This coming Sunday is Pentecost, the birthday of the Church. It was on the first Pentecost after Jesus' death, resurrection, and ascension back into heaven that God sent the Holy Spirit to the praying followers of Jesus. The Spirit made it possible for this once-timid bunch of "losers" to move into the world and communicate the Good News of a God Who is for us and has proved it through Jesus.
That continues to be the thing that makes the church the church: We're the community that in word and deed, shares the hope of Jesus Christ. Peter, who gave a great sermon on that Pentecost, writes elsewhere in the New Testament to Christians: "Be prepared always to give an account of the hope that is in you, but do it with gentleness and reverence."
In a world that has gone crazy with fear, hatred, violence, promiscuity, and war, may the Church always be so prepared!
According to Acts 1:14, Jesus' earliest followers prepared themselves to become the church and to share the Good News of Jesus by spending time in humble, submissive, surrendering prayer and worship. When we spend time with God in prayer and in looking at His Word, He pumps power, insight, courage, and compassion into our lives.
This Pentecost, we need to pray for forgiveness for our sins of selfishness and hard-heartedness. (I know that this rotten old sinner needs to do that anyway.)
We need to pray that as on that special Pentecost after Jesus' ascension, God will fill us with the Holy Spirit and we can be renewed in sharing Jesus with the world.
This Pentecost weekend, please also keep the following concerns in your prayers:
(1) Pray for the people of Chechnya. They continue to be subjected to the most oppressive and ruthless treatment imaginable, at the hands of their Russian overlords.
(2) Pray for the people of Sudan, also subjected to oppressive and violent treatment.
(3) Pray for the health and safety of the little girl our church sponsors through World Vision. Sinanzinkosi Moyo, who turned seven years old this past Sunday, lives in a little village in Zimbabwe. Pray that she will grow physically strong and spiritually strong, relying on the Lord Jesus Christ.
(4) Pray for the peoples of both Haiti and the Dominican Republic. These two nations, which share an island in our Western Hemisphere, have recently been afflicted with flooding. Haiti, the most impoverished nation in the West and among the poorest in the world, has been afflicted for decades by political turmoil, by governments which inflict torture and murder on people, and by the grim oppression of voodoo superstitions. Pray that God will help both countries to be free of their past and to be open to the freedom of Jesus Christ as they rebuild their lives.
(5) Pray for those victimized by flooding in our own midwest. Ask God to help them rebuild their lives and to sense that they are being empowered by Christ as they do.
(6) Pray for an end to the fighting in Iraq. Pray for the people of Iraq, that God will help them to rebuild their lives. Pray for the protection of military personnel. Pray for the protection of relief workers and of innocent civilians. Please pray for the safe release of Matt Maupin from his captivity in Iraq.
(7) Pray for the imprisoned peoples of China, North Korea, and Cuba. Grant that God will make a way for them to be free even in their oprression, free from sin, death, and futility through Jesus Christ!
(8) Pray for an end to the deadly impasse between Palestinians and Israelis. Ask that God will insure that the legitimate aspirations of both peoples will be met and that peace will reign between them.
(9) Pray that God will bless the people of Lutheran Church of the Resurrection in Cincinnati, one of our neighboring parishes, as they dedicate a building addition on Pentecost Sunday. Ask God to help the church to use the new facility to His glory. Also ask God to protect the church from idolizing the building. Pray that God will help the people to see the bricks and mortar they dedicate as tools to be used in their mission of loving God and loving neighbor. Ask God to help them to wear the place out glorifying Him!
(10) Ask that God will protect the world from terror.
(11) Pray that we Americans will hunger and thirst for Jesus Christ. Ask God to help us to humbly submit to Christ, turn from sin, and love God and love our neighbors as we love ourselves.
Have a blessed Pentecost celebration!
Friday, May 28, 2004
Monday, May 24, 2004
Called to Be Jesus' AMEN!
John 17:20-26
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, May 23, 2004)
Today’s Bible lesson is part of a prayer by Jesus. It’s up to us to be the Amen to it.
Amen, you know, is a Greek word. It’s found often in the New Testament portion of the Bible. The New Testament was written in Greek because in the first century, Greek was the language of the world, the language of trade and diplomacy and scholarship, the way English is the language of the world today. Amen is a word which can translated variously: so be it; this is absolutely true; this is what we believe; or simply, Yes!
By custom, it’s a word we put at the ends of prayers. We do it to affirm our belief that the God Who has commanded us to pray in Jesus’ Name has heard our prayers and will fulfill His promises to answer those prayers.
It can be used in other ways as well. But, all these uses of the word Amen can get worn out and rob it of its meaning. A little boy was asked what he thought amen meant and he said, “Peace out, dude!”
I have often thought that some Sunday I should write the worship celebration so that every time we would ordinarily say, Amen, we would shout Yes! instead. In fact, let’s try that right now. I’ll make a statement and you respond with the word, Yes! Here goes...We believe in Christ; YES! We can do everything in Christ’s strength, YES! We will give the pastor a million dollars, YES!
Okay, I only meant two of those. But here is the point: Saying Amen to Christ and His authority over our lives isn’t nearly as important as living it.
The prayer of Jesus that makes up this morning’s Bible lesson is a segment of what Bible scholars call Jesus’ farewell discourse. Jesus is on the brink of offering Himself on the cross, the perfect Lamb of God Who will be killed for the sins of the world. In this part of the prayer, Jesus prays that all who follow Him, in every time and place, will be as united as He and God the Father are. He says that when we who follow Jesus are united, the world will see God’s glory and they too, will want to follow Jesus and become part of God’s family.
That’s awesome stuff. And, as Christians believe that this prayer must accord with Jesus' will and that God answers such prayers.
But there is a problem. A man died and was told to join the latest group of entrants who were going to be given a tour of the place by Saint Peter. Peter proceeded to take the group down a huge corridor from which large rooms ran. “Okay,” Peter would say, “you Baptists get off here.” They’d walk a little further, “Catholics here...” Still further, “Methodists...Pentecostals...Presbyterians...” About half of the new residents of heaven were still with Peter when he announced, “For the next 100 yards or so, I want to ask you to keep absolutely quiet, particularly as we pass the next door.” The group did as Peter requested. They passed the door in silence. After they’d walked further down the hall, the group came to another door and Peter announced, “Episcopalians here.” One person got curious though, and raised his hand to ask a question: “Why did we have to be quiet as we passed that one room?” “Oh,” Peter said, “that was the Lutherans. They think they’re the only ones here.”
The fact is that in spite of Jesus’ prayer, we who confess Jesus Christ as Lord don’t behave as if He and His blood on the cross have made us one. A look at the sorry recent history of Northern Ireland, where Roman Catholics and Protestants have fought and killed each other is all the reminder we need of that.
The reason is simple. Imagine for just a second that some time ago, you got a mail from an out-of-town address. It looked like it might be important. But because you didn’t recognize who the sender was and you were so busy, you just filed it away in a corner of your desk to be looked at later. More recently, as you prepared to move, you found the letter, still unopened, along with a stack of forgotten documents. Absently, you open it up and discover that it’s from a lawyer, notifying you that you have inherited a large sum of money. You immediately dial the number at the top of the letterhead and discover that yes, the money is still available to you. They’ve just been waiting to hear from you.
It’s just the same with Jesus’ prayer: The unity that He prays will be exhibited among all Christians is His gift to us. We just have to claim it!
But why should we claim it? I have to warn you that the answer to that question will be of no interest to those who have a “What’s in it for me?” attitude about their faith or about being part of the Church.
The only people who will be interested in the unity for which Jesus prays are those who let Jesus change them from being members of the me generation to those who are part of God’s we generation. Jesus wants us to claim the unity He gives to those who follow Him “so that the world [will] know” Him and the Father.
And that's an important goal for the follower of Jesus. A few years ago, Ann and I wanted to get the deck on our house cleaned and treated. Ann had done it a few years before and wasn’t satisfied that she’d been thorough enough. We asked around and found a company we thought would do a good job. They did. And you know that ever since then, we’ve recommended the same company to many other people. There’s nothing like the testimony of a satisfied customer. Our unity with other believers in Jesus is a powerful testimony that we are satisfied customers. We tell the world that even though we’re sinners who don’t deserve forgiveness and life, Jesus died on a cross and rose from the dead to give us those things and has changed us into loving people.
And we want our lives to say Amen to Jesus’ prayer so that the whole world will know that Jesus really can a change a life from the inside out.
Today, we’re honoring someone—actually, two someones, because Tim could never do the things he does without the support, understanding, encouragement, and permission of his wife, Laurel. But let me tell you something: I am so proud of Tim, our youth director. He gives countless hours of time, attention, and prayer to what he does for the young people of this congregation and community and for others. And he does it for one simple reason: He wants to be an Amen to Jesus’ prayer; he wants everyone to know about Jesus’ love. And so, just as God has made Tim part of Jesus’ one family the Church, Tim wants to see that family grow in strength of faith and in the numbers who say, “I follow Jesus!”
A few weeks ago, I was feeling guilty because of all that Tim does and that we can’t yet pay him for it. We were talking on the phone and I was about to apologize to Tim, when he said, “Thanks, Mark.” “Thanks for what?” I asked. “Thanks for letting me do all this!”
That’s an extraordinary attitude!
It’s the attitude of a servant of Jesus.
It’s the attitude needed for each of us to roll up our sleeves and say, “Sure, I don’t agree with everything the person at my church or the person at the next church says and does, but I love them anyway and we work on the same team for the same Savior.”
It’s the very attitude that shows us—and the watching world around us—that the crucified and risen Jesus has taken up residence in our lives and in our congregation.
In coming weeks and months, you’re going to be hearing a lot about a special three-weeks that will be happening in the fall at Friendship. It’ll be called, new beginnings.
It holds the promise of elevating the life of our congregation to greater heights of faithfulness and love and unity. I believe that it can help us to be open to God acting powerfully in the life of our church and our own lives.
If that sounds good to you, I ask you to resolve right now that with God’s help, you will be a living Amen to Jesus’ prayer.
Take some time to tell God that you want to be so united with Christ and all who follow Him so that His love will power your every move and everyone will see the Jesus in you!
That’s what Jesus wants for Friendship Church and that’s what He wants for each one of us!
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, May 23, 2004)
Today’s Bible lesson is part of a prayer by Jesus. It’s up to us to be the Amen to it.
Amen, you know, is a Greek word. It’s found often in the New Testament portion of the Bible. The New Testament was written in Greek because in the first century, Greek was the language of the world, the language of trade and diplomacy and scholarship, the way English is the language of the world today. Amen is a word which can translated variously: so be it; this is absolutely true; this is what we believe; or simply, Yes!
By custom, it’s a word we put at the ends of prayers. We do it to affirm our belief that the God Who has commanded us to pray in Jesus’ Name has heard our prayers and will fulfill His promises to answer those prayers.
It can be used in other ways as well. But, all these uses of the word Amen can get worn out and rob it of its meaning. A little boy was asked what he thought amen meant and he said, “Peace out, dude!”
I have often thought that some Sunday I should write the worship celebration so that every time we would ordinarily say, Amen, we would shout Yes! instead. In fact, let’s try that right now. I’ll make a statement and you respond with the word, Yes! Here goes...We believe in Christ; YES! We can do everything in Christ’s strength, YES! We will give the pastor a million dollars, YES!
Okay, I only meant two of those. But here is the point: Saying Amen to Christ and His authority over our lives isn’t nearly as important as living it.
The prayer of Jesus that makes up this morning’s Bible lesson is a segment of what Bible scholars call Jesus’ farewell discourse. Jesus is on the brink of offering Himself on the cross, the perfect Lamb of God Who will be killed for the sins of the world. In this part of the prayer, Jesus prays that all who follow Him, in every time and place, will be as united as He and God the Father are. He says that when we who follow Jesus are united, the world will see God’s glory and they too, will want to follow Jesus and become part of God’s family.
That’s awesome stuff. And, as Christians believe that this prayer must accord with Jesus' will and that God answers such prayers.
But there is a problem. A man died and was told to join the latest group of entrants who were going to be given a tour of the place by Saint Peter. Peter proceeded to take the group down a huge corridor from which large rooms ran. “Okay,” Peter would say, “you Baptists get off here.” They’d walk a little further, “Catholics here...” Still further, “Methodists...Pentecostals...Presbyterians...” About half of the new residents of heaven were still with Peter when he announced, “For the next 100 yards or so, I want to ask you to keep absolutely quiet, particularly as we pass the next door.” The group did as Peter requested. They passed the door in silence. After they’d walked further down the hall, the group came to another door and Peter announced, “Episcopalians here.” One person got curious though, and raised his hand to ask a question: “Why did we have to be quiet as we passed that one room?” “Oh,” Peter said, “that was the Lutherans. They think they’re the only ones here.”
The fact is that in spite of Jesus’ prayer, we who confess Jesus Christ as Lord don’t behave as if He and His blood on the cross have made us one. A look at the sorry recent history of Northern Ireland, where Roman Catholics and Protestants have fought and killed each other is all the reminder we need of that.
The reason is simple. Imagine for just a second that some time ago, you got a mail from an out-of-town address. It looked like it might be important. But because you didn’t recognize who the sender was and you were so busy, you just filed it away in a corner of your desk to be looked at later. More recently, as you prepared to move, you found the letter, still unopened, along with a stack of forgotten documents. Absently, you open it up and discover that it’s from a lawyer, notifying you that you have inherited a large sum of money. You immediately dial the number at the top of the letterhead and discover that yes, the money is still available to you. They’ve just been waiting to hear from you.
It’s just the same with Jesus’ prayer: The unity that He prays will be exhibited among all Christians is His gift to us. We just have to claim it!
But why should we claim it? I have to warn you that the answer to that question will be of no interest to those who have a “What’s in it for me?” attitude about their faith or about being part of the Church.
The only people who will be interested in the unity for which Jesus prays are those who let Jesus change them from being members of the me generation to those who are part of God’s we generation. Jesus wants us to claim the unity He gives to those who follow Him “so that the world [will] know” Him and the Father.
And that's an important goal for the follower of Jesus. A few years ago, Ann and I wanted to get the deck on our house cleaned and treated. Ann had done it a few years before and wasn’t satisfied that she’d been thorough enough. We asked around and found a company we thought would do a good job. They did. And you know that ever since then, we’ve recommended the same company to many other people. There’s nothing like the testimony of a satisfied customer. Our unity with other believers in Jesus is a powerful testimony that we are satisfied customers. We tell the world that even though we’re sinners who don’t deserve forgiveness and life, Jesus died on a cross and rose from the dead to give us those things and has changed us into loving people.
And we want our lives to say Amen to Jesus’ prayer so that the whole world will know that Jesus really can a change a life from the inside out.
Today, we’re honoring someone—actually, two someones, because Tim could never do the things he does without the support, understanding, encouragement, and permission of his wife, Laurel. But let me tell you something: I am so proud of Tim, our youth director. He gives countless hours of time, attention, and prayer to what he does for the young people of this congregation and community and for others. And he does it for one simple reason: He wants to be an Amen to Jesus’ prayer; he wants everyone to know about Jesus’ love. And so, just as God has made Tim part of Jesus’ one family the Church, Tim wants to see that family grow in strength of faith and in the numbers who say, “I follow Jesus!”
A few weeks ago, I was feeling guilty because of all that Tim does and that we can’t yet pay him for it. We were talking on the phone and I was about to apologize to Tim, when he said, “Thanks, Mark.” “Thanks for what?” I asked. “Thanks for letting me do all this!”
That’s an extraordinary attitude!
It’s the attitude of a servant of Jesus.
It’s the attitude needed for each of us to roll up our sleeves and say, “Sure, I don’t agree with everything the person at my church or the person at the next church says and does, but I love them anyway and we work on the same team for the same Savior.”
It’s the very attitude that shows us—and the watching world around us—that the crucified and risen Jesus has taken up residence in our lives and in our congregation.
In coming weeks and months, you’re going to be hearing a lot about a special three-weeks that will be happening in the fall at Friendship. It’ll be called, new beginnings.
It holds the promise of elevating the life of our congregation to greater heights of faithfulness and love and unity. I believe that it can help us to be open to God acting powerfully in the life of our church and our own lives.
If that sounds good to you, I ask you to resolve right now that with God’s help, you will be a living Amen to Jesus’ prayer.
Take some time to tell God that you want to be so united with Christ and all who follow Him so that His love will power your every move and everyone will see the Jesus in you!
That’s what Jesus wants for Friendship Church and that’s what He wants for each one of us!
Do Christians Grieve?
The "five stages of grief" were first introduced to the world by Swiss-born psychiatrist, Elisabeth Kubler-Ross. Kubler-Ross worked with the victims of terminal disease and over time, observed that they typically went through five seasons of grief.
The five stages Kubler-Ross identified were, in turn: denial, anger or resentment, bargaining (in which the patient tries to strike a bargain with God for a few more years of life), depression (as the reality of impending death comes home), and acceptance ( a time of facing death with calmness).
What has subsequently been learned is that any person facing any grief in life–the death of a loved one, the end of a marriage, the loss of a job, whatever–must negotiate these same five stages of grief if they are to become psychologically and spiritually healthy again. Acceptance is the stage at which we are able to acknowledge our grief and move on with our lives.
There are some people who claim that Christians are exempt from grief. "I'm too busy rejoicing to grieve," they like to say. But that's rubbish and such an attitude can be downright un-Christian. It can cause us to get stuck in denial when grief strikes us and it can make us hatefully insensitive to the grief of others.
A man I know went to a funeral viewing one evening. The wife of a high school classmate had lost her battle with cancer. Later that week, the man spent some time with his twin brother and mentioned having been at the viewing. "Oh, yeah," his brother said rather breezily, and then asked how their classmate was doing. "As you can imagine, he's devastated," my friend replied. The twin was incredulous. "Devastated?" he repeated questioningly. "He's a believer in Christ. He knows he's going to see his wife again in heaven. How can he possibly be devastated?" The twin brother's response indicated his belief that there was something wrong with the faith of a believer who grieved.
But the Bible, God's Word and the Christian's authoritative truth source, doesn't accuse people who grieve of being unbelieving! For example, in talking about the promise of resurrection which all who turn from sin and follow Jesus Christ have, the first-century preacher, Paul, writes in the New Testament: "...we do not want you to be uninformed...about those who have died, so that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with Him those who died" (First Thessalonians 4:13-14).
Notice that Paul doesn't say that Christians don't grieve. He says that there is a qualitative difference in the way Christians grieve: Christians grieve their losses, but live with hope that the risen Jesus will ultimately and eternally make things right.
Christians know that whatever befalls them, they have hope. "...[I]f we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with Him" (Romans 6:8).
But Christians also know that in this journey through life, we will grieve.
The person with hope in Christ can, over time, traverse the stages of grief healthfully, and through it, learn how faithful Jesus is to His promise to be with us always!
The five stages Kubler-Ross identified were, in turn: denial, anger or resentment, bargaining (in which the patient tries to strike a bargain with God for a few more years of life), depression (as the reality of impending death comes home), and acceptance ( a time of facing death with calmness).
What has subsequently been learned is that any person facing any grief in life–the death of a loved one, the end of a marriage, the loss of a job, whatever–must negotiate these same five stages of grief if they are to become psychologically and spiritually healthy again. Acceptance is the stage at which we are able to acknowledge our grief and move on with our lives.
There are some people who claim that Christians are exempt from grief. "I'm too busy rejoicing to grieve," they like to say. But that's rubbish and such an attitude can be downright un-Christian. It can cause us to get stuck in denial when grief strikes us and it can make us hatefully insensitive to the grief of others.
A man I know went to a funeral viewing one evening. The wife of a high school classmate had lost her battle with cancer. Later that week, the man spent some time with his twin brother and mentioned having been at the viewing. "Oh, yeah," his brother said rather breezily, and then asked how their classmate was doing. "As you can imagine, he's devastated," my friend replied. The twin was incredulous. "Devastated?" he repeated questioningly. "He's a believer in Christ. He knows he's going to see his wife again in heaven. How can he possibly be devastated?" The twin brother's response indicated his belief that there was something wrong with the faith of a believer who grieved.
