Financial matters trigger an average of 3 arguments per month for married couples, an incidence that rises to 4
per month for those aged 45 to 54, according to a U.S. survey conducted
for the American Institute of CPAs by Harris Interactive. The most
common source of contention is disagreement over what's a "want" and
what's a "need." The next most common issues are unexpected expenses and
insufficient savings.
After I shared it with my wife, we both agreed that, happily, money or how to spend and save it, isn't a bone of contention between us.
You know, Jesus teaches Christians to pray, "Give us this day our daily bread."
Martin Luther explains this petition in The Small Catechism:
"God indeed gives daily bread to all, even unbelievers, without our prayer, but we pray in this petition that He would help us recognize this so that we could receive our daily bread with thanksgiving."
Of course, there are many millions of people in this world who lack "daily bread."
But this is not a provision problem. God provides all that we need, including all the technology we need to cause even the most challenging of environments provide people with sustainability.
The widespread existence of hunger in our world today--every twelve seconds, a child dies of hunger somewhere on the planet--is a sharing problem: We who have aren't sharing with those who have, often not sharing even the know-how by which people who live in parts of the world that suffer drought or, as the result of human power games, famine.
Through World Vision, we sponsor a child in Ethiopia. The money doesn't go directly to the child or to her family, but to efforts toward creating a sustainable future in the village in which she lives. (As well as sharing the Good News of Jesus Christ with her.)
The youth of our church also have, for the past two years, participated in the 30 Hour Famine. During their famine, the teens go without food for thirty hours and receive pledges from those supporting their efforts, with the monies also going to World Vision's efforts to erase the global food shortage.
(Over the course of the thirty hours, the young people also learn about the world hunger challenge and what can be done to address it.)
It's gratifying being able to give up some of our own comfort and resources in order to be the conduits through whom God provides our global neighbors with their daily bread...today and in a sustained future.
I also believe that if couples will daily seek to align their lives with the will of God as revealed in the Bible, their arguments over money will begin to diminish. Grateful for the undeserved gifts of forgiveness for sin and everlasting life with God that comes to all who repent and believe in Jesus Christ, they'll want to spend less superfluously and give more generously. (Learning this is a process, by the way, and it's a lesson we never fully learn this side of the grave.)
It isn't that God doesn't want us to have fun, of course. But when "fun" is the aim of our lives, we separate ourselves from God and others, we can become selfish, and we lose ourselves.
Jesus once asked: "What does it profit...to gain the whole world, but lose or forfeit [yourself]? (Luke 9:25). Good question!
John 17:6-19
Imagine, for a moment, that you’re the parent of younger children (if you're the parent of younger children, no imagining necessary) and you’re about to go away on a long trip.
As a responsible parent, before going, there are at least three major things you would be sure to do.
First, you would arrange for someone to take care of your kids in your absence.
Second, you would review for your children any essential instructions, including remembering that you always love them.
And third, you would pray, asking that God would see that your children were looked after and that you would all be safely, happily reunited.
Jesus does all three of these things in chapters 13 through 17 of John’s gospel, a section of the New Testament scholars call Jesus’ Farewell Discourse. They’re words Jesus speaks at the Last Supper in the presence of the apostles on the night before His crucifixion.
After being crucified, of course, Jesus would rise from the dead and, forty days later, ascend to heaven. From that moment, Jesus knew that no one on earth would see Him face to face for a period of time known only to God the Father.
So, in John 13:36, Jesus says: “Where I am going, you cannot follow Me now, but you will follow Me afterward.” Like a responsible parent, Jesus is preparing His followers for His impending departure.
Later, in John 14:18, Jesus assures the disciples that, even with Him being physically absent, they wouldn’t be alone: “I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you.” Jesus will come back some day, the dead who have believed in Him will rise again, and Jesus will welcome His children into the new heaven and the new earth He has prepared for believers in Christ. But until that moment, He would not (and He does not) leave those who believe in Him by themselves. He sends the Holy Spirit to be with us!
Then in John, chapter 17, having arranged for the care of those who believe in Him and having instructed believers in how to live until He comes back, Jesus does what any responsible parent does before a time of separation from his or her children: He prays.
Turn to John, chapter 17, please. There, you’ll see that Jesus’ chapter-long prayer, called by some the high priestly prayer, has been divided by translators into three sections.
In verses 1 through 5, Jesus prays for Himself, not selfishly, but to ask that, as He had glorified God the Father during His time on earth, the Father would now glorify Him through His suffering, death, and resurrection, all so people will believe in Him and have life.
In verses 20 through 26, Jesus prays for people who will come to believe in Him through the witness of those who first followed and believed in Him. (That includes you and me.)
Our lesson is John 17:6-19. Here, Jesus prays for His first disciples.
Let’s look at what Jesus prays. In verses 6 to 8, He says that He has “manifested” the Father’s Name. To manifest is to show or to make clear. John 1:18 says: “No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, Who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him.” The New Revised Standard Version translates that last phrase: “It is God the only Son, Who is close to the Father’s heart, Who has made Him [made God] known.” By taking on human flesh, Jesus has manifested God. When we look to Jesus, we see what God is like. In fact, we see God.
Of course, not everyone looks at Jesus and sees that He is God in the flesh. Some refuse to see God in Jesus. The fact is that only those who are willing to see Jesus in this way are granted the gift of faith. These are the people who become disciples.
Disciples --followers of Jesus--aren’t perfect people. Nor are they people who don’t sometimes have doubts. They’re people who come from an imperfect world and are themselves imperfect. But by God’s amazing grace, God gives forgiveness to those who repent for sin and grants brand new, everlasting lives to those who surrender control over their lives to Jesus. Disciples are forgiven sinners in whom, day in and day out, the Holy Spirit is constructing faith in Jesus as Lord, God, Savior, and King of their lives.
In verse 9, Jesus prays something curious. We know from John 3:16 and other passages that God the Father sent Jesus because God so loved the world, in spite of our sin, that He sent God the Son--Jesus--so that all who believe in may not perish, lost to God forever, but have everlasting life. God loves the world and the human beings who populate it!
Yet look at how Jesus prays in verse 9: “I pray for them [meaning the disciples] . I do not pray for the world but for those whom You have given Me, for they are Yours.”
You see, more important to Jesus than this world are the people God has given to Him, the people who entrust their lives to Him, the people who make up His Church.
Long after this universe has been destroyed and Jesus establishes His new heaven, new earth, and the new Jerusalem, believers in Jesus--the Church--will still exist. (Revelation 21:1-4)
The Church, the fellowship of Jesus’ disciples, is eternal.
The Church isn’t buildings, gardens, classrooms, sanctuaries, pipe organs, albs and stoles, hymn books, or offering plates.
I love how Article VII of the Augsburg Confession, one of the basic confessional documents of the Lutheran movement, based on the Bible, describes the Church. It says that the “...one holy Christian church will be and remain forever. This is the assembly of all believers among whom the Gospel is preached in its purity and the holy sacraments are administered according to the gospel.”
None of this is to say that the Church on earth is perfect. Personally, I know that I drag my old sinful self, sometimes kicking and screaming, whenever I come into the presence of Christ or gather with the fellowship of believers in Christ! This side of our own resurrections, every saint is still a sinner: a forgiven sinner, a recovering sinner, a sinner who lives in daily repentance and renewal, but still a sinner, saved only by the grace God gives to all who believe in Jesus Christ.
Article VIII of the Augsburg Confession notes that even in the church there are “many false Christians, hypocrites, and even open sinners [who] remain among the godly...”
But that doesn’t make the Church any less essential for anyone to have a life with God.
