The Gospel According to Dr. Seuss: Holy Spirit Moves in the Seen & Unseen

Pastor Leta Arndt Behrens

Sermon Scripture: LUKE 14: 25-33

²⁵Now large crowds were traveling with him; and he turned and said to them, ²⁶“Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple. ²⁷Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple. ²⁸For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not first sit down and estimate the cost, to see whether he has enough to complete it? ²⁹Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it will begin to ridicule him, ³⁰saying, ‘This fellow began to build and was not able to finish.’ ³¹Or what king, going out to wage war against another king, will not sit down first and consider whether he is able with ten thousand to oppose the one who comes against him with twenty thousand? ³²If he cannot, then, while the other is still far away, he sends a delegation and asks for the terms of peace. ³³So therefore, none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions.

Sermon Text:

We began this Dr. Suess and the Gospel series with the story of creation and the beauty of the diversity of being made in the image of God. As we moved through gospel stories and rhyming stories we were reminded of God with us in new faces and places, Jesus accompanying us in impossible situations and we heard the stories from our high school youth of their experiences with this call to see and know God with neighbors close and at the border. Today as we culminate our series, we are given a pretty big call to action as we are told by Jesus that all should hear and listen to God’s voice that tells us to let go of those things that are most precious to us, take up a cross, and follow.

I wonder if when Jesus told this to the crowds that were following him if they got much smaller…

Jesus had reached what we could imagine to be ‘rock star status’ by this point as he now had large crowds travelling with him. They may been attracted to his message or his willingness to stand up to the Pharisees. They may have been following to see his healing or hear more about a different kingdom, one of God where the class divisions and social statuses fall away to include everyone. At this point in his ministry, Jesus tells them to pay attention to what they are really getting into. Jesus wants them to know that being loyal to him will mean that there could be division from those that they love in their families and communities. It will mean that they will give up the life they have known because this following of Jesus is going to mean listening and speaking in a new way that is not easy and no matter what station they are in life, will not leave them in the place they have known.

So maybe when the people were told to count the cost, they did and Maybe some turned and decided that this had been an interesting ride but it’s not that good. Maybe some took to taunting or trying to get others to stop following with them, calling this group crazy just as Horton’s friends did when they could not hear or understand the one voice he kept searching out.

And yet there were those that carried on as we carry on. For 2000 years Christians have often had to count the cost, suffer division and misunderstanding, be drawn into situations that they could not have imagined or sought out on their own. Many in other countries still count the cost daily – how will their children be treated, will they have a job, will they be safe. And we do too, being a Christian in the our world today is not easy. It is not popular, it is not all the same and it is difficult to articulate what ‘kind of Christian’ we are in a way that does not diminish anyone else. We have 15 youth who will affirm their baptisms next week. They all had questions to answer about each of the promises that were made for them in baptism and they now will take on themselves. One of those promises is to proclaim the word of God — to hear it, to speak it, tell it, and let it be, as Jeremiah says, written on our hearts. Every single one of them said this was a difficult promise because in this one they did not want to offend or be thought of as someone who can’t hold different ideas in love. I do not think that middle and high school students are alone in this. This proclamation, hearing and speaking up,  is a challenge for us all and yet it is a part of the discipleship we are called to as we take up our cross and follow Jesus.

Horton, this crazy elephant that hear voices no one else hears, focused in, followed and spoke up for them. He followed the voices when they were lost, he sat with the voices to keep them from being silenced, he carried the voices and asked others to hear over and over again until they were heard. This was not easy or convenient. Horton had to count the cost of his time, his energy, his focus, where his own life would lead. Horton had to let go of control, let go of what he had always known and follow the spirit inside him that led him to know the call of where he should go and how he could bring sound to the unheard voices.

Richard Rohr, a Franciscan priest, says in his book the Universal Christ, “God comes to you disguised as your life.” Which is another way of saying what Jesus says in our gospel. Your life in God will call you to let go of things, to pay attention to the holy spirit, to know that the mystery of the Holy Spirit will not remain silent.