But the Bible, God's Word and the Christian's authoritative truth source, doesn't accuse people who grieve of being unbelieving! For example, in talking about the promise of resurrection which all who turn from sin and follow Jesus Christ have, the first-century preacher, Paul, writes in the New Testament: "...we do not want you to be uninformed...about those who have died, so that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with Him those who died" (First Thessalonians 4:13-14).
Notice that Paul doesn't say that Christians don't grieve. He says that there is a qualitative difference in the way Christians grieve: Christians grieve their losses, but live with hope that the risen Jesus will ultimately and eternally make things right.
Christians know that whatever befalls them, they have hope. "...[I]f we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with Him" (Romans 6:8).
But Christians also know that in this journey through life, we will grieve.
The person with hope in Christ can, over time, traverse the stages of grief healthfully, and through it, learn how faithful Jesus is to His promise to be with us always!
Tuesday, May 18, 2004
How to Help Your Grieving Friend, Part #2
In my last column, I shared three basic lessons I have learned from experience and the Bible on how you can help grieving friends. They were: listen to your friend; don't try to talk your friend out of their grief; and don't explain what you don't understand. Today, four more of those lessons.
Lesson four is this: Let your friend be angry with God. A deeply faithful Christian man whose granddaughter had recently died told me, "Sometimes I get angry with God. I know it's horrible; but it's true." I assured him that what he was feeling wasn't horrible. I reminded him of such people in the Bible as David and Job, who always believed in God, but also got angry with God when dealing with grief or the threat of death. And I told the grieving grandfather, "The fact that you're angry with God proves your faith in God. You would never be angry with someone you didn't think was there."
Most of the time, when we respond to people's anger, no matter its source, with condemnation, it only makes them dig in their heels. God says in Proverbs 15:1, "A soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger." Letting your friend get angry with God will prevent their anger from becoming an ongoing feature in their life.
Lesson five: Don't avoid talking about your grieving friend's loss. Often, friends fear that if they do so, they'll only make their friends feel sadder. But a grieving friend already is sad and if it seems natural to mention a friend's dead loved one, for example, or if your friend mentions that person, you should be willing to talk about them as well.
A woman once told me, "My friends avoid speaking of my late husband like a plague. What they don't seem to understand is that when they do that, it makes me feel as though they think he was unimportant or that they want to pretend he was never there." Through the years, I have heard that grieving woman's words echoed by other grieving people. You honor your friend when you're willing to discuss with them the people or circumstances they grieve.
Lesson six: Pray for your friend. You should pray that God will bring them comfort, for sure. But you also should pray that God will use you as a conduit for the blessings you want your friend to receive. Whenever I visit people who are dealing with grief, I always ask God to fill me with His Holy Spirit, allowing God's love for my friend to flow through me. Jesus says that the world will know Him when His love is visible in us. Pray that God will love your friend through you.
Finally, if you're a follower of Jesus, your friend will probably eventually want to know what has allowed you to be so helpful to them. You can honestly say that it isn't you who have been helpful, that you have prayed over every step you took with them and that God has guided you. You can tell them that you belong to an eternal God Who has destroyed the power of death and that anyone who trustingly follows Jesus Christ has hope beyond the grave. At the right time, after you've lovingly taken the journey of grief with your friend, that will come as very good news for them!
Lesson four is this: Let your friend be angry with God. A deeply faithful Christian man whose granddaughter had recently died told me, "Sometimes I get angry with God. I know it's horrible; but it's true." I assured him that what he was feeling wasn't horrible. I reminded him of such people in the Bible as David and Job, who always believed in God, but also got angry with God when dealing with grief or the threat of death. And I told the grieving grandfather, "The fact that you're angry with God proves your faith in God. You would never be angry with someone you didn't think was there."
Most of the time, when we respond to people's anger, no matter its source, with condemnation, it only makes them dig in their heels. God says in Proverbs 15:1, "A soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger." Letting your friend get angry with God will prevent their anger from becoming an ongoing feature in their life.
Lesson five: Don't avoid talking about your grieving friend's loss. Often, friends fear that if they do so, they'll only make their friends feel sadder. But a grieving friend already is sad and if it seems natural to mention a friend's dead loved one, for example, or if your friend mentions that person, you should be willing to talk about them as well.
A woman once told me, "My friends avoid speaking of my late husband like a plague. What they don't seem to understand is that when they do that, it makes me feel as though they think he was unimportant or that they want to pretend he was never there." Through the years, I have heard that grieving woman's words echoed by other grieving people. You honor your friend when you're willing to discuss with them the people or circumstances they grieve.
Lesson six: Pray for your friend. You should pray that God will bring them comfort, for sure. But you also should pray that God will use you as a conduit for the blessings you want your friend to receive. Whenever I visit people who are dealing with grief, I always ask God to fill me with His Holy Spirit, allowing God's love for my friend to flow through me. Jesus says that the world will know Him when His love is visible in us. Pray that God will love your friend through you.
Finally, if you're a follower of Jesus, your friend will probably eventually want to know what has allowed you to be so helpful to them. You can honestly say that it isn't you who have been helpful, that you have prayed over every step you took with them and that God has guided you. You can tell them that you belong to an eternal God Who has destroyed the power of death and that anyone who trustingly follows Jesus Christ has hope beyond the grave. At the right time, after you've lovingly taken the journey of grief with your friend, that will come as very good news for them!
How to Help Your Grieving Friend, Part #1
[This is the first of two columns I've just submitted to the editor at the Community Press newspaper, for which I write a column. I hope you find it helpful.]
How do we help friends who are grieving?
Over the course of the years, I've learned some important basic lessons about this, both from personal experience and from my reading of the Bible.
If you have a friend who is grieving, whether over the death of a loved one, a divorce, a job loss, or a move that has taken them many miles from familiar faces and places, they can use your help. Fortunately, the principles I've discovered can be used in face-to-face conversations, over the telephone, and even, I have learned, in internet instant messaging. So, to help you help your grieving friend, here are three of those lessons I've learned. In my next column, I'll share four more such lessons.
First and most importantly, listen to your friend. Frequently, whether it's because of our own discomfort or a penchant for wanting to "fix things," we can go to our grieving friends and shower them with torrents of consoling words. But what grieving people most need is to be listened to. Their pain and grief need to be acknowledged.
In the Old Testament book of Job, a man is aggrieved when he loses first, all his sources of wealth and then, all of his children in a natural disaster. Three friends come to visit Job (pronounced with a long "o"). One scholar has pointed out that the friends do something very wise at first. They let Job "vent," allowing him to give full expression to his agony, his questions, his anger. Then, they make a mistake: They open their mouths. My biggest mistakes in life and in trying to help hurting people, have never come from listening. They've always come from talking.
Second, don't try to talk people out of their grief. Grief is something which, over time, follows a more or less natural course. Sometimes more time and sometimes less is required. It depends on the person, their level of faith, and their particular grief. You can't truncate grief with words.
Some people think that they need to give the aggrieved person a "pep talk." But such talks are really designed more to make the talker feel they've done a good turn than to do any real good for anyone else. A woman's husband died. At the funeral home viewing, a man decided to "cheer her up." He said, "I know you feel bad now. But you'll get over it. My wife died. But I immediately went out and found another wife. You can find another husband." That's a true story and it's truly awful.
Thirdly, don't try to explain what you don't understand. When people grieve over their losses, they wonder, as all of us do, why this has happened. The person who wants to help the friend who is asking this question must resist the temptation to answer it. In all honesty, your friend doesn't want to have a rational explanation anyway. They simply want to be able to say, "This isn't fair!"
And it isn't fair. Life often isn't fair. At the end of Job's forty-two chapters, we're left with this answer to the question of why grief befalls us: We live in a world where bad things happen. In the New Testament, Jesus tells us that bad things rain on the good and the evil alike. Why that is so, no one living on this planet is wise enough to say. Only God knows the answer to the question of why and you don't need to play God by pretending to have that answer.
I'll present the other basic lessons I've learned for helping your grieving friends in my next column.
How do we help friends who are grieving?
Over the course of the years, I've learned some important basic lessons about this, both from personal experience and from my reading of the Bible.
If you have a friend who is grieving, whether over the death of a loved one, a divorce, a job loss, or a move that has taken them many miles from familiar faces and places, they can use your help. Fortunately, the principles I've discovered can be used in face-to-face conversations, over the telephone, and even, I have learned, in internet instant messaging. So, to help you help your grieving friend, here are three of those lessons I've learned. In my next column, I'll share four more such lessons.
First and most importantly, listen to your friend. Frequently, whether it's because of our own discomfort or a penchant for wanting to "fix things," we can go to our grieving friends and shower them with torrents of consoling words. But what grieving people most need is to be listened to. Their pain and grief need to be acknowledged.
In the Old Testament book of Job, a man is aggrieved when he loses first, all his sources of wealth and then, all of his children in a natural disaster. Three friends come to visit Job (pronounced with a long "o"). One scholar has pointed out that the friends do something very wise at first. They let Job "vent," allowing him to give full expression to his agony, his questions, his anger. Then, they make a mistake: They open their mouths. My biggest mistakes in life and in trying to help hurting people, have never come from listening. They've always come from talking.
Second, don't try to talk people out of their grief. Grief is something which, over time, follows a more or less natural course. Sometimes more time and sometimes less is required. It depends on the person, their level of faith, and their particular grief. You can't truncate grief with words.
Some people think that they need to give the aggrieved person a "pep talk." But such talks are really designed more to make the talker feel they've done a good turn than to do any real good for anyone else. A woman's husband died. At the funeral home viewing, a man decided to "cheer her up." He said, "I know you feel bad now. But you'll get over it. My wife died. But I immediately went out and found another wife. You can find another husband." That's a true story and it's truly awful.
Thirdly, don't try to explain what you don't understand. When people grieve over their losses, they wonder, as all of us do, why this has happened. The person who wants to help the friend who is asking this question must resist the temptation to answer it. In all honesty, your friend doesn't want to have a rational explanation anyway. They simply want to be able to say, "This isn't fair!"
And it isn't fair. Life often isn't fair. At the end of Job's forty-two chapters, we're left with this answer to the question of why grief befalls us: We live in a world where bad things happen. In the New Testament, Jesus tells us that bad things rain on the good and the evil alike. Why that is so, no one living on this planet is wise enough to say. Only God knows the answer to the question of why and you don't need to play God by pretending to have that answer.
I'll present the other basic lessons I've learned for helping your grieving friends in my next column.
Monday, May 17, 2004
Out with Religion, In with Jesus
John 5:1-18(shared with the people of Friendship Church, May 16, 2004)
Our Bible lesson for this morning shows Jesus picking a fight to make some important points for our lives.
As it begins, we find Him walking on one of the big porticoes of the Jerusalem temple. It’s by the Sheep Gate, the entry into the city through which lambs brought there for sacrificial slaughter are herded. There is a natural pool at a place called Bethesda, a name that means House of Mercy.
There is a reason for its name. The water occasionally bubbles and churns. Many think that at the moment when it is most agitated, the very first lame, diseased, or blind person who can crawl into it or be thrown into it will be healed. Because of that pool and the legend that surrounds it, masses of people huddle around it at all hours of the day, hoping against hope that at the moment the pool churns they can be the first to receive its mercy.
Like other good Jews of His time, Jesus had come to Jerusalem at least three times a year for the proscribed religious festivals since He was a boy. He has probably walked this very place, surrounded by the lame, blind, and paralyzed, many times. He may have even seen one particular invalid, a paralyzed man who’d been looking for his chance for healing in the pool for thirty-eight years. Our Bible lesson in fact, tells us that Jesus knew that this man has “been there for a long time.” Jesus may have noticed the man and passed Him by before. But the fact is that Jesus chooses this moment and this sabbath day of rest to approach the paralyzed man.
He asks the man, “Do you want to be healed?” Talk about an easily answered question! But the man, perhaps understandably, doesn’t answer Jesus directly. He begins to whine about years of being elbowed aside just when he needed to be thrown into the water. Jesus ignores the man’s flood of words and simply commands him to stand up and pick up the mat on which he’s been living all these years. The man does so. He doesn’t stop to thank Jesus. Instead, He walks away as the watching crowd surrounds Jesus. In the house of mercy, the man seems to simply take this miraculous gift for granted.
Soon we see another reaction to this miraculous sign of Jesus’ love and power. Unaware perhaps of who the man is, they ask him what he’s doing. It’s the sabbath day, a day for rest and here he is doing work, lugging his mat around. “You can’t do that,” he’s told, “it’s against our religious traditions!” Instead of honoring Jesus, from whom he’d departed in such a hurry, telling what an amazing blessing Jesus had given him, the man says, “It’s not my fault I’m carrying this mat. The man who made it possible for me to walk told me to do it.”
But Jesus has done exactly what He set out to do. He has picked a fight with people for whom religion was more important than knowing and following God. He has demonstrated His power to bring the healing and help of heaven even to an unworthy ingrate, a man whose selfishness and penchant for taking blessings for granted remind me of myself, frankly. But Jesus has also made this very important point: If we’re going to have the life He wants to give, we need to be willing to give up on our habits, our traditions and instead, follow Him!
If you and I are going to follow Jesus all the way into eternity, there are some things that need to change. The religious folks who railed against Jesus that day were unwilling to change. Even the once-paralyzed man was unwilling to change. Jesus found him later and warned him that unless he turned from sin, something worse than paralysis would befall him: he would be separated from God forever. But after hearing that warning, the man runs to the religious authorities to rat on Jesus and thereby act the part of “a good religious man.” Jesus shows us here that there are some things that need to be changed all through our lives with Christ.
First: We must change our attitudes. Faith in Jesus Christ isn’t really a religion. Faith in Jesus is the heart and soul of a new relationship with God. When we turn from our sin and allow Christ to be the ruler of our lives, He changes us. He makes it possible for us to grow in our relationship with Him and to begin to live as human beings were designed to live: in love for God and love for others.
I was presiding at an outdoor worship at a park once. A man came before the service was to begin and sat down for a second in the front row and then left. I asked him why he was leaving. “There’s no cross here. How can we have worship when there’s no cross?” It was all I could do to bust a gut. For centuries, the Church worshiped without a cross where they gathered. In fact, throughout the early years of the church, the cross wasn’t their central symbol; it was a fish. But the man left in a huff, convinced that all our prayers and praises sung to God were meaningless because we hadn’t erected two hunks of wood in the shape of a cross. He valued a symbol of our faith more than he valued intimacy with Jesus. Others value the rules and norms and rituals of faith more than they value Jesus. Some value certain ways of singing and doing liturgy more than they value Jesus. These are all the ways of religion. They cannot give us the freedom from sin or the freedom to live as God's children that only comes to those with faith in Jesus!
Really committing ourselves heart and soul to Jesus Christ is a far more difficult way to live than is the religious way. In religion, people try to shove the God we meet in Jesus Christ into a little box from which they pull Him on Sunday mornings or when they really want something from Him.
They also think that unless you do certain things in a certain way, God won’t show up. Don’t carry mats on Sunday, they may say. That way, they think, by “being good,” jumping through the right hoops, God will be forced to favor you. Religious traditionalists suffer from the delusion that by following proscribed rules, God will be forced to bless them. They never bargain for how much God wants to bless them. Jesus is the living, crucified, and risen proof of that!
These religious folks are really atheists in the sense that they’ve made themselves gods and turned the God of the universe into a kewpie doll they can control. They don't really trust God; they trust and worship themselves.
When we look at Jesus’ earthly life, we see that He kept those traditions that allowed Him to love God the Father and to love His neighbor. Otherwise, He bagged tradition. To follow Jesus, we need to change our religious attitudes into Jesus attitudes.
We also need to make another change in our lives. We need to be people of action, sharing God’s love always. Once Jesus enters our lives, He stirs us to new ways of living. Sometimes, Jesus may call us to take dangerous actions to follow Him. He certainly did a dangerous thing when He flouted religious authority to heal the lame man!
Roland Hayes was the son of ex-slaves, born in Tennessee in 1887. In Chattanooga, where his mother had taken Roland and his siblings following the death of their father, the family sang in the church choir. One day, the choir director played recordings by two of the most famous singers of the time, Enrique Caruso and Nellie Melba. When Roland Hayes heard the recordings, he was so moved that he later said, “I believe that God has called me to sing a message of peace and brotherhood around the world.”
Many years later, in spite of the odds against a black person in the early twentieth century ever achieving anything, Roland Hayes was on the brink of becoming a celebrated concert singer. In 1924, he was booked to sing at a great hall in Berlin. Success there would set off a chain reaction of engagements throughout Europe. En route to the concert though, Hayes was called to the United States consul’s office in Prague. He was told that he would need to cancel his concert in Berlin. The French had just taken over the Rhineland from Germany and were using American blacks as an occupying army. The consul was certain that no black-skinned man would ever be accepted or be safe in Berlin at the time.
But Roland Hayes prayed about it and decided that he could not cancel the concert. Ringing in his ears was the advice his mother had always given him: “Roland, you can do it if you believe you can and if you give your life to God.”
On the night of the concert, Hayes and his black accompanist entered the Beethoven Concert Hall from the behind the stage, so as not to be seen. As the curtain went up, Hayes prayed, “God, make me a horn for the Omnipotent to sound through.” But when the audience caught sight of Roland Hayes, the hall filled with hissing, catcalls, and insults. People were trying to shout him off the stage. His accompanist suggested that he and Roland Hayes should leave. Standing, with his hands folded, Hayes prayed again, “God, what shall I do?”
And then he had an idea. He whispered to the pianist, “Let’s begin with Beethoven’s This is My Peace.” The audience listened attentively as Hayes finished that song, sang several more classical pieces, and then ended with spirituals and plantation songs. At least for that night, Hayes did sing a message of peace and brotherhood, just as he’s dreamed of as a boy. He went on to become one of the most successful concert singers of the twenties, thirties, and forties. Later in his life, he was on the faculty at The Ohio State University.
We need to be ready to take a chance for Christ all the time. This past week, I ran into Cynthia Petrie, formerly a member of the West Clermont school board. She and I and a number of others in the community had been asked to act as judges for the senior exit action projects at both Glen Este and Amelia high schools. If you know Cynthia, you know that she’s a person of deep faith in Christ. We were talking about the things that can scare us in this life and as we parted, she said with a smile, “When you know where you’re headed, nothing in this life should really scare you.”
A person with an attitude like that can face anything in life and can accomplish a lot because he or she simply aren't afraid of failure. Failure is temporary. Setbacks are temporary. So are illness, poverty, and even death. The follower of Jesus Christ can dare to love God and love neighbor extravagantly and recklessly, knowing that our past is forgiven and our future is secure. We belong to God forever! We live each day knowing that whatever the world may say, we have God’s acceptance and power for love living in us!
Jesus tells us quite directly in today’s Bible lesson that He and God the Father are one. Jesus is God in the flesh. That being so, it simply makes sense to follow Jesus and to pay heed when He calls us to turn away from religion as usual, to change our attitudes and let Him be the absolute God and Lord of our lives. And it makes sense, that we become people of action, who put hands and feet, toil and commitment in our confession that Jesus is our God.
Let’s be people of changed attitudes and changed actions. Let’s be people through Whom the love and power of Christ shines always! Let’s leave religion behind and let Jesus be our leader!
[The story of Roland Hayes' concert in Berlin in 1924 is told compellingly in Robert Schuller's wonderful book, The Be-Happy Attitudes. I learned more about Hayes from a Google search on the web.]
Our Bible lesson for this morning shows Jesus picking a fight to make some important points for our lives.
As it begins, we find Him walking on one of the big porticoes of the Jerusalem temple. It’s by the Sheep Gate, the entry into the city through which lambs brought there for sacrificial slaughter are herded. There is a natural pool at a place called Bethesda, a name that means House of Mercy.
There is a reason for its name. The water occasionally bubbles and churns. Many think that at the moment when it is most agitated, the very first lame, diseased, or blind person who can crawl into it or be thrown into it will be healed. Because of that pool and the legend that surrounds it, masses of people huddle around it at all hours of the day, hoping against hope that at the moment the pool churns they can be the first to receive its mercy.
