Apprehending the New

1 Corinthians 15:19-26

Well, I think it’s about time I just come on out and own up. Some of you folks may have figured this out by now anyway.  I’m a science geek.  Actually, it’s worse than that.  I’m a science geek wannabe.  I’m too lazy to achieve full geekness.  I am hopelessly enthralled with the world of physics whether it be quantum physics, which is the study of the very small or astrophysics, which is the study of the universe.  If I had life to do over and knew what I know now and could ignore the call to ministry, I’d be a physicist who likes theology rather than the other way around.  

When you’re messed up in physics to this extent one of the questions you realize to be important is “how do we know what we know especially when we can’t see it”.  Well, there are two ways of approaching this question – the theoretical or the experimental. The theoretical approach works with what’s the math, what’s the relatedness behind everything.  It’s the E=MC² kind of stuff. The experimental approach is the more hands on, prove it by experiment way of doing things.

In the high and lofty world of physics theorists and experimentalists can often be at odds.  It’s like the difference between hippies and horse people.  But sometimes they come together and it’s just simply fantastic.  This happened with the discovery of the Higgs Boson back in 2012.  These are small sub-atomic, elementary particles that give mass to other kinds of particles that will interact with them.  It’s been dubbed the God Particle (though Richard Feynman originally called it the God-damned Particle) because it was so frustratingly elusive but necessary for our theories about physical reality to work and for stuff to be stuff. 

The search for the Higgs Boson began back in the 60’s with questions about why some particles have mass and others don’t.  The theorists, one of them Peter Higgs for whom the particle is named, quite conclusively demonstrated mathematically that this particle had to be there, but for the experimentalists the technology to demonstrate it by experiment just wasn’t there until 2012.  July 4, 2012 CERN in France powered its particle collider up enough to produce one.  This past December they did another experiment and found something that might prove the existence of another theoretical particle associated with gravity, the graviton.  That’ll be way too cool if they have.

There are a few things we can learn about how to understand our reality that we learn from physics and its theoretical and experimental pursuits.  One is that we can know things about this physical world even without being able to see them.  In this universe things are knowable. 

Secondly, in this universe there is a rational order to what we know.  It is one thing to know that there is such a thing as a Higgs Boson, but entirely another to know and understand how it relates and works with other elementary particles to give stuff mass.  There is rational order, relatedness in this universe.

A third thing that we learn from physics but we don’t really hear much about due mostly to media bias is the number of physicists who stand in awe of this universe with the realization that it is contingent upon something or someone beyond itself for its existence.  Someone or something made it and gave it a rational order that is knowable.  Even Einstein spoke of God.

Fourthly, physics is the pursuit of understanding this creation by questioning it and letting it reveal itself to us in predictable and also unpredictable ways.  In order to know things and the rational order behind them we must keep an open mind to possibilities beyond which we can see or even imagine.  We must be willing to be surprised by things that are new and unique.  And when the new and unique happens we are out of line if we dismiss them outright as irrational because they don’t fit our paradigms of what’s possible. 

To the true physicist, when something new happens, such as Jesus’ resurrection, it is bad science to poo-poo it away as being irrational or illogical spiritual hoodoo.  That is not proper to science.  What you do is accept it for what it is and begin to ask questions of it and let it reveal itself to you until you can start to understand it and its place in the rational order of things. 

Looking at 1 Corinthians, Paul found himself up against this closed minded, improper science in his day.  People were saying that Jesus was not raised from the dead.  That it was irrational.  God  doesn't become human and the dead stay dead.  That’s the way things are.  But Paul says "no" to their irrational close-mindedness and boldly states, “But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead.”  “In fact” – nyni de in Greek – “certainly”, “indeed”, “for sure” Paul says, "Christ has been raised from the dead."  It's a fact.  It happened.  Paul has been confronted by this new reality.  This act of new creation has apprehended Paul – grabbed him by the hair and gotten his full attention. Instead of poo-pooing it as impossible Paul draws a profound conclusion based in known reality.  He says: “for in Adam all die, so in like manner in Christ all will be made to live.  

You know, one of the most historically documented events of the first century AD is the resurrection of Jesus Christ.  There is as much credible historical record both in primary and secondary sources biblical and otherwise for the existence of Jesus of Nazareth, that he lived, died a treasoner’s death at the hands of the Romans, and was raised from the dead as there is for the existence, life, and deeds, and death of Alexander the Great.  That Jesus lived, died, and was bodily raised is a historical fact.  Yet, It is something new to our universe that we must apprehend.  How should we do this?  Well, the route of proper science is an acceptable and fruitful approach.

First, start asking questions in hopes that resurrection will reveal itself to us.  Yet, there is one question we cannot ask about the resurrection, “how?”.  We are incompetent to do so.  We don’t know what life is nor what death is.  Biological life is not a machine for us to figure out how it works so as to take it apart like a car engine and put it back together.  Those who approach medicine this way or evolution in such a mechanistic and cause-and-effect means are way off base here.  We don’t know what consciousness is or how it is we humans can experience meaning.  We are incompetent to ask how Jesus was raised and we are out of order if we say Jesus was not raised because we cannot say how.  That’s what atheism does and it is poor scientific method that leads them to that conclusion.  In fact, it’s not even scientific.