So how do we let go? How do we bring voice to the voiceless? How do we hear the Holy Spirit among us? How do we know for sure when it is the voice of God? St Bonaventure, another Franciscan who lived in the 13th century taught that we start by loving the very simplest and humblest things and then move up from there. Horton began with loving and hearing just the smallest thing he could not see on a clover leaf. So we begin with what we know and we move from there. Once we can hear a voice in our hearts, in our homes, in our families, in our work, in our friendships we can then hear the voices in our community and in our state and in our country and in the world. We cannot control all the things that we encounter in life, but we can know that God is in them and God is asking us to bend our hears, listen, and then speak into the world. This giving up of control is the following Jesus is asking from us and for us. Loving is giving up control, loving is not trying to make God look like us, loving is the other way around, where we seek to pick up a cross and follow Jesus.

We may do this in simple ways like joining the World Council of Churches who us education on violence awareness and inviting Christians and other faith traditions to wear black on Thursdays as a way to raise awareness and give voice to those who are victims of violence. We may take action in our church by joining in contributing to the food bank and school supplies that Outside our Walls helps us to do or helping the sunday school kids with donations to the food kits for Homeward Alliance. We do this by sitting with the lonely kid at lunch or inviting a new person to join us at the movies. We may do this by responding with donations to Lutheran Disaster Response who is working to help those in Hurricane Dorian right now. We may go further in writing letters to tobacco companies who are targeting our children with vaping drugs, or writing our senators on supporting or not supporting policies that harm others or harm the earth, or volunteering in any place that serves those who need a place and and voice in this world. We can also do this by simply by listening and telling the stories of others–when we were in El Paso this summer and heard the stories of refugees, we asked what we could do from Colorado and they said, just tell our story so we know people are hearing our hearts. All these things and more we accomplish through the spirit, by bending an ear and listening well and showing up in our own lives.

And then we trust. We trust the promise of God that as we are called we are also given what we need through God’s grace and love moving in us. We trust that we were made in God’s image, all of us and we were created good and for good. We trust that the Holy spirit will show us the next step, the next voice to hear, the next words to say, the next actions to take on behalf of those who are not yet in a place to be heard on their own. Father Rohr gives us a guide on how to know the voice of God when he says, “If something comes toward you with grace and can pass through you and toward others with grace, you can trust it as the voice of God.” This promise is given to us in our memory verse for this series from Romans 8-the spirit helps us in our weakness and the very spirit intercedes for us with sighs too deep for words. Amen and may it be so.

The Gospel According to Dr. Seuss: Jesus Speaking Miracles into Reality

Pastor Michael Stadtmueller

Sermon Scripture: JOHN 2:1-11

¹On the third day there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there. ²Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. ³When the wine gave out, the mother of Jesus said to him, “They have no wine.” ⁴And Jesus said to her, “Woman, what concern is that to you and to me? My hour has not yet come.” ⁵His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.” ⁶Now standing there were six stone water jars for the Jewish rites of purification, each holding twenty or thirty gallons. ⁷Jesus said to them, “Fill the jars with water.” And they filled them up to the brim. ⁸He said to them, “Now draw some out, and take it to the chief steward.” So they took it. ⁹When the steward tasted the water that had become wine, and did not know where it came from (though the servants who had drawn the water knew), the steward called the bridegroom ¹⁰and said to him, “Everyone serves the good wine first, and then the inferior wine after the guests have become drunk. But you have kept the good wine until now.” ¹¹Jesus did this, the first of his signs, in Cana of Galilee, and revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him.

