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Orphan Grain Train Convention 2006 presentations The transcripts of presentations made by Rev. Ray S. Wilke, Orphan Grain Train President and Rev. Matthew Harrison, Executive Director of LCMS World Relief and Human Care are now online.
Wilke: "Tenting Towards Jerusalem" Harrison: "Why This Mercy?" Tenting Towards Jerusalem Rev. Ray S. Wilke Rev. Wilke explains the theme of the convention, “Tenting Towards Jerusalem,” where our life on earth might be compared to the temporary tabernacle of the Old Testament Israelites as they journeyed towards the Promised Land. Likewise, we “tent” towards our heavenly home. Exodus 36:1-2; 40:36 (KJV) Life is a journey, and we’re tenters. When I first traveled down to Katrina-land we were still one hundred miles out from the Gulf and big, two-foot diameter trees were toppled and whipped about. Roofs from barns and houses were lying beside the original foundations. Blue tarps and tents covered everything. The closer we got to the Gulf the more the tents, the more the tarps, until finally when we arrived at Ocean Springs there was a sea of tents. Everyone was living in tents. They even showered in tents. They ate in tents. They slept in tents. They housed their goods in tents. And the whole announcement to everyone viewing it was, “This is a temporary arrangement.” Then the rule came down from FEMA or from New Orleans City Council, or the State of Mississippi, or the State of Louisiana, that there would come a time that there could be no more tents. But the tents were the things that protected them as the brackish water of Lake Pontchartrain swept over them, as the Mississippi River poured down its flood upon them, as the sea-salt spray from the Gulf washed in over them. They were awash in this amazing un-holy cocktail of water, brackish and briny. They huddled in tents. The brow was covered with the mist of the brackish water and they huddled in tents.
When Moses finished leading his rag-tag group of Hebrews through the Red Sea their brows were covered with the mist of the salt sea and they lived in tents. Moses huddled with God in a tent, a tent of meeting. Ever since the mountain experience, Moses had a lament. A lament is different than a complaint. A lament is allowable. A lament says, “Lord, I hurt, please help.” A complaint says, “Lord I hurt—it’s your fault.” Moses had a lament. The lament was, “Who will go with me on this amazing journey in tents to which you have set us forth?” The Golden Calf event had already taken place, so God said, “I will not go with you. I will not go with you because you are a stiff-necked people lest I slay you on the way.” Moses said, “Oh Lord, if you will not go with us, how shall we go, for you know we are a stiff-necked people, and you know we will lose our way on the journey.” Moses prevailed upon the Lord, and the Lord said, “Okay. My presence will go with you, and I will meet with you in the cloud.” It’s good to have a travel companion. It’s good to have a travel companion. My heart always goes out especially to those who are widows or widowers who travel alone now. It’s not as much fun to travel alone. I’m a good driver. My wife is a good navigator. So we get along good. I drive and she navigates. It’s good to have a companion. Moses was right in asking, “Who will go with us?” The Lord said, “Alright then, since you prevailed upon me, I will go with you.” Moses said to the Lord, “You’ve been telling me lead these people, but you’ve not let me know whom you will send with me. You said, “I know you by name’, you’ve found favor with me; if you are pleased with me teach me your ways so that I may know you and continue to find favor with you. Remember that this nation is your people.” Then the Lord replied, “Alright then, my presence will go with you. And I will give you rest.” Then Moses said to him, “If your presence does not go with us O Lord, do not send us up from here. For what else will distinguish me and your people from all the other people on the face of the earth?” Isn’t it interesting that all across the face of the earth the Ecclesia, “the separated out ones,” the people of God, are in this hour, in this age, in our lifetime becoming distinct for their manner of behavior, for their manner of speaking, for the ability to stoop and bend low down in the mud with those who are broken? God sorts us out. So now the Lord devises a plan whereby His presence will go with them. He first appeared to them at the tent-flap of Moses tent of meeting. Every time the cloud stood above Moses tent of meeting the Lord would meet with him, would hold council with him, would speak with him as I am speaking with you now. Moses would follow His instruction. You heard the instruction that the Lord gave for constructing a travel-tent. It was to be an image for us that Paul would pick up on very strongly. When Paul picked up to leave from one missionary area, he talked in terms of pulling up tent-stakes and he moved on. Jesus dwelling with us in the original language is, “He tented with us. He tabernacled with us.” And He lived in a tent, His body. You’re living in a tent right now, your body. The Lord wants you to know when the wind blows and the frost comes and the