Faith In His Name -- Third Sunday of Easter

Acts 3:12-19

April 15, 2018

            There once was a man born lame, never able to walk on his own two feet. Life was hard for most people, but it was especially rough for someone like him. There were no programs designed to help him function in society. There was no technology available to help him overcome his disability. He was not mobile without the help of others. He had no living except for what he could earn by begging.

            It isn’t known for sure if the man was a person of faith. It is probable that he was born into a religious family. Most of the people in his community were. The Law of his faith would have been ubiquitous in his life, in his world – even if it was not the law of the land or the empire. But whether the man believed or not, whether he put much stock into what religion had to say, we don’t know.

            What we do know is that the man was carried to the temple by others everyday. While everyone else made their way inside to pray, the man was set outside of the gate called Beautiful so he could ask for alms. What irony?! How much beauty could his life have held? I can only imagine what he must have looked like – legs useless, perhaps he had a ragged mat to rest on, perhaps he just waited in the dust. What could he have seen of the people who passed by? Their feet? Their legs? Did he wait there in resigned and numb destitution, thinking that this was all his life was and it was all his life would ever be? Next to that gate called Beautiful, he lay, day after day, asking the church goers for their spare change.

            Maybe the man thought that this day would be like all the others? But it only takes one moment, one event for everything to change, for everything that was before to be over, and everything from that moment on to be new.

            This was that day. Two men were walking into the temple. The man asked them for alms, just as he asked everyone else who walked by him. But these two men did not just throw in a shekel and keep moving. These two men stopped. One of them said,

            “Look at us.”

            The man looked. He looked beyond their feet, beyond their legs. He looked at their faces. The men stared back at him. The one who told him to look said,

            “I have no silver or gold, but what I have I give you; in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, stand up and walk.”

            Then this man took the lame man by the hand and raised him up. Feet that had been crippled were now strong. Ankles that had been weak were now sturdy. The man stood upright for the first time in his life. The man once lame did not just stand, he jumped. He walked into the temple with these two men; he walked and he leaped and he praised God!

            The other people inside recognized that this was the man they had just seen lying by the gate called Beautiful. This was the man they had seen unable to walk, pleading for alms so that he might live another day. They stared at him in wonder and amazement.

            As you can imagine, this man, this walking, leaping, praising man did not want to leave the two men who had healed him. He clung to them, and all the other people gathered there to pray ran to Solomon’s Portico where the three men stood: the healed man and the two who raised him up.

            “When Peter saw it…”

            That is where our part of the story comes in. But the healing of the lame man outside the temple gate is where the larger story begins. Peter and John were those two men who stood and stared at the man unable to walk. Just as Peter and John stared at him, the people now stare at them. Peter stares back. With that he begins to preach. That is what our part of this story is: a sermon.

            “You Israelites, why do you wonder at this, or why do you stare at us, as though by our own power or piety we had made him walk? The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, the God of our ancestors has glorified his servant Jesus, whom you handed over and rejected in the presence of Pilate, though he had decided to release him. But you rejected the Holy and Righteous One and asked to have a murderer given to you, and you killed the Author of life, who God raised from the dead. To this we are witnesses. And by faith in his name, his name itself has made this man strong, whom you see and know; and the faith that is through Jesus has given him this perfect health in the presence of all of you.”

            That’s quite an opening to a sermon, isn’t it? Hey folks, why are you so amazed? This man was healed in the name of Jesus. Remember Jesus? He’s the one you rejected. He’s the one you had handed over. He’s the one whose life you traded for a murderer. He’s the one you killed. That’s who healed this man. Not us. It was his name that healed this man. Faith in his name made this man walk; made him whole again.

            I’m not sure if this would be considered a good way to win friends and influence people. Peter does go on to tell them that they acted out of ignorance, as did their rulers. But the good news, folks, is that God used their ignorance; God used their rejection for the good. In fact their rejection and Jesus’ suffering fulfilled all that the prophets had foretold about the Messiah.

            Although his sermon goes on, we end with Peter’s call to the people to repent. They did act out of ignorance, and God still worked good from it, but now they can repent. Now they can turn to God and their sins will be wiped out, wiped away, erased and forgotten.

            Tough words. Hard words. Even Peter’s proclamation that the people and the rulers acted out of ignorance does nothing to soften them. What I find disturbing about this passage, and others like it, is that it has been used to justify condemnation and persecution of Jews throughout the centuries. They were the “Christ killers.” This persecution is not an ancient event either.

            Another aspect of this that bothers me is that Peter also rejected Jesus. He may not have cried, “Crucify him,” but he denied him. He was afraid. He could not stand by his Teacher, his Rabbi. So maybe when you point that finger, Pete, you should point it at yourself first.