The Gospel According to Dr. Seuss: The Friends We Have Near & Far

Pastor Leta Arndt Behrens & El Paso Youth

Sermon Scripture: LUKE 5:17-32

⁷One day, while he was teaching, Pharisees and teachers of the law were sitting near by (they had come from every village of Galilee and Judea and from Jerusalem); and the power of the Lord was with him to heal. ¹⁸Just then some men came, carrying a paralyzed man on a bed. They were trying to bring him in and lay him before Jesus; ¹⁹but finding no way to bring him in because of the crowd, they went up on the roof and let him down with his bed through the tiles into the middle of the crowd in front of Jesus. ²⁰When he saw their faith, he said, “Friend, your sins are forgiven you.” ²¹Then the scribes and the Pharisees began to question, “Who is this who is speaking blasphemies? Who can forgive sins but God alone?” ²²When Jesus perceived their questionings, he answered them, “Why do you raise such questions in your hearts? ²³Which is easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven you,’ or to say, ‘Stand up and walk’? ²⁴But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins” — he said to the one who was paralyzed — “I say to you, stand up and take your bed and go to your home.” ²⁵Immediately he stood up before them, took what he had been lying on, and went to his home, glorifying God. ²⁶Amazement seized all of them, and they glorified God and were filled with awe, saying, “We have seen strange things today.”
²⁷After this he went out and saw a tax collector named Levi, sitting at the tax booth; and he said to him, “Follow me.” ²⁸And he got up, left everything, and followed him.
²⁹Then Levi gave a great banquet for him in his house; and there was a large crowd of tax collectors and others sitting at the table with them. ³⁰The Pharisees and their scribes were complaining to his disciples, saying, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?” ³¹Jesus answered, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick; ³²I have come to call not the righteous but sinners to repentance.”

The Gospel According to Dr. Seuss: Living in the Impossible

Pastor Michael Stadtmueller

Sermon Scripture: MATTHEW 17:24-27

²⁴When they reached Capernaum, the collectors of the temple tax came to Peter and said, “Does your teacher not pay the temple tax?” ²⁵He said, “Yes, he does.” And when he came home, Jesus spoke of it first, asking, “What do you think, Simon? From whom do kings of the earth take toll or tribute? From their children or from others?” ²⁶When Peter said, “From others,” Jesus said to him, “Then the children are free. ²⁷However, so that we do not give offense to them, go to the sea and cast a hook; take the first fish that comes up; and when you open its mouth, you will find a coin; take that and give it to them for you and me.”

The Gospel According to Dr. Seuss: New Things in God’s Grace!

Pastor Michael Stadtmueller

Sermon Scripture: MATTHEW 9:14-17

¹⁴Then the disciples of John came to him, saying, “Why do we and the Pharisees fast often, but your disciples do not fast?” ¹⁵And Jesus said to them, “The wedding guests cannot mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them, can they? The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast. ¹⁶No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old cloak, for the patch pulls away from the cloak, and a worse tear is made. ¹⁷Neither is new wine put into old wineskins; otherwise, the skins burst, and the wine is spilled, and the skins are destroyed; but new wine is put into fresh wineskins, and so both are preserved.”

Gospel According to Dr. Seuss: One Fish, Two Fish – God Loves All Creatures

Pastor Leta Arndt Behrens

Sermon Scripture: JOHN 17:20-25

²⁰I ask not only on behalf of these, but also on behalf of those who will believe in me through their word, ²¹that they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. ²²The glory that you have given me I have given them, so that they may be one, as we are one, ²³I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one, so that the world may know that you have sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. ²⁴Father, I desire that those also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory, which you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world. ²⁵Righteous Father, the world does not know you, but I know you; and these know that you have sent me.

Sermon Text:

When I was an elementary and preschool teacher, one of the BEST parts was getting to ready with children. And Dr. Suess was among the best books to read. Even now the most loved book of my nephew is My Many Colored Days and we always snuggle up to read this story whenever he is at my house. This author, Theodore Suess Geisel, spent his life with a passion for literacy, for writing engaging stories for all kinds of readers in order to teach words and sound and poetry and to teach about observing the world and living in community. Even though he loved children and writing and creating for them he never had children of his own. He is quoted as saying, “You have them, I will entertain them”

Dr Suess was not only passionate about literacy, he also in the 1960s began to tackle issues of justice in his stories, believing that entering the world of children would also relate to parents and other adults and broaden minds in a post world war 2 era. He addressed civil rights in 1961 with The Sneetches, Environmental Protection in the book The Lorax was written in 1971 and 1984 brought The Butter Battle book with perspective on the nuclear arms race. One Fish Two Fish was written in 1960, as was To Kill a Mockingbird, addressing some of the same issues of the time and became a part of the beginner reader series. It has gone far beyond learning to read as it is a book that has been quoted by a supreme court judge as well as made into the name of a dating website- but he didn’t see that coming….