products of deterioration begin to happen, that your tent is coming apart at the seams. Be ready. Be ready. Be ready. My father died unexpectedly and suddenly in the night, two hours after he took ill. He was ready. Be ready! So the Shekina, the Doxa, the pillar of cloud, the pillar of fire went ahead of them day and night. That pillar of cloud and fire stood over the tabernacle all the days of their journey--forty years. Then it stood above the tabernacle and the house of David. Under Solomon it stood above the temple for six hundred and ninety-seven years. The pillar of cloud stayed with the people of God all that time, almost 700 years. Seven hundred years of Shekina leading, then, one unholy day, in about the year 590 B.C., Ezekiel looked with alarm and saw the Shekina move and tremble and tilt and wobble and linger over the wall of the temple, and depart. And the temple was Icabod, without a head because God said, “I’ve had it, I’ve had it, I’ve had it. I will not go with you anymore.” And they went into captivity—God’s people who had been led so faithfully, O so many years. The Shekina did not go with them, and they languished. There’s a wonderful conclusion to this story because they lived in expectation for 590 years and then one silent night, there were shepherds of Bethlehem keeping watch over their flock by night, and suddenly there was with them a multitude of the Heavenly Host appearing before them singing, “Glory to God in the highest! And good will toward men.” The Glory was back. The Shekina was back. The Doxa was back. The presence of God was back. He “tents” with us still. He leads us still. You know, God spent two chapters with Moses on the mountain. Then He spent five chapters laying out this tent, because he was fussy about His travel equipment. We don’t put a gold ring in a pig’s snout, and God does not travel in a shabby tent. Then He instructed the people, “Bring your skills to the tent site.” This reading in the Old Testament is a story of you. This reading in the Old Testament is a story in which you participate, in which one fine day you discover that the craft that I have been practicing my whole life was a practice session for the great work that the Lord has for me to do now. I can’t tell you how many people have come up to me--nurses, teachers, truck drivers, farmers--all manner of folk having all manner of crafting skills and saying, “You know, I’ve spent a lifetime never realizing that I was being groomed specifically for work in the Kingdom of God. Shame on the Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod for not teaching us that sooner. That this “Priesthood of All Believers” that Luther discovered was left lying idle for so long; that you never knew earlier on that your “worship” is your “work-ship.” That the skill that you practice at the brick, the mill, and the plow is the skill that the Lord desires of you. That He particularly loves to employ in Kingdom things that touch Him. I’m so proud of you and of the fact that the Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod, the LCMS World Relief/Human Care, the Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod Board for Missions, the Lutheran Hour Ministries, LWML [Lutheran Women’s Missionary League, and Lutheran Heritage Foundation, are for the first time in my life on the same page and doing amazing things. I think we’ve just begun. “Then Moses summoned Bezaleel and Aholiab.” Bezaleel means, “In the protection of God,” and Aholiab means, “My tent is here.” Every skilled person whom the Lord had given ability and was willing to come and do the work.” They came, all manner of folk. They set up a tent. It was to be the image of our travel time. Inside the tent the best craftsmen of all crafted a lid. Its inside was acacia wood and its outside was hammered gold and it was heavy and good and beautiful with cherubim on each end. And one fine day the Shekina, the Doxa, the pillar of cloud moved from the tent of meeting to above the Ark of the Covenant in the Holy of Holies. Once a year the High Priest would come in with the blood of a goat or a lamb and pour it over the Ark of the Covenant that contained the Ten Commandments and the Lord’s demand for the Law shall have been covered over, and with the same blood He came out to sprinkle the people and our sins were forgiven. Then on that Great Day the Lord poured Christ’s own blood over those same Commandments and declared us to be free and holy and good, and fit craftsmen and women for the Kingdom. God bless us all in that work. Why This Mercy? Rev. Matt Harrison Rev. Harrison outlines the biblical basis for Christian humanitarian relief efforts—the answer to why we do what we do in the name of Jesus Christ. Our congregations need much more “in-reach.” That is, to be much more the body [of Christ] that cares for those in need. Acts chapter six shows us a circle of the church’s life. Dr. Walther says, “There is a circle of the pastor’s official duties. He is to see that the widow, the orphan, the needy are cared for. He is to see that it happens.” I suggest to you that our churches are so missiologically wane and languid because we have forgotten this very piece, in the context of our welfare state, and assumed that all those issues