Category Archives: Doctor of Ministry

Doctor of Ministry, Pastor Thoughts, Theology & Culture

Letting go of ourselves – so that Easter can hold us

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In the second half of the season of Easter, we have been hearing Gospel readings and readings from the book of Acts about the early church sorting out who they were and what this new community of Jesus’ followers was supposed to be about in the world. 

It can be a strange narrative to track. Benefiting from the perspective of two thousand years of church history, we come at the story backwards. As scenes and images of Pope Leo XIV have been flooding the news the past few weeks, could Peter have imagined a Church spread around the world, hundreds of denominations and billions of members? Or of bishops, cardinals and global Church leaders, prime ministers, queens and heads of state attending the first worship service of the church leader who is often claimed to be Peter’s successor? Surely the small band of Jesus’ followers could not have imagined that. 

As we enter into a phase of transition as the congregation of Sherwood Park Lutheran Church, I can feel my perspective changing. We have been on a journey of community transformation similar to the disciples these past few years. I don’t feel like I am looking at the story of this Easter community from the other side nearly as much. Sorting out what God has been calling us to and planning for us has been confusing, challenging, difficult and uncertain. Along the way, there have been missteps and false starts. Things that we hoped would work didn’t always turn out or come through. There have also been beautiful moments of clear-eyed faithfulness. I have felt the presence of the Holy Spirit in our muddled discernment numerous times. 

As we consider what it means to join with a new community or communities, it is difficult to let go of the hopes and dreams that we have carried. Yet, as we go to find new communities welcoming us, we discover that they indeed bear many of the important things that we value. [As an Oilers fan this week (hear me out now), I cannot help but feel there is some similarity. Jets and Leafs fans, there is room on the Oilers bandwagon! No, it isn’t quite the same, but there is something in common with being a hockey fan AND a Canadian. Sharing that core commonality is at the essence of being a fan.] 

But therein lies the challenge, and this is where I can see why it was so hard for the disciples to become that new Easter community. As we attend to the end of what we were at 7 Tudor Crescent as Sherwood Park, there are a lot of bits and pieces to manage. There are countless details to tend to, and each of those details bears a memory. Each of those details is a small piece of grief to bear. 

It is really hard to deal with all that grief and the prospect of beginning over in a new community, where the countless details are unfamiliar, where there just isn’t the same attachment and memories, where being a part of a community doesn’t come with a wealth of memories and experiences. It can feel discombobulating on Sunday morning to drive to a place that doesn’t feel like your car knows its way on its own, or which pew is yours, or the bulletin is unfamiliar, and you aren’t quite sure where the bathrooms are yet. 

I am sure that feeling is why Peter and several other disciples tried to go back to fishing. They were desperate for something familiar, even as everything they knew was being changed and transformed in the days and weeks after the Resurrection. 

But it isn’t about replacing one Sunday morning drive with a different one, or finding a new pew, or getting used to a new bulletin or finally locating the bathrooms. The process of transition and change requires us to strip all the old experiences and memories back, and hold off on grabbing onto the new ones. In the in-between moment, God calls us to step back and remember who we are and whose we are. God calls us to remember what the purpose of being a part of a community of faith⎯a local congregation⎯is in the first place. 

It is the same thing that the disciples had to figure out in order to have become that Easter community that was transformed into the Church. We are God’s people, we are a baptized and called community entrusted with proclaiming the Gospel. And that Word proclaiming, in the baptismal waters that forgives sin and raises us to new life, and in the bread and wine that turns us into the Body of Christ given to the world, in all those things the Kingdom of God meets us and meets the world. 

These are the things that all congregations hold in common with each other. The details that make each unique are dressings on these core truths. Our identity and the purpose to which God calls us is that we gather together with baptized siblings in Christ to hear the Word and receive the Sacraments. These core truths are the same from community to community, from place to place. 

As the disciples discovered after Easter, with all the chaos of moving from one reality to another, it is very hard to hold on to those core truths of identity and purpose… but we are not left to do it alone. That early church community was promised and given the Holy Spirit to guide their way, to be their connection in faith to the Christ who first called them, and brought them through from Good Friday to Easter. 

