Sunday, June 7, 2020
Am I a follower of Jesus? Ask yourself that question. Sit with it.
Jesus
doesn’t want believers or admirers. He’s
looking for disciples. He assumes belief
and has no interest in flattery or admiration.
He wants followers. Do I believe Jesus is Lord? Yes? An
I submitting all my plans, ideas, words, thoughts, and actions to Him? With these questions, examine your own life.
Now, ask this. What brings glory to the Heavenly
Father? In Matthew 5, Jesus is giving
his most well-known message, the Sermon on the Mount. In this message he says “Let your light shine
before others, so that they may see your good works, and give glory to your
Father in heaven” (5:16). What brings
glory to God?
In historic moments, like our
current times, Biblical truth gets hijacked by partisanship and identity
politics. What brings glory to God? Christians rattle off things they think don’t
bring glory to God.
Antifa and violent protests and
looting don’t bring glory to God.
Police officers using deadly chokeholds
against unarmed, subdued suspects, doesn’t bring glory to God.
Abortion doesn’t bring glory to
God. Liberals don’t bring glory to God.
Using the Bible for a photo op doesn’t
bring glory to God.
Shutting down the economy to prevent
the spread of COVID-19 doesn’t bring glory to God.
Re-opening too quickly and risking
everyone’s health doesn’t bring glory to God.
I am pleading with you – don’t do
that. When we shine the light and see
what’s going on, look for what does glorify God? Please, don’t, with the efficiency of an
auctioneer, list your personal political bugaboos, things you think don’t bring
glory to God.
We
avoid opening our hearts to God and being convicted by His Gospel when we blame
others are for failing to live up to Jesus’ teaching. When our response to a question about God’s
will or God’s glory is to immediately critique those with different politics
than ourselves, we don’t allow the red letters – Jesus’ actual teaching – to be
a mirror that exposes the ugly truth about ourselves.
Let
Jesus’ words be a mirror in which you examine your own soul. He said, “Let your light shine before others,
so that they may see your good works, and give glory to your Father in heaven”
(5:16). Where in the world today, in the public square, in our personal lives
is God glorified?
Look
for God in every news story you see. Set
aside the instinct to defend your identity and your national pride. Chances are, the person you’re arguing
against also believes in country, freedom and good. Confronted by God’s word from the mouth of
Jesus, allow yourself to be taken to uncomfortable places. We squirm under God’s glare, but not because God
isn’t loving. God is love. We squirm because in His light, we see
ourselves, we see the world, and we don’t like everything we see. And we know God doesn’t like those parts we
don’t like.
Stanley
Hauerwas calls the Sermon on the Mount a description of the life of a people
gathered around Jesus.[i] Are you among the people gathered Jesus? Before we talk about the devastation of
100,000 COVID-19 deaths, before we talk about the George Floyd choked in a
humiliating, undignified, deadly way, before we talk about Breonna Taylor shot
by police in her home, before we rush to defend the good police officers we
know, before we condemn the bad actors who turn peaceful protests into violent
riots – before all that; examine your heart.
When you imagine the life you’re living, are you a part of those gathered
around Jesus?
Dietrich
Bonhoeffer was a German pastor and a giant among Christian theologians in the
20th century. He opposed
Hitler and was executed in a concentration camp. He could have fled to England or
America. But he stayed to confront evil
and shine the light of Jesus in dark days.
God was glorified on the cross as his son took the sins of the world on
himself and defeated them in his death.
God is glorified as a German disciple of Jesus hangs from a Nazi
rope.
In
his remarks on the Sermon on the Mount, Bonhoeffer said “disciples are summoned
to follow the crucified in the life of grace.”[ii] The words we live by at Hillside are, “We
follow Jesus, love others, and share hope.”
Considering that Jesus said, “Let your light shine before others that
they may see … and give glory to [God]”, and considering that Jesus is the supreme
example of glory in his death on the cross, we accept Bonhoeffer’s vision of
discipleship. When we pledge to follow
Jesus, we put ourselves in eternal debt to the crucified one, and we commit to
spend our lives walking the path he trod.
God was glorified when Bonhoeffer followed Jesus to the noose. God is glorified when we do the same.
We
won’t all be executed, unjustly. But
hopefully, we all see where Jesus is.
Jesus was weeping with George Floyd, gasping with him, sustaining him
for 8 minutes and 46 seconds. As his
followers, that’s where we have to be.
We confront racism, maybe by protesting (peacefully and forcefully),
speaking out against racism, using our platforms to dismantle white privilege
and empower others; maybe we do all these things; always, we show that in Christ,
black, white, and brown are united as a family.
From
our church family, Tim Pressley, a former member, is committed to Jesus, and served
honorably in his law enforcement career.
Carlin Jordan, husband of our former youth pastor, is a black man and a proud,
committed police officer. He honors God
in the way he approaches policing. While
he may be known as Father, Husband, black man, officer, the way Carlin to be
known is as a disciple submitted to the rule of His Lord, Jesus Christ.
When
I insist that following Jesus means following the crucified one and following
the crucified means we stand with George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, with Eric
Garner and Michael Brown, I am not damning the police. Soldiers were among the people gathered around
Jesus. Pharisees, people with disabilities,
and prostitutes were among the people gathered around Jesus. From every corner of society, many ignored
Jesus and mocked his followers, but a few turned to Him, gave themselves to him,
and became disciples.
We
are among the disciples. We obey him and
thus shine our light. Following the
crucified one, we find ourselves embracing the downtrodden, and holding the
hand of the executed. One of the ways we
announce the new age in the coming Kingdom is we fight injustice. Because Jesus has come, a new reality is
actually breaking in, invading our current fallen, dying world.
Attending
rallies and writing a letter to a congressman are good works, social actions
anyone of any faith could take. We
follow Jesus, and therefore love others, and in our love of others and in the
promise of salvation, we share hope. Our
solidarity with the poor and the persecuted is Gospel work when we draw people
to Jesus.
Within
our community, we tell a story that’s better than the violent one news outlets
constantly repeat. Ours is a story of
love, told in the ways we love each other, welcome others in, and help the
world around us. In this kind of story,
we give extra love and attention to those who hurt the most.
My
family gave me sympathy and space and extra doses of kindness in the days right
after my ankle surgery. They didn’t do
that because I matter more than other family members. They did it because I was hurting. Their love told a beautiful story.
Over
the course of this past week, I reached out to my friends who might be
especially hurt by what happened to Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, and George
Floyd. I called, texted, or emailed
friends who understand the pain more deeply than me. I contacted a dozen of my black friends. Some got back to me, happy that I reached
out. Great! Some didn’t need to hear from or talk to a
white guy at that moment. They ignored
me. That’s OK too. I was pretty sure I’d find Jesus in the tears
of my black friends. All tears matter,
but Jesus sits in the tears of broken people.
I wanted to be near him so that’s where I went.
Look
around the world. Look at our community. Look at your life.
Are
you summoned to follow the crucified one?
When
the light shines, is God glorified in you?
Where
do you see Jesus? Will you join him
there?
AMEN
[i] S.
Hauerwas (2006), Brazos Theological Commentary on the Bible: Matthew,
Brazos Press (Grand Rapids), p.61.
[ii]
D. Bonhoeffer (1963), The Cost of Discipleship, MacMillan Publishing
Company (New York), p.129.
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