pastor’s speaking disables the pastor completely from carrying out the service.

My sister Johanna has ALS or Lou Gehrig’s disease and she can no longer speak. She helps herself by writing her words on a pad and letting us read them. She can be really funny too. When Tirzah, my other sister and she went to a doctor’s appointment, they showed me pretty nearly all the food in the house. “Look, you can eat this or that. Look at this.”

“Don’t worry, don’t worry, I’ll fix something.” I said.

So Hanna wrote, “Don’t starve to death for heaven’s sake!” When I tried to figure out if I forgot to visit anybody in my large family, she wrote, with a twinkle in her eye, “You’ve seen me, who else matters?” She can still laugh and make us laugh, that’s for sure.

A niece of mine brought her a computer upon which she could type her words and whenever she hit space, a voice would say the word. She’s a fast typist so it worked quite well. She could choose a man’s voice, a beautiful woman’s voice, an angry voice; nineteen voices all together. Imagine, she can no longer speak and now she has nineteen voices to choose from!

Zechariah, too, had to ask for a tablet and he wrote, “His name will be John!” ending the controversy over the name and with that his voice came back. You can read all about that in this first chapter of Luke.

Mary had a far greater struggle in her situation, but she came through and said, “Let it be to me according to your Word.” Like Mary, we also have to place ourselves totally in God’s hands – even going through childbirth, a rejected woman, and even in a stall for animals, when there was no room for them in the inn. What a human being has to go through!

It’s the faith of Mary that we celebrate. It’s the joy that does not count the suffering, as she goes running from Nazareth to the Judean hill town where Elizabeth lived to share the good news with her.

And no matter what we have to go through, let us also say, as we grow older, feel all those aches and pains, take all the hits and experience all our losses, *“Let happen to me what you promised, O God! Yes, we believe what you have promised to us, like Mary did. She was a woman of God’s word, who brought forth, kept, and brought up the Word of God for us, the infant Jesus, Son of God. She did not only have Jesus in her womb, she also pondered the word of God in her heart.

Bethlehem here has become humble and lowly. That gives us the opportunity to be the apple of God’s eye. So let us believe God’s promises to our congregation. Let us surrender and submit to God, just like Elizabeth, just like Mary, just like the city Nazareth, to sing the humble tune once more. “What good could possibly come out of Nazareth?” It was completely insignificant. The town could not even afford a rabbi, but the greatest rabbi ever, was born there because of the faith of Mary. And he was more than a rabbi. He was the forever King of the forever Kingdom in which the forever people say, “Here we are Lord: take our lives and carry out your promises, because we are your servants and we will be forever yours. Amen.

Goeser responded: “This ‘despair with the self‘ is what I consider the quintessence of existentialism. Later in Lutheran orthodoxy, what Luther had was lost to a kind of generalized experience, and Pietism went over into affect which Luther, however, never disconnected from intellect.“

“We Lutherans often do not understand Luther, because our familiarity with his words, somehow obscures the radical nature of what he says, and we remain in our ‘dogmatic slumbers.‘ Those who criticize him from outside our tradition, have usually never read him – that, of course, goes for many Lutherans as well. They have never read him.“ I offered.

“What we are reading and experiencing here is not just a question of Lutheranism, nor of a question of Luther‘s being German. It is a question of a great thinker dealing with the human condition.“ Prof. Goeser concluded. “Let’s read 50 pages more for next week.”

Dr. Peter D. S. Krey

Some Theses on Luther’s Theology

Pr. Peter D.S. Krey 3/23/2000

* According to Luther, Sadoleto shows his complete ignorance of theology by thinking Psalm 51 is referring to an actual or particular sin. The issue is not sins, but sin. “This is really to be looking at sin, not this or that misdeed, but our whole nature and our universal sin, with all our powers, with all our righteousness and wisdom of the flesh.”[1] Thus Luther insists that at my very best, I am sinful. It is under the presumption of righteousness that sin is concealed.

* Scholastic theology cannot comprehend what Luther is pointing out, because it needs to be grasped by experience. In The Pursuit of Holiness in Late Medieval and Renaissance Religion, Heiko Oberman and Charles Trinkaus point out that scholasticism at this time maintained a divorce between faith and daily experience, and represented a fearful clinging to the authority of the church.[2]

* Scott Hendrix in Luther and the Papacy argues convincingly about Luther’s pastoral theology,[3] but he does not notice that Luther is speaking not only to clergy but consciously and intentionally to the laity. Thus his theology should be characterized as experiential.

