Remain in the City:
The Life and Work of the Urban Congregation
“Come with me out to the nearest place outside your home where you can see your parish’s church. There I place myself, point to the church, and say with assurance: It is defensible. God Himself guarantees it. Do you see the church over there? It stands there because God has not forgotten His fallen world. He is in our midst among us. He came down to us once in the form of a kind Master and a merciful Savior. Since then He has never abandoned us. Though our world bears the marks of sin and Satan, God is found there also. Over there He established the physical evidence that He still cares about us. Inside His church a baptismal font stands. Do you understand what it means to carry a child forward to it? It means that we carry it from our evil world into God’s, from suffering, sin, death, and decay into everlasting life. How can it then be meaningless to be born? What do the trials of this world mean compared to that which is incomprehensible - being God’s child for eternity? What do I have to fear from darkness and sin when I see that God opens the gates of atonement and forgiveness for my child in the midst of a world of guilt?”
So wrote Bishop Bo Giertz, Swedish Lutheran pastor and theologian, in 1939 on the cusp of World War II. He was specifically addressing the prevalent concern among young couples of the day: is it moral to have children during such a time? A similar question may be asked in our day. I submit that our Lord’s repeated command and blessing, Be fruitful and multiply (Gn 1:28; 9:1, 7; 35:11) remains in effect even today, even in our time, even in our culture and place.
Today, though, I would like to apply his quote and insight to the work of the urban congregation. His question - is it moral to bear children in such a time - may be rephrased for us: of what purpose or good is the urban congregation? The question is this: Does she have you a future? Having asked that, reread the quote above. How fitting! The Church stands, even in the heart of the city, because Christ placed her there! God has not forgotten her!
Within the sanctuary of peace, in the midst of a chaotic world, stands a font and an altar and a pulpit from which the crucified, risen, and ascended Lord reigns! He reigns in water and Word, taking children of wrath (Eph 2:3) and drenching them in His holy bath, making them children of our heavenly Father. He reigns in the preached Word of the Cross by which He transforms the hearts and lives of the most destitute, the most despicable, the most hardened and forgotten of His poor, miserable creatures. He dresses them in His righteousness, gives them a seat at His table, makes them heirs of His kingdom by faith. And He reigns in bread and wine, His Body and Blood, where He brings heaven down to earth among the darkest of neighborhoods and poorest of streets. How can life in the city - the lives of those in the city - be meaningless?
It is written: “Is this not the fast that I choose,” says the Lord, “to loose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the straps of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover him, and not to hide yourself from your own flesh?” (Isaiah 58:6-7). With the coming of Christ and the dawn of the Christian Church, for the first time, “every human soul possessed an infinite value, that each individual existence is of much more worth than the whole world - it was only then that room was found for the growth of genuine charity.”
Indeed, “The Christian Church can never be conceived of as without charity; it was inherent from the very beginning. And it was so, not only because its Lord and Head taught love and commanded love, but because He Himself practiced it.”
As the Lord is, so is His Body the Church. God is love. And Christ is the love of God made manifest. Christ is love incarnate. Love in the flesh. His is not a self-serving love, which is not love, but lust. His is a self-sacrificing love (1 Jn 4). Giving Himself up in love, pouring out His lifeblood for the sins of the world, He not only creates His Church, but gives her His nature and character in a fallen, loveless world (Eph 5:25-27). As a loyal Bride, carrying on the work of her late husband, so the Church lives the life of Christ, a life of charity and love, in the world.
But He is not gone! For He who died once is raised from the dead never to die again! He lives! Christ lives in and among and from His Church on earth. He lives and works in the lives of His saints who have been baptized into His kingdom, a kingdom of love. True love, which lays down its life for its friends (Jn 15:13), “can admit of no other aim but this one, namely, the aiding of our neighbor in his efforts to attain what is the highest aim in life, membership in the kingdom of God.”
It is for precisely this reason that the urban congregation lives and works among the poor and the down-trodden. For Christ did not come to remove poverty. In fact, He says, The poor you will always have with you (Jn 12:8). “He came to bring the poor into the kingdom of God.”
Christ did not come as a social reformer. Neither is His Church a vehicle for social reform. She is, however, as Christ Himself is, the kingdom of God upon earth, where His Word is taught, rightly and purely, and His Sacraments given according to His institution. This is the Church. And where the Church is there is charity and love. Charity and love in a fallen world desperately in need of Christ’s own mercy and life and forgiveness. For this reason the urban congregation exists. For this reason she has been established by Christ, to be His beacon of light in a dark world, to be His sanctuary of peace in a world of chaos, to be His outpost of mercy in a wilderness of sin. And She is founded on the unchanging Christ - the same yesterday, today, and forever - she has a future because Christ has a future. Let’s get to work!
Your unworthy servant,
Pastor Mierow
Thursday of Trinity 11
Artwork: Christ of St John of the Cross by Salvador Dali, 1951.
