Do You Hear Me Now? 4/21/13

       Who is Jesus?
       Who are you, Jesus, was the way the crowd asked it of him when he walked in the
midst of them. Figuring out Jesus was the question du jour – and still is today. Are you the
messiah we've been expecting?, the Jewish community of that day asked him. Tell us
plainly.We need a simple answer. Don’t keep us thinking, guessing, considering,
pondering, wondering.
       Evidently people were talking about Jesus - the crowds he was gathering, the stories
about his works that were spreading, the feedings, the healings, the teachings. In Mark’s
gospel story Jesus asks his disciples, “Who do people say that I am?” (Mk 8:27-29) The
answers given were: a new John the Baptist, a new Elijah, a new Jeremiah, and another
prophet like Elijah, Jeremiah and John. “So who do YOU say that I am?” Jesus goes on to ask.
Peter says, “You are the Messiah.”  In Matthew’s telling, Jesus goes onto say that famous line to Peter, “You are Peter, and upon this Rock I will build my church….”(Mt 16:18)

The answer...
       Who are you Jesus? Jesus answers that question two ways: one, he says that he’s
already told them, if they listened. And second, if the words don’t come through, look at his
works. This is what Jesus told John the Baptist, too, when he sent from prison to ask. Jesus’
words and works match – he has so integrated the message of God into his living that he is
totally consistent in his speaking and living. Most of us haven’t gotten that far in our own
faith and living – we still have ideals which draw us, even as we know we usually fall short.
We WANT to live up to the compassion and faithfulness we hear God call us to, we WANT to
be that integrated – and sometimes we manage to do it – not every time, but sometimes.
        Just like those physical therapy folks who make the exercise more difficult as soon as you are getting better at it, my experience is that God continues to give us a deeper spiritual exercises, just so we don’t get complacent and think we've “mastered” this Christian thing.

Another take on Jesus' answer
        Another take on Jesus’ Q & A is to see that it points up the doubt we all are prone to
feel in difficult circumstances. Even John the Baptist wondered about Jesus. On the one hand, we KNOW God is with us; on the other hand, sometimes we wonder where God is, or if we’ve heard right, or if God really hears and cares. A father who brings his son to Jesus for healing, phrases it this way – “Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!” (Mk 9:24) Many times we have to have something affirmed and reaffirmed to let it sink in; we have to hear it several times, especially if it’s vitally important.
       The conference I attended up at Mercy Hospital last weekend talked about the role of parish nurses, for eexample attending doctor’s appointments with us as a second set of ears to hear just what the doctor says to do. Sometimes when we’re in crisis, things go right past us – a second set of ears at the doctor’s is often a good thing. I think affirming Jesus as the Messiah is one of those important things we might
have to hear a few times.

Predestination??? Free will?????
       Jesus then adds a confusing statement – people asking can’t “hear” him, his words or his actions, because they are not his sheep – his sheep DO hear his voice and know him, and no one can snatch them away.
       That might be reassuring if we are among the sheep who hear Jesus’ voice, and a reassurance that we cannot be snatched away. But for those on the “not-hearing” side, it sounds strangely like they DON’T hear Jesus because they CAN’T hear Jesus. Or, as some have taken it, they don’t recognize Jesus’ voice because they aren’t chosen, or elected, or predestined in the first place. I’m deeply uncomfortable with that take on Jesus’ words, and wish this were just a translation difficulty…but there are other puzzling statements like this in Scripture that lead to the difficult concept of predestination …. or double predestination – ie that some people are predestined to be among the sheep, and some are predestined NOT to be among the sheep, a kind of determinism or fate type of thinking.
       I’m uncomfortable with that kind of take on Jesus’ words because it leaves behind other Scriptures that indicate God’s love for ALL people was the reason Jesus came, and that we are given this time to decide, to choose whether to trust God. Being raised in the Baptist tradition which emphasizes our free will and our free choice to respond to God’s grace, this kind of strict predestination is bothersome. Yet we as Presbyterians look to Calvin as the font of our Reformed heritage, and Calvin was a proponent of this view of predestination in his great work, The Institutes of the Christian Religion. Many have tried to reconcile these two views, but, like on other issues, the Bible sometimes speaks in various voices. After all, it does contain many books from many authors, and all over a great many years - all relating to the One God, all reflective of deep faith, yet sometimes with a different take on things. So these kinds of verses are there, but so are the other.

Modern hyper-Calvinism
       There’s a resurgence of interest in Calvin these past few years, and some believers have been drawn into a strict interpretation of John Calvin’s writings on this topic, now being referred to as Hyper-Calvinism. Calvin as well as Luther both revived the earlier teachings of Augustine of Hippo about predestination and election. In this view, some are elected to salvation, and the rest are therefore are elected to not believe. Therefore Christ didn’t really die for ALL people, but just for the elect. The choice has been God’s, as God is free to do what God wants. And although we might fall into sin again, our election and salvation are sure, as they are hidden in God. The point of this doctrinal understanding is in order to ensure that salvation is totally of God’s grace; that our actions have nothing to do with earning or deserving our salvation – in fact, according to Calvin, we can’t do anything good anyway, as we are totally depraved. God’s grace is totally responsible for our election, our salvation, our hearing and responding. Even our faith is a gift of grace – God is the first mover in any of our responses to God. Lest we think there’s no need for outreach, however, Calvin reminds us that we don’t KNOW who the elect are, however, so we must still proclaim the gospel so the elect can hear.
         It’s reassuring to me that people of faith have disagreed on Augustine’s interpretation of predestination in the whole history of the Christian church, as well as with Calvin and Luther’s strict interpretations. It’s important to see the context in which Luther and Calvin lived and did theology in order to understand why this emphasis on grace alone was so vital to them. We might remember that Luther’s arguments with the church of his day centered around the place of pious works and godly observances in our salvation. The church of Luther’s day had swung way off to the side of emphasizing good works, to the point of holding these things up as the means of salvation. In addition, if a person didn't have enough pious works they could purchase some goodness with a monetary gift – this was called the buying of indulgences. Luther despised this as unbiblical and heretical – our FAITH was what mattered, not our works. Our righteous works (or lack of) were not the point – God’s grace was the point, and our hopelessness without it.

IMHO
       In the evaluation of many, Luther and his followers swung a little too far to the other way. Luther couldn't even read James’ letter about how our good works showed our faith, but wanted it struck from the Scriptures. We can see and appreciate the corrective response to how the church had become off base as to the place of holy living and pious actions; and we certainly want to affirm the grace of God in seeking us and providing for our salvation in Jesus Christ.

Other voices in Scripture
However, as I said previously, Scripture often doesn't speak with one voice about how God works. Even in the gospel of John, there are those beautiful words of Jesus in John 3:16 - God loved the whole world so much that Jesus came, so that the world might be saved. Acts and Romans state that everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved. In Mark’s gospel, we believers are sent to the world to proclaim the gospel to all creation. John the Baptizer recognized Jesus as the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, and that Christ came into the world to save sinners. “Whosoever” was the King James word – whosoever believes, whosoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.  A seminary professor used to suggest that we think of this problem like a door that from the outside says “Whosoever will;” yet from the inside it says, “Elected from the beginning of time.” I kind of like that. Even Luther and Calvin said that in the end it all comes down to mystery.