Like other good Jews of His time, Jesus had come to Jerusalem at least three times a year for the proscribed religious festivals since He was a boy. He has probably walked this very place, surrounded by the lame, blind, and paralyzed, many times. He may have even seen one particular invalid, a paralyzed man who’d been looking for his chance for healing in the pool for thirty-eight years. Our Bible lesson in fact, tells us that Jesus knew that this man has “been there for a long time.” Jesus may have noticed the man and passed Him by before. But the fact is that Jesus chooses this moment and this sabbath day of rest to approach the paralyzed man.
He asks the man, “Do you want to be healed?” Talk about an easily answered question! But the man, perhaps understandably, doesn’t answer Jesus directly. He begins to whine about years of being elbowed aside just when he needed to be thrown into the water. Jesus ignores the man’s flood of words and simply commands him to stand up and pick up the mat on which he’s been living all these years. The man does so. He doesn’t stop to thank Jesus. Instead, He walks away as the watching crowd surrounds Jesus. In the house of mercy, the man seems to simply take this miraculous gift for granted.
Soon we see another reaction to this miraculous sign of Jesus’ love and power. Unaware perhaps of who the man is, they ask him what he’s doing. It’s the sabbath day, a day for rest and here he is doing work, lugging his mat around. “You can’t do that,” he’s told, “it’s against our religious traditions!” Instead of honoring Jesus, from whom he’d departed in such a hurry, telling what an amazing blessing Jesus had given him, the man says, “It’s not my fault I’m carrying this mat. The man who made it possible for me to walk told me to do it.”
But Jesus has done exactly what He set out to do. He has picked a fight with people for whom religion was more important than knowing and following God. He has demonstrated His power to bring the healing and help of heaven even to an unworthy ingrate, a man whose selfishness and penchant for taking blessings for granted remind me of myself, frankly. But Jesus has also made this very important point: If we’re going to have the life He wants to give, we need to be willing to give up on our habits, our traditions and instead, follow Him!
If you and I are going to follow Jesus all the way into eternity, there are some things that need to change. The religious folks who railed against Jesus that day were unwilling to change. Even the once-paralyzed man was unwilling to change. Jesus found him later and warned him that unless he turned from sin, something worse than paralysis would befall him: he would be separated from God forever. But after hearing that warning, the man runs to the religious authorities to rat on Jesus and thereby act the part of “a good religious man.” Jesus shows us here that there are some things that need to be changed all through our lives with Christ.
First: We must change our attitudes. Faith in Jesus Christ isn’t really a religion. Faith in Jesus is the heart and soul of a new relationship with God. When we turn from our sin and allow Christ to be the ruler of our lives, He changes us. He makes it possible for us to grow in our relationship with Him and to begin to live as human beings were designed to live: in love for God and love for others.
I was presiding at an outdoor worship at a park once. A man came before the service was to begin and sat down for a second in the front row and then left. I asked him why he was leaving. “There’s no cross here. How can we have worship when there’s no cross?” It was all I could do to bust a gut. For centuries, the Church worshiped without a cross where they gathered. In fact, throughout the early years of the church, the cross wasn’t their central symbol; it was a fish. But the man left in a huff, convinced that all our prayers and praises sung to God were meaningless because we hadn’t erected two hunks of wood in the shape of a cross. He valued a symbol of our faith more than he valued intimacy with Jesus. Others value the rules and norms and rituals of faith more than they value Jesus. Some value certain ways of singing and doing liturgy more than they value Jesus. These are all the ways of religion. They cannot give us the freedom from sin or the freedom to live as God's children that only comes to those with faith in Jesus!
Really committing ourselves heart and soul to Jesus Christ is a far more difficult way to live than is the religious way. In religion, people try to shove the God we meet in Jesus Christ into a little box from which they pull Him on Sunday mornings or when they really want something from Him.
They also think that unless you do certain things in a certain way, God won’t show up. Don’t carry mats on Sunday, they may say. That way, they think, by “being good,” jumping through the right hoops, God will be forced to favor you. Religious traditionalists suffer from the delusion that by following proscribed rules, God will be forced to bless them. They never bargain for how much God wants to bless them. Jesus is the living, crucified, and risen proof of that!
These religious folks are really atheists in the sense that they’ve made themselves gods and turned the God of the universe into a kewpie doll they can control. They don't really trust God; they trust and worship themselves.
When we look at Jesus’ earthly life, we see that He kept those traditions that allowed Him to love God the Father and to love His neighbor. Otherwise, He bagged tradition. To follow Jesus, we need to change our religious attitudes into Jesus attitudes.
We also need to make another change in our lives. We need to be people of action, sharing God’s love always. Once Jesus enters our lives, He stirs us to new ways of living. Sometimes, Jesus may call us to take dangerous actions to follow Him. He certainly did a dangerous thing when He flouted religious authority to heal the lame man!
Roland Hayes was the son of ex-slaves, born in Tennessee in 1887. In Chattanooga, where his mother had taken Roland and his siblings following the death of their father, the family sang in the church choir. One day, the choir director played recordings by two of the most famous singers of the time, Enrique Caruso and Nellie Melba. When Roland Hayes heard the recordings, he was so moved that he later said, “I believe that God has called me to sing a message of peace and brotherhood around the world.”
Many years later, in spite of the odds against a black person in the early twentieth century ever achieving anything, Roland Hayes was on the brink of becoming a celebrated concert singer. In 1924, he was booked to sing at a great hall in Berlin. Success there would set off a chain reaction of engagements throughout Europe. En route to the concert though, Hayes was called to the United States consul’s office in Prague. He was told that he would need to cancel his concert in Berlin. The French had just taken over the Rhineland from Germany and were using American blacks as an occupying army. The consul was certain that no black-skinned man would ever be accepted or be safe in Berlin at the time.
But Roland Hayes prayed about it and decided that he could not cancel the concert. Ringing in his ears was the advice his mother had always given him: “Roland, you can do it if you believe you can and if you give your life to God.”
On the night of the concert, Hayes and his black accompanist entered the Beethoven Concert Hall from the behind the stage, so as not to be seen. As the curtain went up, Hayes prayed, “God, make me a horn for the Omnipotent to sound through.” But when the audience caught sight of Roland Hayes, the hall filled with hissing, catcalls, and insults. People were trying to shout him off the stage. His accompanist suggested that he and Roland Hayes should leave. Standing, with his hands folded, Hayes prayed again, “God, what shall I do?”
And then he had an idea. He whispered to the pianist, “Let’s begin with Beethoven’s This is My Peace.” The audience listened attentively as Hayes finished that song, sang several more classical pieces, and then ended with spirituals and plantation songs. At least for that night, Hayes did sing a message of peace and brotherhood, just as he’s dreamed of as a boy. He went on to become one of the most successful concert singers of the twenties, thirties, and forties. Later in his life, he was on the faculty at The Ohio State University.
We need to be ready to take a chance for Christ all the time. This past week, I ran into Cynthia Petrie, formerly a member of the West Clermont school board. She and I and a number of others in the community had been asked to act as judges for the senior exit action projects at both Glen Este and Amelia high schools. If you know Cynthia, you know that she’s a person of deep faith in Christ. We were talking about the things that can scare us in this life and as we parted, she said with a smile, “When you know where you’re headed, nothing in this life should really scare you.”
A person with an attitude like that can face anything in life and can accomplish a lot because he or she simply aren't afraid of failure. Failure is temporary. Setbacks are temporary. So are illness, poverty, and even death. The follower of Jesus Christ can dare to love God and love neighbor extravagantly and recklessly, knowing that our past is forgiven and our future is secure. We belong to God forever! We live each day knowing that whatever the world may say, we have God’s acceptance and power for love living in us!
Jesus tells us quite directly in today’s Bible lesson that He and God the Father are one. Jesus is God in the flesh. That being so, it simply makes sense to follow Jesus and to pay heed when He calls us to turn away from religion as usual, to change our attitudes and let Him be the absolute God and Lord of our lives. And it makes sense, that we become people of action, who put hands and feet, toil and commitment in our confession that Jesus is our God.
Let’s be people of changed attitudes and changed actions. Let’s be people through Whom the love and power of Christ shines always! Let’s leave religion behind and let Jesus be our leader!
[The story of Roland Hayes' concert in Berlin in 1924 is told compellingly in Robert Schuller's wonderful book, The Be-Happy Attitudes. I learned more about Hayes from a Google search on the web.]
Monday, May 10, 2004
Jesus' Final Instructions
John 13:31-35
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, May 9, 2004)
Every parent and child can identify with Jesus' words to us in today’s Bible lesson. Spoken just before He went to the cross and His resurrection, they’re a lot like words that parents say to their children as they entrust the kids to babysitters.
In the lesson, Jesus is with the inner circle of His followers, the twelve. He’s about to fulfill His whole purpose for coming to earth. He’s going to be “glorified,” Jesus’ term in John's Gospel for the whole movement through His execution, death, and resurrection. The events of the next few days will see Him decisively destroy the power of sin and death and futility over the lives of all who turn from sin and follow Him. But it will also mean leaving His followers behind.
To reassure the men who form Jesus' core group as He prepares to go to cross and tomb and resurrection and into heaven, Jesus makes three main points.
First: He says that He has to go away. Jesus speaks tenderly to these brawny men. “Little children,” He tells them. “I am with you only a little longer. You will look for me; and...’Where I am going, you cannot come.’”
Next: Jesus says, basically, that He wants them to be good to each other and not tear each others’ heads off. (Every parent has given these instructions to their children as they leave for an evening out!) “I give you a new commandment,” Jesus says. “That you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.”
Finally: Later in their time together, near the end of chapter 14 in John’s Gospel, Jesus will tell these disciples—and us, because He was speaking to us, too—that He isn't leaving them or us alone. "I have said these things to you while I am still with you. But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, Whom the Father will send in My Name, will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you.” Jesus is promising to leave us in the care of the world’s best babysitter, the Holy Spirit.
There are times when we may feel that God has left us alone to deal with life. We may feel like the man, going through a horrible time, who once told me: “Mark, I pray and I pray. But it feels like all of my prayers just bounce off of the ceiling and I’m talking to myself.”
But Jesus does something to help us to know that in times like this, we aren’t alone. He gives the new command we hear in today's lesson. He tells us to “love one another.”
You may think: That doesn’t seem new. We all know the greatest commandment, to love God and to love neighbor. But Jesus is telling us something more than that. He’s telling the people who make up His band of followers in the world, the Church, to love each other.
The Church exists not only to share the Good News of Jesus with the world, you know.
The Church also exists to be what I have sometimes called a support group for recovering sinners.
But Jesus created the Church for still another reason. You’ve heard me tell the story of a little boy, in bed, afraid of the monsters he imagines lurking in his closet, calling out to his dad. “Daddy! Daddy!” When dad arrives, he wraps his arms around his boy and asks what’s wrong. “I’m afraid,” the little boy says. “There’s no reason to feel afraid, honey,” the father says. “Your mom and I are just down the hall and remember that Jesus is always with you.” “I know that,” says the little guy. “But I want someone with skin on him.”
The Church is made up of lots of people with skin on them. And the Church is meant to be there to give us all assurance in the times when we feel alone or afraid or filled with grief that the God we know through Jesus Christ (Who Himself is God with skin on Him!) really is there and He really cares for each of us.
And so, Jesus says, we need to cherish this gift of the Church. We need to love it.
But we need to be careful how we love it.
Ann and I once knew a woman who, everywhere she went, spoke of her husband in the most glowing terms. At card club, she told the other women that her Norman was so smart, so kind, so considerate, such a great father. She did the same thing at work and at the ballfields where she watched little Norman and Susie play baseball. She did the same thing at the PTO meetings. You would have thought that Norman was the greatest thing since sliced bread.
The only problem was that whenever this woman got back with Norman, she could hardly stand him. He didn’t seem nearly as intelligent, resourceful, kind, or considerate as she’d painted him as being to her friends and anyone else who would listen. The real Norman wasn’t perfect. He was ordinary. A few years later, that woman left Norman. Why? Because he wasn’t as perfect as she’d dreamed he was or that she thought he was supposed to be.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the Lutheran pastor and theologian, who lost his life because of his opposition to Adolf Hitler, wrote a book about the Church called, Life Together. One of the things he warns followers of Christ about is our penchant for loving our dream of the Church more than we love the Church as it really is.
Christ did create the Church. Christ did give us the Church to be the body of Christ in the world, to put skin on God when the world can be bleak or difficult or challenging...and to give us hints of the joy, peace, and fellowship of heaven here on earth.
But every person who is part of the Church has something in common: We are all ordinary, imperfect, sinful human beings. Jesus commands us to love, not our dream of the Church, but the Church as it really is, with all its imperfections. This is so difficult that, like Norman’s wife who left Norman in order to find the perfect man, many people hop from church to church to church or leave the Church altogether in order to find the perfect congregation. This side of heaven, they’ll never find the perfect church.
And yet, it is precisely this Church composed of ordinary people that we are to love. Quite frankly, there isn’t a congregation I’ve visited yet that wasn’t composed of characters who could populate a sitcom. Every church is filled with quirks and idiosynracies and bad habits.
And, as C.S. Lewis points out in his book, The Screwtape Letters, the devil will work hard to point us to the foibles and faults of the people who make up any church. You’ll look around and perhaps see the pastor who talks too long, or the man—desperate to be needed—who annoys everyone by trying to be helpful, or the woman bathed in some musty-smelling perfume, or the man with the absurd comb-over. And you’ll think: Is this the body of Christ, Jesus’ grand and glorious Church? And Jesus will tell you, “Yes...and you are to love it! Love all who are part of the Church just as I have loved you.”
How? How can we honor Jesus’ final instructions by loving our brothers and sisters in faith?
One clue is that Jesus sends the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, to fill us and to help us do what we are incapable of doing on our own.
The other clue is in Jesus’ phrase, “as I have loved you.” When Jesus went to the cross, He didn’t have some fake smile smeared across His face. He didn’t say, “I just adore the way you wince when you pound nails into My flesh.”
The greatest temptation Jesus must have ever felt was the one He faced on that day when the whole world condemned Him and cried for His blood. Then, He must have been tempted to say, “There is nothing to be loved in the people of the world. They’re filled with hatred, sin, and imperfection. I’m pulling myself off of this cross and they can all go to hell.”
But Jesus didn’t do that! You see, Jesus knew a simple truth, of which I have spoken before: Love isn’t always what you feel. Sometimes love is what you do in spite of how you feel. Filled with the Holy Spirit, Jesus stayed the course. Because He did, loving us even when He may not have liked us very much, He won everlasting life for us.
When we love Jesus’ Church—warts, imperfections, sins, and all—the Church can become what Jesus means for it to be: the living reminder that while we may not be able to see Him as He sits enthroned in heaven, He hasn’t left us alone and He still loves us!
There’s a story told of two men, boyhood friends who loved each other very much. A series of unfortunate circumstances forced them to live in separate, hostile countries. One day, one of the friends, now a merchant, traveled to visit his friend. The king got wind of a stranger from an enemy country walking his streets. He had the man brought to him.
Convinced that the merchant was a spy, the king ordered his execution. But the man said, “Your majesty, if I’m unable to take care of my financial affairs before I die, my wife and children will be left destitute. Please let me go back to my country to set things right and then I will return to face my fate.”
The king exploded, “Do you think I’m a fool? Whoever heard of a prisoner returning to the executioner without force?”
But the man replied, “I have a friend here who will be security for me.” Incredulous, the king called the man’s friend in and asked, “Will you be security for your friend? Understand that if he doesn’t come back, you will be executed in his place at nightfall thirty days from now.” The man said that it would be an honor to offer his life as security for his friend.
The king then let the stranger and gave him thirty days to get his affairs in order. On the thirtieth day at dusk, the merchant hadn’t yet returned. His friend was brought to the executioner’s block. Just then, the merchant arrived, pushed his friend aside, and said, “I am ready to assume my punishment.” But his friend wasn’t so easily convinced. “Please, friend, you have been like a brother all these years. I have prepared myself over this past month to die in your place.” They argued like this for several moments while the king and his courtiers watched in disbelief.
Finally, the king ordered the executioner and his sword removed. “I have never seen such devotion in my life,” he said. “Both of you are pardoned.” Then the king called the two men before him. “Deep friendship is a rare jewel,” he said. “I beg you, allow me to join you as a third.” From that day forward the two men became friends of the king.
When the world around us sees the people of the Church loving one another and caring for one another, imperfections and all, just as we have been loved by Christ, they will see that we are companions of the King, Jesus. And they too, will want to be His companions.
Jesus’ final instructions to us are simple. “Love...one another...[j]ust as I have loved you. By this everyone will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.” Our simple prayer each day must be, “Lord help me to love others as I have been loved by you.”
[The analogy between Jesus' instructions in John 13:31-35 was created by Laura Jernigan in a message which appears in: The Abingdon Preaching Annual 2004 Edition (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2003)
[The story of the king and the two loyal friends appears in Stories for Telling: A Treasury for Christian Storytellers by William White (Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing House, 1986)
[The books Life Together by Dietrich Bonhoefer and The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis are widely available in various editions in many bookstores.
[For my understanding of "glorification" in the Bible's Johannine literature, I am indebted to my professor and mentor, the late Bruce Schein. His explanation of John's Gospel, Following the Way, is classic.
[I have also consulted with the web-based exegetical notes of Brian Stoffregen and the commentary of R.C.H. Lenski in the preparation of this message.]
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, May 9, 2004)
Every parent and child can identify with Jesus' words to us in today’s Bible lesson. Spoken just before He went to the cross and His resurrection, they’re a lot like words that parents say to their children as they entrust the kids to babysitters.
In the lesson, Jesus is with the inner circle of His followers, the twelve. He’s about to fulfill His whole purpose for coming to earth. He’s going to be “glorified,” Jesus’ term in John's Gospel for the whole movement through His execution, death, and resurrection. The events of the next few days will see Him decisively destroy the power of sin and death and futility over the lives of all who turn from sin and follow Him. But it will also mean leaving His followers behind.
To reassure the men who form Jesus' core group as He prepares to go to cross and tomb and resurrection and into heaven, Jesus makes three main points.
First: He says that He has to go away. Jesus speaks tenderly to these brawny men. “Little children,” He tells them. “I am with you only a little longer. You will look for me; and...’Where I am going, you cannot come.’”
Next: Jesus says, basically, that He wants them to be good to each other and not tear each others’ heads off. (Every parent has given these instructions to their children as they leave for an evening out!) “I give you a new commandment,” Jesus says. “That you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.”
Finally: Later in their time together, near the end of chapter 14 in John’s Gospel, Jesus will tell these disciples—and us, because He was speaking to us, too—that He isn't leaving them or us alone. "I have said these things to you while I am still with you. But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, Whom the Father will send in My Name, will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you.” Jesus is promising to leave us in the care of the world’s best babysitter, the Holy Spirit.
There are times when we may feel that God has left us alone to deal with life. We may feel like the man, going through a horrible time, who once told me: “Mark, I pray and I pray. But it feels like all of my prayers just bounce off of the ceiling and I’m talking to myself.”
But Jesus does something to help us to know that in times like this, we aren’t alone. He gives the new command we hear in today's lesson. He tells us to “love one another.”
You may think: That doesn’t seem new. We all know the greatest commandment, to love God and to love neighbor. But Jesus is telling us something more than that. He’s telling the people who make up His band of followers in the world, the Church, to love each other.
The Church exists not only to share the Good News of Jesus with the world, you know.
The Church also exists to be what I have sometimes called a support group for recovering sinners.
But Jesus created the Church for still another reason. You’ve heard me tell the story of a little boy, in bed, afraid of the monsters he imagines lurking in his closet, calling out to his dad. “Daddy! Daddy!” When dad arrives, he wraps his arms around his boy and asks what’s wrong. “I’m afraid,” the little boy says. “There’s no reason to feel afraid, honey,” the father says. “Your mom and I are just down the hall and remember that Jesus is always with you.” “I know that,” says the little guy. “But I want someone with skin on him.”