Life with God only happens in the lives of those who hear, receive, and believe in the gospel--the good news about Jesus--and who receive the sacraments of Holy Baptism and Holy Communion.
And these things--gospel and sacrament--are only offered by the Church.
This is why Jesus goes on to pray in John 17:11: “Holy Father, keep through Your Name those whom You have given Me, that they may be one as We are.”
Let’s be clear about what Jesus is praying here.
Jesus is not praying that everybody will all just get along.
There’s nothing wrong with people getting along, of course, and one day, after Jesus has returned to the earth, the dead who believed in Him arise, and He establishes the new heaven and the new earth, the harmony God intended for this fallen world will come into being.
But Jesus is not praying for unity in His Church in these days before His return at the expense of the truth.
He’s praying that our oneness, our unity, as Christians will be rooted in the truth that can only be found in Him and in the Word of God inspired by the Holy Spirit and revealed in the pages of Scripture.
That’s why Jesus prays as He does in John 17:17 (look at the verse, please): “Sanctify [that is, set them apart from the rest of the world, make them holy]...by Your truth. Your word is truth.”
A group of people united by anything other than the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ and the revealed Word of God is not a church.
When Martin Luther nailed the 95 Theses to the church door in Wittenberg, Germany and unintentionally began the Reformation, he didn’t mean to divide the Church. He did it in hopes of uniting the Church behind the truth as revealed in Jesus and in the Bible, the living Word of God.
Luther was condemned by bullies of Church and State who told him that the Bible and Christian faith were what they said they were, no matter what Christ and the Holy Spirit-inspired Scriptures themselves may have said to the contrary.
To the bullies, rituals, edicts, traditions, and “church unity” were more important than the truth God has revealed in Christ and reiterated in the Bible.
They wanted to force unity at all costs.
Martin Luther and the other leaders of the Reformation said, “No. We won’t play God for a chump. We won’t turn our backs on the truth.”
Folks, unless a church teaches and believes that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life and that people can only come to life with God the Father through faith in Christ, it’s not really part of Christ’s church.
Unless a church believes that Jesus was born of a virgin and was physically raised from the dead, it’s not a church.
Unless a church believes that the Bible is God’s inspired Word and is useful for teaching, reprimand, correction, and for training in righteousness, it’s not really a church.
Unless a church draws its being, life, and joy from Christ alone, Word alone, faith alone, it’s not really a church.
The church is that fellowship of believers among whom the gospel of new life for all who believe in Jesus is rightly proclaimed and the sacraments are administered according to the gospel.
It’s the fellowship being taken care of by God’s Holy Spirit, in which we hear and heed the Word of God, and is bathed in prayers: the prayers of Jesus for us and the prayers we offer for one another and for our witness about Jesus in the world.
If all these things aren't true of a group of people who call themselves church, they are not part of Christ’s Church. They may be a social club. Or a service club. Or a keep-up-the-building club. But they’re not part of the Church. Salvation isn’t happening among them. Its life isn’t being built on the truth of Christ.
If the church as you experience it is anything less than what Christ intends for you to have, why not join in praying to God today:
I want to build my life on the truth of Christ. I want to be part of a fellowship that scares the devil and shares life in Christ with a world that is dying in its sin by the second. I want to see Jesus’ prayer for His Church answered in my own life, along with the lives of all who are part of Saint Matthew. Grant this, O Lord! Amen
If that prayer expresses the desire of your heart today, I invite you to keep offering prayers like that every day you live and to allow the Holy Spirit to make you part of God the Father’s answer to Jesus’ John 17 prayer! Amen
Yesterday, my wife and I went to buy a few items at Giant Eagle. As we headed toward the self check, I spotted a display of DVDs. Among them were several titles by Leslie Sansone, the inventor of the simple walk at home workouts Ann and I really enjoy. One title looked especially good to us and the price was just $7.99.
We tossed the DVD into our cart and headed for the checkout. The last item I scanned was the Leslie Sansone DVD. As I did, the computer-generated voice said, "9.99." I touched the button on the computer screen for assistance and within seconds, a store manager appeared.
I explained what happened and she said, "Go ahead and complete your transaction, sir, and meet me at the register ahead." At the register, she hit some buttons and was handing my receipt to me when my wife, more alert than me, said, "You gave us the DVD for free?" "That's right!" she said, "have a nice evening and enjoy the workout."
Even if Ann and I didn't already love Giant Eagle, we would have become fans at that moment.
I've since learned that what the manager did is corporate policy.
But can you imagine what the world would be like if we did always did more than was expected of us?
What would happen in our families and marriages?
In our businesses and churches?
Based on what Ann and I felt as we left Giant Eagle yesterday, I can tell you there would be a lot more smiling faces. (The fun thing is the manager smiled too. It feels good when we go above and beyond people's expectations of us!)
Still, loving and praying for enemies is a countercultural and, really, who in this world would expect a person to do such crazy things?
But Jesus goes on to explain: "...if you love those who love you, what reward do you have?...And if you greet only your brothers and sisters, what more are you doing than others?..." When we fail to love our enemies and pray for those who give us a hard time in life, we're no different from everybody else. But, Jesus calls those who want to follow Him into eternity, to be different. In Matthew 5:48, He tells His followers to "be perfect...as your heavenly Father is perfect," meaning abandon the fractured, self-protecting ways of this world and embrace the wholeness and self-giving ways of God Himself.
Company policy at Giant Eagle set that manager free to be more considerate of two customers than we expected her to be.
Jesus Christ sets those who believe in Him free to be the people of love and consideration that we want to be, that God made us to be.
Loving enemies and praying for those who hate us way may not change the minds or hearts of those who experience our love. But then again it might.
And having permission to go above and beyond others' expectations like that is a wonderful thing!
John 15:1-8
On the night of His arrest, in the room where He and the apostles had their Passover meal, Jesus tells them (and all who believe in Him) at the beginning of our lesson: “I am the true vine...”
What exactly does this mean and why should we spend the next few minutes of our lives trying to understand it?
In the Old Testament, God’s people Israel were pictured as a vine. For example, Psalm 80:8 says: “You have brought a vine out of Egypt. You have cast out the nations and planted it.” The mission of God’s people, Israel, was to be a light to the world, pointing others to the life that only God can give to those who turn from sin and believe in Him.
Israel's mission was later to be placed on the shoulders of one anointed king, a person described at least five centuries before the birth of Jesus in the book of Isaiah as the Servant. God speaks to this Servant in Isaiah 49:6: “I will...give You as a light to the gentiles, that You should be My salvation to the ends of the earth.”
In our gospel lesson, Jesus claims to be that Servant, the true Vine, Who is a light to all nations and Who offers salvation to all the world.
In that first verse, Jesus also says, “My Father is the vinedresser.”
Every vine needs pruning. Otherwise, it grows crazy and sprouts small, unhealthy, useless grapes. A vinedresser makes sure that his investment of time, energy, water, and fertilizer are maximized. He cuts off the branches that are likely to rob life from the other branches and not produce much themselves. Jesus evidently has branches that will be pruned away. We'll learn more about that as we dig further into this passage.
In verse 2, Jesus explains: “Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit He [God the Father] takes away; and every branch that bears fruit He prunes, that it may bear more fruit.”
Now, Jesus, like most Jewish teachers in the ancient world and like the Biblical writers, loved plays on word. They helped make teaching more memorable. The word that Jesus uses for prune in verse 2 is kathairei, a word that is similar to one He uses in verse 3, where He says: “You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you.” The word for clean in verse 3 is, in the original Greek, katharoi (we get the words like catharsis or cathartic, used of cleansing experiences, from it). Jesus is equating cleansing with pruning. “My word,” Jesus is saying, “the word that all who believe in Me will not perish but have everlasting life, has made you clean. I wash away the sins of all who believe in Me and am the way you to eternal life with God.”