The question we can ask since Jesus was a man is “who?”  Who is this that was raised from the dead?  We have a “theoretical” basis or record to go by here – the prophets of the Old Testament through whom God spoke and said he would come and do the things that Jesus has done and who also spoke of new creation.  Scripture tells us everything we need to know about who Jesus is as God the Son become the man Jesus.  Scripture and centuries of theology can help us to understand that as Jesus of Nazareth God has done something new, reality changing new, in fact physical reality changing new.  The empirical or experimental basis of Jesus’ resurrection can be proven in Christian community, but ultimately it waits for the day of resurrection when in Christ all will be made to live.

To close, we have several weeks of Easter to talk about the meaning of Easter, but on this day, Easter Sunday, in this day and time the one thing that we must boldly proclaim is that Jesus Christ, the incarnate Son of God, was in fact bodily raised from the dead.  Proper science does not and should not have a problem with this.  In fact, proper scientific method is a good way to apprehend this new thing that God has done.  This is what we call theology.  To apprehend Jesus and his resurrection we must be open to what he himself, Scripture, and Christian witness has to say about him.  We need to ask and explore the questions that arise, particularly the who question.  We need to be open to the one who created this universe and gave it a knowable rational order and welcome the fact that as Jesus he has entered into it and is healing it.  Amen.

The New and Living Way

Hebrews 10:16-25

Why is this day called Good when we are remembering such horrible things that happened?  Well, it was on this day that a new and living way was opened to God.  It was on this day that death itself was put to death.  This is why we call it Good. We cannot understand how this is, but we do know its after effect – we have become participants in the divine nature as Peter writes in his 2^nd epistle 1:4.  This means that the Holy Spirit is present with us and at work in us making us to be more like Jesus in our character and actions proving the love of God the Father.  The wrath of God that humanity deserved to have poured upon us has in God’s great love become God pouring himself out upon humanity to heal us.  I can’t explain how this happened so that we can understand what happened when death and God met when Jesus the incarnate Son of God died on the cross.  But we do have an analogy from nature to help us visualize it – the black hole. 

At the heart of every galaxy in the universe that is of any size is a supper-massive black hole.  Black holes form when stars burnout their fuel and collapse to become neutron stars and then some of these collapse even further until gravity just becomes so powerful that not even light can escape this thing that looks like a perfectly spherical black hole.  On every black hole is a point of no return known as the event horizon.  Things get weird at this point.

If you were falling into a black hole, the closer you get to the event horizon space and time (spacetime) will begin to warp.  For you, you wouldn’t notice this warping.  It would seem like, “blip, I’m gone”.  It would be all over in less than an instant.  But for someone watching you fall into the black hole, it gets spooky.  Space warps.  Seeing you fall feet-first we watch you begin to stretch feet-first.  Your feet and legs begin to elongate as your head stays the same.  The distance between your subatomic particles begins to expand as gravity pulls them apart until you finally disintegrate into basic particles; like a balloon expanding until it pops.

All the while you would start to orbit around the black hole ever faster approaching the speed of light and this causes time to warp.  For us watching, the closer you get to the speed of light the slower time appears to go and the effect of this is that we would never see you or your particles pass the event horizon and go on into the black hole.  If we could talk to you, the sound of your voice would be slower and deeper.  It would take years to nearly forever for a mere sound to come to us while you would experience yourself talking normally. 

Once in the black hole, who knows?  Like death we have no idea what goes on in there.  But amazingly, as you can see in this doctored up picture spewing forth from the black whole is a jet stream of matter that shoots across the galaxy seeding it with the stuff that stars need to come into life and for planets to form.  Without black holes our universe would not exist, life would not exist.  Though black holes seem like the death of everything they make new life possible.

 Thinking about the Christian faith in these terms, the great mystery of the Christian faith is that God the Son who became human as Jesus of Nazareth has somehow experienced death himself when Jesus died on the “black hole” of the cross.  God the Father and God the Holy Spirit somehow suffered the death of God the Son.  These are things too big for this small mind to comprehend.  Thinking pastorally, it is helpful to know that God the Trinity knows in his very self what it is to die and even to loose a child to death.  But, death is not the end.  Let us not forget that resurrection was forth-coming for God the Son because death could not hold him.  The result of death encountering God in the super massive black hole of the cross was that the life of God expressed itself in the resurrection of Jesus, God the Son still incarnate but now in resurrected flesh.  He has gone through death and come out the other side.  Moreover, the Holy Spirit spews the life of Jesus’ resurrected humanity forth upon us and into us like the matter stream that inexplicably jets forth from black holes and seeds galaxies with the stuff of which stars and planets and everything else are made. But for now, this Holy Spirit stream of new life in Christ brings forth his life in us until Jesus comes again to make all things new.