will be taken care of by somebody else. And the church that cares for people inside is the church that spills out and cares for people beyond itself. I’m absolutely convinced we should not set up systems of care in our congregations to grow our congregations. That may well happen—and should happen. But we do it because it’s who we are. I tell you, it’s who we are. How could Jesus not heal? It’s who Jesus is! How could he not preach the Gospel? It’s who He is! How could we not be who we are? So John says in his Gospel, “So I tell you if you close off your ‘splanchna’ (emotional response to others) you have denied the Gospel. You have denied Christ.” It’s who we are. Acts Chapter 11… Paul and Barnabas are up in Antioch, Syrian Antioch, the first place that people are called “Christians.” And Agabus comes along and says, “There’s going to be a famine in the whole world!” Paul and Barnabas look at each other. They say, “The church in Jerusalem is hurting. What are we going to do? I have an idea. We’ll send some aid…”. That’s what they did. They took up a collection. And what did that collection demonstrate? It said, “We love you, in Christ. And we’re part of the same ‘koinonia,’ the fellowship.” And it was a wonderful success. What happened to Paul as a result of his last trip to Jerusalem? He gets thrown in jail, he’s taken to Rome, and he’s martyred. Paul becomes a martyr because of his trip to care for the poor in Jerusalem. Did you ever consider that? Paul loses his life; he is so convinced that caring for people in need is central to the churches’ life. And I tell you the work of Orphan Grain Train, the work of mercy and care for people in need, has got to be at the heart of what the church is missiologically. At the heart! Now, you know all the stewardship passages, don’t you? “God loves a cheerful giver.” “He who sows sparingly will reap sparingly.” “Just as you abound in all things, also abound in this grace of giving.” And there are several more! And we use them all the time. I’m sure they were used to build this wonderful facility. They’re used in your congregations to teach stewardship. They’re used in every place the church needs money except the place Paul himself used them. Every one of those texts is from Second Corinthians 8 and 9, and every one of those texts is directed to the Corinthians to be generous to the poor in Jerusalem. Every one! Care for the needy is not only at the missiological heart churches’ life. Care for the needy is at the heart of the churches’ life of stewardship. Orphan Grain Train, you are at the nexus of the most important realities of the church’s life. You know the joy that comes by giving to people in need, don’t you? Where we have squeezed that out of our churches, where we have ignored personal need, where we have not developed capacity to deal with people in need—real need—I believe we have also choked back the joy of giving! If there is to be a rebirth of giving, if the joy of giving is to be restored to our congregations, mercy must come to the center. Mercy and care for the needy. Mercy is key to the churches’ stewardship life as well. Why this mercy? Why does the church assist those in need? Diakonic love—and that just comes from “diakonia”—diakonic love has its source in the Holy Trinity. Look at the text: “Be ye merciful, as your Father in heaven is merciful.” [Luke 6:36] It’s more than doing. It’s about who God is. God’s very being! So, I tell you, “If we refuse to be merciful, it’s not merely breaking the law—it is denying God. “Be ye merciful as your Father in heaven is merciful.” It is who God is. For us to say, “No, I won’t be that way, God,” we’re saying, “I won’t have the Trinity for my God.” Nothing less. Diakonic love is born of the incarnation and humiliation of Christ. “Though being rich, He became poor for your sakes.” We use that verse in the Catechism—Second Article of the Creed, Incarnation of Christ—but it doesn’t show up in care for the needy—anywhere. The very thing Paul wrote it for. I tell you, look at the text, 1 John 3: “In this we have known love that this one laid down His life in behalf of us.” John uses the great Paul word, “for us ... in our place.” And he goes on to say, “And we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.” And then he goes on to say, “Whoever has the sustenance of life and beholds his brother having a need, and he closes his splanchna [’bowels of compassion’] how can the love of God be in him? Children, let us love, not just with words and the tongue, but in deed and in truth.” I tell you, if we deny those around us the love and the mercy of Christ—the needy—we are not just breaking the law, we are denying the incarnation of Jesus Christ: Mercy Incarnate. Nothing less. “God would have all come to the knowledge of the truth and be saved.” If our work of care for the needy does not recognize that people need to know Jesus then it might as well be the work of any secular organization. We can go into some places where we cannot be just “over the top” with evangelism. Sometimes we don’t speak much, but we should always speak Jesus. But at the heart and soul of what we do is this conviction: “Everybody Needs Jesus.” That isn’t the case among a lot of hitherto “Christian” work.