Conclusion
       However we resolve this tension, or whether we just live with tension and let it be, this idea of election or predestination is never a reason to sink into an “us/them” mentality,that is, we are the elect and saved and we must be greater than those outsiders. Even the purists of predestination theology say that our election has nothing to do with our virtue or goodness or superiority, so there’s no reason here for boasting on our part, or for looking down on any people as less worthy.
      My prayer this morning is that we indeed hear Jesus’ voice calling us to follow, telling us that Jesus and God are one, & therefore Jesus rightly reveals who God is; and that when we hear Jesus, we are hearing God. May we also hear that even if we doubt or stumble, our trust in God’s salvation is sure. AMEN.

Transcending & Transforming 4/28/13

       We can always tell when a critical scene is coming in a movie – the music comes up with a tense feeling, the story moves moment by moment, every word, every act – this is important, we say. Although several normal days or weeks have been condensed, suddenly we are watching a knock at the door, the door opening, seeing the faces react to the sight of the other person, we hear the dialogue. If it’s a crime movie, all the boring stuff like surveillance and waiting for test reports are skipped, but we see and hear every skid of the tires in the chase scene. We might even switch whole countries, skipping the trans-Atlantic flight as the characters move from New York to Paris, say, then watching every moment of a dinner or a party while the spies do their thing… If it’s a love story, it condenses all the days between meetings and centers on the encounters of the future couple, or every fight if they’re breaking up. Books do it,too (except for the music); the author suddenly starts devoting whole paragraphs to every detail of the moment, every thought, every word, every action. They emphasize what’s important to the story moving forward and the development of characters – narrating the car drive from DC to Boston isn't usually part of the plot.
       Now the book of Acts is the same. It chronicles the spread of the gospel from post-resurrection in Jerusalem all through the journeys of Paul, the adventures of other disciples and how various groups of believers in Christ are set up in various cities around the Mediterranean. So there’s a lot to tell. Yet this encounter of Peter and Cornelius is given two whole chapters, which include multiple retellings of this dream and what Paul did about it.The travels and persecutions stop for these chapters while this huge change in perception, the addition of the Gentiles, is detailed.
       This is a critical and vital part of the story of the church, this opening of the gospel to Gentiles.That so much space is devoted to it tells us what a significant development and change this was. Boundaries are transcended; people are transformed – and Christianity is
transformed. We see the astounding new direction the Holy Spirit leads these early believers to go.

The basic short story...
       We read the story, how Peter saw his vision and so responded to Cornelius’ men who came for him. And how they showed the same signs of the Spirit, and were baptized. And how Peter was questioned when he came back, before the whole community would recognize God’s work and move forward into the spread of the gospel. Peter ends with the great question, Who am I to hinder God? Indeed.

Yet the huge change...
       We might not realize how big a change this was for those early Christians. Most believers nowadays are what our Jewish forbears would call 'Gentile,' so we're used to Gentiles in church. To point out the radical change, we might think about a parallel situation in more recent American history, when some believers began to share the gospel with our African-American sisters & brothers, honoring their personhood and being concerned with their souls. Recall the furor that erupted as those assumptions were challenged. ore recently, recall the furor when some began to honor the gifts of women, their souls and their leaderships, and wanted to welcome them to service in the church as deacons, elders and clergy. Notice the current fervor because some believers are welcoming people of a different orientation and challenging those assumptions. 
       Would that believers of those days and this day would have the courage and health to do as Peter’s community did – respect Peter’s personhood and faith, listen to his answers and motivations, and then seek to discern the moving of the Holy Spirit. Instead, many respond with anger, blame, shame, loud voices, accusations and nasty words, as if the one who yells the loudest is right, starting a new denomination where everyone thinks like me. The Christian church has a less seemly side of our history in addition to our faithfulness is hard times.

The response of Peter's community
       Now usually when I preach on this passage, I emphasize the courage of Peter and later Paul ,going to these groups considered outside the bounds of acceptable. Today I want to look at the actions of the group of believers that Peter returns to after welcoming these Gentiles, because this is vital, too.
        The group of believers in this passage actually respond to the challenge of this new action Peter took in what is now recognized as a healthy way of a healthy system. Not all conflict is bad; and they had every right to question how Peter decided to do this new thing, and to challenge him. We believers are the church, the community, the body of Christ. We do not act in a vacuum – how we each live our faith reflects the whole body. What do we do when there are differences?
        What they did was to go straight to Peter and express their concerns in a respectful way. Then they listened, knowing Peter was an apostle, respecting his faith and commitment enough to actually consider and measure what he said. Peter also responded in a healthy way, listening to their questions, and explaining the work of the Holy Spirit in him in a forthcoming way. Finally the whole group validated the word of God to Peter and affirmed his response, praising God for pouring out the gifts of the spirit on Gentiles. The whole church moved together into welcoming these new believers. Not that there weren't more discussions later as they faced how to work out this new thing.  Sharing the gospel of Christ and the church with Gentiles wasn't a quick and painless change.

Indirect ways they MIGHT have responded...
         What if the community had responded in some of the unhealthy ways of communication? What if they didn't go to the person concerned, Peter, but did indirect things like talking about Peter with other people? Did you hear what Peter did? He went to some Gentiles house, actually ate with him and others. That is SO not our norm! Who does he think he is? Why did he do it? Then the rumors and gossip starts…I heard that he’s been having trouble with the other disciples, I heard that Cornelius has a cute daughter, Remember how he denied Christ back on the night he was killed? Maybe his faith is weak! He’s just so arrogant to go off and do this on his own! Why weren't we asked our opinion first? We would have set him straight!           Peter, not being addressed, doesn't know what’s being said and wonders why people aren't happy about the new believers, why no one is talking as freely to him as they used to. He notices that former friends aren't coming to the meetings when these new people come. He notices that people seem to respond to him differently when he talks.
       Or in another indirect method, the rest of the believers might go to Steven or Mark and try to rope them in, saying something that sounds kinda pious like, You know, I am really concerned about Peter - it really worries me that he went off on his own like this – do you think someone should talk to him? I’m sure we all just really want what is best for the gospel, you know, and I really care about Peter except that he’s so independent –I’m sure he means well, but we can’t have someone thinking they know what God wants all by themselves – I’m so worried – could you go talk to him about my virtuous concerns?
       If this other person is healthy, they’ll come back with, Wow, you’re telling the wrong person, and since it concerns our leader Pete, and might have a negative effect on his ministry for this kind of thing to be said behind his back, let’s go to Peter right now and ask him! And if person #1 is unwilling to ask directly, then person #2 will say, “Well then, if it’s not important enough to pursue it with Peter, let’s agree to just drop it, and not spread rumors, gossip & speculation, but support each other in love.” But if person # 2 is also unhealthy, they’ll enter into a nice cozy destruction of Peter’s reputation and undermining of his respect.

Shaming ways they MIGHT have responded...
       Another unhealthy thing those believers might have done was to try and attack Peter, do the shame and blame thing. Yes, they go to him, but with accusations like, You’re destroying the church we’re comfortable with! You don’t care about our opinions! You've gone off on a tangent! You think you’re so great! Are you so arrogant that you think you’re the only one the Spirit talks to? You’re being divisive and destroying the peace! Shame on you! This confusion is all your fault!  See, they don’t really want to listen to him and get an answer; they are actually not seeking the good of the church and the good of Peter; they rather want to cut him down, no matter the cost to the mission of the church. They have no respect or care for his faith or leadership, they just enjoy causing trouble for him.
       If those of Peter’s community acted like this, the door for the Gentiles might have slammed shut before any transformation happened, God would have been hindered, we may never have had Scriptures to read, and you & I, as Gentiles, may never have heard the good news of Christ. Unfortunately, people in the church HAVE acted this way towards one another in challenging times.  Unfortunately, we all bring our unhealthy ways as well as our healthy ways when we come to Christ, and not everyone seeks to grow. Who knows what works of the Spirit have been cut off or delayed by responses like these? Who knows what tender and faithful hearts have been cut to the quick by harsh and accusatory words?