* Luther’s theology is not logic driven like scholasticism, but based, surprisingly, on experience!

* Reality is what a person goes through, not just what they know. A corollary: a relationship is much more than an analysis of it.

* One must go through an experience, it requires going through the moments of time, and in the process, a person cannot stay in control. One kind of knowing tries to maintain the illusion of staying in control. Marriage is an apt analogy for experiential knowing: one can never know how it will come out. One cannot participate in reality without experience.

* Oberman argues that Nominalism was the source of Luther’s emphasis on experience.[4]

1. Note his contingency emphasis.

2. Our world, according to Luther, is not a mere reflection and shadow of higher levels of being. Nominalists insisted on the full reality of our experienced world.

3. Ockham slashes away the hierarchy of being, of ideas and concepts, which sheer speculation invented.

4. Nominalism emphasized coordination, not subordination.

* Luther’s Word of God Theology needs to be understood in a new sense. In a Marxist sense words cannot be equated with reality, for example that the word “state” is really the material existence of the state, because materialism requires a separation of word and referent. But for Luther’s creative language, the spirit and the word are one, much like Hegel’s concept of the concrete spirit. The Word of God is the source of all creation, like, mystically speaking, creatures arising out of an abyss. All creation has its source in the Word of God, as the Second Person of the Trinity, but also in the sense of the living voice, the speech of God. In his commentary on Genesis, Luther speaks of God saying “birds” and behold they fly up out of nothing.[5] “[God] does not speak grammatical words; he speaks true and existent realities….we are all words of God….: Thus the words of God are realities and not bare words.”[6]

Luther maintains that God speaks creation into existence:

Here men have differentiated between the uncreated Word and the created word. The created word is brought into being by the uncreated Word. What else is the entire creation than the Word of God uttered by God, or extended to the outside? But the uncreated Word is a divine thought, an inner command which abides in God, the same as God and yet a distinct Person. Thus God reveals Himself to us as the Speaker who has with him the uncreated Word, through whom He created the world and all things with the greatest ease, namely, by speaking.[7]

These citations help to explain Luther’s passages at the end of his commentary on Psalm 51.[8] “The sacrificed ox is a witness of grace, or, so to speak, a ‘working voice’ of gratitude, or a manual gratitude, through which the hand pours out gratitude as through words of action (realibus vocabulis).”[9]

* In that style of the sociology of religion which uses the cultural linguistic method, Luther would be considered to be thinking in unitive language.[10]

* Luther makes a distinction between the Word of God and human words and teachings, to my way of thinking, very hard to follow.[11] He delimits the circumscribed competence of human reason in the mundane realm. Human beings who refuse to recognize these limits make a false ultimate of themselves. In this sense our reason, wisdom, and holiness become confusion and darkness. If the human being accepts the affliction and humiliation of these limits, then there is a realm outside of us.

This realm is extra nos, as Wolfhart Pannenberg, in his lecture, “Luther’s Contribution to Christian Spirituality” pointed out.[12] He underscores the extra nos in that great paragraph from “The Freedom of the Christian Person.” – The person is lifted above herself (to use our language) by faith into God, and descends below herself through love into the neighbor.[13] And thus the person is outside herself, in the faith and love that comes from the Spirit of God, from outside the circumscribed human sphere. When reason, wisdom, and holiness are not made a false ultimate, they recognize that only grace can bring about participation in creation. A false ultimate distorts and destroys God’s continuous creation and justification by faith overcomes this alienation.

* “Then we shall praise the sacrifices which we earlier condemned, and they will please Thee.”[14] Thus the Church is afflicted and humiliated by having been demoted into the human sphere, and it is not at all justified or worthy except by looking up and receiving the marvelous grace of God from the Spirit, extra nos, in the Word of God. With that the Church has undergone reform, so to speak.

Remember, according to Luther, at its very best, humanity is sinful, when it usurps God’s place, and asserts itself as a false ultimate.

Thus what is as sinful as the Holy Church which identifies itself as the Kingdom of God on earth? It may well be the crown of creation. It may well be that canon law, in my early modern period of study, far surpassed the civil law in quality. As an ultimate, however, it becomes the most subtle and severe distortion of God’s creation, and will leave it twisted and evil.

Second Advent, December 7^th 2008

Isaiah 40:1-11 Psalm 85: 1-2, 8-13 2^nd Peter 3:8-15a Mark 1:1-8

Let us pray.

