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Freely Given
The Rev. Joseph WinstonJune 7, 2009
Sermon
Grace and peace are gifts for you from God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
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In this current economic reality that we find ourselves in, it is very easy tobe concerned about what the future will bring. We all know individuals directlyaffected by this global slowdown. Jobs are hard to find. Last week the governmentreported that unemployment in the United States was at its highest level in twenty-six years. No one needed to tell us this disappointing fact. We can fill you in onall the details about the job searches of our friends and family that have draggedon for months. The same story holds for almost all of the temporary summer jobsnormally held by teenagers. These jobs have all but disappeared. Now, what arethey going to do? The tremendous downturn in the markets has dropped the valuesin our retirement plans, whether they are an investment strategy like a 401(k) or
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Romans 1:7, 1 Corinthians 1:3, 2 Corinthians 1:2, Galatians 1:3, Ephesians 1:2, Philippians1:2, 2 Thessalonians 1:2, Philemon 1:3
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that piece of property that we had hoped to sell so that we would be comfortable.All of that has changed. It seems as if everyone is planning to work a few moreyears before they call it quits. For most of us, that was not in the cards.We constantly see disturbing news outside of theworld of economics. Our wayoflifethathaslastedforgenerationsinthispartoftheworldisbecomingdifferent.When you look around, it appears that fewer and fewer families are farming. Theyare giving it up for many different reasons. The work is hard. Children no longerwant to stay on the farm with Mom and Dad. Global competition is squeezingprofits and the costs of running the business are up. The only real choice left is tosell. Once placed on the market, it appears that the big developers literally changethe landscape by snapping up these properties. The former fields of cotton or cornare now strip malls or new subdivisions. If all goes as planned, the transformationnear Beasley is just starting. Soon there will be an intermodal terminal with thethousands of new people. They all will need a place to stay, some place to shop, aschool for their children, and houses of worship. How will we adapt?This trend of bad news is happening all around us. The tremendous decline of Lutherans in Texas is alarming since ethnic groups we normally associate as beingLutheran settled in this area of the country. Two weeks ago, St. Paul’s Lutheranin Galveston closed after begin on the island for sixty-one years. Last year, thechurch that I was serving in Liberty, Texas voted to disband. The year before that,Park Place Lutheran, a seventy year old church in Southeast Houston, shut theirdoors for the last time. Here in this place, we face similar struggles. Can we attractyoungerpeopletothischurch?Willwewelcomepeoplewhoarenotlikeus?What2
 
do we offer to the local community that they cannot get elsewhere? These are buta few of the questions that we must answer if we plan to be around in the future.Each of the earlier examples of things we fear shares the same root cause. Wewant to be in control of what is happening and we find it very distasteful when weare not. In the world of economics, we dislike it when a market moves against ussince this action shows everyone that we do not have any power over the market.Rather, the world of commerce has authority over our wealth. The same argumentholds with all the dramatic changes that we see all around us. We have almost noinfluenceoverwhatothersdo.Ifafarmissoldanditbecomesamall,asubdivisionor a new business, we are practically powerless to stop any step in this process.Likewise, we are notdirectly responsiblefor whathappens to the Lutheran Churchin Texas. That is the work of the Holy Spirit.While we might like to believe otherwise, other people have suffered similarfates. They too have wanted to be in charge of their lives. We learn this fromtoday’s Gospel lesson.WeonlyhaveafewfactsthatdescribeNicodemustous.WeknowthathewasaPharisee trained in the written Scriptures along with the oral traditions of the faith(John 3:1, 7:50). It seems that his contemporaries held him in high regard becausewe also hear that Nicodemus is some sort of leader (John 3:1). Additionally, itappears that Nicodemus is very wealthy. Near the end of Gospel according toSt. John, we discover that Nicodemus paid for the costly spices used to embalmChrist’s body (John 19:39).It is probably a safe bet to say that Nicodemus liked being in complete control3
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