            But Peter preached about repentance. He called the people to repent. Repenting is not just remorse or being sorry or sorrowful for some bad thing you’ve done. And while the translation from the Greek is “turn around,” it is also more layered than just a returning to God. It is a fundamental change in perspective, in understanding. In seminary I learned the term, “paradigm shift,” as a way to describe this kind of change, this kind of repentance. I’ve had a number of paradigm shifts in my lifetime. It is that moment when your eyes are opened in a way they have never been before, and you see that you are complicit in something – some unjust system or institution or way of life. And you can never unsee what you have seen, you can never have your eyes closed again. It’s just too big, too monumental.

            Isn’t that what happened to Peter and the other disciples, now apostles? In the resurrection, in the giving of the Holy Spirit, they saw what they could not see before. The foundation of their world was shaken to its core. Their eyes were opened and they could not remain blind anymore. The resurrection completely and utterly changed everything.

            Peter and the other apostles repented. They turned. They saw. They believed. They refused to remain blind. So while Peter’s words were harsh, maybe he did know that the finger of blame was also pointed at him. But maybe he also realized what repentance could really mean, what it could really do. So was his sermon about condemnation or was it a plea? Was he imploring the people to understand what they did, not for the sake of guilt but so that they too might be able to see; so that they too could repent, turn, and be healed, be whole, find faith in the name of Jesus?

            As I said last week, the underlying theme, the fundamental motif of Acts is to show what the community of faith looked like post resurrection. These were the original Easter people. They were trying to live out the good news of Jesus the Christ in word and in deed. Peter’s words were not spoken so that centuries of Jewish people could be persecuted. Peter was his calling his people to repent, to turn to God. And he was calling them to see, to really see what faith in Jesus’ name could look like. Faith in his name could look like a man, once lame, walking and leaping and praising God.

            Let all of God’s children say, “Alleluia!” Amen.

Can You Imagine? Second Sunday of Easter

Acts 4:32-35 (36-37)

April 8, 2018

Imagine there's no heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people living for today

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people living life in peace, you

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope some day you'll join us
And the world will be as one

Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people sharing all the world, you

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope some day you'll join us
And the world will be as one

            Those are the lyrics to a rather famous song by a guy you might have heard of: John Lennon. He used to be in this band called The Beatles. I heard they were kind of famous at one time.

            This is probably one of the best known songs from the late John Lennon’s solo career. I learned from my rock and roll/Beatles historian, Brent Stoker, that John said he should have given songwriting credit to Yoko Ono. She was the one who wrote about imagining. Regardless of the credit, this is a song that a lot of people know and associate with John Lennon.

            These are also lyrics that some people find offensive, even threatening. The first verse calls on the listener to imagine there is no heaven, no hell. Imagine that we are not surrounded by a supernatural afterworld waiting to punish or reward. Above us there is only sky. If someone of faith doesn’t appreciate those opening lines, they really must not like the second verse either when Lennon calls us to imagine a world with no countries, no loyalties to fight for, live or die for, and no religion too.

            I realize John Lennon was not a religious person. He eschewed formal religion and all its trappings. But personally, I don’t find this song completely antithetical to people of faith, to those of us who live lives based in and because of faith. What would it be like if we lived lives, not solely focused on heaven or hell, but on this moment now? Would it make us take the present a little more seriously, a little less for granted, if we stopped worrying about the afterlife? Can you imagine?

            I think our passage from Acts also makes people uncomfortable. I think these verses also make people feel threatened. Do you remember in the gospels when Jesus told the rich young ruler that, sure, he followed the commandments to the letter, but he had one more thing that he needed to do: sell all of his possessions and give them to the poor? The rich young ruler couldn’t do what Jesus asked of him, because he had great material wealth and giving that up was too much. I’ve heard countless sermons – some that I’ve preached – and countless apologists gloss over Jesus’ words.

            “That’s not what Jesus meant really.”

            “Jesus does not expect all people to give up their possessions or sell off all their wealth.”

            Except … Jesus said to do just that. We don’t have to like it; we don’t have to agree with it. But Jesus said it. I think that same tendency to gloss over what we read applies to this passage as well.

            “Now the whole group of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no one claimed private ownership of any possessions, but everything they owned was held in common.”

            Yikes! If we’re supposed to be doing that, then we are a long way off from living as the Word of God intends, aren’t we? I have quite a few possessions, and yet I have made no move to sell any of them or hold them in common with others. But that is what this community, this early community of believers did. Although our particular part of this passage ends at verse 35, if you read verses 36 and 37 you will hear about another man in this community. He was a Levite, whose name was Joseph, but he was called Barnabas by the apostles. Barnabas means “son of encouragement.” Barnabas owned a field which he sold, and he brought that money, that profit, and also laid it at the apostle’s feet.

            This passage is one of the many that highlights the underlying theme of Acts. What does it mean to live together when you believe that Jesus lives? What does it mean to be a church of people who believe in the resurrection? These were people, believers – new and old, who lived post-resurrection. Not all would have witnessed the resurrected Christ, but they believed in that so strongly that they were trying to shape their lives together around what the resurrection meant to them.