The Life and Work of the Urban Congregation
“Come with me out to the nearest place outside your home where you can see your parish’s church. There I place myself, point to the church, and say with assurance: It is defensible. God Himself guarantees it. Do you see the church over there? It stands there because God has not forgotten His fallen world. He is in our midst among us. He came down to us once in the form of a kind Master and a merciful Savior. Since then He has never abandoned us. Though our world bears the marks of sin and Satan, God is found there also. Over there He established the physical evidence that He still cares about us. Inside His church a baptismal font stands. Do you understand what it means to carry a child forward to it? It means that we carry it from our evil world into God’s, from suffering, sin, death, and decay into everlasting life. How can it then be meaningless to be born? What do the trials of this world mean compared to that which is incomprehensible - being God’s child for eternity? What do I have to fear from darkness and sin when I see that God opens the gates of atonement and forgiveness for my child in the midst of a world of guilt?”
So wrote Bishop Bo Giertz, Swedish Lutheran pastor and theologian, in 1939 on the cusp of World War II. He was specifically addressing the prevalent concern among young couples of the day: is it moral to have children during such a time? A similar question may be asked in our day. I submit that our Lord’s repeated command and blessing, Be fruitful and multiply (Gn 1:28; 9:1, 7; 35:11) remains in effect even today, even in our time, even in our culture and place.
Today, though, I would like to apply his quote and insight to the work of the urban congregation. His question - is it moral to bear children in such a time - may be rephrased for us: of what purpose or good is the urban congregation? The question is this: Does she have you a future? Having asked that, reread the quote above. How fitting! The Church stands, even in the heart of the city, because Christ placed her there! God has not forgotten her!
Within the sanctuary of peace, in the midst of a chaotic world, stands a font and an altar and a pulpit from which the crucified, risen, and ascended Lord reigns! He reigns in water and Word, taking children of wrath (Eph 2:3) and drenching them in His holy bath, making them children of our heavenly Father. He reigns in the preached Word of the Cross by which He transforms the hearts and lives of the most destitute, the most despicable, the most hardened and forgotten of His poor, miserable creatures. He dresses them in His righteousness, gives them a seat at His table, makes them heirs of His kingdom by faith. And He reigns in bread and wine, His Body and Blood, where He brings heaven down to earth among the darkest of neighborhoods and poorest of streets. How can life in the city - the lives of those in the city - be meaningless?
It is written: “Is this not the fast that I choose,” says the Lord, “to loose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the straps of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover him, and not to hide yourself from your own flesh?” (Isaiah 58:6-7). With the coming of Christ and the dawn of the Christian Church, for the first time, “every human soul possessed an infinite value, that each individual existence is of much more worth than the whole world - it was only then that room was found for the growth of genuine charity.”
Indeed, “The Christian Church can never be conceived of as without charity; it was inherent from the very beginning. And it was so, not only because its Lord and Head taught love and commanded love, but because He Himself practiced it.”
As the Lord is, so is His Body the Church. God is love. And Christ is the love of God made manifest. Christ is love incarnate. Love in the flesh. His is not a self-serving love, which is not love, but lust. His is a self-sacrificing love (1 Jn 4). Giving Himself up in love, pouring out His lifeblood for the sins of the world, He not only creates His Church, but gives her His nature and character in a fallen, loveless world (Eph 5:25-27). As a loyal Bride, carrying on the work of her late husband, so the Church lives the life of Christ, a life of charity and love, in the world.
But He is not gone! For He who died once is raised from the dead never to die again! He lives! Christ lives in and among and from His Church on earth. He lives and works in the lives of His saints who have been baptized into His kingdom, a kingdom of love. True love, which lays down its life for its friends (Jn 15:13), “can admit of no other aim but this one, namely, the aiding of our neighbor in his efforts to attain what is the highest aim in life, membership in the kingdom of God.”
It is for precisely this reason that the urban congregation lives and works among the poor and the down-trodden. For Christ did not come to remove poverty. In fact, He says, The poor you will always have with you (Jn 12:8). “He came to bring the poor into the kingdom of God.”
Christ did not come as a social reformer. Neither is His Church a vehicle for social reform. She is, however, as Christ Himself is, the kingdom of God upon earth, where His Word is taught, rightly and purely, and His Sacraments given according to His institution. This is the Church. And where the Church is there is charity and love. Charity and love in a fallen world desperately in need of Christ’s own mercy and life and forgiveness. For this reason the urban congregation exists. For this reason she has been established by Christ, to be His beacon of light in a dark world, to be His sanctuary of peace in a world of chaos, to be His outpost of mercy in a wilderness of sin. And She is founded on the unchanging Christ - the same yesterday, today, and forever - she has a future because Christ has a future. Let’s get to work!
Your unworthy servant,
Pastor Mierow
Thursday of Trinity 11
Artwork: Christ of St John of the Cross by Salvador Dali, 1951.
RSS Feed