This is a little street boy in Kasumo. These children--there are about 2,500 of them. The Evangelical Lutheran Church in Kenya is caring for a thousand to fifteen hundred of these children in various ways. They live on the street. Their parents are dead--AIDS. The Gospel gifts bring forgiveness and beget merciful living. I began to notice in the Bible when Paul taught about Baptism he soon taught about loving and caring. Again, our Catechism, and don’t get me wrong, the “blue Catechism” is the best thing going, but when it teaches Baptism it’s all me—me and Jesus, me and Jesus—which is great. But if I’m baptized into Jesus, and you’re baptized into Jesus—if you’re hurting, I’m hurting. And the Lord’s Supper drives us out to care for people in need. Christ is the model of care for the whole person. You know, I always thought all these miracles were just sort of an indication of the coming of the Kingdom. It was an eschatological event. It occurred once in time, and that the church is done with the healing part, and now it’s the Word, the Word, the Word. But I’ve become convinced that just as the Word is an indication of the presence of the Kingdom of Christ and continues to be, so [is] the church’s care for bodily needs of people. It’s a sign of the presence of Christ’s Kingdom.
Jesus cared for people, and the church continued to care for people, throughout the first centuries when it was missiologically vigorous. [Referring to photo] This is the Common Chest of Wittenberg. Luther wrote a tract on how the church and the community were to gather all of its funds so it could care for the needy. There are several different keys. Several different people, the pastor and others had keys, so everybody had to open it together. And from this chest the poor and the needy were cared for. Now what does Luther say here? He’s talking about Acts chapter 6: “First you see how a Christian church should be formed in Acts 6 and a correct picture of a spiritual government. The Apostles proceed to care for souls, go around preaching and praying. And they see to it that also the body is cared for by setting up certain men who there distribute goods. Thus the Christian government or regiment is concerned with body and soul that no one suffers want as Luke says, and all are richly fed with respect to the soul and well cared for in the body. That’s a correct picture. It would be very good to begin this if there were people for it. A city such as Wittenberg, one could be divided into four or five sections; each would be given a preacher and a deacon who distribute goods to care for people who are ill. That’s Luther on what the church should be. [Photo] Here’s a lovely picture of some AIDS orphans that we’re privileged to assist. How do you like their rocking horse? We helped children at a nearby orphanage, and I asked one boy “What do you think of this new orphanage we managed to build with the generosity of our donors?” And this boy said to me the most profound thing anybody in the world has ever told me. In this job I’ve been in thirty countries in the last several years. … He said to me, “I thank God and Jesus Christ that somebody has regarded us as human beings.” That’s what we’re doing. That’s what Orphan Grain Train is doing. The Church has a corpo rate life of mercy, a la Acts. The Lutheran Confessions say the work of the Church is one of diakonic love also. And it’s in the Confessions—I love this passage in the Smalcald Articles: “The Church and its bishops or pastors are joined together in unity of doctrine, faith, sacraments, prayer, and works of love.” We’re joined together in works of love. The vocation of mercy is addressed to the Church at all levels—congregation, national, district, we should be working together. This is a great moment in the Churches’ life. It’s time to work together for mutual capacity to get it done! And forget about “turf!” There are many diakonic vocations in the church, many different vocations of doctors, and nurses, people who care, people who know how to get trucks around. There are a thousand vocations that can be used in this work in the church. We’ve been giving cows to Kenyan pastors to improve their lives. And what a difference it’s made for them and for the sake of the Gospel! The Church’s work of mercy extends beyond its borders. It is not just to the Church that we work. We work outside and beyond. And we love people in need. Just as Christ is for all people, the Gospel is for all, so mercy is for all people. The challenge of the world right now is Islam. And the church cooperates with others in meeting human need. We can work well with other Christians, with other well-meaning citizens, with good people; the opportunities to partner for good ends are all around. It’s a fantastic moment. My friends, there has never been a greater moment in history for this work. There has never been a greater moment in history to be Lutheran. The world is open. People around the world, partners, Lutherans who’ve never had anything to do with us are seeking our input, are seeking our partnership. It’s a fabulous moment. Doors are opening everywhere: in south Asia, in Kenya, in Africa, in East Africa, in West Africa, all over in Europe. Now is the moment for us with LCMS World Relief, LCMS World Mission, Orphan Grain Train, Lutheran Laymen’s League, Lutheran Women’s Missionary League, congregations, districts. Now is the time to move. No matter what! I don’t care what else is going on in the church. Now’s the time to go! Let’s go! |
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