Good thing they were healthy communicators!
       How fortunate for the Gospel and for our salvation that Peter’s community came to him in a wise way, asking about his action, yes, yet in a way that was ready to listen and in a desire to faithfully discern the leading of the Spirit, a way that respected his faith and sought to build up each other in love – not seeking to shame or destroy or make trouble.
       Yes, Peter was the one who received the vision and went with Cornelius’ men to preach to the Gentiles. But the community was healthy enough and faithful enough to listen and discern that God was indeed speaking, and to open the way for all people to enter the kingdom of heaven and receive the love and forgiveness of God… instead of cutting things off at the knees out of destructive and adversarial motives.
     Our prayer is today that we may have this same loving spirit in our times of tension and challenge; that we may seek to act in ways that build up the body of Christ and each other, lifting each other up in love; that we may seek to grow in health and wisdom so that we honor each other as children of God; and all for the glory of God and the gospel. AMEN.

Jesus' Kind of Peace 5/5/13

Leave-takings are often difficult.  We hurt when someone we love has to leave, and it’s also hard when we’re the one that has to leave - especially when we are good friends and have
shared meaningful times. Say we go on a special trip - we anticipate arriving at our friend's place and seeing them, then we enjoy good times together, then we find ourselves starting to count down - only 2 more days, only 1 more day, then that last day and it’s time to leave – it’s hard. Same with visiting a favorite spot, a favorite summer camp, a favorite relative’s house, seeing our grown children or grandchildren, moving from a house where we’ve spent happy years. Of course, it’s really only difficult to part when it’s been a good, enriching time, with good friends, with happy memories - we’re happy to leave when it’s that other kind of visit!
       Jesus knows what’s coming for him, knowing the difficult tests he will endure, and how his followers will feel bereft at his leaving. So he’s preparing himself and his followers for his approaching death, so they don’t lose their faith, so they won’t feel the bottom drop out of everything they had envisioned and imagined during their years together on the road, and in ministry. We've pointed out before that they really don’t get what he’s saying, so the tragedy of Jesus’ arrest and crucifixion do strike them to the core – and God raising him from the dead stuns them again. But they have his words to recall to mind, and more than that, they have Jesus’ very Spirit to keep the relationship going.

My peace I give you - & the Spirit
       Have peace, Jesus says, ahead of time. I’m not going to leave you orphaned. I’m saying this while I’m with you, and later you’ll have the Spirit, the Advocate, the Counselor, the One who walks alongside to help – and you’ll be reminded and taught even more. Don’t fear – I give you my peace. Don’t be troubled or afraid.
       Of course, they ARE troubled and afraid; confused, perhaps overwhelmed. They DO feel bereft, not understanding. Jesus’ death is a big shock, even though reading about it these 2,000 years later, we can see in the gospels that Jesus tried to tell them about it. But they had a different picture in mind, they expected a different outcome - Jesus triumphant, Israel reborn. So Jesus’ words didn't click beforehand.
       Then they began remembering, then Jesus breathed on them and gave his Spirit. Then that Day of Pentecost came, that we will celebrate in a couple weeks, with the explosion of God’s power and the beginning of the spread of the gospel. Jesus was still with them.

Scary things happen in this world
       Certainly if we had to face the challenges of life alone, it would be a fearsome thing. Scary things happen in the world and in life – they fill our headlines and our social media. A random maladjusted person takes out their feelings of helplessness and wrath on a grade school. A couple foreign students plant bombs at a great community event like the Boston Marathon. Angry people highjack planes, or send poisons through the mail. Trusted people high in reliable organizations decide to get rich in some nefarious and careless ways, and plunge the whole world into financial chaos. A parent can’t handle the stress in their life and take it out on their children, abusing them and scarring their souls for their life. A nice family dog attacks a kid out of the blue. Cancer happens. Sudden death happens. People we think are friends turn on us in scathing abuse. Cars wreck. Jobs get eliminated. Children experiment with drugs and get hooked. Freak accidents happen. Houses get robbed. Fires sweep through the nearby forests and take one house while leaving those on either side. 

There's varieties of what 'peace' means...
      What does Jesus mean about giving us peace? What kind of peace is it?
      We use the word peace is various ways. Our country calls its missiles “peacemakers” – in the sense that we have enough power to clobber you, so don’t rebel. I guess that's peace of a sort - no overt war, anyway....but it’s not a thriving situation for the powerless. And there’s the other sense that we’ll wipe you out and then you won’t be a bother and we’ll have peace. Some parents punish their children so severely that the kids live in fear of putting a foot wrong – not really a healthy relationship, although I guess there’s a peace of sorts. Not a peace where the children thrive.
       Politically, we call Peace the absence of war. Whatever else is hurting people, however else people are suffering, if there’s no war, it’s peacetime. Back in the hippie days, we wore peace symbols and everyone talked about peace, kind of an Utopian dream of everyone getting along, mainly because they were enjoying the rounded off edges with marijuana. Forget your troubles with an artificial high, drugs or booze whatever, and just be, man.

What Jesus' peace isn't
       The peace Jesus gives isn't about carrying the biggest stick, nor being the victims of those with the biggest sticks. The peace Jesus gives isn't about a sentimental or drug-induced version of peace, either. And certainly the peace Jesus gives doesn't mean the absence of trouble in our lives, or the psychological tension we feel when we wrestle with things. Christians certainly have as much human trouble as the next guy. Believing in God doesn't put a shield around us that trouble can’t get through, although sometimes we don't understand that.  Look at the Bible - The folks in the Bible stories certainly didn't live trouble-free lives – even King David, the great King of Israel’s glory. Our adult Sunday School class has been reading in 2 Samuel about David’s life – although he was a man of God and a great King, he certainly had his difficult times. Jacob, the founder of the Hebrew tribe known as Israel, had his named changed TO Israel because he “strived with God.” His son Joseph, also important to the story of God’s people, was thrown out by his own brothers, thrown in prison and lied about – he landed on his feet, but he had troubles. The disciples were beaten, stoned, imprisoned, and some were martyred. Jesus himself was betrayed, lied about and killed by the state.
       I know there are some preachers and churches that seem to tell people that if only they’d come to God, get right with God, all their troubles would be over. That illness and trouble come because of sins. That’s just simply not true. We don’t cease being humans and participants in the human condition just because we have trusted in God. There’s a verse in the OT that says that when it rains, it rains on the just and the unjust. You can take that 2 ways – one, that when God sends the blessing of rain, it helps the crops of the bad guys as well as the good guys. Two, when trouble comes, it doesn't just affect the bad guys. In any event, it seems to say we are all part of humanity, and prone to the things that befall humanity.