Jesus makes those who believe in Him clean. Our sin is pruned away. But, Jesus says, God the Father also rids His vine of unproductive branches and rids even the productive branches of unproductive shoots.
This is important, because in verse 5, Jesus tells us: “I am the vine, you are the branches...”
Jesus says that those who are baptized and believe in Him are connected to Him, sort of like a lamp is connected to electric power through a wall outlet. A lamp that remains unplugged just sets and collects dust. It only serves a function and only "comes to life" when it's connected to its power source. Believers in Jesus draw their life from Jesus alone and as branches on the same Vine, Jesus, they are also connected to each other. You can't be a Christian on your own: You need both Jesus and His Church.
The apostle Paul says something similar to this in 1 Corinthians, where he writes that those of us who make up Christ’s Church “are the body of Christ and members individually.” So, we are branches who draw life from Jesus, we’re part of His body.
But that raises a problem. Jesus is sinless. The New Testament book of Hebrews says that Jesus “was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin.” Now, if Jesus the Vine is going to thrive and give life to those who truly repent for sin and truly believe in Him, God cannot allow anything impure or sinful to be attached to Jesus. God must prune or cleanse Jesus the Vine of those branches that want to take life and blessings from Jesus without bearing fruit: without repentance for sin or trust in Jesus.
Unless the Father prunes the branches that are wasting God’s grace on the sins they want more than they want God, the whole vine, the entire body of Christ and God’s intention to create a new and everlasting kingdom for those who trust in Christ, is put in jeopardy.
This is why making our relationship with Christ and His Church the highest priority in our lives is so important. Jesus is saying that if we’re not all in with Him and His body, the Church, we’re really locking Him out of our lives.
This leads to what Jesus says in John 15:4. It’s both an order and a plea from the Savior Who loves us like no other: “Abide in Me...”
Abide means live, stay, or remain. Jesus is saying, “Stick with Me.”
Jesus goes on to say: “As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me.” Then, at the end of verse 5, Jesus says something that sticks in the craw of any self-respecting, self-sufficient human being: “without Me you can do nothing.”
Who has the guts to admit that today: "Without Jesus, I can do nothing?" I learn it more every day! A few months ago, God impressed on me a simple message: “Don’t try to be creative with your sermons. Less of you; more of Me. Preach My Word and let the chips fall where they may.” It’s liberating to know that while I can’t, God always can!
Listen: Some of you may be trying to live a good, wholesome life on the strength of your own effort. If that’s what you’re doing, I’m telling you that you are bound to fail. We can never be as good as we were made to be or as we sometimes imagine ourselves to be. Jesus says we can do nothing without Him.
Others of you may think that you’re living a wholesome, godly life without paying much attention to God. As I’ve mentioned before, my grandmother used to say, “It’s easier to be good when you’re old than when you’re young.” What a stupid thing to say! That statement may be true only when you have one sin in mind.
But, I’ve found that the older I get, the easier it is for me to do just what I want to do. Society allows that as we age. “Age has its privileges,” we're told. Live enough years with that mentality and you start to believe it! You think that you’re entitled.
As the years go by--I’m talking to people in their teens as well as those in their 80s--maybe the best thing we could pray in the morning is, “God, what do you want me to do today that I don’t want to do?” I guarantee that if we will pray like that, we’ll be pushed so far out of our comfort zones we’ll have to remain connected to Christ for support and the sheer ability to get the thing done. We’ll know that we can’t, but God can.
In verse 6, Jesus says that if we refuse to be connected to Him, we will be cast out, thrown into the fire and burned. Lest we misunderstand Jesus' meaning here, He says something similar in Matthew's gospel: "So it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come out and separate the evil from the rightweous and throw them into the furnace of fire, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth" (Matthew 13:49-50). The difference between the good and evil people Jesus describes here is not that one group are sinners and the other is not; it's that one group of sinners places its confidence in its own capacity to be good, while the other group relies for its goodness on Christ, the true vine, alone.
Those who don’t believe in hell need to take the subject up with Jesus; He clearly did believe in hell. In fact, He died and rose to prevent any of us from experiencing it. All that is required of us is that we remain connected to Him, trusting in Him alone.
But verse 6 isn’t the most challenging verse in the lesson. Verse 7 is. Jesus says: “If you abide in Me and My words abide in you, you will ask what you desire, and it shall be done for you.”
A lot of games get played with this verse and others like it. “If you only had enough faith,” some people will say, “you would never get sick and everything you ever wanted would be there for you.” That’s not faith, but magical thinking.
So, let’s not play games and deal honestly with what Jesus says here, with what we can understand and what we can’t. Probably every person in this sanctuary has prayed for the earthly lives of loved ones or friends, the new job or career, good health for ourselves or other things, and not received the answers we desperately sought. I cannot and will not explain away all the pain you’ve gone through as a result. Nor do I know why God seems to say, “No” to the prayers of Christians.
But, just a few thoughts. Please look at Psalm 37:4. It says: “Delight yourself...in the Lord, and he shall give you the desires of your heart.”
Notice that the prerequisite for God giving us the desires of our hearts is that we delight in Lord. To delight in the Lord must mean, in part, putting God and God’s priorities first in our lives. We delight in God as we abide in Christ and remain connected to Him. As a result, what we desire changes because we delight in God. God's mind and our minds move more in sync. Some of what we pray for may change when delight in God. God may teach us to truly pray the hardest petition of the Lord’s Prayer: “Thy will be done.” Maybe this is why Jesus makes this promise to give us whatever we desire within the context of His plea and command to abide in Him.
When I first became a Christian, the passage of Scripture that bothered me the most was Genesis 3:24. It comes after Adam and Eve have fallen into sin. It says that God drove Adam and Eve out of the garden and kept the whole human race from getting to the tree of life. “Why did God do that?” I wondered. Doesn’t God want to give us life?
The answer, of course, is that God does want to give us life. But more than that, God wants to give us life with Him. Had the human race gotten access to the tree of life without the change in our relationship with God that comes to those who believe in Jesus Christ, it would have meant an eternity of suffering and separation from God. We would have gotten the desires of our hearts, but the desires of hearts darkened and perverted by sin. We would have been lost to God forever, still in our sins.
God’s ways may not lead us to the answers we seek. But God’s ways, when we persevere in abiding with Christ, always lead to life beyond the confines of this suffering, dying world. God's ways always lead to resurrection victory and eternal life in His kingdom when we stick with Jesus.
The crucified and risen Jesus is the only one with the credibility to ask us to believe that, to trust God even when tragedies we devoutly prayed would not come, come anyway.
That's because Jesus on the cross assures us that God understands our pain and because Jesus risen assures us that there will be a time beyond our earthly sadness when all that seems senseless and barren will be explained, when all the hurts and kills us today will be in the past.
Until that day when Jesus returns, as we remain connected to Christ and our prayers move in sync with God, God will build up our faith, we will delight in God and desire the things God desires, and God will use us to share His love with and bring His kingdom to others. Like our Savior, we will share in others’ sorrows and joys and, in this way, bring the life of Christ to them. It is just this life--a life of deep connection with Christ and the needs of others--that Jesus calls “bearing fruit,” living the same faith Sunday afternoon through Saturday that we profess on Sunday mornings.