So stir up your power, Oh Lord, and come! Stir up our hearts and come! Oh God, prepare the way for your Son! Amen.

Hearts of Gold, Out in Front, Making the Way

Reread some of these passages with me as if you had never read them. Christ asks us, “Have you never read the Scriptures?” They are full of fiery meaning that changes our hearts.

Start with Isaiah: “Comfort, O comfort, my people says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem.” Did you hear that Odetta died this week? Didn’t she stir our hearts? What kind of suffering fashioned her powerful and penetrating voice? She sang about “laughing just to keep from crying.” “Comfort, comfort ye my people.” Didn’t she prepare the way for many great singers who followed her? But go to verse 6. All people are grass; they are like flowers in the field, when the breath of the Lord blows upon it. But the Word of our God will stand forever!” That’s why we cling to God’s Word.

Now Isaiah is proclaiming a way where there is no way. Jumping back a few verses: a way through the wilderness, from the Babylonian exile back to Jerusalem. Every mountain will be made low, every valley will be lifted up; the rough places will be made smooth. Isaiah is talking about building a road for the people of God out of this exile, this alienation, this strange land. But the “highway to heaven” changes those who walk upon it. The people of the way receive equality, are lifted up to become the children of God, who have heard the promises in the Word of God and know that some day God will rescue us from this land of sorrows, this vale of tears, from this exile, take us through the wilderness, make a dry path through the watery chaos of the sea, a way through death to life, give us a way where there is no way.

Poverty can bite us and hang on like a pit bull. We can become alcoholic and hold onto our bottle like a baby that can’t let go the baby bottle, yes, as old as we are. We can try and try to find a job and then give up. We sometimes face rejection, whichever way we turn. “Comfort, Oh comfort my people; your term is ended. You have received double for your sins.”

God’s Word is the way. Hide inside God’s Word. Have God’s Word inside your heart and God will make a way for you where there is no way.

Reading the beginning of the Bible again, I suddenly realized Adam, Abraham, Jacob, Joseph, and Moses are not the heroes. Nor Eve, Sarah and Hagar, Leah and Rachel, Asanath, Joseph’s wife, nor Zipporah, that of Moses either. The hero of the Bible is Yahweh leading his people. God’s name is too holy to pronounce, so they call Yahweh, Adonai, my Lord. The Lord is over the people in there involved with them, loving them, making a way for them.

Joseph gets chosen to make a way. Yahweh sent him into Egypt out ahead of his family so that he could save all of Egypt from the famine and then bring renewal and forgiveness to all his brothers, one sister too, Dinah.

How was he sent? You remember how he dreams that he will rule one day. All the sheaves in the field bow to him. To get him ready, God sends him to school, the school of hard knocks. Luther called it the School of Sheol, hell, Hades, the Schola Scheola, in Latin. We can just call it, the school of hell. Joseph has to go through hell to prepare a way for the people whom God loves. His brothers want to kill him; then they sell him down the river into slavery. Then a woman falsely accuses him of rape and he has to go down, down, down, into a dungeon. Now Joseph sits in that dungeon and wonders about the promises of God. Would he be executed? We know how it all turns out. Joseph didn’t. How does he keep on trusting God? But he does. Then God lifts him up and finds him ready to show all his children the way. Trusting in God “through it all” is the way. Do you want to be sent by God? You better think twice!

Many are called, but few are chosen, because do you have the heart and the courage? The only way through it is through it. You take a step. You place one foot after the other, and God starts making you righteous. God put Joseph through a wringer! That’s why very few of us are willing.

Thus God says, “I am going to send an angel out in front of you, to guard you on the way, and bring you to the place that I have prepared.” (Ex 23:20).

The last verse of the Psalm says: “Righteousness will go out before him and I will make a path for his steps.” God’s sending makes us righteous, changes our hearts. In the Medieval days, alchemists tried and tried to change lead into gold. In God’s alchemy, our hearts get changed from heavy lead into loving, mellow gold. But it is in the fiery furnace of suffering, going through the school of hard knocks, through the valley of the shadow and through the darkness. That’s until we’re ready to prepare the way, to be out in front of the people, to make a way where there is no way.

Look at the lesson from Peter, verse 10. The Lord comes like a thief in the night. That’s breaking and entering and no alarm system will help. Are you ready? “The heavens will pass away with a loud noise and the elements will be dissolved with fire, and the earth and everything that is done on it will be disclosed.” I would change one word in the next line to clarify it. Make “dissolved” into “resolved.” “Since all these things are to be resolved in this way, what kind of persons ought you to be? You ought to be leading lives of holiness and godliness!” (That’s how I hear these words.)