There is a spiritual element here as well as we are invited in our readings from John and Genesis to do the same type of imagination and observation and connect God’s word and love to the world around us. In our Gospel story, Jesus is with his disciples just hours before he will be arrested and taken to be crucified. It is one of their last times together and this reading today is part of a long prayer, a goodbye prayer and a blessing from him to his disciples there and all who would come after. The theme of this prayer is a strong one. He prays that we all may be one–one with God and one with another. This is a prayer of unity, a prayer about our relationship with God and God’s relationship with us as people and as a church community.

This word unity sometimes get mixed up with the word uniformity. And there is a big difference. Sometimes we get confused and think if we are going to be ONE then we have to be just ALIKE. But this is not the prayer or the word from God. Being in unity means being together in the spirit of God in and being together through our uniqueness and our diversity. This is not new, it’s right in line with the very story of creation. God created fish and birds and mammals and plants and fruit and trees and stars and moon. God created not one thing, God created a diversity of things and yet created them all from one source and all tied to being wrapped up in the love and grace of the Holy Spirit.

This is a beautiful and good place to start, at the beginning with creation. I believe God would say From here to there and there to here — good and beautiful things are everywhere. And we can so often see that so well in the natural world around us. Summer in Colorado and summer in the United states is often such a great time to be in awe of creation. We just had a family trip–12 days of camping and traveling by car in a big loop that took us to mesa verde, the grand canyon, southern utah’s national parks, yellowstone and the grand tetons. So much diversity! In weather in animals in canyons and mountains. We got to be in awe of, as my teens put it, the really big hole of the Grand Canyon and a few days later watch in awe–from a safe distance inside the car– as a mama bear and two cubs rambled through the forest. This is observation and imagination at it’s finest when we can pause and take it in. And there it was beautiful but so is here–walking the neighborhood, watching the birds in the backyard, seeing the clouds change form and size across the sky. It’s all diverse and it’s all beautiful and it’s all created good.

So here we are today, millions of years after that first creation and it is still the same. We live in diversity of creation and diversity of mind. We live created as brothers and sisters and moms and dads and big people and small people and brown, black, white and all shades of color and gender identity and interests and talents and careers and gifts and thoughts and feelings all created from there to here and here to there all the people in between. And as Christians we are created in diversity as well. I used to get stuck thinking that Jesus must be sad at all the denominations and splits and church battles–and yes there is sadness in times when we cannot work together or when we are embroiled in demonizing the ‘other’ But there is more because God created in diversity and Jesus prayed and blessed it so even in our brokenness there is possibility and hope. The diversity means all kinds of people in all kinds of places in their lives have the chance to hear, know, and experience God’s love and that even when we are in deep disagreement we can be reminded that we are created together, not to be uniform and think exactly alike, but to be unified in living in the reality of being children of God, created first in love.

And in that love God also tackles the big issues. The issues that because we are not uniform in our experiences or ages or backgrounds or perspectives cause us to be tempted to take the narrow view of our own field of vision instead of stepping back to see the grander picture. And this is where fear can get us– fear gets us to sad and devastating places like the mass shooting in El Paso, fear can drive us to places that are not a part of our call…. fear of the unknown and fear of being seen as the ‘other’, fear of not being understood or relevant and fear of all the changes that happen so fast in life. But fear is not the source, we are not created in fear. Being one with God is the source and promise of Jesus prayer and the promise of hope for humanity.

And this is the beautiful hope of God’s promise for creation and for us all. There is hope in diversity because it grows us and leads us to new things even when we are afraid. There is hope in diversity because it promises we are unique and also not alone. There is hope in diversity because it calls us to serve one another in love. There is hope in diversity because it reminds us of God and that we are all finally one.

In Christ, to be unified is to remember to observe first and imagine God present here in love. To be unified is to engage in deep discussions with kindness, with respect, with a spirit of knowing that you and me are first created in unity and then in the spirit of love here to learn from and teach one another. To be unified is to stand in awe not just of the beauty of the natural world but in awe of one another–our gifts, our talents, our fears, our pain, our joys, our celebrations, our successes, our failures–God loves them all,

From there to here and here to there, God’s love is everywhere.