The Church is made up of lots of people with skin on them. And the Church is meant to be there to give us all assurance in the times when we feel alone or afraid or filled with grief that the God we know through Jesus Christ (Who Himself is God with skin on Him!) really is there and He really cares for each of us.
And so, Jesus says, we need to cherish this gift of the Church. We need to love it.
But we need to be careful how we love it.
Ann and I once knew a woman who, everywhere she went, spoke of her husband in the most glowing terms. At card club, she told the other women that her Norman was so smart, so kind, so considerate, such a great father. She did the same thing at work and at the ballfields where she watched little Norman and Susie play baseball. She did the same thing at the PTO meetings. You would have thought that Norman was the greatest thing since sliced bread.
The only problem was that whenever this woman got back with Norman, she could hardly stand him. He didn’t seem nearly as intelligent, resourceful, kind, or considerate as she’d painted him as being to her friends and anyone else who would listen. The real Norman wasn’t perfect. He was ordinary. A few years later, that woman left Norman. Why? Because he wasn’t as perfect as she’d dreamed he was or that she thought he was supposed to be.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the Lutheran pastor and theologian, who lost his life because of his opposition to Adolf Hitler, wrote a book about the Church called, Life Together. One of the things he warns followers of Christ about is our penchant for loving our dream of the Church more than we love the Church as it really is.
Christ did create the Church. Christ did give us the Church to be the body of Christ in the world, to put skin on God when the world can be bleak or difficult or challenging...and to give us hints of the joy, peace, and fellowship of heaven here on earth.
But every person who is part of the Church has something in common: We are all ordinary, imperfect, sinful human beings. Jesus commands us to love, not our dream of the Church, but the Church as it really is, with all its imperfections. This is so difficult that, like Norman’s wife who left Norman in order to find the perfect man, many people hop from church to church to church or leave the Church altogether in order to find the perfect congregation. This side of heaven, they’ll never find the perfect church.
And yet, it is precisely this Church composed of ordinary people that we are to love. Quite frankly, there isn’t a congregation I’ve visited yet that wasn’t composed of characters who could populate a sitcom. Every church is filled with quirks and idiosynracies and bad habits.
And, as C.S. Lewis points out in his book, The Screwtape Letters, the devil will work hard to point us to the foibles and faults of the people who make up any church. You’ll look around and perhaps see the pastor who talks too long, or the man—desperate to be needed—who annoys everyone by trying to be helpful, or the woman bathed in some musty-smelling perfume, or the man with the absurd comb-over. And you’ll think: Is this the body of Christ, Jesus’ grand and glorious Church? And Jesus will tell you, “Yes...and you are to love it! Love all who are part of the Church just as I have loved you.”
How? How can we honor Jesus’ final instructions by loving our brothers and sisters in faith?
One clue is that Jesus sends the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, to fill us and to help us do what we are incapable of doing on our own.
The other clue is in Jesus’ phrase, “as I have loved you.” When Jesus went to the cross, He didn’t have some fake smile smeared across His face. He didn’t say, “I just adore the way you wince when you pound nails into My flesh.”
The greatest temptation Jesus must have ever felt was the one He faced on that day when the whole world condemned Him and cried for His blood. Then, He must have been tempted to say, “There is nothing to be loved in the people of the world. They’re filled with hatred, sin, and imperfection. I’m pulling myself off of this cross and they can all go to hell.”
But Jesus didn’t do that! You see, Jesus knew a simple truth, of which I have spoken before: Love isn’t always what you feel. Sometimes love is what you do in spite of how you feel. Filled with the Holy Spirit, Jesus stayed the course. Because He did, loving us even when He may not have liked us very much, He won everlasting life for us.
When we love Jesus’ Church—warts, imperfections, sins, and all—the Church can become what Jesus means for it to be: the living reminder that while we may not be able to see Him as He sits enthroned in heaven, He hasn’t left us alone and He still loves us!
There’s a story told of two men, boyhood friends who loved each other very much. A series of unfortunate circumstances forced them to live in separate, hostile countries. One day, one of the friends, now a merchant, traveled to visit his friend. The king got wind of a stranger from an enemy country walking his streets. He had the man brought to him.
Convinced that the merchant was a spy, the king ordered his execution. But the man said, “Your majesty, if I’m unable to take care of my financial affairs before I die, my wife and children will be left destitute. Please let me go back to my country to set things right and then I will return to face my fate.”
The king exploded, “Do you think I’m a fool? Whoever heard of a prisoner returning to the executioner without force?”
But the man replied, “I have a friend here who will be security for me.” Incredulous, the king called the man’s friend in and asked, “Will you be security for your friend? Understand that if he doesn’t come back, you will be executed in his place at nightfall thirty days from now.” The man said that it would be an honor to offer his life as security for his friend.
The king then let the stranger and gave him thirty days to get his affairs in order. On the thirtieth day at dusk, the merchant hadn’t yet returned. His friend was brought to the executioner’s block. Just then, the merchant arrived, pushed his friend aside, and said, “I am ready to assume my punishment.” But his friend wasn’t so easily convinced. “Please, friend, you have been like a brother all these years. I have prepared myself over this past month to die in your place.” They argued like this for several moments while the king and his courtiers watched in disbelief.
Finally, the king ordered the executioner and his sword removed. “I have never seen such devotion in my life,” he said. “Both of you are pardoned.” Then the king called the two men before him. “Deep friendship is a rare jewel,” he said. “I beg you, allow me to join you as a third.” From that day forward the two men became friends of the king.
When the world around us sees the people of the Church loving one another and caring for one another, imperfections and all, just as we have been loved by Christ, they will see that we are companions of the King, Jesus. And they too, will want to be His companions.
Jesus’ final instructions to us are simple. “Love...one another...[j]ust as I have loved you. By this everyone will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.” Our simple prayer each day must be, “Lord help me to love others as I have been loved by you.”
[The analogy between Jesus' instructions in John 13:31-35 was created by Laura Jernigan in a message which appears in: The Abingdon Preaching Annual 2004 Edition (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2003)
[The story of the king and the two loyal friends appears in Stories for Telling: A Treasury for Christian Storytellers by William White (Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing House, 1986)
[The books Life Together by Dietrich Bonhoefer and The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis are widely available in various editions in many bookstores.
[For my understanding of "glorification" in the Bible's Johannine literature, I am indebted to my professor and mentor, the late Bruce Schein. His explanation of John's Gospel, Following the Way, is classic.
[I have also consulted with the web-based exegetical notes of Brian Stoffregen and the commentary of R.C.H. Lenski in the preparation of this message.]
Wednesday, May 05, 2004
A Farewell to Kings!
[Below are two versions of a column I've just written for the Community Press newspaper chain. The first is the original version, the second is the edited version submitted to the editor. Such editing was necessary in order to keep the article within a usable word count for the paper. Think of the first as the album version and the second as the radio play single.]
A Farewell to Kings
In the old Mel Brooks movie, A History of the World, Part I, a goofy ruler played by Brooks repeats the line, "It's good to be the king."
Most of us probably would agree. And some who achieve even what would be considered small successes in life may see themselves as kings of a sort. Tom Wolfe's 1987 novel, The Bonfire of the Vanities, deals with the pitfalls of Wall Street hubris. Its central character, taking his cue from a popular line of toys from the 80s, fancies himself as "Master of the universe."
It may be though, that we not only want to be kings, but also want to have kings...and queens. As an old-fashioned American who believes in the idea of the republic, that leaders ought to emerge from the people by merit and not by heredity, and that our forebears were wise to cut the chain that once shackled us to King George III, I'm appalled and mystified by our country's fascination with the British royal family. To me, the Windsors are a self-indulgent and undistinguished lot, the world's foremost and least worthy welfare recipients.
In his most recent book, conservative commentator Kevin Phillips points with alarm not only to the western world's obsession with royalty, but also its increasing penchant for enthroning and re-enthroning royals in varying fields of endeavor.
In Europe, once-deposed royals are being invited back to their countries, part of an effort to re-establish aristocracy, it seems.
In America, we have hereditary royal families in motion pictures with names like Douglas, Hawn-Winslet, Barrymore, Huston, Bridges, and Coppola (which includes Nicholas Cage).
We have royals like the Kennedy, Bush, Gore, Taft, and Clinton families in politics.
In music, the one-time "king of pop" married the daughter of "the King" in hopes of establishing a royal line.
And in what is arguably the A-list of American royalty, sports, names like Bonds, Winslow, Griffey, Manning, and Boone recur.
We also applaud and are fascinated by the sons and daughters of the rich and famous, not because they do anything, except behave badly. Witness, the Hilton girls.
None of this is to say that the heirs of great success are unworthy of the opportunity to cultivate their native gifts in the same fields in which their parents and grandparents excelled. Jeff Bridges is a great actor, Bobby Bonds is a tremendous baseball player, and George W. Bush is a more facile politician than his father, grandfather, or great-grandfather.
But we clearly give more opportunity to the heirs of American royalty than we do to other people.
And, I think that we derive a certain security and comfort from our royalty. They give us a sense of stability. We speak appreciatively of the "good genes," a supposed intrinsic talent for playing a scene, hitting a baseball, or governing a country.
Apart from the fact that such notions are all rot, we need to be careful about the amount of acclaim or power we give to other human beings.
In the Old Testament portion of the Bible, God's people the Israelites, craved an earthly king to rule over them. All the other countries in the neighborhood had kings and the Israelites thought it would make them powerful and important to have one too. God didn't want to name a king for them. "I am your king!" God insisted. The people repented for a time, but soon started whining again. Finally, as if to show the people how misguided they were, God gave them a king, a man named Saul.
Saul had movie star good looks and a Mr. Universe build. But he soon started believing he was every bit as wonderful as the sycophants around him said he was. He became disastrously self-indulgent and his rule ended in disappointment and tragedy.
Of course, we need leaders. Somebody has to direct every human endeavor, from keeping our roads paved to guarding our homeland.
But our "kings" would do well to remember that whatever their areas of leadership, they're on temporary assignments. And they might also remember that the best leader is, above all, a servant.
Of course, the absolute master of service is God in the flesh, Jesus Christ. He came into the world, He said, to serve. And He did that, all the way to a cross where He bore the punishment for our sins, even though He didn't deserve it. He also said that if we were going to follow Him in this life and into the eternity He opens to all with faith in Him, we had to spurn the world's love for kingship. He said that in the end, the last will be first and the first will be last.
We don't need kings and we don't need to be kings. The world already has a king. He's a humble servant who only wants what's best for us and when we trust Him, grants it to us. He's the God we know through Jesus and if we all volunteered to live under His reign, the world and our personal lives would be the better for it.
A Farewell to Kings, the Column Version
In a movie comedy, a goofy ruler repeatedly delivers a signature line: "It's good to be king."
Most of us probably agree. But it seems to me that we want to have kings as much as we want to be kings.
Throughout the world, there is a mystifying fascination with the wealthy and severely dysfunctional British royal family, for example.
In Europe, once-deposed royals are being invited back to their countries.
In America, royal families reign in various fields. Succeeding generations seem to effortlessly fall heir to the power, influence, and acclaim wielded by their forebears. It happens in such diverse fields as the movies, sports, and politics, where the same names crop up repeatedly.
It may be that every member of these royal lines has been worthy of the opportunities given to them. But we clearly give more opportunities to the heirs of American royalty than we do to other people.
We also seem to derive a certain comfort from our royal families. It makes us feel good to see familiar faces with familiar gestures and intonations of voice. We even speak appreciatively of our royals' "good genes," imagining that they are automatically predisposed to play a scene, hit a baseball, or govern a country.
Such notions are all rot. They come close to advocating the permanent class systems from which the west broke during the Renaissance. Worse yet, they smell suspiciously like Hitler's notions of a master race.
We may inherit talents, but talents grow in the hothouse of work and struggle, not in the air conditioned comfort of a speeding limo.
We need to be careful about who we enthrone as kings. In the Old Testament portion of the Bible, God's people the Israelites, craved an earthly king to rule over them. Other countries had kings. The Israelites thought it would make them powerful and important to have one too.
But God didn't want to name a king for them. "I am your king!" God insisted. The people repented for a time, but started whining again. Finally, as if to show the people how misguided they were, God gave them a king, a man named Saul.
Saul had movie star good looks and a Mr. Universe build. But he soon started believing he was as wonderful as the suck-ups around him said he was. He became self-indulgent and his rule ended in disappointment and tragedy.
Of course, we need leaders. Somebody has to direct every human endeavor.
But all "kings" in positions of leadership need to remember that they're on temporary assignments. And they might also remember that the best leader is, above all, a servant, not a royal.
Of course, the master of servant leadership is God in the flesh, Jesus Christ. He came into the world, He said, to serve. And He served all the way to a cross where He bore the punishment for our sins, even though He didn't deserve punishment.
Jesus says that if we are going to follow Him in this life and into the eternity He opens to all with faith in Him, we must spurn the world's love for kingship and become servants too.
We don't need more kings and we don't need to be kings. The world already has a king. He's the God we know through Jesus and if we all volunteered to live under His reign, the world and our personal lives would be the better for it.
A Farewell to Kings
In the old Mel Brooks movie, A History of the World, Part I, a goofy ruler played by Brooks repeats the line, "It's good to be the king."
Most of us probably would agree. And some who achieve even what would be considered small successes in life may see themselves as kings of a sort. Tom Wolfe's 1987 novel, The Bonfire of the Vanities, deals with the pitfalls of Wall Street hubris. Its central character, taking his cue from a popular line of toys from the 80s, fancies himself as "Master of the universe."
It may be though, that we not only want to be kings, but also want to have kings...and queens. As an old-fashioned American who believes in the idea of the republic, that leaders ought to emerge from the people by merit and not by heredity, and that our forebears were wise to cut the chain that once shackled us to King George III, I'm appalled and mystified by our country's fascination with the British royal family. To me, the Windsors are a self-indulgent and undistinguished lot, the world's foremost and least worthy welfare recipients.
In his most recent book, conservative commentator Kevin Phillips points with alarm not only to the western world's obsession with royalty, but also its increasing penchant for enthroning and re-enthroning royals in varying fields of endeavor.
In Europe, once-deposed royals are being invited back to their countries, part of an effort to re-establish aristocracy, it seems.
In America, we have hereditary royal families in motion pictures with names like Douglas, Hawn-Winslet, Barrymore, Huston, Bridges, and Coppola (which includes Nicholas Cage).
We have royals like the Kennedy, Bush, Gore, Taft, and Clinton families in politics.
In music, the one-time "king of pop" married the daughter of "the King" in hopes of establishing a royal line.
And in what is arguably the A-list of American royalty, sports, names like Bonds, Winslow, Griffey, Manning, and Boone recur.
We also applaud and are fascinated by the sons and daughters of the rich and famous, not because they do anything, except behave badly. Witness, the Hilton girls.
None of this is to say that the heirs of great success are unworthy of the opportunity to cultivate their native gifts in the same fields in which their parents and grandparents excelled. Jeff Bridges is a great actor, Bobby Bonds is a tremendous baseball player, and George W. Bush is a more facile politician than his father, grandfather, or great-grandfather.
But we clearly give more opportunity to the heirs of American royalty than we do to other people.
And, I think that we derive a certain security and comfort from our royalty. They give us a sense of stability. We speak appreciatively of the "good genes," a supposed intrinsic talent for playing a scene, hitting a baseball, or governing a country.
Apart from the fact that such notions are all rot, we need to be careful about the amount of acclaim or power we give to other human beings.
In the Old Testament portion of the Bible, God's people the Israelites, craved an earthly king to rule over them. All the other countries in the neighborhood had kings and the Israelites thought it would make them powerful and important to have one too. God didn't want to name a king for them. "I am your king!" God insisted. The people repented for a time, but soon started whining again. Finally, as if to show the people how misguided they were, God gave them a king, a man named Saul.
Saul had movie star good looks and a Mr. Universe build. But he soon started believing he was every bit as wonderful as the sycophants around him said he was. He became disastrously self-indulgent and his rule ended in disappointment and tragedy.
Of course, we need leaders. Somebody has to direct every human endeavor, from keeping our roads paved to guarding our homeland.
But our "kings" would do well to remember that whatever their areas of leadership, they're on temporary assignments. And they might also remember that the best leader is, above all, a servant.
Of course, the absolute master of service is God in the flesh, Jesus Christ. He came into the world, He said, to serve. And He did that, all the way to a cross where He bore the punishment for our sins, even though He didn't deserve it. He also said that if we were going to follow Him in this life and into the eternity He opens to all with faith in Him, we had to spurn the world's love for kingship. He said that in the end, the last will be first and the first will be last.
We don't need kings and we don't need to be kings. The world already has a king. He's a humble servant who only wants what's best for us and when we trust Him, grants it to us. He's the God we know through Jesus and if we all volunteered to live under His reign, the world and our personal lives would be the better for it.
A Farewell to Kings, the Column Version
In a movie comedy, a goofy ruler repeatedly delivers a signature line: "It's good to be king."
Most of us probably agree. But it seems to me that we want to have kings as much as we want to be kings.
Throughout the world, there is a mystifying fascination with the wealthy and severely dysfunctional British royal family, for example.
In Europe, once-deposed royals are being invited back to their countries.
In America, royal families reign in various fields. Succeeding generations seem to effortlessly fall heir to the power, influence, and acclaim wielded by their forebears. It happens in such diverse fields as the movies, sports, and politics, where the same names crop up repeatedly.
It may be that every member of these royal lines has been worthy of the opportunities given to them. But we clearly give more opportunities to the heirs of American royalty than we do to other people.
We also seem to derive a certain comfort from our royal families. It makes us feel good to see familiar faces with familiar gestures and intonations of voice. We even speak appreciatively of our royals' "good genes," imagining that they are automatically predisposed to play a scene, hit a baseball, or govern a country.
Such notions are all rot. They come close to advocating the permanent class systems from which the west broke during the Renaissance. Worse yet, they smell suspiciously like Hitler's notions of a master race.
We may inherit talents, but talents grow in the hothouse of work and struggle, not in the air conditioned comfort of a speeding limo.
We need to be careful about who we enthrone as kings. In the Old Testament portion of the Bible, God's people the Israelites, craved an earthly king to rule over them. Other countries had kings. The Israelites thought it would make them powerful and important to have one too.
But God didn't want to name a king for them. "I am your king!" God insisted. The people repented for a time, but started whining again. Finally, as if to show the people how misguided they were, God gave them a king, a man named Saul.
Saul had movie star good looks and a Mr. Universe build. But he soon started believing he was as wonderful as the suck-ups around him said he was. He became self-indulgent and his rule ended in disappointment and tragedy.
Of course, we need leaders. Somebody has to direct every human endeavor.
But all "kings" in positions of leadership need to remember that they're on temporary assignments. And they might also remember that the best leader is, above all, a servant, not a royal.
Of course, the master of servant leadership is God in the flesh, Jesus Christ. He came into the world, He said, to serve. And He served all the way to a cross where He bore the punishment for our sins, even though He didn't deserve punishment.
Jesus says that if we are going to follow Him in this life and into the eternity He opens to all with faith in Him, we must spurn the world's love for kingship and become servants too.
We don't need more kings and we don't need to be kings. The world already has a king. He's the God we know through Jesus and if we all volunteered to live under His reign, the world and our personal lives would be the better for it.
Sunday, May 02, 2004
The Proof is in the People
John 10:22-30
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, May 2, 2004)
The flight was running late and the passengers, which included many children, were becoming restive as they waited on the runway tarmac. The pilot thought about what he could do to make the wait easier, especially for the families involved, and remembered one of his airline’s corporate values: Break all the rules and don’t wait for permission to do it. So, the pilot contacted the McDonald’s in the terminal and ordered Happy Meals that were brought out to the plane for all the kids. Needless to say, that pilot became a hero to everyone on board the delayed flight. But he also has become a hero in the company for which he works, Jet Blue.
You know, it does no good for a company to have a value statement, or a family to have values they promote, or for churches to have creeds, doctrines, and statements of belief, if those values and beliefs aren’t lived out. What we’re really about is seen and heard less in our words than in our actions. The proof is in the people.
