Resurrection Power!

[This was shared during today's worship services with the people and friends of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]

Acts 4:1-12

Yesterday, the nation said goodbye to a woman beloved by many, the wife of one president, mother of another, Barbara Bush. 

One theme that ran throughout the funeral was her belief in Jesus Christ and in the resurrection from death that will come to all who believe in Him. Her son, former Florida governor Jeb Bush, reported visiting his mother shortly before she died. He wondered if she was ready to die, if she was frightened. “Jeb,” Mrs. Bush told him, “I believe in Jesus and He is my Savior. I don’t want to leave your dad, but I know that I will be in a beautiful place.”

Barbara Bush expressed the faith we have as disciples of Jesus Christ, God the Son, Who took on human flesh to receive the condemnation for sin that you and I deserve, the condemnation of death and separation from God, then rose from the dead to assure that all who turn from sin and daily entrust their lives to Him, will also be raised to live with God “in a beautiful place,” the eternal kingdom of God.

In the past two centuries or so, the Western world has seen the rise of what some see as rational thought. It features a rejection of belief in God, the deity of Christ, or His resurrection. 

In fact, one of this nation’s founders, Thomas Jefferson, was just such a “rational” thinker: He produced his own version of the Bible, with Jesus’ miracles and His resurrection, deleted. For Jefferson, his “bible” produced a more palatable “Christianity.” 

Today, there are large numbers of ill-informed people who have never taken the time to consider the evidence who agree with Jefferson. Earlier this month, Scientific American cited polling showing that the number of Americans who profess no religious belief whatever rose from dramatically between just 2005 and 2013. 

This is why our friend Bill Mowry and others say that the United States is one of the largest mission fields in the world. 

Some who reject the witness of the early Church that Jesus rose from the dead and the belief that those who trust in Him will also be raised are members of Christian churches who attend worship only out of habit, for social connection, or something to make them feel good once a week.

But rationalism, in my judgment, isn't the biggest reason some people reject Christ and His resurrection. The biggest reason revolves around the old question of power. It's a question that goes back to the garden of Eden where the serpent lured humanity into sin and death by lying to them, telling them that if they ate of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, they wouldn't die as God had warned they would. Instead, the serpent insisted, God only warned Adam and Eve against the fruit because at the moment, they did, they would be like God (Genesis 3:1-5). We human beings have been hot on the trail of god-likeness, of power ever since. We look for it in all the dying stuff of this world because the last thing we want to do is play second fiddle to anyone, even to the God Who made us!

But think about it: When you know that one day, if you will remain faithful to Jesus, you will be reunited with Him “in a beautiful place,” how powerful are the things of this world? 

How powerful is money? 

How powerful are comfort or ease? 

How powerful are governments or the in-crowd? 

The power and utility of each will end for us at the moment we draw our last breaths.

If you belong to the risen Jesus, can anything intimidate you? 

Can you be intimidated by sickness or setbacks, adversity or rejection? 

Can you be intimidated by death? 

Years ago, South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu raised his voice in Christ’s name against the system of racial slavery known as apartheid that existed in his land. He received multiple death threats daily. Why, a reporter asked him, did he keep pressing Christ’s case against government-authorized hatred, he was asked? He couldn’t help it, Tutu said, God hates injustice and loves it when we treat others justly. “Besides,” he said, “death is not the worst thing that can happen to a Christian.” 

Do we live in that assurance? 

Do we dare to fight for the good of our neighbor, not worrying about what’s best for us in this world because we know that by God’s grace through our faith in Christ, we have a share in God’s best for all eternity?

Do we brave the taunts of an ego-imprisoned world to share the good news of new life from the risen Jesus with people who need Him as much as you and I do?

The early Church, having gone through the darkness of Good Friday, the glory of Easter, and now filled with God’s Holy Spirit, did live in the assurance that because Jesus rose from the dead and they belonged to Jesus, nothing could separate them from God (Romans 8:31-39).

