The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.  If there is any concept in the world that seems elusive, it has to be "The Truth."  There are as many versions as there are people.  There is an exercise done with law students when they are learning about the reliability of witnesses --- someone comes in during the lecture and steals a purse or briefcase and runs off with it.  The professor chases after the person to no avail, but lets the class know that campus security has been called, and when security comes, the students are asked to describe the event and the person they saw take the item.  Generally, everyone has his or her very own version and description of the thief --- several notions of the whole truth going on in a room of law students who all just witnessed the same event.  TRUTH might not be as simple as it sounds.

          Jesus tells his disciples that if they know the truth, the truth will make them free.  Freedom is a concept that is almost as difficult to pin down as truth.  The followers of Jesus didn't see themselves as even needing freedom --- "What do you mean, we are the children of Abraham, we've never been slaves."  Short memories I guess of those years crossing the wilderness to get away from the rule of the Pharaohs.

          We too might think we have all the freedom necessary --- what do you mean freedom, we are citizens of the United States of America, the land of the free.  We are not slaves to anyone, what sort of freedom could we possibly need?  Most of us, once we become adults, are free to make all sorts of decisions in our lives, where to live, what sort of work to do, what to have for breakfast --- but there is an area of our lives over which we have absolutely NO freedom.  We are not free to make ourselves right with God.  There is absolutely nothing we can do to make that happen.  Someone has said our approach to the Christian life is often as absurd as the enthusiastic young man who had just received his plumber's license and was visiting Niagara Falls.  He looked at it for a few minutes and then said, "I think I can fix this."  We can't fix it, no matter how smart, how good, how faithful, how pure, how innocent.  Our attempts to free ourselves do not work with God.  In some ways, the words of that old Kris Kristopherson, Janis Joplin song say it well --- (If you are too young to know who they are, go home and look it up on Wikepedia) --- freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose.

          Meister Eckhardt, great 14^th century Christian mystic, said in a sermon, "Above all, claim nothing for yourself.  Relax and let God operate in you and do what he will with you.  The deed is his, the word is his, this birth is his, and all you are is his, for you have surrendered self to him.  God wants to do your work himself."  And there is the point of difficulty for us free and independent types, that we are only free when we are completely bound to the One who is at work in us.  If the Son makes you free, then you are free indeed.  Everything else is just an illusion. Freedom, nothing left to lose.

          My parents grew up Lutheran, part of the Hauge synod --- a pretty common heritage and piety among Scandinavian Lutherans of their generation.  When I was growing up, my parents rarely went forward for communion, and it wasn't until I was in confirmation that I started to wonder about that.  They were raised to believe that you did not go to communion unless you were worthy to receive it, but what a catch 22 that was.  How could you possibly get worthy?  What would be enough? That is not freedom, that is being imprisoned by our own sense of worth, by our own inability to make it right with God.  Our relationship with God is not based on our worthiness; it is based on God's grace and mercy.  The truth that makes us free is the work of the Christ.  Our freedom does not lie in clinging to that little bit of goodness in us and hoping for the best, our freedom is living in the light of God's grace, and trusting that gift.  That is the message of the gospel, the good news.

          If it is constantly up to us, that is a prison itself --- God's love, revealed for us in Jesus Christ does for us what we cannot do for ourselves.  We come forward every week knowing that this sacrament, this bread and wine is gift, pure and simple.  That is the truth of the matter, that is what sets us free.  That was the lightening bolt that finally struck Martin Luther as he agonized over and over about how to win God's approval and his own righteousness.  Now our energy is not spent on getting it together, getting right with God, but on living out a life of thanksgiving for what is already given to us.  Anything that tells you different is a distortion of the gospel.  It's like a race where they hand you the giant winner trophy at the beginning.  You have won --- now you run for the sheer joy of it.  It's like the man who saved for years to get enough money to come by ship to the United States.  He had just enough for his passage, and every night he would sit in his room eating a few crackers and peanut butter while people feasted in the dining room morning, noon, and night.  People kept asking him to join them, but still he would eat in his room.  Finally someone said, don't you realize that the meal is included in the price of the ticket?  That's the prison we are in sometimes, living like people who don't know that the meal is included, that the love of God is included, that it has already been bought and paid for --- for us.

          The Reformation that we celebrate each year is not simply a walk back in time to recognize the work of Martin Luther and the other reformers, it is acknowledging a renewal, a reminder and a re-forming that is the task and mission of the church in every age.  The church, like individuals, dies to itself each day so that it too might depend on the work of the Spirit to be free.

          And so, we come again and again to this gathering, this celebration, this time of thanksgiving and worship to be reminded that not only are we freed from, but we are freed for---- freed for life, freed to let go, to give up, freed to confess and turn in another direction.  We are free to participate in God's work in this world, free to love because there is nothing more to be lost and nothing more to be gained, free to be a living sign of God's grace, free to quit working for the prize and enjoy the victory that is already won.

          The work of Reformation is always before us, to be able to be open to what new thing God is doing, to new birth and new life, to the Spirit speaking to the church.  "Reformation is not simply a breaking away from, it is a letting go of old attitudes, habits, understandings, and ways that do not give life." --- (Grace Brame, Faith, The Yes of the Heart).  Martin Luther never expected to start a whole new denomination; he expected to reform the church, to reclaim the work of God.  He tore himself inside out trying to figure out how he could make himself right with God, and finally came to realize that he could do nothing, and that all he needed was faith in God's grace, and even that faith was the work of the Holy Spirit.  Luther said, "Faith alone lays hold of the promise, believes God when He gives the promise, stretches out its hand when God offers something, and accepts what He offers.  This is the characteristic function of faith alone."

          So, let us carry on as a reforming church, a church that is open to the work of the Spirit and trusts in the promises of God. Let us go on, knowing that God is constantly breathing new life into us and calling forth our gifts to be used for the sake of the world.  We have been freed from the power of the law to condemn us, and are free for a life lived in service and gratitude. Thanks be to God, we are free indeed.