Doctor of Ministry, Pastor Thoughts, Theology & Culture

A Pastor Like Luther

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The Fourth Sunday in the season of Easter is the middle Sunday. It is usually called “Good Shepherd Sunday” because we hear a lot of shepherd-related readings on this Sunday. They serve as a means to turn us from the immediate stories of resurrection that we have been hearing for three Sundays to the next question that the church has to answer: What comes next?

Often, Good Shepherd Sunday is used as an opportunity for pastors (from the word ‘pastoral’ related to the word ‘shepherd’) to tell our stories of call. 

My own story is fairly undramatic. No lightning storms like Martin Luther, no voices from heaven or burning bushes. Simply a lot of time spent in and among church folk who gently and subtly encouraged me to explore the calling that was clearly bouncing around my heart and mind at a young age. 

Now, as I come up to my 16th anniversary of ordination, I realize that being called isn’t so much a one-time event like the legendary lightning storm where Luther promised to become a monk, or the literal calling of Jesus to his disciples. Rather, being called is something that happens over and over again. We heard this last Sunday when Peter and the other disciples, after being given the Holy Spirit by Jesus in the upper room, decided to go back to being fishermen. They needed to be called again!

Our calling begins in baptism, and we are called into ministry over and over by the Holy Spirit. Some of us are called to a ministry that extends out into the world from our secular work and vocations. Some are called to be set apart, to attend to the baptized and called community. These ones held back in the church are pastors – our focus is on feeding and equipping the baptized. 

A year ago, on May 7th, 2024, I found myself standing in St. Mary’s town church in Wittenberg. When you first walk in, the narthex serves as a gift shop and admission desk. It is a little dark, and the ceiling is low, as you are underneath the balcony. Past that, you step into the sanctuary with its distinct green pews, high late-gothic pillars and ceiling. The Lucas Cranach Altar piece stands out in the chancel. 

St. Mary’s is where Martin Luther served as the pastor. I will admit that prior to about a month before that moment, I hadn’t really imagined that being a pastor was a significant part of Luther’s life. I had always imagined him primarily as a professor and debater, writing and speaking out against the abuses of the church. But in preparation for travelling to Wittenberg, I researched some of Luther’s most important sermons and was starting to see how influential his pastoral ministry was to his writing and speaking. 

It was in the context of congregational community and life where I began to feel the call to ordained ministry. Being active and included in all the things that our congregation had going on: Sunday school, children’s choir, confirmation, youth, youth orchestra, praise band, college and careers, serving on council when I was 18, career shadowing my pastor in grade nine, regular potlucks, Christmas pageants, family Bible studies, curling bonspiels, church picnics and campouts, adult studies, ushering, reading lessons, serving communion, etc. 

Being a part of a church was different than any other community that I was a part of. Not quite family, not quite friends and peers, not like a school or workplace, not like a neighbourhood. Church was like church, and I could sense a call to serve that unique community. 

It wasn’t until I was standing in St. Mary’s Church, thinking of Luther preaching his sermons on how to be a community that goes about changing and reforming, that I could see this was probably where his sense of call came from too. After 40 years of being a Lutheran and fifteen years of ordained ministry, I felt connected to Luther in a new way that I did not expect. I could see how, in all the things that he wrote about reforming the Church, he was looking through the lens of his ministry to the people of St. Mary’s and Wittenberg. His call came from the same place as mine, from the Holy Spirit through the congregation he served. A call repeated and reaffirmed regularly by being a part of the life of congregations and faith communities, where he could see the lives of his people sharing in their joys and sorrows. Luther’s community was often the motivation behind his calls for reform. He wanted to create a world where the people he served and cared for could hear the Good News of God’s forgiveness, life and salvation given for them. Luther wasn’t an academic tucked away in an ivory tower (or the Wartburg Castle!) thinking abstractly, but a pastor seeking the best for the people entrusted to his care. 