They knew that no power in this world could rob them of eternal life with God! 

That’s why after the Holy Spirit came to them at Pentecost--as He comes to us in our Baptism, they shared the good news of new life for all who repent and believe in Jesus. 

They were and they made disciples, just as Christ calls and commands you and me to do.

But their message about the risen Jesus threatened those who clung to the power and comforts of this world, just as He does today. 

In Acts 3, we’re told that, in the name of the risen Jesus, Peter and John, two of the apostles, healed a lame beggar at the temple in Jerusalem. Not surprisingly, eople were amazed! Peter explained that this had happened not because he and John were great, but because the risen and living Jesus is infinitely the greatest of all.

The temple crowds weren’t the only ones who witnessed these things though. So did the powerful, in this case, the Sadducees, the priestly class who wielded both religious and earthly power. They didn’t believe in Jesus’ resurrection. And they feared that if the people started believing in the resurrection, they might become fearless. They might realize that they no longer needed the system of temple sacrifices by which the Sadducees kept the people under their thumbs. 

That’s where our second lesson for today, Acts 4:1-12, begins. When the Sadducees saw that after the healing of the lame man and Peter’s sermon, 5000 men (and who knows how many women and children) came to believe in the resurrected Jesus, they took the apostles into custody. 

With Jesus’ crucifixion fresh in Peter’s and John’s memories, the Sadducees undoubtedly thought that some time in a jail cell and time in their intimidating presence would make the two of them (and the rest of the Church) stop claiming that Jesus rose from the dead.

But they soon learned that intimidation cannot work on those who follow Jesus. As they stood before the powerful custodians of the temple, Peter and John are asked, “By what power or what name did you do this?” (Acts 4:7) (Back to the perennial human issue of power again.) 

Notice: The Sadducees didn’t deny that the lame man had been healed. That’s not the issue. They know that the man really had been lame and now really was healed. No, their interest is in the power question. “In whose name are you defiantly flouting our power here in the seat of our power, the temple?” they demanded to know.

The reaction of Peter and John is instructive for we who bear the name of Jesus and confess Him to be our Lord and God. They didn’t counterattack. Like the Lord Jesus, when He was tried, they didn’t become defensive. They didn’t issue a torrent of condemnations. 

But here’s what they also didn’t do: They didn’t buckle under the power arrayed before them. After all, death isn’t the worst thing that can happen to a Christian. 

Verse 8: “Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them: ‘Rulers and elders of the people! If we are being called to account today for an act of kindness shown to a man who was lame and are being asked how he was healed, then know this, you and all the people of Israel: It is by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth,whom you crucified but whom God raised from the dead, that this man stands before you healed…” 

Peter declared that the lame man had been healed by the Savior they’d had a hand in (and we all have a hand in) nailing to a cross, but was very much alive, sitting at the right hand, the power hand, of God the Father! 

The world had not been able to get rid of Jesus. Even when the world killed Him off, He rose again, and there is nothing that the powerful, the cynics, the hopeless, or the joyless of this world can do about it! Jesus is risen; He is risen indeed!

Peter goes on to cite a verse from Psalm 118. It's interesting that he does because Psalm 118 celebrated the restoration of the temple in Jerusalem after the Babylonian captivity of God’s people. The temple had been an important place long before Jesus came into this world. It was where God’s presence dwelt on the earth. It was where pious Jews offered sacrifices for their sins and prayed. 

But those days were done. 

When Jesus died on the cross, the curtain shielding worshipers from the holy of holies where God lived was torn from top to bottom. 

Jesus was and is the final, definitive sacrifice for sin; no more sacrifices were needed. 

“Behold,” Jesus’ earthly cousin John the Baptist had told his own disciples when he caught sight of Jesus at the Jordan, “the Lamb of God Who takes away the sin of the world.” 