“By this [abiding in Him],” Jesus says in verse 8 of our gospel lesson, “My Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit. So [or, in this way] you will be My disciples.”
Stick with Jesus and His body, the Church.
That’s where life is.
That’s where, even in the midst of questions we can’t fully answer in this world, purpose can be found.
Acts 4:5-12
True story about a family in one of the parishes I served as pastor: They were very devout. They showed up for worship every Sunday and saw to it that their children were not only in worship, but also in Sunday School, Catechism, and youth group. They had a daughter who, unlike so many, didn't treat Confirmation as though it were graduation from the church. She stayed involved, evidencing a real faith in Christ.
This young woman went off to college, where she did well. While there, her commitment to Christ only deepened. She got involved with a campus Bible study. She got active with a local congregation in the college town, even going on a few mission trips. In telephone calls to her folks, she gave every evidence of being on fire for Christ.
I was talking with her mom one day and I asked how things were going. "OK," she said, "but I'm really concerned about Mary." "What's wrong?" I asked. "She's really gotten into Church, really into the Bible, really into telling others about Jesus," she told me. I wondered what the problem was. Her mom explained: “We raised her to be a churchgoer, not a fanatic.”
You know, there are people in the Church who have just enough of Jesus to be inoculated against Him. They warm a pew. They go through the motions of being "church members." And most importantly (to them), they are rostered members of their congregations who put money in the plate. What more could any normal--non-fanatical--person expect of them?
I've actually had church members say to me, "You know, Pastor, that was a beautiful sermon. It's great that we're called to love God and trust in Jesus above all else. But it doesn't work in the real world." I ask them, "Have you tried?"
But the fact is, there are lots of people in the Church who don't want to try. They want to keep God at arm's length. That's why they can be so hostile to people like Mary, who take their faith seriously and who strive to keep Jesus as the center of their lives. Do we, in today's world, need the kind of fanaticism Mary evidenced? Desperately!
But you know what? The unwillingness to stand under the authority of Christ and of His Word that Mary's mother articulated can also be seen among so-called "leaders" of the Church, respected pastors and theologians.
About ten years ago, I attended a meeting with other clergy. We had a guest speaker, a New Testament scholar who participated in something called the Jesus Seminar. Basically, the Jesus Seminar is a group of New Testament scholars from established denominations and prestigious universities and seminaries. They get together, hear papers presented, have discussions, and then vote on which parts of the New Testament are true and which parts aren't true.
The Jesus Seminar scholar who spoke to us said, "I don't remember the exact tally, but we voted against the resurrection of Jesus. We're confident that it didn't happen."
One of the pastors screwed up his courage, raised his hand, and said, "I understand that the Biblical writers don't agree on every particular detail of things. And each of them--the gospel writers, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John and the others like Peter, Paul, James, and the preacher in the book of Hebrews--have their own particular theological slants and emphases. But among the things that none of them disputed and on which they staked their lives is that Jesus died on a cross and was raised on the third day by God the Father. How can you take a vote and say that's not true?"
"Well," the theologian said, "have you ever met a person risen from the dead? It's not within the realm of the experiences of anyone else you might meet either. And if it can't happen today, it couldn't have happened then."
What he was doing was holding his experiences and his intellect as higher authorities than the Scriptures, the revealed Word of God. And whenever we do that, we're in trouble.
Now, people like these New Testament scholars or Mary's parents are what we might call nihilists. It's a term that comes from the Latin word, nihilo, meaning nothing. Nihilists, as I'm using the term here, are people who basically believe in nothing. If you can't see it, touch it, hold it, own it, buy it, sell it, or gain weight from it, it isn't true. To the nihilist, there's no heaven, no hell, no omnipotent, immortal God. Nothing.
There are a lot of their tribe these days, both inside and outside the Church. But the phenomenon is nothing new.
Turn to Acts 3, if you would. There, we're told that one day a few years after Jesus rose from the dead and ascended to heaven, the apostles Peter and John were entering the temple in Jerusalem. Like all the first Christians, these two were devout Jews and they maintained their religious practices even then, seeing Jesus as the fulfillment of God's promises to His people. As Peter and John were going into the temple, they met a man who had been lame--paralyzed--from birth. He was sitting there, hoping that people would give him some money. Peter looked at the man and the man thought that Peter was going to hand him a coin or two. Instead, look at what Peter says in Acts 3:6:
“Silver and gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you: In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk.”
This took place in a section of the temple known as Solomon's Portico or Solomon's Porch. It was teeming with people. You can bet that when this crowd saw this paralyzed man walking, leaping, and praising God, it got their attention!
So, this crowd came rushing toward Peter and John. They're about to hail the two apostles as miracle workers. But look at what Peter says to them in Acts 3:12 and beyond:
“[People] of Israel, why do
you marvel at this? Or why look so intently at us, as though by our own
power or godliness we had made this man walk? The
God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God of our fathers, glorified His
Servant Jesus, whom you delivered up and denied in the presence of
Pilate, when he was determined to let Him go. But you denied the Holy One and the Just, and asked for a murderer to be granted to you, and killed the Prince of life, whom God raised from the dead, of which we are witnesses. And His name, through faith in His name, has made this man strong, whom you see and know. Yes, the faith which comes through Him has given him this perfect soundness in the presence of you all."
The typical term for miracle in the Greek in which the New Testament was written is semeia. It means sign. It's like the exit sign over there. The sign doesn't point to itself. It points to the place where we can exit from this room. The miracles of Jesus were never ends in themselves. They had a point. So does this miracle Jesus performed through Peter on Solomon's Porch. All of these miracles represent signs of the fact that Jesus has power over sin and death.
The reason for that is simple. The bigger question in all of our lives--just as was true with this lame man--isn't whether we're healthy or not. The bigger question is whether--healthy or ill, weak or strong--you and I are reconciled with God. The miracles recorded in the New Testament are meant simply to point us to the only one who can overcome sin and death and decay and reconcile us to the God Who, alone, can give us new life: the risen Jesus!
And that's why Peter is so quick to say, "It isn't me who did this, but Jesus, the Lord of all...Jesus, the One you wanted out of your life and put on a cross Who is now risen and alive right now!" He then told them that they could be right with God and have life beyond the grave if they would turn from sin and give their lives to Christ.
After Peter made his proclamation about Jesus, the same leaders who, just a short while before, had petitioned Pilate to put Jesus on a cross, had Peter and John arrested. That's where the lesson for this morning, Acts 4:5-12, begins. Take a look at the opening verses:
And it came to pass, on the next day, that their rulers, elders, and scribes, as
well as Annas the high priest, Caiaphas, John, and Alexander, and as
many as were of the family of the high priest, were gathered together at
Jerusalem.
Now, it's well-documented that among this crew, especially the priests, were people who were first-century nihilists. They called themselves Sadducees. The Saducees believed that the whole notion of a resurrection of the dead was crazy. They found it inconceivable that God could or would veto the power of death.
In fact, this group of important priests, elders, and scribes had fallen prey to something that one of my professors in seminary, Pastor Bruce Schein, used to warn us against. Pastor Schein told us, "Be careful of handling the holy. Be careful in handling the Word of God. Be careful in handling the Sacraments. You might begin to think that they're nothing. You might begin to thing that they're not important and that you are the only thing that makes them worth anything."
For the priests and others who were part of the Saducees party, religious life was simply a set of motions you went through. Liturgy was something pretty that they did. Participating in worship didn't mean that you really believed in a God Who has control over life and death. They were in control and they didn't need any sign from God pointing people away from them.
So, they call Peter and John out of their jail cell to make an appearance before them. And then we read in verse 7 of our lesson what these religious leaders wanted to hear from Peter and John:
“By what power or by what name have you done this?”