            Can you imagine?

            Let’s be clear: the new church in Acts did not always get it right. There were conflicts, not just among believers, but among the apostles. You can’t read too far in Paul’s letters to the church in Corinth without realizing that the early church had conflict and struggles over interpretation and living out what they believed it meant to be the church. Acts is not a perfect blueprint or a checklist for being a church, the Church. But it is a larger story of people living as though the resurrection happened, as though everything they understood or knew or thought had changed.        

We could make the statement that we are trying to do the same thing. We too believe in the resurrection, the resurrected Christ, and we are trying to shape our lives around that belief. That is why we are a church, a congregation. We believe in the resurrection, and we try to live as though we do.

The challenge comes, and it was the same challenge that the early church faced, is that nothing in the world around us seems to have changed. Everything seems the same. Innocents in countries like Syria are still dying because of a brutal, bloody civil war. Many of our sisters and brothers in Puerto Rico do not have electricity and access to clean water and the necessities for life. Our teachers, in this state and others, are forced to walk out of classrooms because not only are they not paid a living wage but our students don’t have the basics they need to learn. We are as divided as ever – here at home and around the world. Nothing seems to have changed, and it is easy to lose hope because it seems that humanity never will change.

Can you imagine?

So we believe in the resurrection, and we are technically Easter people, a post-resurrection community. But what does that mean? What difference does that make? I’m not going to stand up here and tell you that it is time to sell all of our possessions and put them in a common purse. But maybe we need to think about how we think about the resurrection? Is it doctrine or is it relationship? If it is only doctrine than we can recite our beliefs in our creeds and move on; but if believing in the resurrection means that we see it as new relationship then everything really is different.

It seems to me that these early believers, this community of folks trying to live together, saw the resurrection as relationship. They were trying to live together as Jesus the man and the resurrected Christ would have them live. When we think about our lesson from John’s gospel, was Thomas seeking proof? No. He wanted what the others had already received – a new relationship with the Jesus who rose from death to new life. When we let go of resurrection only as doctrine, a tenet to which we must ascribe, and view it instead as relationship, new relationship with the Christ, with God and with one another, then we do live as though everything has changed. Because it has! We are Easter people!

Can you imagine what our lives together can and will look like when we see resurrection as relationship? Can you imagine what our lives together can and will look like when we focus our living – not only on the afterlife but how we live right now? Can you imagine the abundant possibilities to witness and live out the love of God when we focus on the new relationship we have been given in the resurrection?

Can you imagine?

Let all God’s people say, “Alleluia!” Amen.

Just As He Told You -- Easter Sunday

Mark 16:1-8

April 1, 2018

            “Five more minutes, folks. Five more minutes.” 

            No three words have filled my heart with such dread as “five more minutes.” Why would an announcement of time cause such consternation in my soul? Out of context it makes no sense. It is the context that makes the difference.

            “Five more minutes,” were the words I would hear during an exam. “Five more minutes,” was spoken by the test proctor to let all of us taking the exam know that our time was almost over. When I was taking a straightforward question and answer test, hearing “five more minutes,” did not bother me all that much. It was when I was writing an essay that the announcement, “five more minutes,” made my heart constrict within my chest.

            Why? Generally, I’m a good essay writer. As long as I’ve studied and know the information I am supposed to, I can usually organize my thoughts quickly and write them down cohesively and cogently. Yet hearing, “five more minutes,” would make me realize that I had to wrap things up and wrap them up quickly. I needed to make my point, draw a conclusion and be done already. I know that I have ended several essays abruptly because of the words, “five more minutes.” I know that I have missed some finer points I hoped to make because the announcement that my time was almost done made me rush to get to the ending.

            Reading these eight verses in Mark’s gospel makes me wonder if Mark wasn’t under some time constraint; even if it was of his own making. Although we have two other endings to Mark’s gospel: the shorter and the longer; it is widely believed by scholars that this is the original ending to Mark’s telling of the story of Jesus.  

            To say that the ending is abrupt is an understatement. There is no happy ending. There is no neat conclusion with all the loose ends tied up in a pretty bow. We don’t even get another appearance from Jesus. Just these three women and a young man dressed in white. Was he an angel? It would seem so, but the text does not state that specifically. What is made clear is that the women did not do what the young man instructed them to do. They did not run right off to tell the disciples and Peter the good news. Instead, fright made them mute. They were overcome and overwhelmed by the young man’s appearance and message. They ran away in terror and amazement; telling no one what they had seen or heard.

            No, this is not a tidy ending. Matthew and Luke must have concurred on that point – their gospels end more conclusively. Whoever the scribes or monks or editors were who added the shorter and the longer endings, they must not have been satisfied with the way Mark left it either. Perhaps Mark heard his own version of “five more minutes,” and rushed to finish. Or perhaps this was exactly the kind of ending – or lack thereof – that he was going for.