Jesus was and is the only foundation stone on whom eternal life is built, which is why Peter described Jesus to the Sadducees, quoting the psalm, as “the stone you builders rejected, which has become the cornerstone…”

No matter how the power-hungry, rational, self-worshiping world may rail against belief in Jesus’ resurrection or the resurrection of those who follow Him as nonsense, the truth cannot be altered. 

The 500-plus disciples of Jesus Who had saw Him risen from the dead and staked their lives on that truth cannot be ignored (1 Corinthians 15:3-8). 

Nor can the millions of lives that have been changed, transformed by the risen Jesus. 

Nor could they possibly deny the truth of Jesus’ resurrection if they dared, with the help of Christian friends like you and me, to put their trust in Jesus. When I came to faith in Christ after being exposed to the faith of the people of our home church in Columbus and the Biblical witness on which they built their lives, I reached a point at which I told God, "Lord, I find it hard to believe. But I am willing to believe. I'm willing to trust what these people believe and what your Bible tells me. Help me to believe." If people would dare to come to God in this way, the Holy Spirit would begin to build their faith in Jesus Christ. He and His resurrection would become undeniably and palpably real in their lives!

It’s to underscore the truth of Jesus' resurrection victory over sin and death that Peter says in the final verse of today’s lesson: “Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to mankind by which we must be saved.”

Today is the third installment of our series, Church Lessons, taken from the New Testament book of Acts. Here is our third lesson: 

The only power to overcome the sin, death, and futility of this world is the risen Jesus Christ. The true, eternal Church is made up of those who trustingly live as though they believe that’s true...because it is! 

Jesus Christ calls us to live in this truth. Are you in?

[I'm the pastor of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]

Saturday This and That

These are some of the things that caught my eye this past week.

Ever wonder what that extra shoelace hole is for?
It isn't just for show.

Are fountain pens the next big thing?
In A Primer on Fountain Pens, Brett and Kate McKay share the writing instrument's history and tell us why, at times, they should be our instrument of choice for writing. Somehow, I don't see the fountain pen taking off as a fad.

Denzel Washington's recommended number 1 priority for college graduates...
...put God first.

Letter to JetBlue...
...from the grateful mother of an autistic child.

"How is it that really, really smart people can come to believe really, really stupid things?"...
...The revered journalist, Seymour Hersh, seems to have been looking for the "big story" for decades and, in the process, produced some embarrassments, including his just released story alleging that Osama bin Laden's death was less of an American achievement than a Pakistani government gift. Marc Ambinder suggests that, in his long journalistic career, Hersh has often been right on facts, but often way off when taking about motive, leading him to believe crazy things.

The US is "less Christian"...
...so says a new study.

But the sky is not falling...
...So shows Ed Stetzer.

The US restaurant business is stagnant...
...because millennials don't go to restaurants as much as preceding generations did. One factor that might explain this, not mentioned in the article, is the plethora of cooking shows. Cooking has become fun and hip, whereas in previous generations regarded it as a necessity and a chore. So, millennials might actually prefer eating their own cooking at home.

$179.3-million is no abstraction...
...That's how much Picasso's Women of Algiers brought in at an auction this past week.

Has the decline of baseball...
...corresponded with the decline of American character?

Hillary would, if he weren't a competitor, likely advise Jeb to watch out for questions...
...Clinton has only answered eight from the media since her campaign began, preferring to take questions from folks at town meetings. On the other hand, Bush's most challenging questions have come from "ordinary" voters, not the media, and as he answers them, seems to get himself into increasingly deeper waters. I wrote here:

While it may be in a candidate's interest to speak to the press, Clinton isn't legally bound to do so. If she wants to reach the public with town hall meetings, advertising, conventional campaigning, and social media releases, that's her choice. But it's likely to backfire on her...

Now, Bush seems to be showing us that answering any question from anybody can produce its own backfires.