Jesus was once confronted by a surly group of His fellow Jews. It happened at a section of the temple in Jerusalem known as Solomon’s Portico or Porch. It was named after one of Israel’s kings, David’s son Solomon. It was a sensible place for Jesus to walk on a winter’s day just before Hanukkah because the way it was situated, Solomon’s Portico protected Him from the cold prevailing wind of the season. But it afforded Him no protection from nasty questions.
Our translation of the New Testament’s original Greek tells us that Jesus was asked, “How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Messiah, tell us plainly.” But there is good reason, based on examples from both the ancient Greek and the modern Greek language that the question was couched in an everyday phrase that really meant, “How long are you going to keep annoying us? Who do you think you are, the Messiah?”
Of course, Jesus had and would state plainly Who He was. He was and is the Messiah, God’s anointed Savior of the world. He was and is God in human flesh Who came to save everyone who follows Him from sin and death and pointless living, giving us forgiveness, life, and purpose. But Jesus doesn’t bother with words at this moment. He tells this bunch:
“I have told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in My Father’s Name testify to Me; but you do not believe...”
They didn’t believe, Jesus said, even though it was as plain as the noses on their faces Who He was. They didn’t believe because they were unwilling to see themselves as sheep who had wandered far from God. They were unwilling to be sheep who listened and heeded the Good Shepherd’s voice.
The proof was in the people. Anyone who bothered to look at Jesus and what He did day in and day out, understood Who He was. And anyone who looked at the lives of His skeptical tormentors could see who they were as well.
But if people can see Who Jesus is by His actions—His life, His acts of compassion and miracles, His death, His resurrection, the question I constantly must ask myself is this: Can people see Jesus in me? Does my life give evidence that Jesus is alive and real and working in the life of one who professes to follow Him?
Now, as good Lutherans, we all know that there is nothing that we can do to earn God’s love or forgiveness. No work, no matter how wonderful, will allow us to buy our ways into the Kingdom of God.
But we also know, as Jesus’ earthly brother James said, that faith without works is dead. Faith that isn’t seen in the ways we live our lives, the choices that we make, the priorities we choose, the service we render, and the love we share isn’t faith. Faith in Jesus begins in complete surrender to Christ, daily repentance and renewal in His Name, and a commitment to be precisely what the New Testament calls the Church: the very body of Christ, working in the world. Faith makes us, in Martin Luther’s phrase, little Christs, who live, love, and die for the world.
Our faith in Christ will be visible to the world in at least three ways which I want to talk about this morning. First: It will be seen in our acts of love done in Jesus’ Name. Steve Sjogren, the senior pastor of the Vineyard Church in the tri-county area, is the person who re-invented and then popularized kindness outreaches in the contemporary church. In one of his books, Steve talks about an outreach the congregation did back in the 80s. A gathering of New Agers was happening in downtown Cincinnati at the convention center. Steve convinced folks from his church to go down there and give away cold cans of Coca Cola just outside the doors. These people, many of whom had long ago repudiated faith in Christ, were stunned to see these Christians reaching out to them without judgment or harshness or Bible tracts. The Vineyard folks even showed good humor as they did so. They’d say things like, “I’m channeling into the fact that you want diet instead of regular.” Jesus could be harsh and confrontational toward those who were part of His religious community. But He always demonstrated the greatest degree of flexible love toward those who stood outside the Kingdom and needed Him in their lives: the tax collector who watched longingly as Jesus walked into town, the woman caught in adultery, the hated foreigner. When Christ has come to live in our hearts, Christ’s love will be seen in us.
Another way in which our faith will be visible is in our service. This past week, Ann and I watched the new Hallmark Hall of Fame movie. God’s Name was never mentioned in the movie, so it really wasn’t meant to be “Christian.” Yet, it showed a community of people who were kind to each other as each dealt with adversities in their lives. A woman cared for her father, suffering from Alzheimer’s Disease. A father, his marriage falling apart, looks out for his boys. An old woman, feeling alone and useless, reaches out to those same boys as they deliver her daily paper; she teaches them how to bake. Two confirmed bachelor ranchers take in a seventeen year old girl who is pregnant and rejected by her mother.
The title for this story was Plainsong. That’s a term borrowed from the worship music of the Church. A plainsong was the genre of simple chants used in worship that began with the Gregorian Chants. I liked this name for the movie because, over and over again the New Testament tells us that when we serve others, we really serve the God we know in Jesus Christ. Jesus said that whenever we serve the least important and most despised people in our world, we really serve Him. What we do here on Sundays is more a pep rally than worship. The service we render to others in Jesus' Name in our daily lives is our real worship. It is our plainsong. And it’s a sign to the world that Jesus is living in us.
Finally, it should be said that faith evidenced in our lives will gain us the right to tell others about Jesus. From my experience, whenever we love or serve others, eventually they will want to know why. Peter in the New Testament tells us that we need to be ready for such questions. “Be prepared always to give an account for the hope that is in you, but do it with gentleness and reverence.” I guarantee that whenever we serve and love others genuinely, not for our gain, but for their gain and Christ’s glory, we will be ready to tell them about Jesus. He will have come to live inside us and with us and He will give us the right words when they need to be uttered.
By the time she died (within days of Princess Diana), Mother Teresa was known around the world for her acts of love and service in Jesus’ Name. Everyone wanted to know what made this follower of Jesus tick. Once, she appeared at a Harvard University chapel service. Her love for all people allowed her to share the hope of Jesus...and even some uncomfortable counsel from God.
“I understand,” she said "there are lots of you students in this school who are doing things that displease God. You are harming yourselves and offending God. Some of you are drinking alcohol and taking drugs. Others of you are engaged in sexual sin of many sorts. I have a message for you from God: Repent, turn away from what you are doing.”
Probably not the smooth message that a PR guru would have told her to deliver! But the response of everyone there was amazing. The entire crowd rose to its feet and gave her thunderous applause for several minutes. Her life of authentic love and service in Jesus’ Name gave her the credibility to confront the sins that bedeviled that campus community and get applauded for it!
Today, all across America, there are churches that booming and offering all sorts of services. Friendship is growing. Christian books climb to the tops of mainstream best seller lists. Everyone was buzzing about Mel Gibson’s movie, The Passion of the Christ. But it troubles me that for all the popularity accorded Christian books, music, and movies, there seems to be no corresponding change in our society.
Our materialism, with its reliance on things rather than God, keeps getting worse.
Our culture of violence grows more pronounced.
Crassness and nastiness are on the upswing.
We watch an endless outpouring of so-called "reality TV" in part, so that we can watch others be humiliated and hurt.
I fear sometimes that we Christians are all blow and no show. I know that I can be that way! Who Jesus was could be seen in His actions of love and service. None of us is perfect and none of us will ever perfectly reflect Jesus’ goodness and power.
But I believe that if we will let Jesus be the Messiah Lord of every part of our lives, something amazing will happen. People will see something they have rarely glimpsed before: a real-life, genuine follower of Jesus. They’ll see Jesus working in us, even with our self-acknowledged imperfections, and like that crowd in the Harvard Chapel in their response to Mother Teresa, their defenses will be disarmed and maybe, just maybe, they’ll let Jesus take control of their lives too.
The proof is in the people and we are Christ’s people. Let’s live that and let the world in on all the blessings, forgiveness, hope, and power that comes from Christ!
[The source of the true story about the Jet Blue pilot is told in the latest issue of the business magazine, Fast Company.
[Steve Sjogren tells the story of his church's New Age outreach in his book, Conspiracy of Kindness. That book also is the source of the true story told about Mother Teresa. It originally appeared in a book by Tony Campolo.
[Hallmark has indicated that the DVD of Plainsong will soon be available.]
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, May 2, 2004)
The flight was running late and the passengers, which included many children, were becoming restive as they waited on the runway tarmac. The pilot thought about what he could do to make the wait easier, especially for the families involved, and remembered one of his airline’s corporate values: Break all the rules and don’t wait for permission to do it. So, the pilot contacted the McDonald’s in the terminal and ordered Happy Meals that were brought out to the plane for all the kids. Needless to say, that pilot became a hero to everyone on board the delayed flight. But he also has become a hero in the company for which he works, Jet Blue.
You know, it does no good for a company to have a value statement, or a family to have values they promote, or for churches to have creeds, doctrines, and statements of belief, if those values and beliefs aren’t lived out. What we’re really about is seen and heard less in our words than in our actions. The proof is in the people.
Jesus was once confronted by a surly group of His fellow Jews. It happened at a section of the temple in Jerusalem known as Solomon’s Portico or Porch. It was named after one of Israel’s kings, David’s son Solomon. It was a sensible place for Jesus to walk on a winter’s day just before Hanukkah because the way it was situated, Solomon’s Portico protected Him from the cold prevailing wind of the season. But it afforded Him no protection from nasty questions.
Our translation of the New Testament’s original Greek tells us that Jesus was asked, “How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Messiah, tell us plainly.” But there is good reason, based on examples from both the ancient Greek and the modern Greek language that the question was couched in an everyday phrase that really meant, “How long are you going to keep annoying us? Who do you think you are, the Messiah?”
Of course, Jesus had and would state plainly Who He was. He was and is the Messiah, God’s anointed Savior of the world. He was and is God in human flesh Who came to save everyone who follows Him from sin and death and pointless living, giving us forgiveness, life, and purpose. But Jesus doesn’t bother with words at this moment. He tells this bunch:
“I have told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in My Father’s Name testify to Me; but you do not believe...”
They didn’t believe, Jesus said, even though it was as plain as the noses on their faces Who He was. They didn’t believe because they were unwilling to see themselves as sheep who had wandered far from God. They were unwilling to be sheep who listened and heeded the Good Shepherd’s voice.
The proof was in the people. Anyone who bothered to look at Jesus and what He did day in and day out, understood Who He was. And anyone who looked at the lives of His skeptical tormentors could see who they were as well.
But if people can see Who Jesus is by His actions—His life, His acts of compassion and miracles, His death, His resurrection, the question I constantly must ask myself is this: Can people see Jesus in me? Does my life give evidence that Jesus is alive and real and working in the life of one who professes to follow Him?
Now, as good Lutherans, we all know that there is nothing that we can do to earn God’s love or forgiveness. No work, no matter how wonderful, will allow us to buy our ways into the Kingdom of God.
But we also know, as Jesus’ earthly brother James said, that faith without works is dead. Faith that isn’t seen in the ways we live our lives, the choices that we make, the priorities we choose, the service we render, and the love we share isn’t faith. Faith in Jesus begins in complete surrender to Christ, daily repentance and renewal in His Name, and a commitment to be precisely what the New Testament calls the Church: the very body of Christ, working in the world. Faith makes us, in Martin Luther’s phrase, little Christs, who live, love, and die for the world.
Our faith in Christ will be visible to the world in at least three ways which I want to talk about this morning. First: It will be seen in our acts of love done in Jesus’ Name. Steve Sjogren, the senior pastor of the Vineyard Church in the tri-county area, is the person who re-invented and then popularized kindness outreaches in the contemporary church. In one of his books, Steve talks about an outreach the congregation did back in the 80s. A gathering of New Agers was happening in downtown Cincinnati at the convention center. Steve convinced folks from his church to go down there and give away cold cans of Coca Cola just outside the doors. These people, many of whom had long ago repudiated faith in Christ, were stunned to see these Christians reaching out to them without judgment or harshness or Bible tracts. The Vineyard folks even showed good humor as they did so. They’d say things like, “I’m channeling into the fact that you want diet instead of regular.” Jesus could be harsh and confrontational toward those who were part of His religious community. But He always demonstrated the greatest degree of flexible love toward those who stood outside the Kingdom and needed Him in their lives: the tax collector who watched longingly as Jesus walked into town, the woman caught in adultery, the hated foreigner. When Christ has come to live in our hearts, Christ’s love will be seen in us.
Another way in which our faith will be visible is in our service. This past week, Ann and I watched the new Hallmark Hall of Fame movie. God’s Name was never mentioned in the movie, so it really wasn’t meant to be “Christian.” Yet, it showed a community of people who were kind to each other as each dealt with adversities in their lives. A woman cared for her father, suffering from Alzheimer’s Disease. A father, his marriage falling apart, looks out for his boys. An old woman, feeling alone and useless, reaches out to those same boys as they deliver her daily paper; she teaches them how to bake. Two confirmed bachelor ranchers take in a seventeen year old girl who is pregnant and rejected by her mother.
The title for this story was Plainsong. That’s a term borrowed from the worship music of the Church. A plainsong was the genre of simple chants used in worship that began with the Gregorian Chants. I liked this name for the movie because, over and over again the New Testament tells us that when we serve others, we really serve the God we know in Jesus Christ. Jesus said that whenever we serve the least important and most despised people in our world, we really serve Him. What we do here on Sundays is more a pep rally than worship. The service we render to others in Jesus' Name in our daily lives is our real worship. It is our plainsong. And it’s a sign to the world that Jesus is living in us.
Finally, it should be said that faith evidenced in our lives will gain us the right to tell others about Jesus. From my experience, whenever we love or serve others, eventually they will want to know why. Peter in the New Testament tells us that we need to be ready for such questions. “Be prepared always to give an account for the hope that is in you, but do it with gentleness and reverence.” I guarantee that whenever we serve and love others genuinely, not for our gain, but for their gain and Christ’s glory, we will be ready to tell them about Jesus. He will have come to live inside us and with us and He will give us the right words when they need to be uttered.
By the time she died (within days of Princess Diana), Mother Teresa was known around the world for her acts of love and service in Jesus’ Name. Everyone wanted to know what made this follower of Jesus tick. Once, she appeared at a Harvard University chapel service. Her love for all people allowed her to share the hope of Jesus...and even some uncomfortable counsel from God.
“I understand,” she said "there are lots of you students in this school who are doing things that displease God. You are harming yourselves and offending God. Some of you are drinking alcohol and taking drugs. Others of you are engaged in sexual sin of many sorts. I have a message for you from God: Repent, turn away from what you are doing.”
Probably not the smooth message that a PR guru would have told her to deliver! But the response of everyone there was amazing. The entire crowd rose to its feet and gave her thunderous applause for several minutes. Her life of authentic love and service in Jesus’ Name gave her the credibility to confront the sins that bedeviled that campus community and get applauded for it!
Today, all across America, there are churches that booming and offering all sorts of services. Friendship is growing. Christian books climb to the tops of mainstream best seller lists. Everyone was buzzing about Mel Gibson’s movie, The Passion of the Christ. But it troubles me that for all the popularity accorded Christian books, music, and movies, there seems to be no corresponding change in our society.
Our materialism, with its reliance on things rather than God, keeps getting worse.
Our culture of violence grows more pronounced.
Crassness and nastiness are on the upswing.
We watch an endless outpouring of so-called "reality TV" in part, so that we can watch others be humiliated and hurt.
I fear sometimes that we Christians are all blow and no show. I know that I can be that way! Who Jesus was could be seen in His actions of love and service. None of us is perfect and none of us will ever perfectly reflect Jesus’ goodness and power.
But I believe that if we will let Jesus be the Messiah Lord of every part of our lives, something amazing will happen. People will see something they have rarely glimpsed before: a real-life, genuine follower of Jesus. They’ll see Jesus working in us, even with our self-acknowledged imperfections, and like that crowd in the Harvard Chapel in their response to Mother Teresa, their defenses will be disarmed and maybe, just maybe, they’ll let Jesus take control of their lives too.
The proof is in the people and we are Christ’s people. Let’s live that and let the world in on all the blessings, forgiveness, hope, and power that comes from Christ!
[The source of the true story about the Jet Blue pilot is told in the latest issue of the business magazine, Fast Company.
[Steve Sjogren tells the story of his church's New Age outreach in his book, Conspiracy of Kindness. That book also is the source of the true story told about Mother Teresa. It originally appeared in a book by Tony Campolo.
[Hallmark has indicated that the DVD of Plainsong will soon be available.]
After Easter, What?
John 21:1-19
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, April 25, 2004)
A man woke up one morning with a feeling. He just knew that something special was going to happen that day. He looked at his clock and it had stopped at 3:00. He went downstairs and glanced out his kitchen window to look at the thermometer and found that the outside temperature was 33 degrees. He grabbed the morning paper and it was dated March 3, the third day of the third month. On a hunch, he turned to the third page of the third section of the paper and just as he thought, it was the racing news. In the third race, one of the horses was called Trio. The guy ran to the bank, withdrew his life-savings, and bet it all on Trio to win that race. He shouldn’t have been surprised by the outcome, but he was. Trio came in third.
I’ve seen people look for all sorts of signs—whether from God or elsewhere—for how to live their lives, be successful, avoid calamity, find a job, find a mate. But just as often as not, we seem to avoid clear guidance that’s staring us right in the face. Recently, I’ve been undergoing physical therapy with a neck problem. I go three times a week. For several weeks now, the physical therapist has given me the same basic instructions: four times a day, I’m to lie down on my back and get the weight of my head off of my neck; throughout the day, I’m to gently do retractions with my neck to help realign things. What’s amazing to me is that even though the physical therapist's instructions are clear and simple and redundant, I find ways to forget them or muff them, all the time.
This past week, things improved so markedly that I went into overdrive. I’m a man and as a man, I sometimes use “man logic.” If a few retractions, helped a little, a lot of retractions, would help a lot! I figured that by exercising aggressively, I would get over the hump and back in the gym to lose my flab. Instead, I set myself back, causing me headaches. So, during my visits this past week, with a smile, the physical therapist reminded me again of my simple instructions. I wondered if she was gritting her teeth as though she were teaching a frustratingly thick-headed student: “Four times a day, lie on your back and after the inflammation you’ve caused your neck and head muscles dies down, gently do retractions with your neck to realign things.” I think I get it now. We’ll see.
Our Bible lesson for this morning is the epilogue of John the Evangelist’s telling of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. In it, we find that Jesus is forced—like my physical therapist—to review some things with seven of His disciples that He’s shared with them many times before. This is critical though, because He has gone through His cross and His resurrection. Soon, He will no longer be physically present with them. Through Jesus’ encounter with the disciples in today’s lesson, He shows that neither they—or we—need any signs to tell us what our lives should be about on this side of Easter morning. We already know what to do. And it’s crystal clear!
The lesson begins very strangely. It’s just days after Jesus had risen from the dead. Easter is the most exciting thing that has ever happened in human history and the disciples had been given ringside seats! That in itself should have clued the disciples to the fact that their lives were to be different than they had been before.
Besides all of that, over the preceding few years, Jesus had spent hours and hours with these men. He had made clear that He was God, that He had come to die and rise so that sinners like them—and us—could be forgiven, have new lives, and live with God forever. Jesus had already told them that they would be going out into the world to tell others about Jesus so that they too, could turn from sin, entrust themselves to Jesus’ leadership, and live forever with God. Jesus had even told those who were engaged in the fishing profession that their fishing days were over. Instead, they would be fishing for people, gently calling them back to the God Who made them, loves them, and wants to live with them forever.
So, what exciting plans and great risks are the disciples preparing to make as our lesson begins? What kindness outreaches are they going to do? What sorts of bold prayers are they bringing to God, asking Him to help them share Jesus with their neighbors? They weren’t doing any of that!
Like children on a rainy Saturday, they seem to be bored and listless. Finally, Peter says, “I think I’ll go fishing.” The other six disciples say, “We’ll go with you.” They turn their backs on Easter and Jesus’ clear instructions. But habits are powerful things, you know. They’re hard for us to break. They make it difficult for us to try new things. Habits wear ruts into our souls. The husband and wife who constantly squabble out of habit, keep driving their relationships over the same old cliffs. Alcoholics make the mistake of ordering what they tell themselves is “just one drink.” The student who needs to get an important paper done says that just like last night, she needs to call a friend or play a video game and before you know it, just like the night before, the evening is gone, the important paper undone. Someone has said that one sign of insanity may be believing that if you keep doing the same things in the same ways you always have, eventually you’ll get different results than you’ve gotten before.
Jesus came to bring us the joy of heaven. But first, He came to annoy us by calling us out of our ruts and comfort zones and into His Kingdom instead. There, we’re called to love and serve as we’ve been loved and served.