John gave us a very graphic image of this when that Roman soldier pierced Jesus’ side and water and blood began to spew forth upon him.  This is what is happening to humanity and all of the creation now since God the Son has died and risen.  We are being flooded with the life of God and are being recreated to bear forth the living image of Christ Jesus and his self-giving love.  God the Trinity has written upon our hearts a new covenant, a new and living way of coming to him and of living in response to him.

The way of this new life isn’t for us to simply pick ourselves up by our bootstraps and simply be good people who live according to higher standards of morality and altruism.  No, rather it is that we live forth from the new life of faith, hope, and unconditional love that we find in God's continual presence with us bearing our old life away into the black hole of the cross and transforming us with Jesus’ resurrected life.  Jesus' once and for all death has made it possible for us to be a part of God's now and forever life-giving, person-restoring work as we listen to Jesus with ears made alive by the Holy Spirit whom he has poured into us making us able to trust and to follow him. 

Unlike death is for us, Jesus' death had a purpose.  It was a purposeful death.  But, we still have the capacity to void his death of its purpose.  When we let go of our hope and cease trying to discern and follow his guidance in the acts of love and good that the Trinity wants us to do with the new life he has given to us we make Jesus' death meaningless.  When we turn our backs on each other and let hate, unforgiveness, and disunity into our communities of faith we make his death to be in vain.  When we cease to encourage and love one another and rather gossip and lie and ignore one another, we have done nothing less than crucified our Jesus once again.  Friends, for Jesus’ sake live your new life before the Triune God of grace in the new and living way, the way that is steeped in prayer, worshipping and rejoicing always, studying and meditating upon the Scriptures, turning from selfish ambitions and narcissistic tendencies to love everyone unconditionally no matter who or what they are.  Jesus, God the Son become a man and died in order to write a new and living way of being in relationship with God and one another onto our hearts.  Yet, God raised him and through him all things are being made new according to his image.  Such is the new and living way he has given us.  This is reality.  Live accordingly.  Amen.

There's Something Hidden in All This

In Luke’s Gospel we cannot simply read the Triumphal Entry passage and wave our palms and sing “Hosanna”.  Luke nestles the event in a sermon of his own.  He bookends it so nicely between Jesus telling his disciples for a third time that he will die in Jerusalem and the conspiring to kill him that goes on after he cleanses the temple of the vendors and moneylenders who were making big business out of Israelite faith.  We cannot ignore Luke’s sermon here for it is a powerful one.  So, this morning instead of a sermon of my own I will simply walk us through Luke’s sermon and make a few comments as we go.  Hopefully, we’ll see that Luke has hidden some things in here for us to find and understand.

Luke 18:31-34

³¹ Then he took the twelve aside and said to them, “See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and everything that is written about the Son of Man by the prophets will be accomplished. ³² For he will be handed over to the Gentiles; and he will be mocked and insulted and spat upon. ³³ After they have flogged him, they will kill him, and on the third day he will rise again.” ³⁴ But they understood nothing about all these things; in fact, what he said was hidden from them, and they did not grasp what was said.^[1]

I rarely take my children to the grocery store.  It’s just too stressful.  When I do, I’ve learned that it is good to tell them what to expect before going in. I usually start with “Listen up” and then I go on to list a few things they are not to do and then I tell them there will be a rewrd in it for them if they are good.  

Well, Jesus is doing this here with his disciples before heading to Jerusalem.  He gives them the “listen up.  This is what the Scriptures say will happen to me.”  Then, he lists for them seven things the Old Testament mentions will happen to him, the Son of Man.  

Now, if you know anything about numbers in the Bible, seven is a significant number.  So also, the seventh in a series of seven is important.  Like the seven days of creation culminating with the Sabbath rest of God.  In like manner here, six things bad will happen to Jesus.  He will be handed over to the Gentiles, mocked, insulted, spat upon, flogged, and killed.  The seventh thing is unimaginable: he will rise from the dead.  Hiding at the end of this list of six bad things is a good thing; Jesus will rise from the dead.  Death will be defeated.

The disciples didn’t get any of this. In fact, Luke says it was hidden from them.  They were expecting Jesus just go to town and take over just like everyone believed the Messiah was supposed to do and…they will take their thrones beside him.  That’s the way Matthew and Mark present it but it won’t happen that way.

Moving on to our next passage, Jesus approaches Jericho and a blind man sees something about him that the religious authorities in Jerusalem can’t see.

Luke 18:35-43

³⁵ As he approached Jericho, a blind man was sitting by the roadside begging. ³⁶ When he heard a crowd going by, he asked what was happening. ³⁷ They told him, “Jesus of Nazareth is passing by.” ³⁸ Then he shouted, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” ³⁹ Those who were in front sternly ordered him to be quiet; but he shouted even more loudly, “Son of David, have mercy on me!” ⁴⁰ Jesus stood still and ordered the man to be brought to him; and when he came near, he asked him, ⁴¹ “What do you want me to do for you?” He said, “Lord, let me see again.” ⁴² Jesus said to him, “Receive your sight; your faith has saved you.” ⁴³ Immediately he regained his sight and followed him, glorifying God; and all the people, when they saw it, praised God.^[2]

This blind man made a very annoying spectacle of himself.  Shouting repeatedly as loud as he could “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me.”  “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me.”  “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me.”  “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me.”  The people told him to shut up. But this blind man knew who Jesus was and what Jesus could do and he was not going to let this opportunity to see again pass him by.  He got Jesus’ attention. Jesus stopped and called for him and asked what he wanted him to do for him.  “Lord, let me see again.”  Jesus restored his sight.