            Mark’s version of the good news is open-ended because so is the good news. The good news of the gospel did not end with the resurrection or even the ascension. It did not end with the women running to tell the disciples or the disciples checking the story out for themselves. It did not end with the upper room at Pentecost or in the early churches Paul helped bring to fruition. The good news, the gospel does not end. If it had an ending, it really wouldn’t be the good news of God, would it?

            I resonate with Mark’s gospel the most of all four – one because his version of Jesus is the most human, and two, because when it comes to getting what Jesus was trying to tell them, the disciples fail spectacularly most of the time. As do I. Mark was brutally honest about the disciples’ failings. In verse 8, the women do not fare much better. But I don’t believe that Mark was trying to disparage them. All of them were afraid. All of them were amazed and terrified by the good news Jesus told them. Mark understood this. I think Mark recognized that it would take generations of people to begin to get a glimpse of what Jesus came and did, of who he truly was and is. I think Mark realized that the good news would not be good news if it ended with the people in the original story. For all his immediacy and urgency, I don’t believe Mark finished his gospel because of some time limit. I think he left it where it was so that the next generation of disciples – those people he originally wrote the gospel for and us – could pick up the story and take it into the future.

            But here’s the thing: the news of Jesus’ resurrection did spread. Perhaps the women shook themselves and did what the young man requested after all. Perhaps they went to the disciples and to Peter and told them what they had heard, what they had seen. Maybe they got it together enough to remember what Jesus had told them, and they reminded the disciples of his words as well.

            It’s possible that what was supposed to happen did happen. They woke up from their amazement and terror and took the good news to Galilee. They met Jesus there. They made sure the word of the Lord was spread and far and wide. Maybe the reality was closer to the shorter and longer ending then we realize. Maybe it wasn’t. But whatever the ending was of Mark’s particular chapter, the story goes on and on. Some refer to the story of Jesus as the greatest story ever told. I think of it more as the unending story. Each of us contributes sentences and paragraphs. Each of us adds to the unfolding narrative.

            Jesus told them he would meet them in Galilee. And he tells us that as well. What is Galilee anyway? Jesus was not asking them to have coffee with him at the Galilean IHOP. Jesus was telling them to meet him in the place where the marginalized were found. Galilee was the place of the poor, the oppressed, the forgotten, the lost and the lonely. There, he told them, among those folks, that was where they would meet him.

            Just as Jesus told them, Jesus tells us. We are also called to go to our Galilees. We are also called to put ourselves in the midst of the least of these. Jesus tells us that it is there, on the margins, where we will meet him. Jesus told us this. He has been telling us this all along. And the good news, the gospel, the story of God and God’s Son and God’s people, continues whenever we shake ourselves out of our fear and amazement, and go to Galilee. The resurrection happens again and again, whenever hope rises out of despair, whenever joy rises out of sorrow, whenever we recognize the holy in the midst of the ordinary, whenever we let go of our fear and make our way to Galilee. It is there we see Jesus. It is there we meet the risen Lord. It is there we understand that God has done and is doing and will do a new and wonderful thing. He is risen! Death does not win. The bonds of sin are broken. He. Is. Risen!

            Let all of God’s children, tellers of God’s good news, say “Alleluia!” Amen.

Do You Know? Maundy Thursday Service

John 13:1-17, 31b-35

March 29, 2018

            “Do you know what I have done to you?”

            What a strange question for Jesus to ask. Why did he not ask?

            “Do you know what I have done for you?”

            Or

            “Do you understand what I did just now? Do you get it? Do you see how I treated you?”

            But no, Jesus asked,

            “Do you know what I have done to you?”

            What is it that he did? On this night, a night that is named Commandment Thursday, we remember what Jesus commanded. We remember the greatest commandment that he could make: to love one another.

            But he did not ask,

“Do you see the way that I have shown love for you?”

He asked,

“Do you know what I have done to you?”

You see, this was not just a clever illustration or a tidy object lesson on Jesus’ part. He was not merely demonstrating one possible way to show love. He was doing love to them. He was loving them. From the moment he tied a towel around his waist, from the second he knelt before each of them, and washed their feet as a servant would, he was loving them.

“Do you know what I have done to you?”

Jesus loved them. He loved them from the beginning and he loved them to the end. If they wanted to love as he loved, then this was how they must do it. This was his commandment. They must willingly humble themselves. They must serve others. They must perform even the most menial tasks in service to another. They must put others first and themselves last. They must do to others, not as they would want done to themselves, but as Jesus did to them. They must do love. Jesus, their Rabbi, their Teacher, knelt before each one of them and washed their feet. Jesus loved them. He loved them beyond words, beyond grand declarations. He not only bestowed love and kindness on them. He wrapped them in love with the touch of his hand, with the water he poured on their feet. He did love to them. He did love to them. He loved them.

“Do you know what I have done to you?’