Peter and the rest forgot that. They went back to old habits. They went fishing. And like a night on which several of them had gone fishing a few years before, they didn’t catch a thing. They shouldn’t have been surprised. They didn’t need any new signs or flashes of intuition. Jesus had already told them that for the rest of their lives, they’d be fishing for people. He’d also told them, “Without Me, you can do nothing.” If Jesus isn’t in the center of our lives, our lives can never be what God made them to be.
So, the disciples come back from a night of futility, their nets empty. A stranger is frying up fish over a charcoal fire on the shore. “Children,” He calls out, “you didn’t catch anything, did you?” (Of course, they hadn’t.) He tells them to throw their nets over the right side of the boat and soon their nets are full, just as happened in that incident of a few years before when Jesus had given them a similar command. Now, they know Who the stranger is. It’s the risen Jesus!
Soon, they’re sitting around a charcoal fire and having dinner with Jesus. A painful memory may have crossed Peter’s mind at that moment. It had been while he was standing around another charcoal fire, in the high priest’s courtyard, warming himself against the cool Judean night, that within sight of Jesus, Who been arrested and bound, Peter denied knowing Jesus three times.
As if to assure Peter that all is forgiven and that he can go on with his new life, Jesus asks Peter three questions, each a chance to erase his earlier denials. “Simon Peter, do you love Me...?...do you love Me?...do you love Me?” And each time Peter says, “Yes,” Jesus reminds Peter of his mission in life: Feed My lambs. Tend My sheep. Feed My sheep. In other words: Take care of your neighbor in My Name, love the unlovable, tell others about Me, pray for those who are hated, give to the poor, help others to be My followers too, be a servant. Jesus summarizes it all even more succinctly when He says, “Follow Me.”
On Easter Sunday morning, this place was filled. Everybody loves Easter! But after Easter, what? Do we grow bored? Are we looking for some sign about what to do next? We don’t need to! Our mission is clear. No more business as usual. No more religion. Instead, we’re to follow Jesus. Period. We’re to do that by feeding His lambs, loving the world for whom He died and rose.
For each of us, that may look a little different. Some will teach Sunday School or volunteer occasionally for Children’s Church. Some will clean up the building, volunteer to man the mixer board for our new audiovisual system, take care of the sign on Route 125, mow the lawn. Others will help with mailings, or youth work, or Catechism, or play in a musical group, or participate in skits, or become a hospital visitor. Some will lead small group Bible studies, after school programs. I hope some day soon, the people of Friendship will be running a coffee shop, a Christian book store, an auto repair shop, and a hair salon right on our campus—using the income generated to provide services to those who can’t afford them and giving employment opportunities in a wholesome environment, especially to young people.
If you don’t believe those things can happen, look around you and see how far God has brought us so far and realize that other churches in other communities are doing these same kinds of things and more. When Jesus is at the center of our lives, we can do lots of things! And of course, no matter what we do, all of us will be involved in serving our neighbors, inviting them to worship with us, and helping them to know Jesus.
After Easter, new life comes! It’s a life filled with blessings and challenges and heavenly power. After Easter, we’re to follow Jesus. We’re to fish for people, bringing them to Jesus. We’re to take care of others, loving as we’ve been loved. There are sign-up sheets for some ministries in the lobby and when it comes to new ministries of love in Jesus’ Name for which you may have an idea, I am always all-ears. We don’t need to wait for a sign. We already have Jesus. Let’s get to work!
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, April 25, 2004)
A man woke up one morning with a feeling. He just knew that something special was going to happen that day. He looked at his clock and it had stopped at 3:00. He went downstairs and glanced out his kitchen window to look at the thermometer and found that the outside temperature was 33 degrees. He grabbed the morning paper and it was dated March 3, the third day of the third month. On a hunch, he turned to the third page of the third section of the paper and just as he thought, it was the racing news. In the third race, one of the horses was called Trio. The guy ran to the bank, withdrew his life-savings, and bet it all on Trio to win that race. He shouldn’t have been surprised by the outcome, but he was. Trio came in third.
I’ve seen people look for all sorts of signs—whether from God or elsewhere—for how to live their lives, be successful, avoid calamity, find a job, find a mate. But just as often as not, we seem to avoid clear guidance that’s staring us right in the face. Recently, I’ve been undergoing physical therapy with a neck problem. I go three times a week. For several weeks now, the physical therapist has given me the same basic instructions: four times a day, I’m to lie down on my back and get the weight of my head off of my neck; throughout the day, I’m to gently do retractions with my neck to help realign things. What’s amazing to me is that even though the physical therapist's instructions are clear and simple and redundant, I find ways to forget them or muff them, all the time.
This past week, things improved so markedly that I went into overdrive. I’m a man and as a man, I sometimes use “man logic.” If a few retractions, helped a little, a lot of retractions, would help a lot! I figured that by exercising aggressively, I would get over the hump and back in the gym to lose my flab. Instead, I set myself back, causing me headaches. So, during my visits this past week, with a smile, the physical therapist reminded me again of my simple instructions. I wondered if she was gritting her teeth as though she were teaching a frustratingly thick-headed student: “Four times a day, lie on your back and after the inflammation you’ve caused your neck and head muscles dies down, gently do retractions with your neck to realign things.” I think I get it now. We’ll see.
Our Bible lesson for this morning is the epilogue of John the Evangelist’s telling of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. In it, we find that Jesus is forced—like my physical therapist—to review some things with seven of His disciples that He’s shared with them many times before. This is critical though, because He has gone through His cross and His resurrection. Soon, He will no longer be physically present with them. Through Jesus’ encounter with the disciples in today’s lesson, He shows that neither they—or we—need any signs to tell us what our lives should be about on this side of Easter morning. We already know what to do. And it’s crystal clear!
The lesson begins very strangely. It’s just days after Jesus had risen from the dead. Easter is the most exciting thing that has ever happened in human history and the disciples had been given ringside seats! That in itself should have clued the disciples to the fact that their lives were to be different than they had been before.
Besides all of that, over the preceding few years, Jesus had spent hours and hours with these men. He had made clear that He was God, that He had come to die and rise so that sinners like them—and us—could be forgiven, have new lives, and live with God forever. Jesus had already told them that they would be going out into the world to tell others about Jesus so that they too, could turn from sin, entrust themselves to Jesus’ leadership, and live forever with God. Jesus had even told those who were engaged in the fishing profession that their fishing days were over. Instead, they would be fishing for people, gently calling them back to the God Who made them, loves them, and wants to live with them forever.
So, what exciting plans and great risks are the disciples preparing to make as our lesson begins? What kindness outreaches are they going to do? What sorts of bold prayers are they bringing to God, asking Him to help them share Jesus with their neighbors? They weren’t doing any of that!
Like children on a rainy Saturday, they seem to be bored and listless. Finally, Peter says, “I think I’ll go fishing.” The other six disciples say, “We’ll go with you.” They turn their backs on Easter and Jesus’ clear instructions. But habits are powerful things, you know. They’re hard for us to break. They make it difficult for us to try new things. Habits wear ruts into our souls. The husband and wife who constantly squabble out of habit, keep driving their relationships over the same old cliffs. Alcoholics make the mistake of ordering what they tell themselves is “just one drink.” The student who needs to get an important paper done says that just like last night, she needs to call a friend or play a video game and before you know it, just like the night before, the evening is gone, the important paper undone. Someone has said that one sign of insanity may be believing that if you keep doing the same things in the same ways you always have, eventually you’ll get different results than you’ve gotten before.
Jesus came to bring us the joy of heaven. But first, He came to annoy us by calling us out of our ruts and comfort zones and into His Kingdom instead. There, we’re called to love and serve as we’ve been loved and served.
Peter and the rest forgot that. They went back to old habits. They went fishing. And like a night on which several of them had gone fishing a few years before, they didn’t catch a thing. They shouldn’t have been surprised. They didn’t need any new signs or flashes of intuition. Jesus had already told them that for the rest of their lives, they’d be fishing for people. He’d also told them, “Without Me, you can do nothing.” If Jesus isn’t in the center of our lives, our lives can never be what God made them to be.
So, the disciples come back from a night of futility, their nets empty. A stranger is frying up fish over a charcoal fire on the shore. “Children,” He calls out, “you didn’t catch anything, did you?” (Of course, they hadn’t.) He tells them to throw their nets over the right side of the boat and soon their nets are full, just as happened in that incident of a few years before when Jesus had given them a similar command. Now, they know Who the stranger is. It’s the risen Jesus!
Soon, they’re sitting around a charcoal fire and having dinner with Jesus. A painful memory may have crossed Peter’s mind at that moment. It had been while he was standing around another charcoal fire, in the high priest’s courtyard, warming himself against the cool Judean night, that within sight of Jesus, Who been arrested and bound, Peter denied knowing Jesus three times.
As if to assure Peter that all is forgiven and that he can go on with his new life, Jesus asks Peter three questions, each a chance to erase his earlier denials. “Simon Peter, do you love Me...?...do you love Me?...do you love Me?” And each time Peter says, “Yes,” Jesus reminds Peter of his mission in life: Feed My lambs. Tend My sheep. Feed My sheep. In other words: Take care of your neighbor in My Name, love the unlovable, tell others about Me, pray for those who are hated, give to the poor, help others to be My followers too, be a servant. Jesus summarizes it all even more succinctly when He says, “Follow Me.”
On Easter Sunday morning, this place was filled. Everybody loves Easter! But after Easter, what? Do we grow bored? Are we looking for some sign about what to do next? We don’t need to! Our mission is clear. No more business as usual. No more religion. Instead, we’re to follow Jesus. Period. We’re to do that by feeding His lambs, loving the world for whom He died and rose.
For each of us, that may look a little different. Some will teach Sunday School or volunteer occasionally for Children’s Church. Some will clean up the building, volunteer to man the mixer board for our new audiovisual system, take care of the sign on Route 125, mow the lawn. Others will help with mailings, or youth work, or Catechism, or play in a musical group, or participate in skits, or become a hospital visitor. Some will lead small group Bible studies, after school programs. I hope some day soon, the people of Friendship will be running a coffee shop, a Christian book store, an auto repair shop, and a hair salon right on our campus—using the income generated to provide services to those who can’t afford them and giving employment opportunities in a wholesome environment, especially to young people.
If you don’t believe those things can happen, look around you and see how far God has brought us so far and realize that other churches in other communities are doing these same kinds of things and more. When Jesus is at the center of our lives, we can do lots of things! And of course, no matter what we do, all of us will be involved in serving our neighbors, inviting them to worship with us, and helping them to know Jesus.
After Easter, new life comes! It’s a life filled with blessings and challenges and heavenly power. After Easter, we’re to follow Jesus. We’re to fish for people, bringing them to Jesus. We’re to take care of others, loving as we’ve been loved. There are sign-up sheets for some ministries in the lobby and when it comes to new ministries of love in Jesus’ Name for which you may have an idea, I am always all-ears. We don’t need to wait for a sign. We already have Jesus. Let’s get to work!
Sunday, April 18, 2004
The Strange Peace of Christ
John 20:19-23
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, April 18, 2004)
Some of you have heard me speak before of William Wilberforce. He is one of the great heroes of History. Wilberforce spent his life pursuing two great goals: abolishing slavery in his country of Great Britain and reforming the nation’s manners, making the country gentler and kinder. He approached these goals with utter tenacity, in spite of setbacks and difficulties. On his death bed, Wilberforce learned that slavery had been abolished throughout the British Empire. (This came some twenty years after a battle he'd led the previous two decades to bring an end to the slave trade within Britain itself.)
Wilberforce's years of fighting for right paid off just as he breathed his last. The source of Wilberforce’s fierce, tough tenacity was Jesus Christ. Wilberforce was an ardent, passionate follower of Jesus. Once, a smug young believer, evidently thinking that there was something missing in Wilberforce’s faith asked him, “Have you found peace?” Wilberforce replied, “No, I have found war.”
Anybody who has ever let Jesus Christ take control of their lives knows exactly what Wilberforce meant. When we accept the fact that we are sinners who live under penalty of death and that only Jesus Christ can set us free to be God’s people for all eternity, we do have peace. We have peace with God. [Romans 5:1] But it’s a strange peace. We see this in today’s Bible lesson.
Set the scene. It’s evening of the very first Easter. Jesus’ first followers are quaking in fear behind locked doors. Now that the Passover has passed, they wonder whether the Roman and Jewish authorities will come after them the way they went after Jesus. Mary Magdalene has come to them with the unbelievable report that Jesus has risen from the dead. Suddenly, Jesus appears among them. His words are interesting. Twice, our translation quotes Jesus as saying, “Peace be with you.” But that isn’t completely accurate. You see in the original Greek in which it’s written, there is no verb in Jesus’ greeting. When that happens, the Greek language usually is making a declarative statement. Jesus would be declaring a fact: You have peace or Peace is yours.
The disciples might have wondered whether Jesus’ recent experiences with death and resurrection had caused Him to take leave of His senses. There was a reason that they were behind closed doors, after all. The Romans and Jewish leaders had executed Jesus and weren’t likely to take too kindly to them either. They were learning what Wilberforce learned nineteen centuries later—and what you and I can sometimes learn: dare to follow Jesus Christ and it just might put you at war with the world!
Jesus Himself had warned those who follow Him that this would happen. He said that He had come with a sword, one that would tear families apart between those who loyally followed Him and those who went their own ways apart from God. Just the night before His own execution, He told the disciples, “In this world you face persecution. But take courage; I have conquered the world.” [John 16:33]
The moment you and I try to follow Jesus in our every day lives, some sort of war will be round the corner. A manager in a large corporation once told me, “Mark, if I try to enact my faith at work, I won’t be able to provide for my family. Every single day, I’m ordered to do things that I know are unethical. I’m not even talking about sharing my faith in Christ. I can’t even live it.”
A political office-holder confided to me, “Every politician gives lip service to God and loving our neighbor as God teaches. But if you don’t look out for yourself, you’ll get destroyed.”
More than one teenager has told me, “If you don’t act hard, everybody will dump on you.”
None of that may seem very peaceful to us. And yet, Jesus’ words are right there in our Bibles. He says to all who follow Him: Peace is yours, You have peace. What do we make of that?
First of all, I think we need to redefine peace. We tend to see peace as a trouble-free existence. No problems. No strife. No traffic jams. No unpleasant disagreements. We should know better.
Scientific experiments often create perfect, stress-free environments for lab animals and you know what the result is. Without some external challenge to lift them outside of themselves, they start picking fights with each other. This is true for we human beings, too. One of the books I’ve been reading lately is the second volume of Winston Churchill’s History of the English Speaking People. I was interested in reading about an era of British history I really didn’t know about: the reign of Charles I back in the 1600s. When Charles came to the throne, people were questioning the need for a king and how the people themselves might have a say in national decisions. Charles decided that this would be a good time to lay low, to virtually do away with taxes and disband the Army. Charles thought that if he placed no demands on the people, he could win them over. But it backfired on him. A civil war happened and in the end, Charles was beheaded. Churchill, considering how Charles never challenged his people and tried to create this low-stress, no-hassle environment writes very insightfully:
"In later years..., all England looked back to these placid [times] as an age of ease and tranquility. But man has never sought tranquility alone. His nature drives him forward to fortunes which, for better or for worse, are different from those which it is in his power to pause and enjoy."
In fact, trouble is underrated as a force for good. We need a certain amount of trouble in our lives. Pastor Gerald Mann tells of presiding at the wedding ceremony of a young woman from a wealthy family. On the night of the rehearsal, the dad asked if Mann would like to go to the local airport with him. The enormous wedding cake was arriving from a distant city via private jet. So, Mann tagged along for the ride and watched as this cake was carefully taken from the jet and placed in a waiting car.
Piling out of the jet and supervising the operation was a slight woman who obviously knew exactly what she was doing. Mann later asked her how she got into this business. She said that as a young wife and mom of three girls, in her early thirties, her husband died. She didn’t have an advanced education and had no idea what she would do. In the midst of thrashing and praying about this, she was invited to a wedding reception. She probably hadn’t wanted to go, but did. The cake was beautiful to look at, but tasted awful. She knew that she couldn’t do much. But she could make beautiful cakes that tasted good.
That was the beginning of a business she enjoyed and that provided for her family. Her success began in a time of trouble that set her to praying. She learned the truth of what Saint Paul writes in the Bible, “When I am weak, then I am strong.” You see, when we’re weak we go to God for strength, insight, wisdom, forgiveness, and the power to go on. That’s why the woman with the successful wedding cake business told Gerald Mann something we should all remember: Trouble is a trigger.
I think that woman was right! Trouble can set you to doing things you never realized that you could do. I believe that even in heaven, God will give us perplexing assignments that will cause us to grow. It’s possible to have trouble and still be at peace!
Peace is not the absence of trouble. Peace is having Jesus at the center of your life, fortifying you to face life’s troubles and to share Jesus’ love with others even in the midst of trouble. One of the songs we sang earlier, It is Well, was inspired by the experience of a Christian missionary in Africa. He and his family had worked for many years to serve the people there and to share Jesus’ love with them in whatever way they could. But there was an uprising and he and his family were threatened. He made arrangements to send his wife and children back to their native country while he remained behind, continuing to serve folks and share Jesus. As his family boarded the ship, someone asked if he might not reconsider and go back home as well. “No,” he said, “it is well with my soul.” That man had peace. He was in the center of God’s will for his life. He was showing Jesus to others and no matter what happened, he had peace.
I don’t understand The Lord of the Rings very well. I do know that J.R.R. Tolkien, who wrote the books on which the movies are based, described them as “Catholic,” conveying central truths of Christian faith. This was powerfully portrayed for me in one scene from The Two Towers. Gandulf, a sort of priestly wizard, comes face to face with a king Theoden, who has come under a sort of demonic spell. Gandulf, who has already come through what seems like hell and back, wants to free Theoden. Theoden resists at first and you can see Gandulf’s pain in this contest. But ultimately, Theoden is set free and he becomes once more, the man he was made to be. My son Philip tells me that in the book, Gandulf simply takes Theoden into the sunlight and that revives him.
When we cast the light of Jesus into people’s lives, some will reject Jesus and us. But others will soak it up. A few years ago, some of you will remember, I sat with a Muslim acquaintance at a funeral home. His brother-in-law died and he asked me what I believed happened to people when they die. I did the only thing I know how to do: I told him about Jesus. I said that Jesus died and rose, that He gives new lives and peace with God to everyone who follow Him, and on our deaths, waits to usher us into God’s presence forever. As I left, my acquaintance shook my hand and said, “Thanks, Mark. I don’t know what it was, but when you were talking earlier, it made me feel better.”
The Gospel of John particularly emphasizes that our mission as followers of Jesus is to simply bring people into the presence of Jesus—whether in our words, or deeds, or living. Exposed to the light of Jesus’ love and goodness, they’ll cast one of two judgments on themselves.
They may run from letting God, the world, or themselves see that they’re faulty human beings in need of a Savior and so condemn themselves to life without God.
Or, they’ll run to Jesus and let Him lighten their ways through life all the way to eternity. Our call is simply to be faithful to Christ, irrespective of others’ reactions. [See John 3:16-18 for more on this.]
Peace is not the absence of trouble. Peace is having Jesus at the center of your life, fortifying you to face life’s troubles and to share Jesus’ love with others even in the midst of trouble. Maybe that’s why, just after telling His disciples, Peace is yours, Jesus breathes on them and tells 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."
This past week, you know, my wife flew to Florida to visit our daughter. The flight down and even the landing were a bit turbulent. But she and our friend Pat arrived and had a good visit. Our rides through life may get bumpy. But even then, we have peace. Even then, we can share the peace of Christ with others as we live for Christ, serve in Christ’s Name, and invite others to know Christ too. Today, ask Christ to fill you with His peace and then, filled with His Spirit, invite a spiritually-disconnected person to know Jesus. They may say no...but like you, they just might also say Yes! And whatever they say, Jesus says, “Peace is yours! You have peace!”
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, April 18, 2004)
Some of you have heard me speak before of William Wilberforce. He is one of the great heroes of History. Wilberforce spent his life pursuing two great goals: abolishing slavery in his country of Great Britain and reforming the nation’s manners, making the country gentler and kinder. He approached these goals with utter tenacity, in spite of setbacks and difficulties. On his death bed, Wilberforce learned that slavery had been abolished throughout the British Empire. (This came some twenty years after a battle he'd led the previous two decades to bring an end to the slave trade within Britain itself.)