So...what IS Jesus' peace?
       Like those other fruits of the Spirit, love and joy and kindness and long-suffering, the peace Jesus gives is a deep inner certainty that we are God’s beloved, and in God’s hands. The Hebrew word “Shalom,” which is often translated “peace,” actually carries a concept of wholeness, well-being, and inner security that we know the One who is the Beginning and the End – and everything in between.
       So in troubles, we know that we are not out of God’s hands, and we have not been abandoned. We remember that God is with us, and even if things are dire, our lives are safe in God’s larger plan. The peace of God is a deep-seated sense of well-being that comes from one’s experience of the Divine in daily life. Our hearts are not perturbed, even if the seas roar around us. Nothing can separate us from the love of God. We do not live in existential loneliness - rather our reality is that place where God’s will is being done and God’s promises are being fulfilled, where the Spirit of God lives in us and connects us to the ultimate reality of Being Itself. Jesus’ peace emerges from a sense of God’s nearness and an experience of the Spirit’s illumination. Peace enlivens the soul and widens our sense of self beyond the fragile and defensive self to embrace the Spirit of God moving in all things. The fearful self, worried about its survival, gives way to a self that sees all things in God, including its individual unfolding, and God in all things. We remain mortal and finite, but our mortality is no longer demoralizing; our mortality is embraced in our relationship to a trustworthy and faithful God. (from Bruce Epperly’s blog, http://www.patheos.com/blogs/livingaholyadventure/ 2013/ 05/the-adventurous-lectionary-the-sixth-sunday-of-easter/)

God makes a home in us
       Jesus promises in these verses that we who love God will keep God’s words, and God will come and make a home within us. John’s word for this is often translated, “abide.” God will abide in us if we abide in God. The gospel of John uses this word 40 times, so it’s a significant concept in John. Abide signifies to stay, to remain, to dwell, to lodge, to last, to persist, and/or to continue. At the spiritual level, it describes what God does in our lives. God abides in Jesus and Jesus abides in God (14:10). Jesus abides in and with us (6:56). We bear fruit because Jesus abides in us (15:5). Jesus' words abide (15:7). The Holy Spirit abides with Jesus (1:32-33). Therefore disciples abide with or in Jesus (8:31, 35, 12:46, 15:4-5, 7, 9-10). (from webpage blog, http://www.patheos.com/Progressive-Christian/Home-Alone-Alyce-McKenzie-04-29-2013)
       God makes a home within us. Isn’t that a delightful promise? No wonder we can have the peace of God – we are in an ongoing relationship with the Divine. We live together with the God of the universe. Not only does that give us peace, it also says we are never alone when we face the troubles of the world. God is with us. What a remarkable assurance – and a remarkable peace. AMEN.

Text - John 14: 23-29

God Speaks Our Language 5/19/13

       At my conference this past week, there was this poor guy who had the job of
standing up after either the worship service or lecture and doing announcements. I say
“poor guy” because there were about 1700 preachers there, and when the closing song was
sung, we got up like it was the end of church and time to head for the snacks in the
fellowship hall. He tried to talk over the sound of babble, babble, babble, but some folks
were into their conversations and really didn't pay attention. That he spoke softly didn't help. The second time, he leaned in close and said, “I have gifts to give out,” which helped, but still people were talking on the way out the door. By the next day the group learned to wait & listen, thank goodness - but the first day must have been totally embarrassing for him. Having been working on this sermon, I was struck by the noise of babble, babble, babble. We preachers can really talk.
      Was Babel a prequel for our Pentecost
       The mnemonic thing in English about "babble, babble, babble" is a neat trick in English to remember the story and the name of the tower. Of course the name of Babel in the Genesis text later becomes “Babylon,” the Sumerian civilization.  It actually did grow from a travelling population, built cities and tall towers called ziggurats as temples to connect earth and heaven, did come up with baking bricks rather than just sun drying them, and used bitumen to hold them together. They were a powerful empire, and enforced a one language rule to unite and strengthen their society. And they were eventually thrown down by invading forces from several directions at once, which brought their various languages as well as carrying captives off where other languages were spoken. This is the pre-story, the pre-quel , for the story of Abraham, introduced as Abram before his name is amended by Jehovah God, who sets out on his journey and becomes the ancestor of Israel.

Compare & contrast - that is so God!
        This text is often paired in our common lectionary with the coming of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost, seeing the two stories as a reversal of each other. The situations are similar – the Roman Empire, like the Sumerian Empire, was a powerful civilization, and also enforced a one-language rule over the peoples they either conquered or did business with – much like people kinda have to speak English today to deal with the powerful empire we live in. And in both situations, suddenly there are multiple languages in town. The difference is that in Sumer, the language was a result of the overthrow of the Empire, and the confusion of the people was
result of what tore the down. Whereas in Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost, the Spirit of God enabled the disciples to spread the good news of Jesus Christ in people’s native languages…. and so subvert the edict of Rome at the same time. In Sumer, the people said “Let’s make a name for ourselves,” setting themselves up to challenge God; and God threw them down in a confusion of languages. In Rome, who had done the same things, God now undercut their enforced unity with speaking to people in their own language, using this miracle of talking to folks each in their own language.
      THAT IS SO GOD!
      In Sumer, God scattered the empire that tried to be settled themselves and worship a false god; in Jerusalem, God comforts these unsettled and far-flung Jews who had come to worship the true God by speaking to them in their words of home. 
       THAT IS SO GOD!
        We can imagine what it must have been like for the faithful Jewish people in that day, under the thumb of Rome, a conquered people, scattered, dispersed; coming back to their own holy city for one of their own holy festival days, and forced to speak in the language of the oppressor, use the money of the oppressor, walk by the soldiers of the oppressor. But then they hear the language of home, the language they know best – and they hear about the new activity of their God, the mighty works of God in Jesus Christ. Yeah, some scoffers think it’s just a bunch of babbling drunks, but many, many people there hear the gospel news and believe. This miracle on Pentecost sent the faith in Jesus as the Christ of God, the Messiah of God, all over the Mediterranean region as these folks returned to their own countries - we sometimes call it the birthday of the church.

God speaks to us in the words of home...
        IT IS SO GOD to speak to us in the words we know, in the words of home – literally
and metaphorically the words of home. God speaks to us in ways we can understand, our
own language, speaks straight to our heart the words we need to hear, the words of
deliverance, forgiveness, salvation. Through the Spirit, God speaks words of comfort, words of call, words of wisdom. In fact, in Jesus Christ, God spoke THE WORD in the flesh of a human person like us, our human language, in one who was born like us and lived like us and died like us – Yet the new WORD spoken in joy was that God raised Jesus up in a new creation, which we are invited to also share.
       Don’t you just hate being misunderstood? Sometimes, even all speaking English, our native language, we can be misunderstood. Communication takes effort – we have to metaphorically speak the same language. Right now in our poor country, if we speak about the economy, some people hear that the Republicans keep causing all sorts of problems, and others hear that those darn Democrats did it. In our Christian religion, we might all say we’re following Jesus, yet we go in different directions. In our close relationships, sometimes what we try to communicate isn’t heard – there’s a popular book about love languages – some people evidently speak “action” and others speak “kind words.” Even all speaking English we can have miscommunications.
       It’s good to know that the Spirit of God speaks OUR language. God communicates with us deep in our souls with the Holy Spirit, who knows who we are, knows what we intend, what we feel, what we think – and when necessary can even speak to us below the level of words. Our conversations with God don’t need a translator.
       Part of the fun of my conference was that we all spoke “preacher,” and could talk together about shared experiences and shared struggles - and laugh together at preacher jokes – and hear sermons and talks aimed towards our joint profession. It’s great to be understood in that way. Colleagues are important.

Closing
       On my flight home, I sat next to a nice man who unfortunately only spoke Spanish – his English was limited to “Coca-cola,” when the flight attendant came by with the cart. He didn't understand pretzel, peanuts or cookies, though, so he pointed to what I had. When the announcement came on that it was time to put your trays up and get ready for landing, he saw me do it and so did it, too. I saw him waiting at the wrong carousel for his bag, so went over to him and pointed to the right one. But did his face light up when his family found him and they began to talk and hug! They spoke Spanish, and they also spoke love. He was understood.
Friends, God is like that – God speaks our language. We are understood, and we can understand. God comes to where we are. God communicates love, acceptance, wisdom,
inspiration – whatever it is we need for our journey. Let us praise today for the miracle of the Spirit and Pentecost. AMEN.