That way we can be in front of this sorry world and show the people of God the way to the new heavens and the new earth, Peter is talking about.

We have to go through this fire to change our lead-heavy hearts into hearts of shining gold. Those old alchemists never did figure out how to make gold. Do you know that gold is made by the exploding stars called supernovas? A supernova explodes and the elements melt into metals, some of which are gold. Some of that gold from the stars was found in California and started the gold rush; a lot is in the Congo with diamonds and many other rich elements, but the nations around it have been fighting for it and five million people have already been killed. What a sorry world!

That is why Peter speaks of purifying us. Our hearts are purified in God’s fiery star, changed from heavy lead into hearts of molten gold, when God melts the elements with fire.

It’s in that kind of a fire that God fashions the ones sent out ahead of his people to show them the way to peace, the way of sharing, the way to forgiveness.

The one who has the heart of the finest and most precious gold is coming. He was all the way behind us, is present with us, and is out before us, and is the one that went all the way to the cross for us. John said, I baptize with water, he will baptize you in the Holy Spirit. I am not worthy to untie his shoelaces.” He said, to put it into our words.

If you read the lesson of Mark with me carefully, you will notice something remarkable. “In the beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God: See I am sending a messenger ahead of you to prepare the way.” Notice that John the Baptist has not been mentioned yet.[1] This is the beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ that we are being invited to participate in, because it is not finished. Jesus was sent to us by God to go ahead of us, a sending that he lived up and down Calvary’s Mountain, ending up on the cruel rails of the cross, to become our righteous Branch, to be our righteousness, going before us.

We are in the Advent of the birth of our King. Isaiah shouts, “See the Lord comes with might, and his arm rules for him, his reward is with him, and his recompense is before him” (Isaiah 40:10).

Who is this Jesus Christ? Who is this Son of God? Do you see the way Mark starts his Gospel? What does it mean that he is beginning the good news? Usually good news spelled the news of the victory of a king, that of Caesar Augustus, for example. Thus we could read it this way: “It is the beginning of the victory of Jesus, the Anointed, the Son of God.”[2] Do you have the heart, the courage to join Christ? Mostly we have to face just the opposite of what we expect.

It is the voice of Jesus now crying in the wilderness. He is making straight the way of the Lord. Jesus is proclaiming that God’s will be done here on earth as it is in heaven. Jesus is the One that God sent. Yes, we are in the Advent of our king.

John the Baptist had the heart, had the courage. He is the new Elijah now like the one of old, sent ahead of God’s Messiah. He had two proclamations. The Greek word for “proclamation” is kerusso. I wonder if Enrico Caruso’s name is related to the Greek word for “proclamation”? He was one of the greatest tenors for the opera. His name is probably not related, because he was Italian.

John had heart and courage, let me tell you. He dressed just like the old Prophet Elijah with a cloak of camel’s hair and a leather belt, and ate grasshoppers and wild honey. “Carusso” one: John proclaimed a water baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. The confession of one’s sins was part of this preparation. “Carusso” two: John proclaimed that one more powerful than he, was coming after him, whose shoelaces he was unworthy to untie. He was referring to the Advent of the Lamb of God who would take way our sin. Jesus had a heart of the most precious gold and that’s why thousands of sermons will preach him, because he goes before us to show us the way to the promised land, the way out of this sorry exile, the way through the wilderness, back to the garden of Paradise, the way out of this melt-down, out of all our sorrows, and into the land of laughter, where a heaven of grace stretches out over us and a new earth spreads out before us, like our Psalm says, where “steadfast righteousness and faithfulness meet,” where “righteousness and peace kiss each other, and faithfulness will spring up from the ground and righteousness will look down from the sky,” because of the living Word of God, like a bright fiery star, melting the elements, forging our metal, making our golden hearts molten with faith hope and love.

Get ready! We are celebrating the second Sunday of the Advent, the birth of our King. Amen.

Here I use children’s books, the interference of pictures in deciphering hieroglyphic writing, iconoclasm, and incarnation to illustrate what Hegel means by bringing thought to the concept. I scanned the ten page study and hope that it is enjoyable reading.

(For some reason it is not coming in.)

Copy and paste the following URL address above and my piece will appear in a .pdf file.

http://peterkrey.files.wordpress.com/2008/12/img1172.pdf