Wilberforce's years of fighting for right paid off just as he breathed his last. The source of Wilberforce’s fierce, tough tenacity was Jesus Christ. Wilberforce was an ardent, passionate follower of Jesus. Once, a smug young believer, evidently thinking that there was something missing in Wilberforce’s faith asked him, “Have you found peace?” Wilberforce replied, “No, I have found war.”
Anybody who has ever let Jesus Christ take control of their lives knows exactly what Wilberforce meant. When we accept the fact that we are sinners who live under penalty of death and that only Jesus Christ can set us free to be God’s people for all eternity, we do have peace. We have peace with God. [Romans 5:1] But it’s a strange peace. We see this in today’s Bible lesson.
Set the scene. It’s evening of the very first Easter. Jesus’ first followers are quaking in fear behind locked doors. Now that the Passover has passed, they wonder whether the Roman and Jewish authorities will come after them the way they went after Jesus. Mary Magdalene has come to them with the unbelievable report that Jesus has risen from the dead. Suddenly, Jesus appears among them. His words are interesting. Twice, our translation quotes Jesus as saying, “Peace be with you.” But that isn’t completely accurate. You see in the original Greek in which it’s written, there is no verb in Jesus’ greeting. When that happens, the Greek language usually is making a declarative statement. Jesus would be declaring a fact: You have peace or Peace is yours.
The disciples might have wondered whether Jesus’ recent experiences with death and resurrection had caused Him to take leave of His senses. There was a reason that they were behind closed doors, after all. The Romans and Jewish leaders had executed Jesus and weren’t likely to take too kindly to them either. They were learning what Wilberforce learned nineteen centuries later—and what you and I can sometimes learn: dare to follow Jesus Christ and it just might put you at war with the world!
Jesus Himself had warned those who follow Him that this would happen. He said that He had come with a sword, one that would tear families apart between those who loyally followed Him and those who went their own ways apart from God. Just the night before His own execution, He told the disciples, “In this world you face persecution. But take courage; I have conquered the world.” [John 16:33]
The moment you and I try to follow Jesus in our every day lives, some sort of war will be round the corner. A manager in a large corporation once told me, “Mark, if I try to enact my faith at work, I won’t be able to provide for my family. Every single day, I’m ordered to do things that I know are unethical. I’m not even talking about sharing my faith in Christ. I can’t even live it.”
A political office-holder confided to me, “Every politician gives lip service to God and loving our neighbor as God teaches. But if you don’t look out for yourself, you’ll get destroyed.”
More than one teenager has told me, “If you don’t act hard, everybody will dump on you.”
None of that may seem very peaceful to us. And yet, Jesus’ words are right there in our Bibles. He says to all who follow Him: Peace is yours, You have peace. What do we make of that?
First of all, I think we need to redefine peace. We tend to see peace as a trouble-free existence. No problems. No strife. No traffic jams. No unpleasant disagreements. We should know better.
Scientific experiments often create perfect, stress-free environments for lab animals and you know what the result is. Without some external challenge to lift them outside of themselves, they start picking fights with each other. This is true for we human beings, too. One of the books I’ve been reading lately is the second volume of Winston Churchill’s History of the English Speaking People. I was interested in reading about an era of British history I really didn’t know about: the reign of Charles I back in the 1600s. When Charles came to the throne, people were questioning the need for a king and how the people themselves might have a say in national decisions. Charles decided that this would be a good time to lay low, to virtually do away with taxes and disband the Army. Charles thought that if he placed no demands on the people, he could win them over. But it backfired on him. A civil war happened and in the end, Charles was beheaded. Churchill, considering how Charles never challenged his people and tried to create this low-stress, no-hassle environment writes very insightfully:
"In later years..., all England looked back to these placid [times] as an age of ease and tranquility. But man has never sought tranquility alone. His nature drives him forward to fortunes which, for better or for worse, are different from those which it is in his power to pause and enjoy."
In fact, trouble is underrated as a force for good. We need a certain amount of trouble in our lives. Pastor Gerald Mann tells of presiding at the wedding ceremony of a young woman from a wealthy family. On the night of the rehearsal, the dad asked if Mann would like to go to the local airport with him. The enormous wedding cake was arriving from a distant city via private jet. So, Mann tagged along for the ride and watched as this cake was carefully taken from the jet and placed in a waiting car.
Piling out of the jet and supervising the operation was a slight woman who obviously knew exactly what she was doing. Mann later asked her how she got into this business. She said that as a young wife and mom of three girls, in her early thirties, her husband died. She didn’t have an advanced education and had no idea what she would do. In the midst of thrashing and praying about this, she was invited to a wedding reception. She probably hadn’t wanted to go, but did. The cake was beautiful to look at, but tasted awful. She knew that she couldn’t do much. But she could make beautiful cakes that tasted good.
That was the beginning of a business she enjoyed and that provided for her family. Her success began in a time of trouble that set her to praying. She learned the truth of what Saint Paul writes in the Bible, “When I am weak, then I am strong.” You see, when we’re weak we go to God for strength, insight, wisdom, forgiveness, and the power to go on. That’s why the woman with the successful wedding cake business told Gerald Mann something we should all remember: Trouble is a trigger.
I think that woman was right! Trouble can set you to doing things you never realized that you could do. I believe that even in heaven, God will give us perplexing assignments that will cause us to grow. It’s possible to have trouble and still be at peace!
Peace is not the absence of trouble. Peace is having Jesus at the center of your life, fortifying you to face life’s troubles and to share Jesus’ love with others even in the midst of trouble. One of the songs we sang earlier, It is Well, was inspired by the experience of a Christian missionary in Africa. He and his family had worked for many years to serve the people there and to share Jesus’ love with them in whatever way they could. But there was an uprising and he and his family were threatened. He made arrangements to send his wife and children back to their native country while he remained behind, continuing to serve folks and share Jesus. As his family boarded the ship, someone asked if he might not reconsider and go back home as well. “No,” he said, “it is well with my soul.” That man had peace. He was in the center of God’s will for his life. He was showing Jesus to others and no matter what happened, he had peace.
I don’t understand The Lord of the Rings very well. I do know that J.R.R. Tolkien, who wrote the books on which the movies are based, described them as “Catholic,” conveying central truths of Christian faith. This was powerfully portrayed for me in one scene from The Two Towers. Gandulf, a sort of priestly wizard, comes face to face with a king Theoden, who has come under a sort of demonic spell. Gandulf, who has already come through what seems like hell and back, wants to free Theoden. Theoden resists at first and you can see Gandulf’s pain in this contest. But ultimately, Theoden is set free and he becomes once more, the man he was made to be. My son Philip tells me that in the book, Gandulf simply takes Theoden into the sunlight and that revives him.
When we cast the light of Jesus into people’s lives, some will reject Jesus and us. But others will soak it up. A few years ago, some of you will remember, I sat with a Muslim acquaintance at a funeral home. His brother-in-law died and he asked me what I believed happened to people when they die. I did the only thing I know how to do: I told him about Jesus. I said that Jesus died and rose, that He gives new lives and peace with God to everyone who follow Him, and on our deaths, waits to usher us into God’s presence forever. As I left, my acquaintance shook my hand and said, “Thanks, Mark. I don’t know what it was, but when you were talking earlier, it made me feel better.”
The Gospel of John particularly emphasizes that our mission as followers of Jesus is to simply bring people into the presence of Jesus—whether in our words, or deeds, or living. Exposed to the light of Jesus’ love and goodness, they’ll cast one of two judgments on themselves.
They may run from letting God, the world, or themselves see that they’re faulty human beings in need of a Savior and so condemn themselves to life without God.
Or, they’ll run to Jesus and let Him lighten their ways through life all the way to eternity. Our call is simply to be faithful to Christ, irrespective of others’ reactions. [See John 3:16-18 for more on this.]
Peace is not the absence of trouble. Peace is having Jesus at the center of your life, fortifying you to face life’s troubles and to share Jesus’ love with others even in the midst of trouble. Maybe that’s why, just after telling His disciples, Peace is yours, Jesus breathes on them and tells 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."
This past week, you know, my wife flew to Florida to visit our daughter. The flight down and even the landing were a bit turbulent. But she and our friend Pat arrived and had a good visit. Our rides through life may get bumpy. But even then, we have peace. Even then, we can share the peace of Christ with others as we live for Christ, serve in Christ’s Name, and invite others to know Christ too. Today, ask Christ to fill you with His peace and then, filled with His Spirit, invite a spiritually-disconnected person to know Jesus. They may say no...but like you, they just might also say Yes! And whatever they say, Jesus says, “Peace is yours! You have peace!”
Monday, April 12, 2004
How Easter Can Be a Wow! for Us
Luke 24:1-12
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, April 11, 2004, Easter Sunday)
An expectant couple, anxious to confirm their suspicions about the gender of their baby, arranged to have an ultrasound done at the doctor’s office. So, they arrived for the appointment, the pregnant mom got onto the table, and the doctor began the procedure. Suddenly, the doctor let out a, “Wow!” “What is it?,” the couple wondered, “Is it a boy?” “Well,” the doctor replied slowly, “the middle one is.”
Sometimes life surprises us and the only appropriate response from us is, “Wow!” Easter records the greatest event in human history. Jesus Christ, true God and true man, rose from the dead. And yet, we manages somehow not to be stunned or amazed by it. How is it that you and I can “acquire the fire,” gaining or regaining our sense of wonder at the most wonderful thing that has ever happened? Maybe the answer lies in going back to the original Easter and following what happened according to one of the Biblical writers on the first Easter Sunday. I want to do that by considering Luke’s telling of the Easter story, doing so from three different perspectives.
First, there is the perspective of the women who came to the tomb at sunrise that Sunday morning. They’d come to anoint Jesus’ body with spices. Ordinarily this task would have been done before Jesus’ body was buried. But back in those times in Judea, a new day was thought to begin at sundown. Jesus had died shortly before sundown, on the cusp of the Sabbath during the Passover celebration. Had Jesus’ fellow Jews spent the time to anoint His corpse then, they wouldn’t have had time to become ritually clean and able to participate in the holiday. So, on Jesus’ death, He was wrapped in linen cloths and placed in the tomb.
But the women got a surprise. The stone had been rolled away. Jesus’ body was gone. Luke says, with probable understatement that they were “perplexed.”
I’ve seen that sort of perplexity in people’s reactions to our Kindness Outreaches. Our congregation has touched literally thousands of people with our acts of kindness—cold water or pop on hot days, free coupons for discounts at restaurants and filling stations. Most people react like the women at the tomb. What’s going on?, they wonder. Why would somebody do something so nice for us? The questions are like those the women may have had: If Jesus had such power over death, why would He have bothered dying for us? Has someone stolen His body and if so, why?
You see, most people have small expectations of life. But on Easter, God shouted that He reserves the right to surprise us! He reserves the right to replace our shortsightedness with an awareness of eternity!
The second perspective on the first Easter is that of the other disciples, the other followers of Jesus with whom the women at the tomb shared the news of Jesus’ resurrection that day. In the midst of their perplexity at the tomb, the women had encountered two figures in dazzling white—I think it’s safe to call them angels—who had reminded them that Jesus had said He had to die on a cross, bearing our punishment for sin although He didn’t deserve it, and then would rise again, opening up eternity to all who follow Him. And so, they told the other disciples about Jesus’ resurrection. Jesus is alive!, they said.
The other disciples didn’t believe them. Why? Some scholars think that the women were disbelieved because they were women. It may be. In those days, a woman’s testimony was never deemed valid. Women were thought to be frivolous and unreliable. But Jesus had never shared the sexist attitude of first-century Judean culture. Unlike other pious men of that time, He spoke with women in public. And I think it’s especially delicious that God chose women to be the first ones to preach the Easter message!
But there may be another reason the disciples didn’t believe the women. A few years ago, a prominent preacher told the true story of a friend and his son when the boy was small. The little guy had two heroes: Captain Kangaroo and MisterRogers, back when both of those children’s show hosts were on TV. The father and son would sit and watch these two stars every day. Then an announcement was made that one day, MisterRogers was going to visit Captain Kangaroo’s show. The boy was so excited he could hardly stand it. Day in and day out, he would ask his father, “Is this the day? Is this the day?” Finally, the day came and the two of them sat in front of the TV to watch this magic. Captain Kangaroo’s show began and after a few moments, MisterRogers was introduced. The boy watched this for a few moments and then, left the room. Mystified, his dad found him in another part of the house. “What’s wrong?” the dad asked.” The son replied, “It’s just too good. It’s just too good!” The women’s story of Jesus’ resurrection may have been dismissed because it was simply too good to be true.
The third perspective on the first Easter comes from Peter. Peter, you know sometimes gets a bad press because like us, he’s proud, impetuous, and prone to snap judgments. But when Peter heard the women’s story of Jesus’ resurrection, he reacted differently from the other disciples.
Maybe that’s because Peter had a track record with Jesus, memories that came flooding back to him now. Maybe he remembered the early morning when he and his crew returned from a night of futility when they’d been unable to catch any fish. They found the preacher Jesus, from landlocked Nazareth, waiting on the shore. He suggested that they put back out and lower the nets. You can almost hear the smirk in Peter’s voice when he tells Jesus that, like generations of Galilean fishermen, they’d been out trolling the waters all night long. He knew what he was doing, Peter seemed to say. He was a professional fisherman. But then, he said, as if to prove Jesus wrong, he would go out again. They’d gone just a few feet from shore and lowered the nets. They became so full that the catch nearly sank the boat. Peter was overwhelmed. He collapsed before Jesus and begged the Lord to go away. Peter was aware in a sudden, dramatic way of how great the distance between him and the sinless Lord Jesus.
He may have also remembered the events of just a few days before. Jesus had told Peter that when the going got rough and the world turned against Jesus, Peter would deny knowing Jesus three times. Peter told Jesus that would never happen. But it did.
Peter had been the first to confess that Jesus was the “son of the Blessed,” a Semitic phrase signaling Peter’s belief that Jesus was God Himself.
That flood of memories may have incited Peter to not walk, but run, to the tomb and investigate for himself. There, he saw all the evidence he needed: the tomb empty and the linen burial cloths laying there. Our Bible lesson says that Peter went back home “amazed.”
Peter, I think, holds the key to our believing and greeting the good news of Easter with a Wow! And not just on Easter Day, but every day of our lives. For Easter to have meaning for us, it won’t be the result of our gaining knowledge through say, the reading of Scripture. (Although anyone who follows Jesus will want to read Scripture in order to know Him better!) And it won’t be the result of emotions. (Although the better we know Jesus, the more our emotions—like love and gratitude and even others like anger with injustice—will be roused. The wonder of Easter will come to us in another way, Peter’s way.
Psychologist James Dobson once told the story of being alone with his then-toddler son, Ryan, shortly after they’d moved into a developing neighborhood. Dobson was busy preparing dinner when he became aware of silence in the house. He called for Ryan...no answer. He looked all over the house and couldn’t find the boy. He then ran outside and saw, to his horror, some distance away that Ryan had crawled into the back of a large dump truck. How this little guy had climbed up there, Dobson didn’t know. He wanted to avoid startling his son, so Ryan approached him quietly. The closer he got to Ryan, the more he could hear that Ryan was sort of talking to himself. At one point, Ryan decided he wanted to get out of the dump truck bed. So backing up toward the edge of the truck, he began to probe with his feet for a place where he could land. Try as he might though, he couldn’t find it. Dobson heard his son saying quietly, “Somebody help the boy.” Ryan finally decided that he would just back off the bed and see where he would land. He did so and fell...right into the waiting arms of his dad.
In the end, we will only know the truth and the life-changing power of Jesus’ resurrection when we stop trying to get through this life on our own steam. The WOW! of Easter will be ours when after remembering at Jesus’ track record as Peter did, we surrender and fall into Jesus’ waiting arms. On this Easter Sunday, that’s what I invite you to do today and every day!
[The joke about the expectant parents is a variation of a story appearing in Philip Longfellow Anderson's book, The Gospel in Disney.
[The true story of the little boy and his dad as they watched Captain Kangaroo and MisterRogers in a joint TV appearance is told by Thomas G. Long in a sermon appearing in the April 4, 2001 issue of Christian Century magazine.
[James Dobson tells the true story of his son, Ryan, in a presentation that appears on his famous Focus on the Family lectures on film (now on VHS and DVD).]
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, April 11, 2004, Easter Sunday)
An expectant couple, anxious to confirm their suspicions about the gender of their baby, arranged to have an ultrasound done at the doctor’s office. So, they arrived for the appointment, the pregnant mom got onto the table, and the doctor began the procedure. Suddenly, the doctor let out a, “Wow!” “What is it?,” the couple wondered, “Is it a boy?” “Well,” the doctor replied slowly, “the middle one is.”
Sometimes life surprises us and the only appropriate response from us is, “Wow!” Easter records the greatest event in human history. Jesus Christ, true God and true man, rose from the dead. And yet, we manages somehow not to be stunned or amazed by it. How is it that you and I can “acquire the fire,” gaining or regaining our sense of wonder at the most wonderful thing that has ever happened? Maybe the answer lies in going back to the original Easter and following what happened according to one of the Biblical writers on the first Easter Sunday. I want to do that by considering Luke’s telling of the Easter story, doing so from three different perspectives.
First, there is the perspective of the women who came to the tomb at sunrise that Sunday morning. They’d come to anoint Jesus’ body with spices. Ordinarily this task would have been done before Jesus’ body was buried. But back in those times in Judea, a new day was thought to begin at sundown. Jesus had died shortly before sundown, on the cusp of the Sabbath during the Passover celebration. Had Jesus’ fellow Jews spent the time to anoint His corpse then, they wouldn’t have had time to become ritually clean and able to participate in the holiday. So, on Jesus’ death, He was wrapped in linen cloths and placed in the tomb.
But the women got a surprise. The stone had been rolled away. Jesus’ body was gone. Luke says, with probable understatement that they were “perplexed.”
I’ve seen that sort of perplexity in people’s reactions to our Kindness Outreaches. Our congregation has touched literally thousands of people with our acts of kindness—cold water or pop on hot days, free coupons for discounts at restaurants and filling stations. Most people react like the women at the tomb. What’s going on?, they wonder. Why would somebody do something so nice for us? The questions are like those the women may have had: If Jesus had such power over death, why would He have bothered dying for us? Has someone stolen His body and if so, why?
You see, most people have small expectations of life. But on Easter, God shouted that He reserves the right to surprise us! He reserves the right to replace our shortsightedness with an awareness of eternity!
The second perspective on the first Easter is that of the other disciples, the other followers of Jesus with whom the women at the tomb shared the news of Jesus’ resurrection that day. In the midst of their perplexity at the tomb, the women had encountered two figures in dazzling white—I think it’s safe to call them angels—who had reminded them that Jesus had said He had to die on a cross, bearing our punishment for sin although He didn’t deserve it, and then would rise again, opening up eternity to all who follow Him. And so, they told the other disciples about Jesus’ resurrection. Jesus is alive!, they said.
The other disciples didn’t believe them. Why? Some scholars think that the women were disbelieved because they were women. It may be. In those days, a woman’s testimony was never deemed valid. Women were thought to be frivolous and unreliable. But Jesus had never shared the sexist attitude of first-century Judean culture. Unlike other pious men of that time, He spoke with women in public. And I think it’s especially delicious that God chose women to be the first ones to preach the Easter message!
But there may be another reason the disciples didn’t believe the women. A few years ago, a prominent preacher told the true story of a friend and his son when the boy was small. The little guy had two heroes: Captain Kangaroo and MisterRogers, back when both of those children’s show hosts were on TV. The father and son would sit and watch these two stars every day. Then an announcement was made that one day, MisterRogers was going to visit Captain Kangaroo’s show. The boy was so excited he could hardly stand it. Day in and day out, he would ask his father, “Is this the day? Is this the day?” Finally, the day came and the two of them sat in front of the TV to watch this magic. Captain Kangaroo’s show began and after a few moments, MisterRogers was introduced. The boy watched this for a few moments and then, left the room. Mystified, his dad found him in another part of the house. “What’s wrong?” the dad asked.” The son replied, “It’s just too good. It’s just too good!” The women’s story of Jesus’ resurrection may have been dismissed because it was simply too good to be true.