While I recognize that there's a good chance that anyone who runs for president is either (a) filled with megalomania or (b) racked by feelings of inferiority, I nonetheless feel badly about the meat grinding analysis and tedious verbal parsing to which all candidates for the country's highest office are subjected.

A legend has died...
...B.B. King passed on Thursday. Love this article about him from USA Today.

In that other big game...

Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, is the first choice of possible Iowa Republican caucus-goers, and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is the top choice, by a huge margin, of potential Iowa Democratic caucus-goers. Iowa, of course, holds the first formal presidential contest of the two major parties' presidential nominating processes.

Clinton appears to be a prohibitive favorite there:

Clinton, the former U.S. secretary of state and a fixture in national Democratic politics for more than 20 years, is the first choice for 56 percent of poll respondents. That's 40 points ahead of the next potential contender, liberal populist Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, who is the top choice for 16 percent.

Clinton's numbers seem to be scaring off most potential candidates for president in her party.

Things are quite a bit different among Republicans. Lots of candidates are either committed to or looking at the race. So, Republicans in Iowa haven't made any real choices yet. Walker leads the pack with 15%. But then, there's this:

The Wisconsin governor is...the No. 2 most popular choice for likely caucusgoers who want an establishment candidate, and he's the No. 2 for those who want an anti-establishment candidate.

In other words, people don't know Walker very well yet. He's a blank slate on which potential voters are imposing their own versions of Scott Walker. Surely, voters in Iowa, which shares a border with Wisconsin, know something of Walker who, by virtue of his three statewide runs in Wisconsin--in first election campaign, his recall campaign, and his re-election campaign. But some see him as an establishment (i.e., Bush, Romney) Republican, while others see him as an anti-establishment (i.e., Ted Cruz, Rand Paul) Republican.

This means that Walker has a delicate task ahead of him. As he rolls out his campaign, he has to be careful to portray himself as the anti-establishment establishment candidate, or maybe the establishment anti-establishment candidate. That, of course, is impossible and Walker is going to have to just be himself--or a reasonable version of himself--and let the chips fall where they may. To me, he seems a likely viable contender for the nomination, along with Jeb Bush.

Bush, by the way, needs, I think, to hope that one or two others emerge as viable contenders for the Republican nomination besides Walker and himself so that Walker can't position himself as the new and conservative voice over against Bush as the older establishment candidate. Bush's chances are enhanced, at least through the early primaries and caucuses, by a multitude of anti-establishment types like Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, and Mike Huckabee.

Of course, if Bush fails to win the nomination and the person who garners it has painted their candidacy as distant from Bush's perceived mainstream conservatism, that nominee will have a tough time "re-positioning" in the general election campaign.

In recent history, voters have tended to turn out the party that's been in the White House for eight years. That would suggest that the 2016 race is the Republicans to lose. But, demographics right now give the Democrats an advantage. If they can lock up the coasts and ad a handful of flyover states, they can win routinely, it would seem. These two imperatives will collide in the next election.

Clinton faces her own land mines. As she learned in 2008, being the frontrunner doesn't ensure a candidate of the nomination. She also will be seen by some as a vestige of an unwanted past, even as others see her as a harbinger of a new American future. She will also be assailed for the Benghazi incident during her tenure at the State Department.

Having said all of this, two things:

• 1. I express no preferences here. If you think that I have, you misunderstand. I've come to believe that pastors shouldn't make political endorsement or get involved with politics. And I'm not doing that here at all. It's just that, against my will, I'm still afflicted with my lifelong interest in the politics of politics. Even when I make my choice about who I vote for in 2016, you won't know it.
• 2. I wish that presidential campaigns were shorter and that, at least publicly, those in government spent more time governing and less time campaigning. I wrote about that back on January 20, 2007, here. It's worth reading, not so much for what I wrote, but for the interesting conversation that came out of it, either recorded or linked to, there.

Okay, go back to Super Bowl coverage. (Can you tell that I got my sermon finished early today?)