You have a daughter who goes off to college and gets involved with her faith and, exercising your parental authority, you demand of her, "Whatever possessed you to think that Jesus really mattered? Didn't you know that we just took you to church so you could learn good morals and be a nice person?"
You meet a New Testament scholar who tells you that Jesus' resurrection never happened and the scholar asks you, "By what authority do you--a common layperson or a common pastor, who has never done graduate work or spent years studying the New Testament--have the temerity to tell us that this book is actually true, that Jesus really did die and rise."
The question of authority is what the religious leaders asked of Peter and John: "Who exactly do you think you are? Who told you that you could do and say these things?"
Look at how Peter answers the question in verse 9:
If we this day are judged for a good deed done to a helpless man, by what means he has been made well, let
it be known to you all, and to all the people of Israel, that by the
name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, whom God raised
from the dead, by Him this man stands here before you whole.
You know what? Peter wouldn't have been in trouble if he'd said something like, "Well, I picked up a little magic somewhere along the way and that's how I was able to make the man walk again." Or if he'd said, "I recognized that his paralysis was psychosomatic and that if I simply told the man to walk, he'd be able to do it." If Peter had taken the credit for himself, this healing wouldn't have been controversial. The leaders wouldn't have even arrested John and Peter in the first place!
But the trouble was that Peter ascribed the miracle to Jesus. And the minute you give any credit to Jesus, you get yourself in trouble in this world.
The Saducees and others wanted to knock Peter and John down a peg or two. Peter said, in effect, "That's OK. I'm not the One Who did this. It was done by the One Who was killed by our sins, the One God raised from the dead."
Now I ask myself, "Where is it that Peter got the stuff to do this?" Remember Peter on Maundy Thursday, when Jesus was bring tried and faced death on the cross? He denied even knowing Jesus three times. Where does this guy get his guts? Acts 4:8 answers that mystery:
Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit...
We can have the power to live by the faith in Christ we profess, not because we talk ourselves into it or because of some inspiration we pick up along the way, but because Jesus sends His Holy Spirit to those who are desperate enough to acknowledge their need of the Spirit, desperate enough to ask for the presence of the Spirit in their lives.
I know all about that desperation. When I told my mother that I was going to seminary, she told me that she was apprehensive. "Mark," she said, "you've never dealt well with sickness or death. Are you sure you can be a pastor?" I said, "No." But here's how I've done it for twenty-seven years: In the car, on the way to the hospital, or the death bed, or the funeral home, I pray, "God, I can't. You can. Give me the right words. Give me the right silences. Send Your Spirit."
You know, that God has always answered that prayer? God has never failed once.
That's how Peter was able to share his faith in Christ.
And that's how you and I, in the face of a world that is increasingly indifferent or hostile toward the good news of new life for all who repent and believe in Jesus, can stand firm. We can stand firm, not out of egotism or an attitude of being holier or better than others, but simply because we love God and we love others and those "others" need Jesus as much as we do.
Look at what Peter says at the very end of our lesson, Acts 4:12:
"Nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.”
Now, if we believe that--if we believe Jesus when He says that He is the way and the truth and the life and that no one can be reconciled with God the Father except through Him, we can't have it on our consciences that we have not shared Jesus with others. We can't settle for a hypocritical half-faith. And though we are unable to do it on our own, as weak, at least, as Peter, God can help us share Christ with others when we depend on His Spirit.
60%
of U.S. government employees studied by Gallup say they don't clearly
know what's expected of them at work. That's because a lot of government
workers are stuck with lousy managers, according to Jim Clifton,
Gallup's CEO. If an organization hires managers who care about
employees' development, workplace misery magically disappears, Clifton
says.
Whether you're a leader or a manager, you get a lot more accomplished when people know that you care about them!
Leaders who view people as game pieces to be manipulated delude themselves with the notion that by their depersonalizing "efficiences," they will accomplish more.
Impersonal or harsh leaders may score temporary spikes in measurable outputs--even when the leaders in question are pastors. But such "leadership" will never sustain positive results.
Good leadership entails viewing those being led as people with lives, families, dreams, and goals.
I recently read Ten Most Common Mistakes Made by Church Starts by Bill Easum and Jim Griffith. It was interesting for me to read because I was a church planter for seventeen years and believe me, to lesser or greater extents, consciously or unconsciously, I made every single one of the ten mistakes Easum and Griffith mention!
One of the mistakes mentioned though, is especially interesting: So focusing on Jesus' great commission--attracting new believers to Christ--that His great commandment--loving God and loving others--is forgotten.
Without a loving consideration of the people you seek to lead to Christ, you won't make any disciples, no matter how many people come to your church.
The number one fact every leader must remember is a principle I first heard enunciated by pastor and leadership guru John Maxwell: If nobody is following, you're not a leader. And I would add: You're not a leader if you haven't demonstrated concern about and a commitment to the people you would lead.
"Faith grows best in the soil of a heart that rejoices in Jesus despite what’s going on around it."
(From: Cymbala, Jim (2012-02-21). Spirit Rising: Tapping into the Power of the Holy Spirit (Kindle Locations 1337-1338). Zondervan. Kindle Edition.)
Joy and happiness are two different things. Happiness is about what happens to you. Joy is what God gives to those who trust in Christ and know that through Christ, nothing can separate them from God, not even death.
I love these words, also from Cymbala's new book, reminding us not only that Christ gives joy, but also reason for rejoicing:
"Should we be depressed that Jesus died for our sins and rose from the grave and that all of our sins are forgiven? Should we lament the knowledge that one day we’re going to be with the Lord forever? Should the fact that our name is written in the Book of Life make us sad? No. Those things should give us great joy."
(From: Cymbala, Jim (2012-02-21). Spirit Rising: Tapping into the Power of the Holy Spirit (Kindle Locations 1213-1216). Zondervan. Kindle Edition.)
Below, a video for Audio Adrenaline's great Rejoice. AA was a great Christian rock band, but they didn't impose the Biblical understanding of how believers in Christ can rejoice no matter what their outer circumstances on those they asked from through the country what made them rejoice. Crank it up!
Here are the lyrics to Rejoice:
"Rejoice"
I'll sing this song just as long as I'm breathing
I'm feeling good, I'm feeling right
Come sing a song a song of freedom
Sing every morning and into the night
[CHORUS]
You've got to tell everyone in the land
Come on, come on
Tell every girl, boy, woman, and man
Rejoice, rejoice
That god's been good yeah good to me
Come on, come on
I've been forgiven and it feels so free
It's a beautiful thing when I sing to you Jesus
The days are a joy
The nights are all bright
Even the rocks cry out your glory
Let everyone rejoice tonight
That God's been good yeah good to me
[REPEAT CHORUS]
Come on, come on
I've been forgiven and it feels so free
Rejoice
Of the 30 countries with the largest labor forces, the Philippines scores highest in terms of workers' fluency in English — above India, Canada, and the UK, says a CIO
report of an online test by English-language instruction company
GlobalEnglish. Scoring lowest among the big-labor-market countries were
Colombia and Brazil, according the test of 108,000 employees of 216
companies. The worldwide average English-fluency score has declined 7% since last year, GlobalEnglish says.
Luke 24:36-49
To begin this morning, let’s look at two great verses about the greatest promise God gives to all who turn from sin and believe in Jesus Christ.
First, Romans 10:9: “...if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.”