Musings on this Trinity Thing 5/28/13

       Why did Jesus, Moses, Mohammed and the Buddha Cross the Road? is the catchy title of Brian McLaren’s most recent book, which is about how to be a Christian in our multi-faith world. I got to hear him speak at the conference I just attended, where he expanded on a latter part in the book, asking us to re-look at the way our doctrines have been used in a hostile way against each other as well as others in the world, not promoting dialogue but drawing lines and barriers between “us” and “them.” Is there a way, he asks, that we can reimagine our doctrines so that they become agents of healing and understanding? It’s an intriguing thought on this Trinity Sunday. Let’s talk about that.
       

Brief history aside....
       The doctrine of the Trinity has been one of those hard-to-understand but fiercely fought over doctrines. People within Christianity have fought over just how to word things, and people of other faiths misunderstand the doctrine and think we have 3 gods.
       In the early centuries of Christianity, our faith forbears tried to work out in precise detail just how Jesus was connected to God – the early apostles had experienced God in him in a unique way, and were saying he was God incarnate, a strange idea to these Jewish monotheists.The Hebrew Scriptures did talk about God’s Spirit, and some of the older stories seemed to imply that the 3 strangers Abraham encountered, for example, or the dark man Jacob wrestled with, were somehow Divine encounters. But to have God in human flesh was something different. People fought each other over defining how God as Trinity works, calling each other heretics, excommunicating each other, and the like. No one could come up with a universally accepted explanation of how the God of the universe could have three distinct “persons” and still be one God. Eventually, though, those who wrote arguments this way or that way each had to say, “It’s a mystery.” And how do you define and explain a mystery? If we can define and explain it, it’s no longer a mystery, is it?
     It was the Emperor Constantine who made all the leaders sit down and hammer things out into words they could all be united about – they came up with the carefully worded Nicene Creed, which we will read later as our creed. Constantine wanted to make Christianity his state religion, so he wanted the Christians to be united on their beliefs & spell them out.

IMHO...
I read about and studied the arguments and definitions in seminary, and I have to admit, it all sounds arcane at this point in history; it’s just not a hot-button issue any more for me and many others. The explanation that works for me about the concept of the Trinity, is that God is experienced in different ways by people of faith, and that a reminder of God’s mystery and freedom is a good thing in a day where Christians who make the news seem to have put God into a little box to which they alone have the key. God can do what God wants, appear how God wants, be present how God wants and communicate how God wants. That's always been true. And it’s all God.
       God is far more than what we can understand in the first place, so if God wants to send the Spirit, great; and if God wants to live as a human, great. God is not A being, like we understand “beings;” God is being itself – Matthew Fox used the term “isness” – God just is. Theologian Paul Tillich called God the “Ground of Being;” the Way, the Truth, the Life – good metaphorical and philosophical terms (and mystery terms, btw) that try to capture the immensity of what we somehow intuit as God.
       I think of God sometimes as being like a well-cut diamond - with many facets, or faces, each one catching light and refract it in a certain way, making the diamond sparkle. Each facet reflects light a different way, but they are a part of the one diamond, and all contributing to the glory. God could be a trinity or more.

God self-reveals, and in ways we can take in
       God wants us to understand as much as our brains can take in. God has continually tried to reveal Godself to us – in creation, in the Law, and then in Jesus. In the wonder and majesty of creation, God reveals eternal truths and aspects about the God who is Life itself. It’s not a perfect revelation, but we can see truth about God in creation - it’s a start. In the Law of the OT, God reveals more about the life humans are to live – acknowledging God, living in right relationship with each other as well as God, with certain ethical and moral standards that will make us live together most effectively and efficiently.
       Then God decided to speak “human” to us in a living human, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus is what a perfect human life looks like, lived in the realm of God and in perfect unity of relationship with God.

How in the world can we comprehend God anyway?
       I mean, think about it – how can we mortal beings comprehend the vastness and “otherness” of God? Here’s a homely analogy:

•  How can my cat think she understands me, her human? True, she can learn certain things about me and have some experience of me; but she can’t come close to understanding all the complexities of my existence. She doesn't know where I go when I leave, she doesn't know why I take her to the vet, she doesn't know why I read books or type on the computer – or what I’m talking about as I type.
• If you've read Madeline L’Engle’s trilogy, in the one A Swiftly Tilting Planet we get the illustration of the mitochondria (real things, actually) in the cells of a main character decide to rebel against doing their job – they have no comprehension of the whole body of which they are a minute part, they don’t realize that their rebellion is endangering the death of their whole universe (the person). How can a mitochondria understand the whole body of that character and what part they play? It’s a cool sci-fi book.

       Like those little illustrations, we have some interactions with God, some relationship with God. At some point, however, we hit the wall, we run out of RAM - we can’t even begin to conceive of God’s point of view, God’s big picture, God’s purposes. God tells us about Life and Truth and Faith and Eternal things – we basically have to affirm God’s love for us and go with that, and trust what God says about life and relationship and faith.

Faith is more than right formulas
        Why do we have to define and figure out the way God works / is/ lives/exists? How does knowing the right formulas and correct wordings grow our faith and trust? Mostly it doesn't  Sometimes it’s important to sort things out, especially if we start going out on a limb somewhere too odd for others to follow.
       Remember, doctrines are not the same as faith. Doctrines are how we try to organize our experiences of God in a coherent way. The experience with God, the relationship with God – THAT is the vital part of faith. How we try to order those common experiences end up as doctrine. The impetus for the doctrine of the Trinity came from how the disciples – and other early believers – experienced God in Jesus, and experienced God in the Spirit that flowed into them.

So - for today....
       So what does the Trinity of God have to do with tornadoes that ravage yet another town? With an English patriot being attacked in broad daylight in London? With teenage pregnancies? With a sluggish economy? With suffering, health crises, divorces, grief? With finishing school, getting a job? I asked this on my Facebook page but didn't get much response - I guess that question is pretty much a stumper. 
       My answer is that thinking about the mysterious and unexplainable nature of God leads us back to the fact that we are a part of a larger work God is doing, that God loves us, and that God has sought us and found us and made a way for us to be in relationship. It leads back to gratitude for the way God has sought to be known to us humans. It leads us to remember that God is greater than anything we can imagine, and that God’s purposes are ultimately good (though often unclear). Thinking about God lifts our minds from getting stuck in our miseries, to looking outside the box for what God might have in store. Realizing God’s presence can come to us in so many ways helps us look around for how God may be coming to us even now, because God does seek us and come to us, for which we give thanks and praise. AMEN.

Fallibility...Was Jesus Fallible? 6/30/13

       Well, there’s yet another Superman movie out.  This is what, the seventh? Ninth?  I looked it up on Google, and folks disagreed on their lists. At least seven, anyway. And TV shows back to the 50s, with some as recent as a few years back. And comic books – whoops, I’m now supposed to say ‘graphic novels.’  Little history of Superman blurb – two high school guys from Cleveland are credited with the first idea back in 1933. They had a background history for him, but basically focused on his adult super-human powers that were used for good. 

       Superman is an iconic figure in our culture – everybody knows who he is.  If I say Superman, most of you could say back, “Truth, justice and the American way.” Everybody knows that kryptonite is his weakness, his Achilles’ heel – an image from another time in history. Most everybody knows Lex Luthor and Lois Lane, the Joker and the Riddler. 

       We are fascinated SO with Superman! In our age of wanting to understand the motivations and psychology of a figure that has attained mythological stature, we make movie after movie and TV series after TV series to wonder what it must have been like for him growing up, wondering when he came into his powers and how he dealt with it, how he handled his teenage angst, we ponder if he is tempted to use his powers to win football games or save Lois’ life.  We like to think about these things. And the movies are usually a hit. 