This is a Luther I can identify with: A Shepherd called to tend to his sheep and live his life in community. 

Doctor of Ministry, Pastor Thoughts, Theology & Culture

The ministry we are all called to

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This week, the disciples have gone fishing. It feels like an interesting choice following the events of Good Friday and Easter. Yet, even in their attempt to go back to what they know, to the lives they lived before Jesus came and called them from their fishing boats, Jesus comes strolling down the shoreline again. There, he cooks them a meal of fish for breakfast. 

Following the meal, Jesus shares a conversation with Peter. He asks Peter if he loves him. Three times. This well-known story from the Gospel of John is a gospel reading often used at ordinations, the services where deacons, pastors and bishops are set apart for the ministries to which they are called. 

As I have shared before, the topic of my doctoral research thesis is the Lutheran Office of Ministry. Or in other words, the understanding that Lutherans share of how clergy or ordained ministers go about their work. As I hear this gospel lesson about Jesus’ meeting with confused disciples, uncertain of what to do next, I cannot help but think about the work of pastors and other clergy. 

Often, it can seem like pastors are the only ones “called” to ministry in the church. Or at least we talk and act like that is the case. But as you know, I am fond of repeating, our calling is firstly a baptismal calling⎯one we all share. 

Still, it’s easy to think that the only person doing ministry is the pastor. I believe this perspective on ministry stems from an unavoidable reality that pastors and clergy are often working at the heart of the ministry of a congregation or faith community. Pastors are tasked with preaching the Word and administering the Sacraments. Pastors bear responsibility for the care of the community of faith. 

When Jesus looks at Peter and asks, “Peter, do you love me?”,

Peter responds, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.”

Then Jesus says, “Feed my sheep.”

Jesus is calling Peter to ministry. Yet, it doesn’t mean that this is a task just for clergy. 

Ministry happens in congregations and faith communities. Ministry happens relationally. Ministry doesn’t take place with one person or another, but rather happens in the space in between. The space in between the pastor and the congregation is the place of ministry. We physically represent this in worship with Word and Sacrament. The Word becomes Gospel as it is announced from the pulpit and into waiting ears in the pews. The Holy Spirit meets the newly baptized as the waters fall from the hands of the presider onto the head of the baptized. The Body of Christ joins us to itself and each other as bread and wine are passed from communion server to communicant. 

Ministry, the work of the gospel, happens between us. And I think that is why Jesus tells Peter to feed his sheep three times. Jesus is reminding us that it isn’t about Peter and it isn’t about the sheep. It is about the Bread of New Life that feeds us with the Gospel. 

Doctor of Ministry, Pastor Thoughts, Theology & Culture

The Happy Exchange

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Doubtless, you will have heard me talk about Martin Luther’s concept of the Happy or Joyful Exchange at one time or another in the past few months. 

The Happy Exchange is the metaphor that Luther uses to describe how our sins are forgiven. In the exchange, we give to Jesus our sins. But what does that mean? Do we heap them on him like some kind of scapegoat who is then sent away? Do we mark him with them like bruises and wounds like the famous camp skit ‘The Ragman’?

Not exactly. In giving our sins to Christ, it is that he takes responsibility for what was our responsibility. Jesus takes our sins from us by claiming them as his own. In return, Jesus gives us his righteousness, blessing and life. 

You might call it an exchange of goods for bads. 

For the past few years, we have been using a Good Friday tradition of tying black strips of cloth to our rough-hewn cross on Good Friday. I will admit, the first year we did it, it felt a bit hokey. However, as we have come back to this tradition, it has taken on a more profound and deeper meaning. This year, while I watched as worshippers tied their black strips of cloth to the cross, I couldn’t help but think of the Happy Exchange. 

Here, we were putting our sins, suffering and death onto the cross⎯onto Christ. It didn’t matter if they were big or small, known or unknown. The moment that truly caught me, though, was the letting go. I noted that more than a few folks held onto their strips for a moment, and even more lingered after tying their cloth strip to the cross. It was an emotional act to make tangible our connection to Christ on the cross. 