The blind man had faith.  It takes faith to see the hidden things of God.  Faith is knowing who Jesus is and knowing his reign is one of powerful restoration of life.  Faith is what leads to and results from what happens when our Risen Lord meets us with the power of his resurrection and gives us a taste of new life in him. 

Next, Jesus enters Jericho and there he finds a wee little man, a tax collected named Zacchaeus who has climbed a tree to be able to see him.

Luke 19:1-10

¹He entered Jericho and was passing through it. ² A man was there named Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was rich. ³ He was trying to see who Jesus was, but on account of the crowd he could not, because he was short in stature. ⁴ So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree to see him, because he was going to pass that way. ⁵ When Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said to him, “Zacchaeus, hurry and come down; for I must stay at your house today.” ⁶ So he hurried down and was happy to welcome him. ⁷ All who saw it began to grumble and said, “He has gone to be the guest of one who is a sinner.” ⁸ Zacchaeus stood there and said to the Lord, “Look, half of my possessions, Lord, I will give to the poor; and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back four times as much.” ⁹ Then Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because he too is a son of Abraham. ¹⁰ For the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost.”^[3]

“Zacchaeus, you come down, for I’m coming to your house today; for I’m coming to your house today.”  Zacchaeus climbed down and welcomed Jesus. But, everybody else, (disciples included I guess) began to grumble because they knew what kind of a man Zacchaeus was, a greedy little power hungry tax collector who was lord of his own little manor.  Yet, something moved Zacchaeus, he stood there and said to the Lord, “Listen up.” Just like Jesus said to his disciples earlier.  He gave half of everything he had to the poor and promised that if he had defrauded anyone he would pay them back four times over.  In turn, Jesus says, “Today salvation has come to this house.”

Salvation!  Salvation is what happens when Jesus’ Kingdom manifests here on earth.  Zacchaeus’ giving to the poor and making right on his wrongs in response to being in Jesus’ presence was salvation.  God’s Kingdom come here on earth as it is in Heaven.  If we think of salvation mearly in terms of “me going to Heaven when I die”, then the Gospel that Jesus  himself proclaimed, that “the Kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe this Gospel”, remains hidden to us.

 Finding himself summonsed by and in the presence of the Lord Jesus, in the presence of God, Zacchaeus did something that Israel was supposed to do every 50^th year but didn’t because of greed and powerlusting. He enacted the year of Jubilee as best he could.  Every 50^th year was to be the year of Jubilee in Israel.  Lands lost to debt were supposed to be returned to their tribal holdings. Israelites enslaved by other Israelites we’re to be set free.  But, there is no record anywhere that ancient Israel ever did this.  But the early church in Jerusalem did as best as it could.  The Book of Acts 2:43-47 says: “Awe came upon everyone, because many wonders and signs were being done by the apostles.  All who believed were together and had all things in common; they would sell their possessions and goods and distribute the proceeds to all, as any had need.  Day by day, as they spent much time together in the temple, they broke bread at home and ate their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having the goodwill of all the people. And day by day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved.”^[4] That’s what salvation looks like.  This is what we can expect when Jesus returns and we are raised from the dead and he puts things to rights just as it happened with Zacchaeus.

Well, sometimes small acts say big things.  Let us take a moment now to point towards salvation.  Please greet one another with the peace of Christ.

Let us return to Luke and take a look at the Parable of the Ten Pounds.  It is similar to the Parable of the Talents, but don’t mistake it for being the same.  As we read it keep in mind Zacchaeus and what he did.

Luke 19:11-28

¹¹ As they were listening to this, he went on to tell a parable, because he was near Jerusalem, and because they supposed that the kingdom of God was to appear immediately. ¹² So he said, “A nobleman went to a distant country to get royal power for himself and then return. ¹³ He summoned ten of his slaves, and gave them ten pounds, and said to them, ‘Do business with these until I come back.’ ¹⁴ But the citizens of his country hated him and sent a delegation after him, saying, ‘We do not want this man to rule over us.’ ¹⁵ When he returned, having received royal power, he ordered these slaves, to whom he had given the money, to be summoned so that he might find out what they had gained by trading. ¹⁶ The first came forward and said, ‘Lord, your pound has made ten more pounds.’ ¹⁷ He said to him, ‘Well done, good slave! Because you have been trustworthy in a very small thing, take charge of ten cities.’ ¹⁸ Then the second came, saying, ‘Lord, your pound has made five pounds.’ ¹⁹ He said to him, ‘And you, rule over five cities.’ ²⁰ Then the other came, saying, ‘Lord, here is your pound. I wrapped it up in a piece of cloth, ²¹ for I was afraid of you, because you are a harsh man; you take what you did not deposit, and reap what you did not sow.’ ²² He said to him, ‘I will judge you by your own words, you wicked slave! You knew, did you, that I was a harsh man, taking what I did not deposit and reaping what I did not sow? ²³ Why then did you not put my money into the bank? Then when I returned, I could have collected it with interest.’ ²⁴ He said to the bystanders, ‘Take the pound from him and give it to the one who has ten pounds.’ ²⁵ (And they said to him, ‘Lord, he has ten pounds!’) ²⁶ ‘I tell you, to all those who have, more will be given; but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away. ²⁷ But as for these enemies of mine who did not want me to be king over them—bring them here and slaughter them in my presence.’”^[5]