Lack of details about Jesus is frustrating 

       This kind of inner exploration of thought and motive is we’re used to in writings of our time.  I read a troubling book recently whose main characters were a son who became a school shooter and his mother. It was difficult to read, but I couldn't put it down. (That troubled me, too.) We wonder how these young people get formed this way, what made them turn out like this. And it’s not just the psychology of serial killers that intrigue us, because there are even more biographies and autobiographies of good people, exploring how their early lives formed them. 

       So the brief and terse accounts of Jesus’ life are frustrating to us. We want things explained more fully. We want historical accuracy and footnotes. We want more details, more analysis of his time and culture and his place in it. We base our faith on Jesus, and we want to understand more about him. Jesus is the center of our salvation story, and we have lots of questions. Of course there are lots of plays and movies about Jesus as well, and libraries full of historical and cultural analyses of his time, how his Jewishness interacted with the Roman Empire, various suggestions put forward as to how to hear his words. And there are many, many sermons. 

The can he sin or can't he sin question

       This morning’s suggested topic is one of those questions that attempt to fathom who Jesus is and what he is. The question submitted asked, “Was Jesus Fallible?” Our knee-jerk, gut reaction is, “Of course not!  He was God!” I can play out how the debate goes in my imagination, “Then how could he be fully human and know about sin, and how could it be a virtue that he resisted it?”  Ah ha! We affirm in our creeds and doctrines that Jesus was also fully human, that he was tempted as we are, yet without sin. So Jesus must have been able to sin, he must have been fallible. But those same creeds and doctrines affirm that Jesus was also fully God, and God can’t sin. “So,” responds our arguing friend, “we can’t compare Jesus to ourselves because he had this built-in advantage all the time. And we can’t expect ourselves to resist like he did.” So the question is actually asking, how can Jesus be human and Divine at the same time? Systematic theology and our creeds have tried to answer this paradox. But an even deeper layer of the question is pastoral, and it’s about my relationship with Jesus - does Jesus really know my struggles?   Our struggles?   Did God really take on the human condition and know our pain? Can God really understand?

       The short answer is "Yes." The passage we read from Philippians 2 lays it out for us.  Here it is from The Message: 7-8 When the time came, Jesus set aside the privileges of deity and took on the status of a slave, became human! Having become human, he stayed human. It was an incredibly humbling process. He didn't claim special privileges. Instead, he lived a selfless, obedient life and then died a selfless, obedient death—and the worst kind of death at that—a crucifixion.

       I think that’s pretty clear that Jesus was fully human.  And felt the things we feel.  And was tempted in the ways we are. Evidently we can’t excuse ourselves for falling prey to temptation by saying Jesus had a special grace and that’s how HE did it.  We can’t let ourselves off the hook for striving towards the same kind of spiritual life, obedience, faithfulness and insight Jesus had.

No question about us being fallible...   

       We CAN have the assurance, however, that Jesus understands the struggle we have with fallibility.  Let's use the old-fashioned word - sin.  An understanding of ourselves as sinners is so crucial that we incorporate a common confession and assurance of pardon in every worship service.  We can’t approach the Divine without realizing we are created creatures, limited not only by the confines of our mortal life between birth and death, but also limited in understanding, compassion, submission. My favorite verse in the Bible since way back in my teen years has been just a few verses further in Philippians 2 - ¹³ for it is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.  I've taken much assurance from the fact that God is working in me even when I WILL to do righteous things, because God knows I don’t always live up to even what I know is right.  And I am also aware there’s much I don’t comprehend even beyond that.

       We see evidence of human fallibility daily in the news. Our creative minds that bring about arts and inventions and scientific inquiry and exploration of the creation, are equally creative when it comes to doing evil and serving death. Our compassionate hearts that reach out to assist are equally able to close off and not care. We are incredibly fallible.  

        And not only are we great at sinning, we are also great at deceiving ourselves about our fallibility.  It’s no fun to look at our fallibility, and it’s even less fun to see that choice is involved.  Yet this is the very path of salvation – the inner work of knowing ourselves, the corners of our hearts – seeing and acknowledging and repenting – and humbly accepting God’s love and forgiveness. 

Forgiveness & healing

     The spiritual life involves seeing more and more of just how fallible we are, and letting God’s forgiveness restore us, heal us, at a deeper and deeper level.  Things happen to us and we see truths about ourselves we’d really rather not have seen; people come into our lives for good and for ill, and we learn more about ourselves that we’d really rather not have known.  Most of us would much rather be challenged to go do some helpful things, some missions that make us feel good about ourselves perhaps, some recognition that we are trying hard to be pleasing to God.  We want to think well of ourselves – that’s human nature.  We don’t like admitting that less than wonderful parts of ourselves exist. 

       Sometimes those unacceptable places in ourselves get pushed down so deep that we think they’re gone – that's our Dr. Jeckyll.  Except we also have our Mr. Hyde – those unacceptable parts get triggered and come around like a scorpion tail to hurt. Sometimes we project those negative things out onto someone else and get mad at them, punish them, we make them a scapegoat. Sometimes we do this to whole groups of people, a whole race, or a whole gender, or a whole socio-economic class – or a whole political party. Anybody but me!   Then we can righteously be vindictive and mean to those people, like we would like to do with those unseen parts of ourselves.  We are a complex people.

       Yet before we can be healed, the truth God reveals is that these things are realities of our own lives, things we have to let God’s light shine on, and humbly repent, giving up that false persona and becoming real again. 

       Jesus, unique person that he was, did this perfectly – he was so much in tune with God and one with God that he fulfilled the whole Law, and walked in the kindom of God even as he walked on earth.  And we have declared ourselves to be his followers, his disciples. That means we are seeking to be like him. This week, may we be challenged to recognize these impulses and resist them as true disciples of Christ, who was tempted in every way like as we are, yet without sin.  AMEN.

Is 'Father' God's Real Name? 6/16/13

       This timely question (as its Fathers' Day!) was submitted as a topic in our ongoing series of ideas you all submitted.  I know this formulation of the question is floating around because I've heard it from a couple young men seeking ordination and membership in this presbytery & my last one. And its a question that is close to my heart as a clergywoman who has sought in my whole 30-year ministry to open people to the concept that NO, 'Father' is not God's real name but is among the many metaphors in Scripture for understanding our experiences and relationships with the Divine. It's a rather awkward topic for this day when we remember and honor our fathers, because I need to walk that line between appreciating good fathers, appreciating how the metaphor of 'Father' is a meaningful one for this special relationship with the Divine, and still emphasize that it's not God's 'real' name at all.

Being a parent is amazing

       Being a parent is an amazing experience for us, isn't it? We've all read about 1st-time fathers saying how their hearts opened up, or their appreciation for the mystery of life was kick-started, at the sight of their first child.  Of course, being exhausted after the heroic (sheroic?) journey of labor and delivery, my own reaction was a little different than the fathers' experiences, yet I dare to think that the amazement and wonder are close to the same.  And also similar to the glow in the hearts of adoptive parents. Our love for our children changes every perspective on life. It’s quite the responsibility, bringing up another human: watching those new little people and their distinctive personalities and gifts grow and develop; helping to form their take on the world & their outlook on relationships; modeling being a whole person who is functional and reflective and as whole as we can be at the time; introducing them to God and faith. Not that they don’t soon have their own opinions…. and their own reflections on their unique experiences…and think ours are lame!  