Here is the thing about the Happy Exchange: it is not an easy trade. Giving up our sins is not easy. Our sins are not just rule infractions on a report card. Our sins make up a significant part of who we are; our failures, our hurts, and our sufferings, all contribute to shaping us as people. It is not easy to just hand big parts of ourselves over to God. 

There is a reason we confess our sins each week in worship. We need to practice the act of handing over our sins to Christ. Because once we do manage to let go, our sins are gone from us forever⎯we can no longer hold onto them!

On Easter Sunday morning, the image that we began on Good Friday was completed. The strips of black cloth were gone from the cross. In their place, were beautiful and colourful flowers⎯signifying the righteousness, the blessing and the life of Christ. 

It struck me this year more than it has before that, together in worship, we rehearsed and lived out the Happy or Joyful Exchange this Holy Week. A beautiful image of how our sins are forgiven and our lives are transformed by the Good News of Christ’s death and resurrection. 

Alleluia! Christ is Risen!

Doctor of Ministry, Pastor Thoughts, Theology & Culture

A Responsibility to Repent?

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It is only the third week of Lent, and already, the themes of the season have been remarkably difficult. The temptation of Jesus was a glimpse into the clashing of kingdoms in the first week. Jesus’ lamenting for Jerusalem and wanting to gather in God’s chosen people was really about the unwillingness of human beings and the destruction of Jerusalem temple.

In this third week, the Lenten theme is less convoluted. Jesus is asked by the people who followed him around tragedies that loomed large in the minds of the Israelites: a group of pilgrims unceremoniously killed by Pilate and a civil construction project that fell on 18 workers. One might assume that these followers of Jesus are wondering: Where is God in the midst of these tragic moments? 

But the followers aren’t wondering about that. Rather, they are asking if the pilgrims or workers were worse sinners who deserved their deaths. 

Ouch… that is not the kind of question you are supposed to ask out loud! Especially not of Jesus. That feels like the kind of insensitive question that a parent would scold a child for asking. Or, at the very least, there should be some tacit acknowledgement that it is inappropriate to blame victims for their suffering. 

Of course, this kind of victim blaming happens all the time in our world, but rarely in circumstances so tragic. It is not uncommon in our time for victims of sexual harassment or assault to be blamed for wearing inappropriate clothes, or for the poor to be blamed for their poverty, and for us to wonder if those who develop an illness did something to cause it. But we wouldn’t look at a pedestrian hit by a car and think, “Oh, they were probably a tax cheat who deserved to be hit.”

In Jesus’ day, however, it wasn’t uncommon for people to believe that any kind of suffering was the result of sin or unrighteousness.

The reality is that we also know there are degrees of sin to some extent. We know that some things are worse sins than others. We know that the Nazis who claimed to be just following orders during the Holocaust are not the same as speeders. That fighting with my sister as a kid is not the same as dealing drugs. That clandestinely appropriating some of my children’s Easter chocolate is not the same as wealthy CEOs hoarding hundreds of times more salary than their employees earn. 

We know that some things are worse sins than others, but in this season of Lent when we take time to step back and consider our lives, our identity and even our sins… what are we to do with this knowledge? What are we to do with Jesus’ response to his followers?

Jesus’ response sounds pretty pious, “No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish as they did.”

Is Jesus warning them, and us, that if they and we don’t get our acts together, we might suffer the same fate as the pilgrims and construction workers?

I don’t think so. Even if it sounds like Jesus is saying that if we don’t repent we are going to suffer. 

Martin Luther would remind us that, in regard to repentance, God has commanded us to confess and repent. Our response to our sin is not to worry about our degree of sin, not to worry about who among us has sinned the most, but to confess and repent of our sin. 

In fact, the only thing that we can do in response to our sin is to confess and repent. 

And how does God respond to sin? Well, that is something we will explore throughout the Lenten season.

Photo: The Holocaust Memorial in Berlin