This is not a parable about what we do with our time, talent, and money.  It is a parable about what we do with Jesus in our midst, what we do with his Kingdom in our midst, what we do with the Holy Spirit in our midst.  I asked you earlier to keep Zacchaeus in mind as we read this parable. The return on the pound is salvation like Zacchaeus enacted it.  Zacchaeus’ actions are representative of having a ten-fold or a five-fold return on the pound of the Kingdom of God the Jesus has placed in the midst of his churches by the power and presence of the Holy Spirit.

Jesus has entrusted to us, his slaves, a pound of his kingdom.  He entrusts a pound of his kingdom to every fellowship of his disciples.  We are to do as Zacchaeus and the early church did and bring forth a return on his pound.  We are to enact salvation even right here in this community.  We must take up the Godly mission, the Kingdom of God mission of bringing real, tangible salvation to this community. That’s what the early church did. We must do it too. It is costly. It is risky.  Hiding ourselves behind church walls is only taking that pound that Jesus has entrusted to us and wrapping it up in a cloth to keep it hidden.  If we are not focused on Jesus’ mission to bring his kingdom to this community, then it is likely we’re really not focused on Jesus.  Let us read on.

Luke 19:29-40

²⁹ When he had come near Bethphage and Bethany, at the place called the Mount of Olives, he sent two of the disciples, ³⁰ saying, “Go into the village ahead of you, and as you enter it you will find tied there a colt that has never been ridden. Untie it and bring it here. ³¹ If anyone asks you, ‘Why are you untying it?’ just say this, ‘The Lord needs it.’ ” ³² So those who were sent departed and found it as he had told them. ³³ As they were untying the colt, its owners asked them, “Why are you untying the colt?” ³⁴ They said, “The Lord needs it.” ³⁵ Then they brought it to Jesus; and after throwing their cloaks on the colt, they set Jesus on it. ³⁶ As he rode along, people kept spreading their cloaks on the road. ³⁷ As he was now approaching the path down from the Mount of Olives, the whole multitude of the disciples began to praise God joyfully with a loud voice for all the deeds of power that they had seen, ³⁸ saying, “Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!  Peace in heaven, and glory in the highest heaven!” ³⁹ Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, order your disciples to stop.” ⁴⁰ He answered, “I tell you, if these were silent, the stones would shout out.”^[6]

So, leaving Jericho Jesus enters Jerusalem like a king.  His followers praise and welcome him as they would King.  It’s loud.  Some of the Pharisees ask Jesus to order his disciples to stop.  It is likely they are afraid that this will start a revolt and the Romans will crack down.  Jesus’ response to them is that in a word is that these people are giving voice to what all of creation is doing right now as he heads into Jerusalem to take his victory over sin and death.  Yet, as he gets closer to Jerusalem he begins to weep because Jerusalem does not recognize what is happening.  Who he is as the Son of God incarnate and what he has come to do is hidden from them.

Luke 19:41-44

⁴¹ As he came near and saw the city, he wept over it, ⁴² saying, “If you, even you, had only recognized on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. ⁴³ Indeed, the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up ramparts around you and surround you, and hem you in on every side. ⁴⁴ They will crush you to the ground, you and your children within you, and they will not leave within you one stone upon another; because you did not recognize the time of your visitation from God.”^[7]

In 70 A.D. the Romans leveled Jerusalem and destroyed the temple.  Why?  They did not recognize the day that God visited them.  Why were these things hidden from them?  They didn’t repent and believe Jesus’ Gospel that the Kingdom of God was at hand.  Why?

Luke 19:45-48

⁴⁵ Then he entered the temple and began to drive out those who were selling things there; ⁴⁶ and he said, “It is written, ‘My house shall be a house of prayer’; but you have made it a den of robbers.”

⁴⁷ Every day he was teaching in the temple. The chief priests, the scribes, and the leaders of the people kept looking for a way to kill him; ⁴⁸ but they did not find anything they could do, for all the people were spellbound by what they heard.^[8]

 Instead of repenting, the people of God held onto their greed and powerlust.  They didn’t do as Zacchaeus had done.  There was no Jubilee when Jesus came to Jerusalem; only a cleansing of the the Temple.  The Greek word for repent literally means “becoming with-minded” or changing your mind to be of one mind with another.  One of my former New Testament teachers, Jack Kingsbury, said repentence was “thinking the things of God rather than the things of man”.  The people of God were not thinking the things of God.  They were instead, making wealth on them.

