This annual event of the Northwest Danish Association will be September 20-22, 2024 at the Menucha Retreat and Confer­ ence Center in Corbett, Oregon. The program will include two presentations by Terri Barnes from Portland State University: "The Allure of the Vikings: Warriors, Women, and Politics" and "King Harald Bluetooth." The experience of Danish Jews during WWII is another topic with two presentations: one by Ralph Shane about his graphic novel Hour of Need: the Daring Escape of the Danish Jews During World War II and the other by Bodil Jelhof Jensen based on her book Denmark's Forgotten Holocaust: My Fam­ ily History in Letters. Lilian and William Latham will give their perspective from Denmark on the Danish Folketing (Parliament) and current events in Denmark. The Saturday night entertain­ ment will be Flemming Behrend, a Danish folk musician living in Olympia, WA.

More information and a link to the registration form can be found at the DACR page of the Northwest Danish Association website: https://northwestdanish.org/dacr/ Registration must be completed by September 8.

Beloved of God, grace to you and peace from Christ whose power comes oddly enough in weakness. Amen.

One of the biggest mistakes Christians regularly make is defining God primarily in terms of power. Christians do this again and again, talking about God in terms of size or control or judginess or sheer power. When Christians define God primarily in terms of power, it leads to impos­ sible conundrums like: if God is so powerful, why do bad things happen? Or more personally, if bad things happen to me and God is so powerful, so omnipotent, so omni­ scient and omnipresent, then God must have wanted me to go through those hard times. It can also make us feel a pressure for perfection with all those "omnis." These are impossible situations created by this mistake of see­ ing God primarily in terms of power. We can tone down the superlatives about God's power. The theologian Paul Tillich once wrote, "When applied to God, superlatives become diminutives." In other words, if we say God is the Greatest Being or Supreme Being, it just makes God like us, only bigger. It ends up diminishing God, overshadow­ ing what is truly God's Godness. God's Godness comes in a different category entirely.

We often miss this, but we can see it today. God's God­ ness comes with profound love, with incarnate solidarity, with redeeming grace that we see expressed in the symbol of the cross. So we don't miss it, that symbol is all over this space. There's a really prominent cross in the center. If we miss that, there's a processional cross by the bap­ tismal font. If that's not enough, it's boldly emblazoned on the center of the altar. The cross is a symbol of how God's Godness comes in a different way-God knows the suffering of people like you and me. Whether that suffer­ ing comes from political repression like what the Romans did or from the pain of our mortality or how sin sepa­ rates us from our belovedness and from one another, God knows our suffering and enters here to show profound love, incarnate solidarity, redeeming grace. The cross is about how God's Godness subverts usual understandings of power. God is not defined by those, but by a love that seeks to redeem us in grace.

Nearly every week we receive communion where Jesus is not presented as powerful or controlling, but is present with us in redeeming grace. In the night in which he was betrayed is a phrase we hear each time. Not in the night in which he was coronated or raised on a podium but in the night in which he experienced betrayal. God's Godness comes in joining us at those places that are hard for us: betrayal, mortality, separation. Jesus gives his body to sustain the disciples through all that's ahead, gives his blood to forgive and join us together in community. God's Godness comes in "this is my body, given for you." God's Godness does not come primarily in terms of power, but in a new reality that is present with us in the here and now.

In today's gospel from Mark [Mark 6:1-13], it says Je­ sus could do no deed of power. Did you hear that? Re­ member, in Mark's gospel, wherever Jesus went there was conflict. People could not accept the new vision where outcasts were healed and women and girls were raised and welcomed. People could not handle the teaching of little seeds and soils that conflicted with what the reli­ gious leaders taught. Now even in his hometown, Jesus deals with conflict. The townspeople say, "We know his family. We know his work as a carpenter. Who does he think he is?" And because of their offense, because they didn't think he could amount to much, it says Jesus could do no deed of power there. Oh, except curing a few sick people. I wish I could do that, but Mark makes clear that Jesus is not defined in terms of power but in something else, a new way. After not being able to do any deed of power there, Jesus calls the twelve and sends them out to teach this new vision. And here's the thing: Jesus sends them out empty-handed-no extra pamphlets, no ap­ parent authority or money nor even an extra change of clothes. How much more vulnerable can you get? Just you empty-handed, and this message of a new reality that is here. Imagine such vulnerability! You want to go do this? Are you familiar with the work of Brene Brown, a re­ searcher and social scientist? She has done a ton of work on vulnerability and its relationship to courage. Brene Brown distinguishes between courage and bravery. Being courageous is not necessarily the same as being brave; courage has to do with being whole-hearted. We can all be courageous. The word courage comes from the Latin root car, which is the word for heart. Courage comes in living with our heart open, which is precisely what vulnerability means. When we are able to be vulnerable, to be seen as we really are, we are open to creativity, courage, connection, and love. Being vulnerable means openness also to our feelings of shame and fear, and not needing to be perfect. Being vulnerable connects us together as imperfect people who are nevertheless worthy of love and belonging. Je­ sus sends the twelve out with open-handed vulnerability. To be seen as they really were, to share love with their whole heart, to practice grateful joy, and to know they were enough in Christ's grace. They didn't need some­ thing else. Like them, we can be vulnerable when there is grace present to welcome us. We can be whole-hearted­ courageous-because of Christ's grace. The cross speaks to us of Christ welcoming us as we are. God's Godness comes not in power but in vulnerability, in the courage to join us where we are, in weakness and limits. "This is my body," Jesus says, not "this is my lightning bolt." You, empty-handed you, are enough in Christ's grace.

In the second reading today from Corinthians [2 Cor­ inthians 12:2-10], there is a verse that I have loved since high school. In high school I didn't feel very powerful. I wasn't a jock, I wasn't popular, I had a lot of acne and even more self-doubt. The verse that comforted me again and  again was what we heard today when Paul kept praying to God but heard "My grace is sufficient for you. Power is made perfect in weakness." I could never figure out exact­ ly what that meant or how that worked, but I felt God's grace. I knew that God's Godness was different, that I did not need to be perfect or strong. Paul had been writing to the Corinthians about some powerful spiritual experienc­ es he had had, all that stuff about being in the third heav­ en and a vision of paradise, but none of that could contain God's Godness. It was in his affliction, when Paul asks to be rid of that human limitation he's struggling with, that he instead hears how God's grace holds him through it all. My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness. You are enough, God says. It is not about power, but grace. There is God's Godness!

Beloved of God, we don't know exactly what Paul's affliction was, but we know some of our own. I don't know what afflictions you are carrying today-pressures to be more spiritual or more powerful, mental or physi­ cal distress, relationships, addictions, or whatever. I don't know what it is for you, but I know this. Christ's grace is sufficient for you. You don't have to be more perfect or more powerful or more anything today. God's Godness is here, welcoming you as you are, and sending you to our world with a new vision. We are together in that new reality. Amen.



hans@sttimothylutheran.org