The third perspective on the first Easter comes from Peter. Peter, you know sometimes gets a bad press because like us, he’s proud, impetuous, and prone to snap judgments. But when Peter heard the women’s story of Jesus’ resurrection, he reacted differently from the other disciples.
Maybe that’s because Peter had a track record with Jesus, memories that came flooding back to him now. Maybe he remembered the early morning when he and his crew returned from a night of futility when they’d been unable to catch any fish. They found the preacher Jesus, from landlocked Nazareth, waiting on the shore. He suggested that they put back out and lower the nets. You can almost hear the smirk in Peter’s voice when he tells Jesus that, like generations of Galilean fishermen, they’d been out trolling the waters all night long. He knew what he was doing, Peter seemed to say. He was a professional fisherman. But then, he said, as if to prove Jesus wrong, he would go out again. They’d gone just a few feet from shore and lowered the nets. They became so full that the catch nearly sank the boat. Peter was overwhelmed. He collapsed before Jesus and begged the Lord to go away. Peter was aware in a sudden, dramatic way of how great the distance between him and the sinless Lord Jesus.
He may have also remembered the events of just a few days before. Jesus had told Peter that when the going got rough and the world turned against Jesus, Peter would deny knowing Jesus three times. Peter told Jesus that would never happen. But it did.
Peter had been the first to confess that Jesus was the “son of the Blessed,” a Semitic phrase signaling Peter’s belief that Jesus was God Himself.
That flood of memories may have incited Peter to not walk, but run, to the tomb and investigate for himself. There, he saw all the evidence he needed: the tomb empty and the linen burial cloths laying there. Our Bible lesson says that Peter went back home “amazed.”
Peter, I think, holds the key to our believing and greeting the good news of Easter with a Wow! And not just on Easter Day, but every day of our lives. For Easter to have meaning for us, it won’t be the result of our gaining knowledge through say, the reading of Scripture. (Although anyone who follows Jesus will want to read Scripture in order to know Him better!) And it won’t be the result of emotions. (Although the better we know Jesus, the more our emotions—like love and gratitude and even others like anger with injustice—will be roused. The wonder of Easter will come to us in another way, Peter’s way.
Psychologist James Dobson once told the story of being alone with his then-toddler son, Ryan, shortly after they’d moved into a developing neighborhood. Dobson was busy preparing dinner when he became aware of silence in the house. He called for Ryan...no answer. He looked all over the house and couldn’t find the boy. He then ran outside and saw, to his horror, some distance away that Ryan had crawled into the back of a large dump truck. How this little guy had climbed up there, Dobson didn’t know. He wanted to avoid startling his son, so Ryan approached him quietly. The closer he got to Ryan, the more he could hear that Ryan was sort of talking to himself. At one point, Ryan decided he wanted to get out of the dump truck bed. So backing up toward the edge of the truck, he began to probe with his feet for a place where he could land. Try as he might though, he couldn’t find it. Dobson heard his son saying quietly, “Somebody help the boy.” Ryan finally decided that he would just back off the bed and see where he would land. He did so and fell...right into the waiting arms of his dad.
In the end, we will only know the truth and the life-changing power of Jesus’ resurrection when we stop trying to get through this life on our own steam. The WOW! of Easter will be ours when after remembering at Jesus’ track record as Peter did, we surrender and fall into Jesus’ waiting arms. On this Easter Sunday, that’s what I invite you to do today and every day!
[The joke about the expectant parents is a variation of a story appearing in Philip Longfellow Anderson's book, The Gospel in Disney.
[The true story of the little boy and his dad as they watched Captain Kangaroo and MisterRogers in a joint TV appearance is told by Thomas G. Long in a sermon appearing in the April 4, 2001 issue of Christian Century magazine.
[James Dobson tells the true story of his son, Ryan, in a presentation that appears on his famous Focus on the Family lectures on film (now on VHS and DVD).]
Sunday, April 04, 2004
The Journey, Through Lent...Through Life, April 4, 2004
John 12:12-16
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, April 4, 2004)
About a year ago, I was working at home and decided to take a lunch break. I turned on the TV and tuned into one of the news channels. What I saw was a sight I’ll wager many of you have seen many times in the intervening year: videotape of grateful, excited Iraqis cheering as US military personnel used a tank to pull down an enormous statue of Saddam Hussein. Do you remember what happened after the statue was toppled? Many startled and grateful Iraqis shook the Americans’ hands, thumped them on the backs, and cheered them. It was a moment of celebration and victory!
Contrast those images to the ones we saw this past week from Fallujah in Iraq. American engineers, civilian workers, in that city to help rebuild the country, were ambushed and killed. A mob then gleefully desecrated their bodies. While that mob and that city don’t represent all of Iraq, one couldn’t help but wonder, “What happened this past year?”
The events we celebrate this Holy Week—the period between today, Palm Sunday, and Easter Sunday—teach us how quickly things can change in life. The events we remember this morning, everything associated with Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem as He prepared to celebrate the Jewish holiday of Passover, are well-known to you. Back in the first-century and for eons before, Jews from all over the known world would travel to Jerusalem three times a year to celebrate important religious festivals. Passover was one of those festivals. So, Jerusalem was packed with crowds of people as Jesus arrived.
Ever since Jesus’ dinner in the Jerusalem suburb of Bethany with Mary, Martha, and Lazarus, which we talked about last week, there had been a buzz about the possibility of Jesus coming into town. Everybody knew that if Jesus did show up for these holy days, He would provoke a confrontation. The Roman occupiers wouldn’t like it. And the Jewish religious authorities, who had already plotted to murder Jesus’ friend, Lazarus, wouldn’t like it either.
The crowds though, ate it up! They were fed up with their religious leaders, who laid stern demands on them and told them that the only way they could live with God and avoid His punishment was by obeying a lot of human laws. They were fed up with religion! They were also fed up with these Roman outsiders running the show in the land God had given to them. But Jesus aroused a hope within them. Maybe, they probably thought, Jesus would lead the charge and throw the Romans out and bring down the religious elite and let them all do what they wanted to do.
Even the way the crowd chose to welcome Jesus indicated that they completely misunderstood Him. They waved palm leaves, something which in ancient times, Jews had used to welcome conquering military heroes. At the moment of Jesus’ arrival, the crowd didn’t think of the fact that Jesus didn’t speak in “Us vs. Them” terms. Jesus said that everybody was a sinner, everybody needed a Savior, and everybody—Jew, Roman, Iraqi, American—could follow Him and live forever with God. They certainly were ignoring Jesus’ words that their old sinful selves needed to die so that Jesus could help them become people on their way to being just like Jesus: loving servants who put the interests and needs of God and neighbor ahead of their own. As they shouted, “Hosanna!,” a word that means, “Lord, save” or “Lord, mercy!,” what they really meant was, “Give us what we want, Jesus. Treat us like kings!”
But if that’s the way they felt, events of that week would quickly leave them disappointed. The text of a Valentine’s card I recently found on the web said, “To my love. You've taken care of me when I was sick, cheered me up when I was sad, comforted me when I was in trouble. But what have you done for me lately?” Within days of their conquering hero’s welcome for Jesus, the crowd’s feelings about Him would be similar. Jesus had given them a feel-good celebration on Palm Sunday. Jesus had brought them healing and hope and the good news that God’s forgiveness and new life were free gifts for all with faith in Him. But as Sunday gave way to Monday and drifted onto become Tuesday and Wednesday, they became impatient and angry with Him. Jesus was offering them the most precious gift in the universe—life forever with God, but they weren’t interested. By Thursday, the crowd had turned completely from Jesus and wanted Him dead. Things can change quickly!
But if people are fickle, Jesus is faithful. Of all the thousands of people on the streets of Jerusalem that Palm Sunday, Jesus alone knew what was going to happen. While He wished—and even prayed—that He wouldn’t have to go through the agony of the cross, He forged ahead.
That really is the wonder of Palm Sunday: Jesus was obedient to His mission. He didn’t let the crowd, His desire for safety or popularity, or His instinct for self-preservation prevent Him from going to the cross for us. He didn’t whine about how His suffering and death were unfair. He knew that if He remained faithful to God’s plan for Him, the payoff would be enormous. And it was. At the end of the first Holy Week, Jesus Who had endured death rose again and through that miracle, opened the possibility of everlasting life to all who follow Him!
Some of you have read the phenomenal Rick Warren book, The Purpose Driven Life. Do you remember the book’s very first sentence? Warren writes, “It’s not about you.” I don’t know for certain why the people of Iraq who oppose American occupation there feel the way they do, but I have a pretty good idea why the crowds in Jerusalem turned on Jesus. I have a pretty fair idea why people turn on Him even today. I have a good idea as to why I turn on Jesus myself sometimes.
I’ll never forget a lecture given by one of my seminary professors when I was preparing to become a pastor. He had been through a lot in his life, tragedies and challenges. So, I felt that he had the right to say what he did. He talked about how difficult it was for him, after all he’d been through, to be with people who, confronting challenges in life, would ask, “Why is this happening to me?” The professor said that while he would never be so insensitive, he often wanted to shake these people and ask them, “Why shouldn’t this be happening to you?” This is not heaven. Yes, God has invaded our world and our lives through Jesus Christ. And He promises to be with us. But Jesus’ reason for coming into this world wasn’t to make this life easy. He came to change us from the inside out.
There’s a good reason for Jesus not making everything easy for us in this life. When I was growing up, my family spent time with two other families. In one of these families, the dad was a tyrant. On occasion, when the kids misbehaved, I watched him grab his kids by the throats and smack them on the ears until he thought he had control. All of those children ended up getting into lots of trouble as adolescents and adults. In the other family, the parents doted on the kids, let them have temper tantrums, and never told their children, “No.” Those kids also had grave problems as adolescents and adults. God is neither a dictator or a doormat. He so wants what is best for us that He sometimes says No and He loves us even in life’s tough times. God isn’t monster. God doesn’t bring tragedy or pain to us. But the New Testament book of Hebrews tells us that God does use the circumstances of our lives to discipline us, to help us, and fit us for the work God has for us in eternity. The Jerusalem crowd—and I suppose, you and I—would rather that God made this life a trouble-free existence. When life throws us difficulties, it’s easy for us to join the crowd and complain that God isn’t bowing down to serve us. But life isn’t about us!
Listen: Don’t pay attention to the changeable crowd! Don’t listen to the fickle interior voices of our own selfishness! Listen instead to God and the powerful message He’s sent to us through Jesus the Christ. Let God love you into a life made new by Jesus. Let Him love you into a life of boldness and risk, of hope and fulfillment, of eternity with Him! In the foreword for the book accompanying his new movie, The Passion of the Christ, Mel Gibson talks about why he made this movie about Jesus in Holy Week:
“This had its genesis during a time when I found myself feeling trapped with feelings of terrible, isolated emptiness...during...[a] time period of meditation and prayer...I first conceived the idea of making a film about The Passion. The idea took root very gradually...I wanted the effort to be a testament to infinite love of Jesus the Christ, which has saved, and continues to save, many the world over. It seems that in our modern secular existence we tend to forget...I wanted to remember to unforget...the Passion of Christ which cannot be articulated, only experienced..."
Jesus came into this world to die and to rise for you. You don’t have to earn that love. It’s God’s gift to you. Through all the seasons of life, whether it’s popular or convenient to follow Jesus or not, whether we feel like following Jesus or not, Jesus is still the Savior Who gave His life for you. As long as you and I still have breath, we can still decide to follow Him. The question of Holy Week—the question for each day of our lives is, “Will we follow Jesus?” All of heaven for all of eternity is waiting to hear our answers.
[The quote from Mel Gibson is cited in a sermon by Michael Foss.
[I highly recommend Rick Warren's book, The Purpose Driven Life. While I don't agree with everything Warren says in his book (ie, I disagree with his understanding of Holy Baptism for one thing), I nonetheless love the book and think that it can contribute mightily to one's spiritual growth, as it has to mine.]
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, April 4, 2004)
About a year ago, I was working at home and decided to take a lunch break. I turned on the TV and tuned into one of the news channels. What I saw was a sight I’ll wager many of you have seen many times in the intervening year: videotape of grateful, excited Iraqis cheering as US military personnel used a tank to pull down an enormous statue of Saddam Hussein. Do you remember what happened after the statue was toppled? Many startled and grateful Iraqis shook the Americans’ hands, thumped them on the backs, and cheered them. It was a moment of celebration and victory!
Contrast those images to the ones we saw this past week from Fallujah in Iraq. American engineers, civilian workers, in that city to help rebuild the country, were ambushed and killed. A mob then gleefully desecrated their bodies. While that mob and that city don’t represent all of Iraq, one couldn’t help but wonder, “What happened this past year?”
The events we celebrate this Holy Week—the period between today, Palm Sunday, and Easter Sunday—teach us how quickly things can change in life. The events we remember this morning, everything associated with Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem as He prepared to celebrate the Jewish holiday of Passover, are well-known to you. Back in the first-century and for eons before, Jews from all over the known world would travel to Jerusalem three times a year to celebrate important religious festivals. Passover was one of those festivals. So, Jerusalem was packed with crowds of people as Jesus arrived.
Ever since Jesus’ dinner in the Jerusalem suburb of Bethany with Mary, Martha, and Lazarus, which we talked about last week, there had been a buzz about the possibility of Jesus coming into town. Everybody knew that if Jesus did show up for these holy days, He would provoke a confrontation. The Roman occupiers wouldn’t like it. And the Jewish religious authorities, who had already plotted to murder Jesus’ friend, Lazarus, wouldn’t like it either.
The crowds though, ate it up! They were fed up with their religious leaders, who laid stern demands on them and told them that the only way they could live with God and avoid His punishment was by obeying a lot of human laws. They were fed up with religion! They were also fed up with these Roman outsiders running the show in the land God had given to them. But Jesus aroused a hope within them. Maybe, they probably thought, Jesus would lead the charge and throw the Romans out and bring down the religious elite and let them all do what they wanted to do.
Even the way the crowd chose to welcome Jesus indicated that they completely misunderstood Him. They waved palm leaves, something which in ancient times, Jews had used to welcome conquering military heroes. At the moment of Jesus’ arrival, the crowd didn’t think of the fact that Jesus didn’t speak in “Us vs. Them” terms. Jesus said that everybody was a sinner, everybody needed a Savior, and everybody—Jew, Roman, Iraqi, American—could follow Him and live forever with God. They certainly were ignoring Jesus’ words that their old sinful selves needed to die so that Jesus could help them become people on their way to being just like Jesus: loving servants who put the interests and needs of God and neighbor ahead of their own. As they shouted, “Hosanna!,” a word that means, “Lord, save” or “Lord, mercy!,” what they really meant was, “Give us what we want, Jesus. Treat us like kings!”
But if that’s the way they felt, events of that week would quickly leave them disappointed. The text of a Valentine’s card I recently found on the web said, “To my love. You've taken care of me when I was sick, cheered me up when I was sad, comforted me when I was in trouble. But what have you done for me lately?” Within days of their conquering hero’s welcome for Jesus, the crowd’s feelings about Him would be similar. Jesus had given them a feel-good celebration on Palm Sunday. Jesus had brought them healing and hope and the good news that God’s forgiveness and new life were free gifts for all with faith in Him. But as Sunday gave way to Monday and drifted onto become Tuesday and Wednesday, they became impatient and angry with Him. Jesus was offering them the most precious gift in the universe—life forever with God, but they weren’t interested. By Thursday, the crowd had turned completely from Jesus and wanted Him dead. Things can change quickly!
But if people are fickle, Jesus is faithful. Of all the thousands of people on the streets of Jerusalem that Palm Sunday, Jesus alone knew what was going to happen. While He wished—and even prayed—that He wouldn’t have to go through the agony of the cross, He forged ahead.
That really is the wonder of Palm Sunday: Jesus was obedient to His mission. He didn’t let the crowd, His desire for safety or popularity, or His instinct for self-preservation prevent Him from going to the cross for us. He didn’t whine about how His suffering and death were unfair. He knew that if He remained faithful to God’s plan for Him, the payoff would be enormous. And it was. At the end of the first Holy Week, Jesus Who had endured death rose again and through that miracle, opened the possibility of everlasting life to all who follow Him!
Some of you have read the phenomenal Rick Warren book, The Purpose Driven Life. Do you remember the book’s very first sentence? Warren writes, “It’s not about you.” I don’t know for certain why the people of Iraq who oppose American occupation there feel the way they do, but I have a pretty good idea why the crowds in Jerusalem turned on Jesus. I have a pretty fair idea why people turn on Him even today. I have a good idea as to why I turn on Jesus myself sometimes.
I’ll never forget a lecture given by one of my seminary professors when I was preparing to become a pastor. He had been through a lot in his life, tragedies and challenges. So, I felt that he had the right to say what he did. He talked about how difficult it was for him, after all he’d been through, to be with people who, confronting challenges in life, would ask, “Why is this happening to me?” The professor said that while he would never be so insensitive, he often wanted to shake these people and ask them, “Why shouldn’t this be happening to you?” This is not heaven. Yes, God has invaded our world and our lives through Jesus Christ. And He promises to be with us. But Jesus’ reason for coming into this world wasn’t to make this life easy. He came to change us from the inside out.
There’s a good reason for Jesus not making everything easy for us in this life. When I was growing up, my family spent time with two other families. In one of these families, the dad was a tyrant. On occasion, when the kids misbehaved, I watched him grab his kids by the throats and smack them on the ears until he thought he had control. All of those children ended up getting into lots of trouble as adolescents and adults. In the other family, the parents doted on the kids, let them have temper tantrums, and never told their children, “No.” Those kids also had grave problems as adolescents and adults. God is neither a dictator or a doormat. He so wants what is best for us that He sometimes says No and He loves us even in life’s tough times. God isn’t monster. God doesn’t bring tragedy or pain to us. But the New Testament book of Hebrews tells us that God does use the circumstances of our lives to discipline us, to help us, and fit us for the work God has for us in eternity. The Jerusalem crowd—and I suppose, you and I—would rather that God made this life a trouble-free existence. When life throws us difficulties, it’s easy for us to join the crowd and complain that God isn’t bowing down to serve us. But life isn’t about us!
Listen: Don’t pay attention to the changeable crowd! Don’t listen to the fickle interior voices of our own selfishness! Listen instead to God and the powerful message He’s sent to us through Jesus the Christ. Let God love you into a life made new by Jesus. Let Him love you into a life of boldness and risk, of hope and fulfillment, of eternity with Him! In the foreword for the book accompanying his new movie, The Passion of the Christ, Mel Gibson talks about why he made this movie about Jesus in Holy Week:
“This had its genesis during a time when I found myself feeling trapped with feelings of terrible, isolated emptiness...during...[a] time period of meditation and prayer...I first conceived the idea of making a film about The Passion. The idea took root very gradually...I wanted the effort to be a testament to infinite love of Jesus the Christ, which has saved, and continues to save, many the world over. It seems that in our modern secular existence we tend to forget...I wanted to remember to unforget...the Passion of Christ which cannot be articulated, only experienced..."
Jesus came into this world to die and to rise for you. You don’t have to earn that love. It’s God’s gift to you. Through all the seasons of life, whether it’s popular or convenient to follow Jesus or not, whether we feel like following Jesus or not, Jesus is still the Savior Who gave His life for you. As long as you and I still have breath, we can still decide to follow Him. The question of Holy Week—the question for each day of our lives is, “Will we follow Jesus?” All of heaven for all of eternity is waiting to hear our answers.
[The quote from Mel Gibson is cited in a sermon by Michael Foss.
[I highly recommend Rick Warren's book, The Purpose Driven Life. While I don't agree with everything Warren says in his book (ie, I disagree with his understanding of Holy Baptism for one thing), I nonetheless love the book and think that it can contribute mightily to one's spiritual growth, as it has to mine.]
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