Friends, the Kingdom of God is at hand!  But, what will we do with it?  Jesus is here!  He has summonsed us down from our lofty perches of pride and has welcomed himself into our houses.  We’ve sung our “hosanna’s”.  Well and good.  But what about that pound he has entrusted to us?  Amen.

---

^[1] The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. 1989 (Lk 18:31–34). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.

^[2] The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. 1989 (Lk 18:35–43). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.

^[3] The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. 1989 (Lk 19:1–10). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.

^[4] The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. 1989 (Ac 2:43–47). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.

^[5] The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. 1989 (Lk 19:11–27). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.

^[6] The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. 1989 (Lk 19:29–40). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.

^[7] The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. 1989 (Lk 19:41–44). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.

^[8] The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. 1989 (Lk 19:45–48). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.

Getting Personal with Jesus

John 12:1-8

“What a friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and griefs to bear; what a privilege to carry everything to God in prayer… can we find a friend so faithful, who will all our sorrow share?  Jesus knows our every weakness: take it to the Lord in prayer.”  You all know that hymn, right?  What a Friend We Have in Jesus…many people regard it as kind of cheesy, Sunday school-ish, old-fashioned…whatever, but it’s spot on in getting the message across that Jesus is our friend who wants to share every detail our lives with us, even and indeed certainly the sinful and broken parts of us.  He is our friend.

As he is our friend the appropriate way to deal with Jesus is relationally – to have a relationship with him.  Get personal with Jesus.  Our relationship with Jesus is at the heart of the Christian faith.  Relationships require communication and being present with one another.  This is what’s behind the emphasis on prayer in What a Friend We Have in Jesus.  But, if I were to offer a critique of that hymn it’s that it doesn’t say anything about him being present with us in through the Holy Spirit.  He is indeed present with us when we pray.  We are certainly not launching prayers off into space as if they were some sort of message in a bottle.  He is present and hears our every care.

But more on this relationship stuff, Timothy and I have been reading a book for Lent by one of my doctoral supervisors, Andrew Purves, called “The Crucifixion of Ministry”.  Right up front in the book Dr. Purves points out that we tend to deal with Jesus functionally rather than relationally or personally.  We do this when we approach Jesus from the perspective of the questions of how? and what? rather than the question who?  Let me deal with the who? question first.

The most important question we have to deal with in life is the question Paul asked Jesus when Jesus confronted him on the Road to Damascus.  If you remember, Paul was going from Jerusalem to Damascus to round up Christians to bring them back to Jerusalem to be tried for blasphemy.  Jesus stops him and confronts him as to why Paul is persecuting him personally by means of persecuting his folowers.  Paul’s response was “Who are you, Lord?”  There’s only one person a faithful Jew such as Paul is going to address as “Lord” – the Lord God of Israel.  So, Paul knows that it is God himself who is confronting him.  Jesus answers him, “I am Jesus whom you are persecuting.”  Jesus is the Lord.

  That question “Who are you, Lord?” or “Who are you, Jesus?” is the way we come to Jesus.  It’s personal.  It is seeking to come to know him, to know who he is, to know him as friend and brother, to know his character, his nature, to know what drives him…and to share in his relationship with God the Father by our union with him in the God the Holy Spirit which culminates in our coming to know ourselves as beloved children of God.  This question draws us into a lifelong prayerful conversation with Jesus to discover who he is and he will, in the power and presence of the Holy Spirit reveal himself and the Father to us.  Asking “Who are you, Jesus?” is how we come to Jesus and his personal answer to that question utterly transforms us at the core of our being making us to be like him.

Let me take another direction here for it is sometimes easier to ponder what something is by saying what it is not.  The flip side of the who? question is the how? and the what? questions.  It is very easy for us to deal with Jesus functionally rather than personally with the how? and what? questions.  The how? question deals primarily with how we go about being a Christian.  It focuses in on our behavior.  It sees Jesus as simply being an example, the prime example, for the way we ought to be.  Jesus the great Moral Teacher.  The problem here is that we set aside getting to know Jesus personally and reduce the Christian faith simply to doing what we think Jesus would do.  It’s the WWJD – What Would Jesus Do – way of being a Christian.  Behavior matters, uprightness matters, but we do not come to know who Jesus is by simply being good people.

The what? question deals more with doctrine, with beliefs.  This is the route of Fundamentalism.  As long as we believe the right doctrines about Jesus we will be “the” true disciples.  But, we do not come to know Jesus by believing the correct things about him.  You can go to my blog page and read my biography and my sermons, but you won’t get me.  So it is with Jesus.  We can read about him, but we don’t get to now him. Just believing stuff about Jesus doesn’t give us Jesus.

Since we are sharing the Lord’s Supper today let’s take a look at our passage from John where his disciples are gathered around the table with him.  There we find a contrast between friendship with Jesus and functionalism.  Jesus is in Bethany at his friends’ house, the home of Lazarus, Martha, and Mary.  They were his friends.  How did they relate to him?

Lazarus is the one Jesus raised from the dead.  He was stinking in the tomb dead and Jesus brought him back.  So it is today that you will find among the friends of Jesus gathered around this table people who have had dramatic, traumatic life changes at the hands of Jesus.  Healing of mind, body, and spirit by which we have discovered new life in Jesus Christ by the power of his Spirit.  As Paul said we’ve come to know Christ and the power of his resurrections.