     Because we have been children, and we have often also been the parent, 'Father' is a deep and wonderful metaphor for understanding our experience of relationship with God, especially if we are fortunate to grow up with a  father who loves us and treats us well. 'Father' is not the only metaphor for our relationship with the Divine, and it doesn't encompass ALL that we experience of God.... yet it is still a vital component. 

Seeing ourselves as made in God's image

       I admit that, in my own journey, it was vitally important to my understanding of myself as a woman to explore other metaphors for God, and expand my understanding and appreciation of the hugeness and ultimately totally-beyond-me nature of God.  In fact, that is probably a good journey for ALL of us to take, men as well as women.  Then returning to this metaphor of 'Father' that is in our Scriptures so much, we can appreciate it again without falling into the idolatry of  making this the SOLE relationship and experience of God we can have.    

       It’s important for EACH of us to know that we are made in God’s image, that it takes male and female creation to be the image of God, it takes relationship to be the image of God, it takes dissimilarity as well as similarity to be the image of God.  Men and women both grow from embracing the metaphor of God as Father; women and men both grow from embracing the metaphor of God as Mother.  It honors our differences as well as our same humanity for us to examine and experience how it feels to use these metaphors, and how that enriches our experience of God. 

       I don’t want to get into a gender thing where we say male equals this set of qualities and female equals that set of qualities.  There’s such a wide spectrum for each gender.  But in a culture that still tries to stereotype females as being one way only, and males as being one way only, its healthy for both male and female to see ALL those qualities as part of the Divine.  It was never the intent of the Christian feminists to take away from God as Father; rather it was – and is - to invite a broader understanding of God.  Some use the word “Parent” for worship, which can be mom, dad, adoptive parents, anyone who parents.  I like to bring in all the biblical names for God we can, and more.  It’s only by using the great variety of experiences of God that we let God be God, and don’t stick God in a box of one experience only. 

A few other metaphors for example

       To illustrate metaphors, let’s hear some I Googled for us:

   -Fishing for a compliment –she’s not standing there with a literal rod and reel and a baited hook, no, she’s saying things where the polite answer would be, Oh, but your hair is pretty! or something like that.

   - Our hearts go out to him – do hearts literally go out of our bodies somehow?  No – we’re trying to picture in language the feelings of empathy we have for a person, and the longing to be able to comfort.

   - Emotional rollercoaster -  certainly not a literal rollercoaster, but a reference to rapidly changing emotional states.

   - Feeling blue – what shade?  Not a literal color

   - You light up my life – not a literal lightbulb!

   - She broke my heart – hearts don’t break like that, although they do get disease…

   - He’s the apple of my eye – sure hope that's not literal 

   - And my favorite- let’s get on the ball here!  - on the ball?  Like at a circus? 

       Metaphors suggest that dissimilar things have something in common, and enhance the more unknown thing trying to be communicated, by using another, usually more known thing.  For our sermon purposes today, God is the more unknown thing, the experience of which we are attempting to describe through the use of more common human experiences. There’s a quality of God we are trying to explain, capture, communicate.  God our rock – we’re not saying God is a rock, we’re saying God is strong like a rock, enduring like a rock, unmovable like a huge rock.The good shepherd – that brings in the experience of God as protecting and leading. The bread of life – not literally a loaf of bread, but pointing out the similarity of how God nourishes our life, sustains our life, is necessary to life.

Jesus calls God 'Father' a lot. 

       Jesus obviously chose the relational metaphor of “Father” in the gospels to be his main metaphor.  The question is, how did he mean us to take it?  Since God is a Spirit, God is not literally a male, female or a human of any gender, so those can't be the meaning.  Since male and female are both made to image God, it can't be that the maleness is the point of the metaphor.  Ah - perhaps Jesus is pointing out in a human way that sense of family, kinship, connectedness,  intimacy and closeness in good familial ties!  That, indeed, is a vital understanding of God that fits with Jesus' teachings about God's welcome of us, God's deep love for us, and God's desire for relationship with us.  It's also a corrective to the common understanding of God as a remote, punitive figure that tells us the rules and coldly punishes us for disobedience.  In the relationship of Jesus with God the Father, love and unity of purpose are intertwined - and we are called into the mix.  That is indeed very good news.

       Our Christian forbears have made some mistakes in understanding this metaphor that Jesus uses.  We have taken the cultural understandings of 'father' from Jesus' time and other times to be literal, and missed the great thing Jesus was telling us about kinship and relationship with God. We've taken the whole business of human fathering literally - I've actually heard people argue that God must be male because he made Mary pregnant. That's among the silliest things I've heard people say, and I've heard some doozies.  We've even taken the word 'Father' and said it is NOT a metaphor but God’s very name, like the mysterious name YHWH in the Old Testament.  

What Jesus is saying with this vital metaphor'

        So what qualities about “Father” was Jesus using to explain God’s mystery?

       Jesus’ actual word in Hebrew was the young child’s word, Abba- like Dada, Daddy.  If you’re an NCIS fan, which by the way is still the #1 show on TV with 12 seasons so far, you might remember the emotional episode when Ziva’s father was shot and killed – even with all the mixed emotions of their relationship, what does she call out when he’s shot?  Little Ziva cries out that first name of her childhood, “Abba, Abba.”  The little child to her daddy, a connection of deep love. 

       That same love is the key feature in the parable we read as our text this morning, where actually the father of the story is the first mentioned and key figure, not either of the sons.  And the father’s love for his sons, plural, is the main feature of the story, no matter what they did – to go off and be profligate, or to stay and be obedient and sour.  The connection of God as Father is God’s love for us, which is at least as deep and intense as our love for our own babies.  And it invites us to love God back in that way as well. 

Jesus’ choice of this familal love as his central metaphor while on earth is for the purpose of the deep connection, the deep love, the family ties, the kinship and strong connection of God for us.  On OUR part, there is that deep and primal love back, the knowledge of our origin in God’s family, knowing who we are in God; there’s that utter dependence of a human child on its parents for survival and for teaching; and although we gradually grow more self-sufficient as human adults, that tie to the parent is always there.  Note the many, many, many books and movies focusing on the relationship of a child to a father or mother – good, bad, in-between, but always central and straight to the heart. 

So...human fathers?

     It’s quite a compliment to human fathers that Jesus chose this earthly relationship as a central metaphor about God.  Jesus must have had a very positive experience with Joseph, for one thing.  Knowing that most Christians reading the Scripture will first picture their experience of their earthly father and reach for connections to God’s loving relationship, we see it's also quite a challenge to human father.  I’d think it is also rather quite humbling to realize we are not always up to the comparison…yet quite encouraging for us to be so. It might make the parental relationship to a child almost holy, as we get to participate in a relationship that Jesus used to communicate about God.

      Our human experiences and our human concepts are what we have to work with as we speak of God – as we try and express the divine in mortal terms. Instead of the common mistake of taking our cultural ideas of fathers and putting them on God, let's take the picture of God from the Scripture and attempt to live into that as fathers and mothers.  Let's take God's acceptance, forgiveness, welcome, love and gentle teaching as models for how we can accept the challenge of this metaphor on this Fathers' Day.  AMEN

What Would Jesus Have Us Do? 6/9/13

This week's suggested sermon topic was that slogan WWJD (What Would Jesus Do?) that’s been on bracelets and tee-shirts and other Christian items for several years now. I found this a rather nebulous suggestion, so decided to do what a colleague suggested, and put the question out on Facebook. A couple folks responded to the stereotype of people using this to justify their own theology, or being rather shallow in their faith. Someone suggested looking at what Jesus actually DID, and asking if we really felt called to do that.  Another suggestion was to tweak the question to the title I've used here, What Would Jesus Have US Do?  So I sat and thought.