Now, turn to one of my favorite passages, John 11:25-26. Jesus spoke these words to His friend, Martha, grieving over the loss of her brother, Lazarus: “I am the resurrection and the life. [All] who [believe] in Me, though [they] die, they shall live. And whoever lives and believes in Me shall never die.”
Both of these passages--and many more--tell us that Christ shares His Easter resurrection with all who entrust their lives to Him. They bring God's comfort and power into our lives!
Ask the average Christian what happens to believers after they die and they may say something like: “Well, I guess that our immortal spirits go to live with God.” This is the kind of thing that the ancient Greeks and Romans said happened to people when they died. It’s not what the Bible teaches.
First of all, the Bible doesn’t say that we have immortal spirits. It says that we are mortal beings, completely dependent on the breath or the Spirit of God to live. Genesis says that when God created the first man, He did so by scooping dirt from the earth He had just created and exhaling life into it. We have no immortal spirit; either we have the breath or spirit of God within us and live or we don't have God's life within us and die. This is why we often say at grave sites, "Ashes to ashes; dust to dust."
And, according to the Bible, as believers in Christ, you and I are not destined to be airy murky ghosts.
When you and I, as believers in the promises of God recorded in both the Old and New Testaments, confess a belief in “the resurrection of the dead,” we’re saying something different from what any other religion or popular belief system has asserted.
Take a look at 1 Corinthians 15, starting at verse 51. These words written by the apostle Paul, inspired by the Holy Spirit in the first century and are addressed to believers in Christ: “We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed--in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible [this not only means they can no longer sin, but also that their bodies will no longer deteriorate, age, or decay], and we shall all be changed. For this corruptible [nature] must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality...”
When believers in Christ are resurrected, it will be the result of God making a brand new creation. It’ll be a new Genesis.
We will, in some sense, look the same as we do here and now and we will have the benefit of all the lessons this life has taught us, but we who were once simply people of earth will become people of both earth and heaven.
On a day known only to God the Father, Jesus will show up on this earth and bring His new, eternal creation to supplant the old, tottering, death- and sin-infested creation in which you and I now live and we will rise, not as wispy spirits, but as new human beings.
It may happen long centuries after we have died, our skin and bones already reduced to dust or ashes, but God can bring new life from ashes. And God will not forget us! He will raise up all who have believed in His Son.
This is not a new teaching. Job is probably the oldest book in the Old Testament. Yet Job expressed belief in the resurrection that would come to all who believed in the God Who would, in the fullness of time, come into the world to die and rise again. Look at what Job says in Job 19:25-26: “For I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last He shall stand on the earth; and after my skin is destroyed, this I know: That in my flesh I shall see God.” In my flesh I will see God; not from the perspective of some ghostly phantom!
But how do we know that it’s true? In 1 Corinthians, Paul calls Jesus Christ “the firstfruits of the dead.” The resurrected Jesus is God’s prototype of what we will be like when those who follow Jesus are resurrected. 1 John 3:2 speaks to believers, “...it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when [Jesus] is revealed [at His return to this world], we shall be like Him...” The risen Jesus is the new Adam and those who believe in Him are destined by God to be like Him!
Turn to our gospel lesson, Luke 24:36-49 to see what we will be like.
After Jesus disappeared, they tore back to Jerusalem to tell other followers of Jesus that the crazy story brought from the tomb by some of the women disciples was true. Jesus was risen from the dead. They had seen Him too! When they got back to Jerusalem, they were told that Peter too, had seen the risen Jesus.
While they were talking about all of this, Jesus suddenly appeared among them. Verse 37 says that all of the disciples--the eleven apostles plus other believers in Jesus--”were terrified and frightened, and supposed they had seen a spirit.” Other translations say they thought they were seeing a ghost.
Why would they have thought that? After all, they had it from multiple witnesses by then that Jesus was raised from the dead.
The answer is simple: People with physical bodies don’t just show up in the midst of a crowd of people. They walk through open doors or, at least, slink in through open windows. But there had been no walking or slinking. Jesus had just appeared. Clearly, the resurrected Jesus isn’t constrained by the things that ordinarily constrain us.
In the face of their doubts, Jesus issues a challenge to the disciples in verse 39: “Behold My hands and My feet, that it is I Myself. Handle Me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see I have.” Then, to underscore that He is no ghost, but a body of flesh and bone, in verse 41, Jesus looks around like a teenager at the end of a school day (or at the end of the 30 Hour Famine) and asks, “Got anything to eat?” (Actually, “Have you any food here?”) The disciples give Jesus boiled fish. Spirits don’t have bodies that can be touched. Ghosts don’t eat. Living bodies do.
So, what does all of this have to do with you and me?
First of all, it means that our bodies are important. As C.S. Lewis writes in Mere Christianity: "God likes matter. He invented it."
The fact is that Jesus died and rose not to bring us to some murky, spiritual half-life. Jesus died and rose so that God can recreate us as physical beings, just as He originally intended when He made Adam and Eve.
Paul says in 1 Corinthians 6:19, that the physical body of each believer in Jesus Christ is "a temple of the Holy Spirit." God cares about what we do to and how we care for our bodies.
Second, we can live each day in the confidence that whatever comes our ways in this life, we belong to a risen Lord Who has big plans for us. Romans 14:8-9 says: “For if we live, we live to the Lord; and if we die, we die to the Lord. Therefore, whether we live or die, we are the Lord’s. For to this end Christ died and rose and lived again that He might be Lord of both the living and the dead.” The risen Jesus can be with us, filling us with His life, all the time.
Third, we know that repentance and belief are more than nice ideas. In verse 47 of our lesson, Jesus says that the reason He calls the Church into existence is to tell the world about His suffering and resurrection and so that “repentance and remission [or forgiveness] of sins should be preached in [Jesus’] Name to all nations...” It’s those who repent and believe who will share in Jesus’ resurrection. That needs to be lived out in our daily lives...and shared with others!
Finally, we should know this: While all the mysteries about what will happen the moment after we breathe our last in this world haven’t disappeared, we can be certain that those who have died before Jesus’ returns are with Him. The New Testament does say that those who have died believing in Jesus have gone to sleep and from the perspective of this world made imperfect and time-bound by human sin, that’s true. But the Bible teaches that there are two dimensions of reality. On the one hand, there is the earthly. In this dimension, we’re constrained by things like time and space and sin. The other dimension of reality is the heavenly. It’s the place where God reigns.
The heavenly dimension has invaded the earthly reality through Jesus and is being invaded still every time we read God’s Word, receive Holy Baptism and Holy Communion, or pray and serve in Jesus’ Name. We pray for the fullest possible invasion of the heavenly dimension into our lives and the life of the world every time we pray, “Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”
One day, when Jesus returns to the world, that invasion will be complete. The old will pass away and the new will take control forever.
And what happens in the meantime? Look at Luke 23:42. Jesus is dying on the cross between two criminals. One joins the crowd in excoriating Jesus. The other though says to Jesus: “Lord, remember me when You come into Your kingdom.” Then Jesus makes a promise: “Assuredly, I say to you, today you will be with Me in paradise.”
Right now, this very moment, if you trust your past sins along with your present and future life to the control of Jesus, you are in His kingdom, though we do, in the Biblical phrase, see through a glass darkly.
And right now, those who have died believing in Jesus are with Him in paradise. We can’t see them now in their resurrected bodies and, from the perspective of this time-bound world, their resurrection has yet to happen. But in that other dimension--the heavenly dimension--they are with Jesus now in strong, youthful bodies.
They’re eating and drinking at the table of the Lord.
They’re laughing and rejoicing in a kingdom in which every tear has been wiped away, every physical ailment is banished, and sin is a forgotten affliction.