Who was it that Jesus loved that night? It was the disciples, yes; those followers who had been with him from the beginning. But among them was the one who would betray him. Jesus did love to him. And there was the one who would deny him. Jesus did love to him as well. He did not withhold his love even for those who would hurt him most. Jesus washed the feet of each one.

“Do you know what I have done to you?”

I have loved you, and I give you a new commandment, to do as I have done. You too must do love to others.

It is a commandment that the disciples surely failed, at least sometimes. It is a commandment that we fail as well. To wash someone’s feet is humbling. It is hard. But I can readily do it for those that I love. But could I wash the feet of my betrayer? Could I wash the feet of my enemy? Could I do love even to someone I do not like? It seems like an impossible task, an impossible love. But Jesus was not setting up the disciples to fail. Jesus does not set us up to fail either. Jesus knows that we will not always get it right, but still we are commanded, still we are called to do love to others. Still we are commanded to do love to those we love and those we do not. Still we are called to do love to God’s children.

“Do you know what I have done to you?”

A writer once told a story about her mother. Her mother and the minister’s wife were not the best of friends. The minister’s wife was difficult and aloof. She was demanding, and she made it hard for others to like her, much less love her. But her husband, the minister, admitted that he had had a relationship with another parishioner; several relationships. The minister’s wife was home, humiliated and alone.

This writer’s mother took her to see the minister’s wife. They did not bring casseroles or candy. Instead they came into the house, and her mother took a bowl of water and a towel and she washed the wife’s feet. She washed and the other woman wept. She washed and the warm water was both comfort and grace, blessing and benevolence. She did love to that woman, that broken woman. She did love to her.

“Do you know what I have done to you?”

From this moment on, it will seem as though the darkness will win. It will seem as though the powers and principalities will have the final word and the last laugh. But Jesus did not stop doing love when he was finished washing their feet. Jesus did love all the way to the cross. Jesus did love, even to those who betrayed and denied him. Jesus did love, even to those who crucified him. Jesus did love all the way to the cross.

Jesus does love to us, though we fail him, though we betray him, though we deny him. Jesus does love to us, in spite of ourselves. Jesus does love to us because that is what he came to do. For God so loved the world. For God so loved the world.

“Do you know what I have done to you?”

Amen and amen.

Just Like Them

Mark 11:1-11

March 25, 2018/Palm Sunday

            The pomp was the circumstance on that triumphant day. The scene so carefully set; disciples dispatched to retrieve a colt who had never known a rider. Words given to them in case they were questioned,

“The Lord needs it and will send it back here immediately.”

The Lord needs it.

            Permission granted, they returned with the animal. Cloaks spread across its back, he sat on it and they made their way. People saw them coming. Some spread their own wraps and coats, mantles and shawls on the road before him. Others took branches, leafy fronds, freshly cut from the fields and laid those down where the pony’s feet would trod.

            Pomp was the circumstance that day. As he rode into the city, the people shouted and waved, crying out,

“Hosanna!

Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord!

Blessed is the coming kingdom of our ancestor David!

Hosanna in the highest heaven!”

They hurled their hosannas, their cries of “save us,” at him, hoping that he would catch them and do what they asked; hoping he was the one they had waited for, longed for. They shouted their “hosannas,” hoping and praying that he was the one to finally, completely, utterly save them.

Pomp was the circumstance that day, and surely he staged it. Surely he set that particular scene, but not for manipulation or managements’ sake. That scene, that moment, that majesty was full of imagery from their prophets; a reminder of where they had come from and where God promised they would go. His pomp was the recollection of their circumstance, and the promises of their God that the present reality was not the full story. God promised a savior, a messiah and that messiah had come. He was there, the first rider of a colt, sitting on coats and walking on branches, ears ringing with pleading hosannas:

“Save us. Save us. Save us.”

But how quickly those lovely “hosannas” would twist into ugly shouts of “crucify him.” How quickly would the day’s pomp be ground under the circumstance of their oppression at the hands of a cruel Empire. It would not take long for disappointment to overwhelm delight. They believed the pomp would transform their circumstance, but they did not understand. They could not see. After all that time, they still could not see.

So the triumphant entry was forgotten. Jesus and the disciples would leave the city on the same day they came. The tides would turn on the next day when they returned. But that second entry was not hailed with hosannas or softened with cloaks and branches. How soon the people forgot and moved on. How fast did their hosannas, their pleas for salvation turn to accusation.

Jesus was not what they expected, and in the end he was not what they wanted. His coming laid bare their hearts and their desires. They wanted their circumstances to be fixed and corrected, but they did not want to change. They did not want to see the truth about themselves that he made clear. They wanted their circumstances to be made whole, but their hearts could be left broken.

Aren’t we just like them? We celebrate this day as though we were merely remembering a parade, a joyful celebration, a majestic march. But Jesus knew how dark the coming days would be. Jesus knew that this was not just pomp and circumstance. Jesus knew what waited after the pomp was gone, after the branches were cleared away and the cloaks were retrieved. Jesus knew what lay ahead.