What Jesus actually did...

       I decided to go through the gospel of Matthew and make a list of the things Jesus actually did, as suggested. Not that I haven’t read Matthew a bunch of times, but this was the first time I made a list.  Wow! Somewhere around 30 years old, he was baptized by his odd cousin John in the desert, and then went on a 40-day vision quest where he talked to the Devil and got solidified in his purpose. From that baptism, Jesus was a three-year whirlwind until his death -  & resurrection. The message he solidified in the desert was, “Repent, for the realm of God is at hand.” From the moment he came back, he was focused and centered in this call. He told this good news everywhere: talking and teaching, stunning people with healings, making the blind see, making lame people walk, casting out demons, feeding thousands at a time, eating with people most others considered beneath their notice.  Along the way he really ticked off the more respectable religious leaders. It’s not that they didn't hear his message – they heard it in all its subversive and overturning meaning, it’s non-traditional but vital view of God as merciful and welcoming. They heard it – and were threatened.

       Now the poor and powerless embraced Jesus' message with open arms and ears – but most of the establishment resisted the message and went after the messenger. In fact, one way of looking at Jesus’ three years is that the religious establishment won – they got him executed – a very final solution. This is a phrase  I've heard about what the call to ministry entails, which sums up Jesus’ ministry, too: “Comfort the afflicted……and afflict the comfortable.” 

       While crowds flocked to him in the regions where he went, the religious establishment recognized the challenge he presented to the way things had always been done and the control they had on the practice of faith.  They asked him trick questions - and he always bested them. When they said, you are breaking tradition, he said, “YOU are using tradition to break the meaning of the Law!” He taught using multi-leveled stories (parables) that turned things upside down even more when you unpacked them.  He pulled together a posse of followers and taught them more intently, so they could carry on his work and message – he pretty much knew that the word of God stirs up opposition, and threatened people who liked control better than mercy and law rather than grace. So they would be out to get him. 

        Jesus got three years before the fear in humankind rose against him and killed him.  God’s purposes, however, were greater than this – Jesus was raised from the dead, the perfect servant of God, and became the first of the new creation of God, and opening the door for this good news to spread and spread. 

       Looking at what Jesus DID, do we really want to use what he did as our model?  Asking 'What Would Jesus Do' and intending to copy it is rather scary.  

Jesus had his own special call - and gifts

       Fortunately, we don’t have to be God's Messiah, because that’s already been done.  I think it took someone who was also God to resist all the temptations inherent in what he had to do.  The power thing is really heady - lots of Christians like to imagine themselves heroically cleansing the Temple and calling church leaders a brood of vipers and white-washed graves. A certain kind of person thinks its fun to expose people's clay feet and bring them down...they make room for the devil in their heart because they like that kind of thing.  The “I’m the great provider” pose is tempting, too – I can work wonders; look at me, I can save the world, I am the great and generous host to all you lesser mortals. That lets the devil in your heart, too. In fact, those are some of the temptations Jesus resisted in the desert before he started.  The megalomania of thinking we are God and above everything and everyone else, is a place the devil can exploit. What Jesus did was supremely difficult I’m glad God didn't ask me to do what Jesus did.

So what of Jesus CAN we follow?

       I looked all over Matthew for Jesus doing things we might copy if we asked, “What Would Jesus Do?” in some circumstance of our life.  If we wanted to follow Jesus’ example of identifying all the world as kin, God’s beloved people, we would see our inter-relatedness with all people and offer ourselves to work for the common good.  Jesus called those who followed him his mother, father, sister and brother – in place of his birth family. Yes, he mainly preached to the larger kinship tribe of the Jews, but he did reach outside that to the larger kinship tribe of all people – and he saw his work as for all. 

       If we wanted to follow Jesus’ example of humility, setting aside his godliness and identifying with the common person, we would hold possessions very lightly and go out to the world with little, like he did.  Jesus became an itinerant, with no place to lay his head; he had no home or steady job or wages, no furniture or cars or other “things” to hold him back. He challenged the 'rich young ruler' on this – so you kept all the rules – did your passion for God take your whole heart?  Where is your treasure laid up?  What would we give for that pearl of great price?

       If we wanted to follow Jesus’ example of compassion and mercy, we could stand in solidarity with those considered unworthy by polite society, seeing their worth to God, and advocating for them in our government policies as well as meeting the emergency needs as they fall through the cracks. We would run to forgive those who long to return home to God, and shower them with feasting and rejoicing. We wouldn't begrudge them any welcome and healing, like that elder brother of that parable. We would be about the kinds of work Jesus did – healings of all kinds, restoring wholeness, restoration to community, selflessly working for the common good.

       If we wanted to follow Jesus’ example of true obedience and perfect worship, we would submit ourselves to God’s goal for the world, setting aside self-aggrandizement, self-indulgence and self-centeredness for the life held up in the Scriptures, trusting in God’s promises, giving ourselves to God daily through spiritual practices like prayer and worship. 

       Beware, though, Jesus said.  He told his followers that if they followed him, they’dget the same treatment he got - suffering, persecution, being reviled and called names, and that they’d never make everybody happy.  JESUS obviously wasn't trying to please people or grow the largest church in town. Disciples aren't higher than their master, he said – what reception he got will be our reception, too. 

 Jesus' actual instructions... 

      Jesus’ instructions are more in general than specific, often hidden in his parables, and often not real detailed.  He told us not to worry about food and clothes and stuff – just ask God for our daily bread, basic needs. He told us to go in to the world and tell about the realm of God, where the first will be last and the last will be first and all sorts of injustices in the world will be righted.  He told us to feed the hungry, clothe the naked and give water to the thirsty. Jesus was interested in the here and now world, and doing the works of God's realm NOW.  Jesus’ salvation wasn't the personal, fuzzy, feel good religion – it was the salvation of the world through God’s will being done on earth – social righteousness, right relationships to creation and humanity. He told us to baptize in God’s name and teach what God was like – generous, forgiving, and compassionate.  He said this is God’s table where all who believe are welcome – the feast of creation and the feast of God’s abundance is for us from the God who loves us so much that he died for us.  HOW to carry these instructions out is left to us.

A good thing about WWJD after all -

       If there’s a good thing about the WWJD question, it would be that perhaps it causes us to stop and reflect a moment before we just let go and do stuff without thinking. People sometimes talk about connecting their brain to their mouth  - - Christians also want to connect their heart-felt faith in there, too. If the WWJD questions makes us stop and consider, pray even, and remember God’s love, forgiveness and compassion – that’s good.  If the bracelet that reads WWJD helps us question our own intents and our own actions – that’s a good thing.  If it manages to help us correct ourselves, stop ourselves from meanness; wrestle in prayer over our hurts and desires for revenge – then it’s a good thing.  For a moment, I remember that I want to be a Christ follower; that I have publicly professed my deep faith and my desire to live for God.   I may ask myself, “Will people be able to look at my actions and notice how much we Christians love one another?  Will people be able to see the care of God through my own generosity and caring?  Will they be invited into the kingdom of God through my example?” 

       Those aren't bad questions for measuring our daily and hourly choices. 

Closing

       This week – and longer, hopefully – let’s remember Jesus before we just react; let’s recall the words of God before we write someone off, be unthinking or rude in our responses, overlook the person waiting on us, let fly with words we can’t take back, try to make a quick buck from someone because “everyone dies it,” - - - and consider whose we are and whom we serve.   May the presence of the Spirit in us call Jesus to mind as we walk through our daily lives.  AMEN.