If, in the power of God, we will spend our lives turning from sin and entrusting our every moment to the risen Christ, the kingdom in which they live right now--the kingdom of Jesus--will be ours forever. The resurrection of Jesus shows us that it’s so.
The mental health of people who are unemployed takes a hit at first but gradually improves over 10 to 12 weeks,
according to a team led by Connie R. Wanberg of the University of
Minnesota. After that, it drops slightly if rejections continue to pile
up. 72% of the 177 participants in the study found employment within the 20-week span of the research.
Jesus once said: "...do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today's trouble is enough for today" (Matthew 6:34).
In his book, When the Bad Times Are Over for Good, Pastor Gerald Mann restated Jesus' teaching memorably by saying, "Wait to worry."
When disasters like losing our jobs hit us, it's easy to go into panic mode, dreading the future. But it's a good procedure to wait to worry and instead, take the following steps:
Lay your situation before God, asking for His wisdom, intervention, and guidance.
Stay connected with other people, especially ones who will be supportive to you, including those who will be lovingly honest with you about faults and failings.
Live in the present, accept God's forgiveness for your past, offered through Jesus Christ, and ask God to secure your future.
Wait to worry. Jesus says that without Him, we can do nothing (John 15:5). But when we trust in Him, we live in the same confidence enjoyed by the apostle Paul, who wrote that he could do all things through Christ, Who gives strength to believers (Philippians 4:13).
The God we meet in Jesus Christ can help us "wait to worry," no matter what our circumstances.
Waiting to worry doesn't mean being passive. In fact, the opposite is the case.
The worrier is paralyzed by fear and does nothing.
When we put off worry and instead, put our needs in God's hands, God frees us to be creative, bold, and confident in the face of even daunting circumstances. We become less susceptible to expensive quick-fix schemes or to the temptations to anesthetize ourselves with unhealthy physical or psychological addictions.
What job seekers who have experienced rejection for a period of time understand is that rejection and failure are not fatal. When we put our faith in the God we know in Jesus Christ, we don't have to learn that truth after long periods of debilitating worry and heartache. We can know it all the time!
Through faith in Christ, our personal disasters and setbacks can be catalysts for giving our lives to Christ. And when we do that, disasters can even be conduits for the blessings of God!
William Booth, founder of the Salvation Army, said, “We are not such fools as to refuse good bank notes because there are false ones in circulation; and although we see here and there manifestations of what appears to us to be nothing more than mere earthly fire, we none the less prize and value, and seek for the genuine fire which comes from the altar of the Lord.” 3
Cymbala, Jim (2012-02-21). Spirit Rising: Tapping into the Power of the Holy Spirit (Kindle Locations 435-438). Zondervan. Kindle Edition.
Meg Jay is a clinical psychologist on the faculty at the University of Virginia. She wrote recently in The New York Times:
...Couples who cohabit before marriage (and
especially before an engagement or an otherwise clear commitment) tend
to be less satisfied with their marriages — and more likely to divorce —
than couples who do not. These negative outcomes are called the
cohabitation effect.
Researchers originally attributed the cohabitation effect to selection,
or the idea that cohabitors were less conventional about marriage and
thus more open to divorce. As cohabitation has become a norm, however,
studies have shown that the effect is not entirely explained by
individual characteristics like religion, education or politics.
Research suggests that at least some of the risks may lie in
cohabitation itself.
What is it "in cohabitation itself" that cause couples who have ostensibly taken each other out on test drives before saying, "I do," to be less satisfied in their marriages or more likely to divorce than couples that don't live together before marriage?
Jay doesn't approach the subject from a Christian perspective and I don't know what her religious affiliation, if any, may be. She suggests that one factor in the cohabitation effect is the casualness with which many couples decide to cohabit in the first place. They carry that casualness over into the subsequent marriage; they don't take their relationship as seriously as couples who wait to live together until after they've made their marriage vows.
That may be. And, if so, it dovetails with an observation made years ago by Pastor Arthur Rouner, also a counselor, in his book, Struggling with Sex.
A married couple came to Rouner saying that they were both deeply dissatisfied with their sex life. He learned that they had lived together before they got married. This, he concluded, was the source of their problem: They had robbed sexual intimacy of some of its meaning and power; it was not a sign of their commitment to one another, only a recreational activity.
From a biblical perspective, sexual intimacy is a gift from God to men and women in a lifelong marriage covenant. It appears to have three purposes:
to bind wife and husband in an act of intense intimacy,
to bring spouses mutual pleasure, and,
sometimes, to bless the couple with children.
When couples choose to rob God of the gift of sexual intimacy in anything other than the marital relationship, the intimacy is also robbed of its significance and its fun.
Something similar happens, I believe, in every aspect of relationships when preceded by cohabitation.
Couples may believe that they're testing out their compatibility by living together. But cohabitation doesn't reliably prepare couples for marriage any more than watching episodes of PanAm prepares a people to be pilots.
When couples cohabit, everything about their relationship is contingent. "I can always bail" is the unspoken subtext of their every day together. Often, couples carry this mentality on into the marriage and the result is the dissatisfaction or even divorce that Jay writes about.
Just three additional points.
(1) It isn't about the marriage certificate. I'm a pastor and authorized by the State of Ohio to, as the law puts it, "solemnize" marriages. But to me, this is just an additional service I offer to couples, helping them with a legal hoop. What's more important to me is that couples make vows to God and to one another binding themselves together as husbands and wives. It's not about a paper issued by the local court, but a covenant and a commitment involving God and the couple.
(2) Jay notes evidence indicating that "cohabitation effect" may be diminishing. If so, there are all sorts of possible explanations to be considered. But those will have to await further data and a later post.
(3) Some of you reading this may say, "But I know couples who lived together before getting married and have been happily married for years." I do too. And some of them subsequently became committed Christians who would never recommend living together before marriage.
But Jay's article raised the question of why the marriages of those who cohabit before their wedding days, a step many take in order to vet the marriage-worthiness of their relationships, fail more often than other marriages. I've offered my view.
The world doesn't need more programs or glitzy, celebrity-driven presentations of information about the Christian faith. The world needs ordinary people reaching out to other ordinary people with the love that comes from the Savior of the world. The good news that saves human beings from sin, death, and futility and gives them life with God forever is centered in relationship with Jesus Christ. And Christ almost initiates the relationships with him into which people enter through the loving relationships they enjoy with those who already follow Jesus.
It takes place not only after Jesus’ resurrection from the dead, but also some time after Pentecost, the day when the crucified and risen Jesus sent the Holy Spirit to the disciples.
At one level, the topic of today’s lesson is money, which seems an odd thing to be talking about on the Second Sunday of Easter.
But Jesus said more about money than He did about heaven and hell combined. And for good reason: As Quaker theologian Richard Foster has pointed out, money is a power in this world, an alternative god that many people follow and give their lives for.
Every day, you and I must decide whether we will control the money we have or whether money will control us.
If we repose our hope in money or in anything other than Jesus, we separate ourselves from the risen Jesus, the only One Who can give us a life worth living on this earth or a life with God beyond the grave.
Today's appointed lesson, Acts 4:32-35, is just the start of a slightly longer story that Luke, the author of Acts, wants to tell us. Today, I want to look not only at the beginning of the story, but also its completion in Acts 5.
So, please go to Acts 4:32. There, we’re told that the first Christians were united and “neither did anyone say that any of the things he [or she] possessed was [their] own, but they had all things in common...” Now, slip down to verse 34: “Nor was there anyone among them who lacked; for all who were possessors of lands or houses sold them, and brought the proceeds of the things that were sold, and laid them at the apostles‘ feet.”