And we do too, but aren’t we still just like those crowds, just like those people who shouted, “Hosanna?” Don’t we want our circumstances fixed, but leave our hearts and minds alone? Don’t we desire change without transformation?

But Jesus did not come to merely alter circumstance. Jesus’ coming into the world revealed the hearts of the people around him. Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem, his unrelenting march toward the cross laid bare the hearts of the world. It exposed how far the world had moved from its Maker.

I don’t think that it is excitement we feel this day. I think it is nervous anxiety, knots in our stomachs, because we know that the world was changed and is changed and will be changed again. The events of this coming week, the darkness, the death, were and are cataclysmic. We cannot avoid the darkness ahead. The very universe will grieve before finally the heavens will once more tell of the glory of God.

That glory is what we both celebrate and anticipate, and even fear. Glory is not just a happy glow. Glory is a God who loved those crowds enough to become like them. Glory is a power we cannot begin to fully comprehend or understand. Glory is a sacrifice that is more than we can bear. Glory is a love that transcends our mortal understanding. The glory of God is awesome and awful. It is both comfort and crisis. It is indictment and it is forgiveness. God’s glory took on human frame and became just like them, just like us.

If we remember anything on this day it is that we are just like them, just like those crowds, those fickle throngs. We are just like them, so quick to cry for salvation, and so easily disappointed when it does not look as we expect.

We are just like them. We claim to want change, until we realize that we must be changed in the process. We make God in our own image, and are confounded when God refuses to stay in the categories we assign.

We are just like them, surrounded by darkness but believing that it is light. We are just like them, even knowing the rest of the story, but still unable to grasp its full consequences. We are just like them. But God’s good news is that God became just like us. God became like us in Jesus, and Jesus walked into the darkness willingly, obediently, determinedly. Jesus was just like us, so that we could learn to become more and more like him.

Amen and amen.

Lifted Up

John 3:14-21

March 11, 2018

            My age means that I fall into the original generation for several cultural phenomenons. I am the original generation of “Sesame Street kids.” I mean forget “who shot J.R?” I still remember when it was revealed that Mr. Snuffleupagus was real and not just a figment of Big Bird’s imagination. I was a high school student when MTV aired, and that was a major influence in my life and in the life of my friends. And I was the first generation of Mr. Rogers’ kids. While my mother made dinner, and my older sister and brother did their homework, I would curl up in my dad’s lap and we would watch Mr. Rogers together.

            It has been 50 years since “Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood,” first aired on public television. It was the simplest of programs. There was almost no budget, and the host, Fred Rogers, was unlike other hosts of other popular kids programs. He didn’t act like a clown, although I know he wasn’t afraid to try different things or even look silly. He never talked down to kids, he just talked to them. He was gentle and humble, and if I remember my facts correctly, the sweaters he wore were ones that his mother knitted for him. He was always kind, and he always made you feel welcome. In a time when “inclusive” was not yet a buzz word, Fred Rogers went out of his way to be inclusive. People of every race and creed were welcomed into his neighborhood, and he also made sure to include people of differing abilities.

            I will never forget watching a tribute to him, when a young man in a wheelchair told him that when he could not navigate other places in the world because of his limitations, he could watch “Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood,” and always feel welcome.

            Fred Rogers testified before the Senate about the importance of keeping children’s public television available to everyone, and managed to sway the most cynical of senators. One thing about him that I did not know until after I went to seminary was that he was an ordained Presbyterian minister; ordained, as I understand it, to his ministry with working with children through the medium of television. I like to believe that this man, one of my earliest role models, encouraged my own ministry, although that’s not a connection I made for a long, long time.

            Other than the fact that his show is still remembered and honored 50 years later, why talk about Fred Rogers today? Is it just nostalgia on my part? Maybe, but I also think that Fred Rogers, in his own human, humble, flawed way, did his best to love the world as he believed God loved the world.

            “For God so loved the world…” That’s the beginning of perhaps the most well-known verse in all of our scripture; John 3:16.

            “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.”

            Or, if you learned the King James Version…

            “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life.”

            This verse is everywhere. It’s at football games and on license plates. I’ve seen it on billboards and bumper stickers. “For God so loved the world…”

            But the problem with a verse that is as iconic as this one is that it is easy to forget it was not written in a vacuum. It has a context. There are other verses around it. It’s part of a larger story. We don’t read the whole story today, but it’s important to know that Jesus spoke these words to Nicodemus, a Pharisee. Nicodemus came to Jesus by night and confessed that he knew Jesus was of God. No one could do what Jesus was doing if he was not of God. In response, Jesus confused Nicodemus by telling him that no one could see God’s kingdom if they were not born from above. From that part of the story, we get into the debate over what it means to be born again, and I don’t want to jump into those difficult waters today.