Martha too is there waiting on Jesus, indeed ministering to Jesus in his very real need to eat.  In Luke’s Gospel Martha gets a bum wrap for being a busybody.  But that’s not the case here.  She is as attentive to Jesus as Mary is.  So it is today that you will find among the friends of Jesus gathered around this table people who humbly serve Jesus by ministering to the very real needs of people not just needs for food and drink but by giving comfort in grief, friendship in loneliness, speaking the truth in love.  In our ministering in humble compassion to one another and to others not in this church we minister to Jesus himself.

And there’s Mary, the devoted one, the one who loves Jesus extravagantly.  She loves Jesus and of all the people at the table that night she is the only one who understands what’s going to happen to him in Jerusalem.  So she takes a bottle of perfume that she bought to anoint Jesus’ body after his death – pure, costly nard, worth 300 days wages – and she pours it out on Jesus’ feet and dries them with her hair.  Let’s not mistake this as something other than a very warm, tender, and affectionate display of hospitality shown to someone she deeply loved and admired who was a guest in her house.  This is a foot washing a step above even the foot washing Jesus would give his disciples on the night that he was betrayed. 

In the other Gospels when this anointing story comes up Jesus says that wherever the Gospel is proclaimed it will be told what Mary had done.  The reason is that this is what love for Jesus looks like when you feel it.  John says the whole room smelled of perfume.  This is symbolic for saying the Holy Spirit permeated the room, permeated this friendship with Jesus.  Friends, the Holy Spirit is here with us gathered around the table.  Jesus is here.

And there at this feast of love for Jesus sits Judas, Judas the betrayer, Judas the thief.  He sees this extravagant display of love and he simply cannot handle it and he starts to talk like Satan, the accuser, “Why wasn’t this perfume sold and the money given to the poor.”  He didn’t really care about the poor. Nor does it seem that he even cared about the principle of it all.  He just wanted the money.  He apparently had the right answer to the how? question.  He was following Jesus just like the other eleven disciples.  Doing his part.  He had apparently the right answer to the what? question.  He was following Jesus because it appeared that Jesus was the Messiah.  But it appears that Judas never got personal with Jesus.  It just seems he did not get WHO Jesus is, and the great love that Jesus had for him.  Judas didn’t catch a glimpse of that until he realized that he had betrayed Jesus over to death and he couldn’t handle that.  He killed himself.

Friends, let us not forget that Jesus welcomed even Judas at his table. The first thing Jesus has to reveal to us each, the first thing he has to reveal to us about himself today is that we are welcome at his table even if we have a little or a lot of Judas in us.  Come to the feast at his table, you friends of Jesus.  Come.  He is here.  And by the powerful working of the Holy Spirit may you get a taste of who he is.  Amen.

Where's My Party?

Luke 15:1-32

One popular approach to life these days is what I call the myth of “life strategy”.  Go figure out what you want in life, decide what you’re willing to do to get it, and go get it.  A few decades ago the question was what do you want to do with or in your retirement.  But, now things are more immediate.  What do we want now in life and what are we willing to do to get it and do we have the courage to go and get it.  Now before going on and dealing with this parable which I would rather call The Parable of the Dysfunctional Family, take a moment to think about your life strategy.  What do you want in life and what would you be willing to do to get it?  Or, to be more true to context here what did you want in life and did you do what it took to go and get.  Did you follow your "life strategy"?

I think those questions are at the heart of this parable.  There are two sons here and what they want in life is their inheritance.  They want their father’s estate.  Now, what are they willing to do for it?  Well, the younger, he realizes that he is never going to have it as good as his older brother.  In their way of doing things back then the oldest son got the bulk of the estate.  This younger brother was likely to get his own little corner of it and as long as he hung around and did what his brother said he’d get a share of the profits.  But apparently, being a glorified slave in his brother’s yard wasn’t good enough.  He wanted his own digs.  He wanted to see the world.  So what is he willing to do to get what he wants?  Well, he is willing to wish his father dead to get that inheritance.  In those days, asking your parents for your inheritance before they died was more than just rude.  It was the same as saying, “You are dead to me.”  But, that’s what he does and for some reason of parental providence the father gives it to him.

The older brother…well, he’s the typical oldest child.  His values are more conservative, more reflective of his parents values.  In his opinion there’s only one way to skin a cat.  The way the parents always did it because that’s what put the money in the bank.  He appears to be of better moral stock.  He honours his father and mother like it says in the good book.  But, let’s not forget something here.  He’s still primarily motivated by that inheritance and in order to get it he is willing to live like a dutiful slave in his father’s house all his life never to see the world.  “Yes, Father” this and “Yes, Father” that.  I'm guessing it must have been a big estate for these boys to carry on this way.