Nobody told the first Christians that they had to share with each other or take care of poorer fellow Christians. Out of simple gratitude to Christ for dying and rising to give them forgiveness for their sins and everlasting life with God, they made the decision that they would all take care of one another. They responded to the radical act of God in Jesus with a radical commitment to His Lordship over their lives.
In 2 Corinthians 9:7-8, Paul writes: “Each of you must give as you have made up your mind [notice, he doesn’t say, “as someone tells you to give”], not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver [the original Greek more literally says, “a hilarious giver”]. And God is able to provide you with every blessing in abundance, so that by always having enough of everything, you may share abundantly in every good work.” According to our lesson, the first Christians were living this way of life. Because of their belief in Jesus, no one among them went without anything they needed.
Now look at Acts 4:36: “And Joses, who was also named Barnabas by the apostles (which is translated Son of Encouragement) [it was his nickname], a Levite of the country of Cyprus, having land, sold it, and brought the money and laid it at the apostles‘ feet.”
This is faith in the risen Jesus! In those days, land equaled wealth, which equaled prosperity. As long as you had land, you could farm it, sell its produce, and eat the rest of the crops yourself. With land, you probably would never go hungry. And if you ever ran into a rough financial patch, you could sell off parcels of it and have enough money to float through until the good times returned. Land meant financial security.
Yet, here was Barnabas, selling off his land, selling off his financial security, because he believed in Jesus more than he believed in financial security.
The story of Barnabas is a positive, joyful expression of faith in Jesus.
Yet, even in a church in which there was so much faith, where believers voluntarily gave themselves to Christ and to one another, there was also unbelief.
That’s what we see in what Luke writes next in Acts, the second act in his narrative about the early Christians and their possessions. Look at Acts 5:1-2: “A certain man named Ananias, with Sapphira his wife, sold a possession. And he kept back part of the proceeds, his wife also being aware of it, and brought a certain part and laid it at the apostles’ feet.”
People like Barnabas gave all they had voluntarily. When they did so, obviously, the early Church was grateful, even though, we know from other things we learn about his life from Acts and from the writings of Paul that Barnabas did what he did to honor God, not to gain people’s gratitude.
Ananias and Sapphira wanted to be complimented and revered like Barnabas. And they wanted to do it on the cheap. They wanted the title of sacrificial, giving Christians without making the sacrifices or truly trusting that Jesus would take care of them.
They were like people who want...
Easter without Good Friday,
forgiveness without repentance,
the power of Jesus at work in their lives without surrendering to Jesus,
Christianity without the stuff in God’s Word, the Bible, they don’t like.
Read what happened next. “Peter said, ‘Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and keep back part of the price of the land for yourself? While it remained, was it not your own? And after it was sold, was it not yours to control? Why have you conceived this thing in your heart? You have not lied to men but to God.’”
Maybe Peter had the memory of Ananias in mind when he wrote those words. Ananias had listened to Satan telling him, “Better hold back some for yourself. Who do you trust: yourself and your own judgment or an unseen Holy Spirit you can’t see sent by Savior you can’t see?” Ananias caved. He believed more in himself and his money and craved the accolades of others more than he did believed in or craved Jesus.
In verse 5, we’re told that Ananias heard Peter’s words and fell down dead. Then it says, “So great fear came upon all those who heard these things.” I’ll bet!
The book of Hebrews says that it’s a fearful thing to fall into the hands of living God. The first Chritians saw just how fearful the moment that Ananias fell dead.
Through the years, some members in the churches I’ve served as pastor have used this passage as a reason for not estimating their giving for the coming year. “I don’t want to lie to God if my financial situation changes,” they tell me.
Listen: God will never hold us accountable for promises we can’t keep, only those we refuse to keep.
Ananias made a promise not commanded of him by God or the Church. But having made that promise, he deliberately broke it.
Could he have been forgiven? Of course he could have been, had he been repentant. But there’s no evidence of that. Nor was his wife Sapphira repentant. When confronted by Peter, she stuck with the same lie and met the same fate.
What are we to make of these events?
At the beginning today, I said that at one level, this lesson is about money. But it’s also about other things.
Look at Acts 5:11. Sapphira has just, like her husband, fallen over dead. We’re told: “So great fear came upon the church and all who heard these things.”
This is the first time in the book of Acts that Luke refers to the first Christians as “the church.” The word translated as church in the Greek language in which the New Testament was written is ekklesia, which literally means “called out ones.”
The church is the fellowship of believers in Jesus who have been called out of the world to stand under Jesus’ lordship, who claim Jesus as the center and the only hope of their lives.
When we submit to Jesus’ lordship, we also become part of a fellowship in which we are accountable to our fellow Christians.
The Church is that group of people who, in response to Christ’s promise of forgiveness and new life for all who repent and believe in Him, make promises of our own. Our promises may be to trust in Jesus, be faithful in our marriages, or to listen to the Holy Spirit when He tells us the truth about sin and about forgiveness. But when we make promises to God, the Church is there to remind us of those promises, help us keep them, show us when we have failed to keep them, and encourage us when we have kept them.
All of this is what Jesus calls, “the keys of the kingdom,” the power and responsibility to declare forgiveness to the repentant and condemnation to the unrepentant. We see Jesus giving this job to the Church in our Gospel lesson for this morning, on the evening of His resurrection: "Jesus said to them again, 'Peace be with you. As the Father has sent Me, so I send you.' When He had said this, He breathed on them and said to them, 'Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them if you retain the sins of any, they are retained" (John 20:21-23).
Peter confronted Ananias and Sapphira not because he was a holier than thou busybody, but because he knew Satan was at work in their lives and wanted to give them a chance to repent and get back on track with God and because when we fail to challenge Satan’s attacks on believers, the witness of the Church for Christ is compromised. This is why Martin Luther said that in every sermon, a preacher must proclaim both God’s law and God’s promise or else the whole truth about God hasn’t been proclaimed.
But here, I think, we come to the deepest point of what Luke wants to show us in these verses of Acts 4 and 5.
Luke compares and contrasts belief and unbelief. It’s very easy to look like a Christian. And, unlike Ananias and Sapphira, we may get away with it until the days we die far less dramatically than they did.
But why settle for looking like Christians when we can actually be Christians? Authentic belief in Jesus may entail greater sacrifice and greater truthfulness before God than the fake Christianity it can be so easy for us to adopt.
But fake faith always ends in death.
True faith always ends in resurrected life with Jesus Christ!
Which do we prefer? That’s a question we need to answer with our lives every day.
We watched Bonhoeffer: Agent of Grace yesterday in Catechism class. Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a Lutheran pastor in Germany who opposed Hitler and his Nazi regime, not because he thought the Church or pastors should be involved in politics, but because the Nazis demanded that Hitler be worshiped alongside God.
In the movie’s closing scene, Bonhoeffer is about to be executed and someone says to him, “So now it ends?” Bonhoeffer replies quietly, “No.” Then, he stepped onto the scaffold to his death.
When you belong to the crucified and risen Jesus, when you’re repentant for your sins and believe that Jesus is your only hope, you know that the end of this life is not the end of your life.
Following Jesus frees us to make and keep outrageous promises, to hold Him first, last, and foremost in our lives even when Satan and things like materialism or the praise of others falsely gained, try luring us away from Christ.
Jesus frees us to be outrageously giving, believing, encouraging believers like Barnabas--to be part of Christ’s true and eternal church.
May the Holy Spirit empower all of us who are part of Saint Matthew to be outrageously believing followers of Jesus every day of our lives.