            Yet it is all part of what Jesus was trying to teach Nicodemus, of what he was trying to make him understand about who he, Jesus, was. Yes, he was of God, but what did that mean? Yes, he was God’s Son, but what did that look like? He ushered in God’s kingdom, but what did the kingdom actually require?

            The first verse in our part of the passage this morning is about the Son of Man being lifted up. Moses lifted up the bronze snake in the wilderness to cure the people of their snake bites – that’s the story we have from the book of Numbers this morning. Just like Moses lifted up that metal serpent, so the Son of Man will be lifted up.

            The Son of Man will be literally lifted up on the cross, and don’t we look to the cross as the “cure” for sin and death. But the Greek for lifted up also means “exalted.” The Son of Man will be exalted, lifted up not just on a cross, but lifted up as living proof of God’s love for the world.

            For God so loved the world … It would seem that since this verse is so ubiquitous in our culture that it must be because we love its meaning so deeply. But I’m not so sure. We may say it, proclaim it, display it, but do we really love it? Do we live it?

            I realize that some people are attracted to this verse because of the promise of judgment that is implied for those who don’t believe. Yet, go one verse further and we read that God didn’t send the Son into the world to condemn the world but to save it. Yes, those who do not believe are condemned already by their own inability or refusal to believe. Yet, the judgment we read about is from the same Greek that we get the word, “crisis.” There is a crisis for those who remain in the darkness. There is a crisis for those who are afraid to come into the light, afraid of what the light might reveal; what it might reveal about them, about their own hearts and minds.

            Remember that Nicodemus came to Jesus in darkness? It seems to me that he was in crisis; crisis about what it would mean to believe this man in front of him was the Son of God, crisis about what that would mean for him as a Pharisee. Nicodemus was facing a judgment, but it wasn’t of the hellfire, brimstone sort. It was a crisis, a crisis of faith. Can you step into the Light, knowing what it may reveal? Or will you choose to stay in the darkness because the darkness is easier, because it seems safer, because it is more familiar, because you are afraid?

            It seems to me that our beloved John 3:16 is not so much a verse of comfort, but of crisis. Because if we believe that God so loved the world, if we believe that God did not send God’s Son to condemn the world, then what is our response? What is our response to the world God loves? What is our response to the people God loves? We may proclaim on banners and billboards that God so loved the world, but when it comes right down to it, do we?

            I know I don’t. I know I fail. I know that I refuse to pray for my enemies, that I constantly look for the speck in others’ eyes while ignoring the log in my own. I know how I struggle to remember that every person I meet is a child of God. Not only that, I completely and utterly forget that every person I meet could be Christ himself; as I said last week, God right in front of me, only I’m too busy or distracted or too blind to see. I walk in darkness and I don’t even realize it.

            Yet, isn’t that what this season of Lent is about – a time of intention and preparation, a time of examination and reflection, a season to recognize the darkness and once more choose the Light.

            I stick with my earlier statement that John 3:16 is a verse of crisis. But that does not lessen its good news. It is good news. It is incredible and wonderful news. For God so loved the world is not only in the past tense. For God so loves the world, for God so loves us, that God’s Son was lifted up, exalted, so that we might have see the Light, have new life, and learn to love as we are deeply and truly and completely loved.

            For God so loves the world.

            Amen and amen.

The Temple of His Body

John 2:13-22

March 4, 2018

            I read a story recently about an event that took place in a Washington, D.C. metro station. A young man with a violin was playing for the commuters passing by. His case was open and on the floor in front of him, and occasionally people would walk by and throw change into it. The only people who really paid any attention to the violinist were children. They would stop and watch until their parents shooed them along.

            I used to live outside of D.C. and while it was not completely uncommon for a street performer to be found in a metro station, it was not an everyday sight either. You would notice someone playing the violin. But the passengers who walked by him that day were either too busy or too distracted to care. So the young man played on, and by the time he quit there was about $32 in his case.

            Here’s the thing; the musician was world renowned violinist Joshua Bell. A few weeks before this train station concert, he had played to a sold out crowd in Boston, where the cheap seats were more expensive than what he collected in the metro station. I couldn’t find out the name of the piece of music he was playing, although apparently it was one of the most intricate and complicated pieces every written for the violin. And Mr. Bell was playing it on a Stradivarius violin worth over 3.5 million dollars.

            The people in that metro station had the opportunity to enjoy a free concert from a renowned violinist on a magnificent instrument, and they didn’t stop. They didn’t look. They didn’t take notice. They didn’t know what they had right in front of them.

            Unless we read all four gospel stories of Jesus cleansing the temple side by side, we might not know what is right in front of our eyes either.

            This story of Jesus cleansing the temple is found in all four gospels. On the surface it may seem that John is telling the same – or at least a similar – story as the other gospels. But there are some significant differences. In Matthew, Mark and Luke, this event is placed after Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem. It comes after the people have gathered to wave and welcome Jesus into the city like a king. The synoptic gospels place it as part of the culmination of events that lead to Jesus’ arrest and crucifixion. In fact, Jesus cleansing the temple is the straw that breaks the camel’s back for the religious leaders and authorities.