Well, we know how this one plays out.  The younger brother, driven by his passions, wants to live life to its fullest - have it all now.  He’s your typical youngest child.  He’s basically a spoiled brat who’s learned that there’s more than one way to skin a cat...but he’s got to go procure his own cat to prove it.  He rudely demands and surprisingly gets his inheritance and then leaves the estate and sets out to be “King of the World”.  But for every Titanic, there is an iceberg.  The money runs out and he soon hits rock bottom.  It gets bad.  This young man, this young Jewish man, winds up feeding the pigs of a Gentile, a non-Jew.  Jews back then concidered pigs and Gentiles as untouchables.  What’s even worse he winds up envying the pigs for the food they eat. 

So there he is.  He’s lost everything…except his will to get what he wants by weaselly doing what he can to get it.  So, he considers his options and comes up with a new life strategy.  Basically, “Dad will bail me out.  I’ll just go back and say I’m sorry and offer myself as a servant in his house.  He can’t say no.  I’m his son.”  That’s his plan but what’s missing is genuine remorse.  Contrary to popular belief, he is not sorry.  He’s just hungry and looking to do what he can to survive and so he’s just going to tuck his tail into a bowl of obsequiousness and go home to his father.

He goes home looking like death warmed over and what a surprise he gets.  The Father sees him coming.  He’d probably been waiting for this moment since the boy left, preoccupied with it, knowing what was going to happen.  Parents are like that.  Unexpectedly, the old man filled with compassion starts running across the fields to meet his son.  Culturally speaking, this act was completely out of step.  Yes, his son had come home.  But, remember the boy had at one time wished his father dead.  If his father were to receive him, it should be on a more formal basis.  The father sitting in the front room of the house looking stern and not making eye contact while the son groveled. This prodigal son had done nothing to deserve his father’s welcoming him with such great joy and outpouring of love, nothing.  He starts to rattle off his grovel but what does the Father do?  He cuts the groveling short and ignoring it, he tells the slaves to get a robe, a ring, and some sandles and to go kill a fatted calf and ready a feast for this son who was dead is now alive.  He was lost and now he’s found. 

This moment is Easter morning, my friends.  This is what Jesus wants us to understand about the way that God loves us.  This son returned home expecting to live like a slave but instead winds up feeling his father’s love like he never had before.  The father dresses him and restores his honour and dignity as a son.  He’s done nothing to deserve it.  Yet, the father has raised him from the dead.  I don’t know what your thoughts on God's judging us are but one thing we have to take into consideration is that instead of being punitive or retributive (you get what you deserve), it is in someway rather having to live with the restorative effects of the overwhelming love of God the Father which is beyond our understanding.

Now how about that older brother?  He has lived his whole life like a glorified slave because it was in his “life strategy” to please his father to get what he wanted, which incidentally was the same as what his little brother wanted – you know, his share of that inheritance that his little brother was willing to wish his father dead for.  This older son had made a life of dutifully going to work that family farm day after day after day after day after day like a slave, never knowing anything more in this life than that plot of land that would be his when his father finally died.  He may not have been wishing his father dead, but he certainly was waiting for it to happen.

The surprising twist in the story is that for all this obedient son has done to please his father he wasn’t content.  He’s done everything his father has asked of him but it seems he has never experienced his father’s joy for him or his father’s love.  So he’s thinking, “Where’s my party?”  He's left to believe there's no party for doing what you’re supposed to do.  There’s no justice if things aren’t fair, right?  His whore-mongering little brother got his honour and dignity restored after his father’s humiliating display of affection like he’d done nothing wrong.  Understandably, he refuses to take part in the celebration.  But unfortunately, his righteous indignation was keeping him from joining in the gracious celebration of family love that his father was having with the younger son…and the slaves too.  This older son was just as lost and distant from his father as was the younger son. 

This time as I have thought through this parable for the umteenth time what hits me is that there was something wrong with that family dynamic.  How could these two sons go through life not knowing their father’s love for them.  Instead of the bond of love, their relationship with the father seemed to be based on a social transaction involving an inheritance.  It’s as if the giving and receiving of the inheritance overshadowed the giving and receiving of love.  Pretty dysfunctional, don’t you think?

Luke uses this parable as a brutal commentary on the religious types in his community who were caught up in a transactional religious system where everything was focused on how well one observed the “commandments, statutes, decrees, and traditions” in order to get God's blessing. Observe them and you get the rewards.  Ignore them, squander your life and there are consequences.  But, this transactional sort of religious system always leads to the more “devout” (if we can call it that) passing judgement on the less “devout” and, in turn, missing the party.

Jesus’ point in this parable is that “tax collectors and sinners” are coming to him because in the fellowship he shares with them they are perceiving the love of God the Father.  A new day has arrived!  The party the Father is throwing for the youngest son returned is the older son’s party too.   A new day has arrived!  Jesus has revealed the love of God the Father to us.  The party is on.  In Christian fellowship we are perceiving God's extravagant love for us.  Here’s our party.  Yes, gathered around the table of our Lord for a simple meal are sinners who are saints and saints who are sinners, but that is not the point.  The point of the party is that the family of God is together, bonded in the love of God…but beware this love.  It will expose you, heal you, restore you.  Give you honour and dignity.  Raise you from the dead.  It’s better than any life strategy we can devise.  Amen.