September 2, 2007
Luke 14:7-14
Joint Service

I think it is interesting how people choose where to sit at a party or when you go out to eat with friends. At a birthday party or farewell party, there is usually a guest of honor. It is fun when the guest of honor tries to sit in the back and everyone says, "Come up and sit here in the front where we can all see you." It seems like many people know the advice of Jesus and use it so that they can get more attention and so more honor.

You know, Sunday morning at church is like a dinner party, especially when there is the Lord's Supper. Then of course the place of honor is the Altar where Jesus is our Host. Jesus is front and center where we can all see him. When Jesus speaks, we all want to hear his words clearly: "This is my body given for you for the forgiveness of sins."

When we come to the Sunday morning Church Banquet, where do you like to sit? Some people enjoy the front row, some enjoy the back row. If we were to say to the people in the back like Jesus did, "Come up and sit in the front," they would probably refuse "the honor." When I was a kid, we always sat in the back pews which were marked, "Reserved For Families With Small Children." When we kids got older, my mother was sad that she had to sit up closer to the front. But many mothers have told me that they are happy when their kids can sit still through the service and so they can listen to the sermon, etc.

My grandfather always sat up in the balcony. There were only a few people up there, rather lonely, I thought. I asked him, "Why do you sit by yourself in the balcony?" He said, "There is a loudspeaker very close to where I sit so I can hear the service and sermon better." Years later when he lived at our house and couldn't always go to church, we would come home after Sunday School and he would be sitting in his chair, with his portable transistor radio near his ear listening to the Lutheran Hour and then he would pray the Lord's Prayer out loud together with Oswald Hoffman.

Where do you like to sit in church? When I was attending daily chapel services at the Seminary in Tokyo, I had two places I liked. It was a rather dark chapel, so I liked one place that was under a lamp. The other place was up front, right in front of the pulpit. The chapel had bad acoustics and voices got muffled. My Japanese is bad enough, so that if I cannot hear clearly, everything becomes like static. So, if I sat up front I could hear very clearly. And when I heard the Gospel of Jesus Christ clearly spoken, I really enjoyed the service. Sometimes, however, I could hear the speakers words clearly and could understand the Japanese, but I still could not hear the Gospel because it was not spoken. It makes me angry when I try hard to hear a sermon that doesn't proclaim Christ, it is a waste of time, I feel. A sermon that doesn't speak of Christ is not Christian. That is why the liturgy is good, it cannot be messed up. That is why I always try to get Christ into my sermons, I might have to squeeze him in sometimes, but when I do, then there is the powerful message of Salvation by grace through the love of Christ who died on the cross to forgive our sins. My favorite place in church is standing behind the pulpit speaking the word of God.

My favorite place in church is at the altar. But Jesus is always with us where ever we are, and so we can be happy where ever we are. We are always honored that Christ shares his presence with us!

Amen.

Michael Nearhood, Pastor
Okinawa Lutheran Church