            But in John’s gospel, Jesus turning over the tables in the temple follows the story of his turning water into wine at the wedding in Cana. We are just at the beginning of John’s gospel and at the beginning of Jesus’ ministry. He was barely getting started. Which begs the question, why was Jesus so angry? It makes sense that he was angry in the other gospels. He had been preaching, teaching and proclaiming to anyone who would listen, that the kingdom of God was in their midst. He had been on the move for three years, speaking truth to the powers that be, calling out the leaders for corruption and abuse. So it is understandable that when he went into the temple and saw further evidence that the poor were being exploited and taken advantage of, he was furious.

            But as Karoline Lewis pointed out in the WorkingPreacher podcast, it was too soon in John’s gospel for Jesus to be angry. It was too soon in Jesus’ ministry for Jesus to be angry, and she made the point that in John’s version of this story, Jesus wasn’t angry. He was zealous. He was filled with zeal and a righteous fervor, but he was not angry.

            In the other gospels, Jesus accused the moneychangers for turning his father’s house into a den of robbers, but in John’s version, he just told them to stop making his Father’s house a marketplace. Yet, this is also confusing. The marketplace was a necessity. The people could not use Roman coins to buy their sacrifices. So the Roman coins had to be exchanged for Hebrew coins. To bring a foreign coin into the temple was sacrilege, a glaring violation of the Law. There is no indication in John’s telling that the moneychangers were doing anything but their job. There is no sense of violation or exploitation.

            But this scene in the temple inflamed Jesus’ zeal. Why? What are we not seeing? I think what we are not seeing is that the people in the temple were not seeing. They did not see Jesus for who he was. They did not see that God inhabited more than just a physical space that they visited on religious holidays. They did not see that the temple of God was in Jesus’ very body.

            If the gospel of John were written as a stage play, John would be the narrator and his remark about the temple of Jesus’ body would have been an aside to us, the audience. When Jesus was questioned about what he was doing, he told them,

            “Destroy this temple, and in three days time I will raise it up.”

            Sure you will. This temple has been under construction for almost half a century, and you’re going to rebuild it in just three days? Right.

            “But he was speaking of the temple of his body.”

            The temple of his body; God within Jesus and Jesus right in front of them. They did not know what they were seeing. They didn’t know who they were seeing. They didn’t know who was right in front of them.

            It seems to me that Jesus wanted them to understand – or at least begin to understand – that God was not limited to the temple. God was not limited to the walls and enclosures of a human made building, even one that was sacred and divinely appointed. God was not limited or restricted only to where they thought God would be or should be. God was in Jesus. Jesus was God’s Son, and God was in the temple of his body.

            This makes me wonder how many times I have encountered God and not seen. How many times have I talked with God, laughed with God, ignored God, and not realized it? How many times have I overlooked the hands of Christ or the feet of Christ because they were not hands or feet that I expected?

            But isn’t that why we make this trek through Lent? To prepare ourselves for the unexpected? Isn’t that what Paul was referring to when he wrote of the cross as foolishness? It is foolish. It is! It is nuts. God dying on a cross?! God dying?! That’s absurd! Yet that’s what we believe, and that is what we are moving toward. Every day brings us closer and closer to God’s great foolishness; God’s absurd and ludicrous cross.

            So if God does what is unexpected and foolish, why do we only expect to see God in certain places and in certain people? The people in that metro station did not expect to see a world renowned violinist, but there he was, right in front of them. The people in the temple that day were there to see God in those four walls, but Jesus said, no. Jesus said that he was the temple. He was the temple that would be destroyed but raised again.

A commentator wrote about the church using centripetal and centrifugal force. Centripetal force is the force that pulls you in. Centrifugal force pushes you out. If you have ever been on a whirling, spinning amusement park ride it is centrifugal force that keeps you plastered to the wall of the ride. His point was that instead of thinking of church as centripetal, drawing people in, we need to see church as centrifugal – sending people out.

It seems to me that we need both. We need to draw people in, not because this is the only place where someone can find God. It isn’t. But because this is where we learn and this is where we remember. We remember what God has done. We remember who God is. We remember through the stories and we remember through the table, and we find strength and hope and courage once more.

And then we need to be pushed out, pushed out to the world expecting to see God, expecting to see God alive and at work. We need to be pushed out to see God in the heavens that tell of God’s glory and in the people God created. We need to be pushed out, sent out so that we can be the body of Christ and so that we can be Christ’s hands and feet and heart. We need to be pushed out and sent out so that just as we can see Christ in others, others can see Christ in us. Look around and know that God is here. Go out and know that God is there. God is right in front of us; may our eyes, our minds and our hearts be opened to see.

Amen and amen.