Palm Sunday, March 28, 2021

 

watch - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f046idqOIt4

 

11 When they were approaching Jerusalem, at Bethphage and Bethany, near the Mount of Olives, he sent two of his disciples ² and said to them, “Go into the village ahead of you, and immediately as you enter it, you will find tied there a colt that has never been ridden; untie it and bring it. ³ If anyone says to you, ‘Why are you doing this?’ just say this, ‘The Lord needs it and will send it back here immediately.’” ⁴ They went away and found a colt tied near a door, outside in the street. As they were untying it, ⁵ some of the bystanders said to them, “What are you doing, untying the colt?” ⁶ They told them what Jesus had said; and they allowed them to take it. ⁷ Then they brought the colt to Jesus and threw their cloaks on it; and he sat on it. ⁸ Many people spread their cloaks on the road, and others spread leafy branches that they had cut in the fields. ⁹ Then those who went ahead and those who followed were shouting,

“Hosanna!

    Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord!

¹⁰     Blessed is the coming kingdom of our ancestor David!

Hosanna in the highest heaven!”

¹¹ Then he entered Jerusalem and went into the temple; and when he had looked around at everything, as it was already late, he went out to Bethany with the twelve.

¹² On the following day, when they came from Bethany, he was hungry. ¹³ Seeing in the distance a fig tree in leaf, he went to see whether perhaps he would find anything on it. When he came to it, he found nothing but leaves, for it was not the season for figs. ¹⁴ He said to it, “May no one ever eat fruit from you again.” And his disciples heard it.

¹⁵ Then they came to Jerusalem. And he entered the temple and began to drive out those who were selling and those who were buying in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold doves; ¹⁶ and he would not allow anyone to carry anything through the temple. ¹⁷ He was teaching and saying, “Is it not written,

‘My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations’?

    But you have made it a den of robbers.”

¹⁸ And when the chief priests and the scribes heard it, they kept looking for a way to kill him; for they were afraid of him, because the whole crowd was spellbound by his teaching. ¹⁹ And when evening came, Jesus and his disciples^[a] went out of the city.

The Lesson from the Withered Fig Tree

²⁰ In the morning as they passed by, they saw the fig tree withered away to its roots. ²¹ Then Peter remembered and said to him, “Rabbi, look! The fig tree that you cursed has withered.” ²² Jesus answered them, “Have^[b] faith in God. ²³ Truly I tell you, if you say to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and thrown into the sea,’ and if you do not doubt in your heart, but believe that what you say will come to pass, it will be done for you. ²⁴ So I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received^[c] it, and it will be yours.

²⁵ “Whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone; so that your Father in heaven may also forgive you your trespasses.”^[d]

 

 

            They came to the outskirts of Jerusalem and Jesus gave an instruction.  “As you go into the village, untie a donkey at a certain house and bring it back.  If anyone asks why you are taking a donkey that doesn’t belong to you, tell them, ‘the Lord needs it.’”  They followed Jesus’ instructions and as he indicated, someone asked about the donkey.  They responded as he said they should, and they were allowed to take the donkey. 

I have a thick sermon file on Mark 11.  Each Gospel has a version of Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem, but even alternating from one gospel to another, after 20 plus years, I have looked at Mark 11 quite often.  This week, following a simple ‘A-B’ pattern helped me walk through this story in scripture.  I don’t mean to prescribe this as the only way to analyze a passage.  Systematic theology and critical study of Biblical texts are useful, unless these approaches are overdone and given exclusive voice.  The Bible is a living word that speaks afresh in our lives. When we read, come with our own experiences and the Bible speaks into those experiences.  So, I offer this A-B pattern as one of many possible pathways into this passage, understanding that the Bible is under no obligation to conform to patterns imposed upon it.

Part A is a divine action.  God does something. In this case, Jesus gives an instruction.  Part B is human response.  In the Mark 11 text, the human response is obedience.  The disciples do exactly what Jesus says to do and it turns out well.  They get the donkey and are able to prepare for Jesus’ ride into Jerusalem.  This simple A-B approach reveals the action of Mark 11, what we now call “Palm Sunday,” as it unfolds.

Through this approach we see what God is doing as Jesus rides into the city on the donkey, the disciples’ garments serving as his saddle blanket.  A raucous crowd greets him on his ride, as if he were a conquering general.  Some were his true followers and had been for quite a while.  Some in the crowd were always watching for the Messiah, hoping he would come with fanfare and drama as he forcefully evicted Rome and re-established the throne of David.  Others lining the road shouting just saw a crowd and decided to join it.

Jesus’ ride into Jerusalem was a divine action, and whatever motivated particular individuals within the crowd, that crowd provided the human response.  In the A-B pattern, God is the initiator and we, those created in his image, respond to what He’s doing, whether we realize it’s God acting or not.

Remember, how fickle the crowd can be.  On this day, they shouted “Hosanna,” which means, “O Lord save us, save us now.”  It’s from Psalm 118, verse 26.  A few days later, the same frenzied crowd would, at the prompting of certain priests and scribes, “Crucify him.”  The popular consciousness is easily manipulated and certainly was in this story.  The “Hosannas” were appropriate, but uttered in short-sighted ignorance.

The crowd hope the Messiah would boot the Romans out while they cheered.  They thought He had come to confront Rome.  They never imagined the Messiah to be God’s own son, through whom God would challenge their own sacrificial system.  That comes out in the next divine act.

Jesus instructed the disciples and the followed instructions; divine act, human response; the A-B pattern.  Jesus rode into Jerusalem and the crowd cheered and worshiped.  Upon arriving, he surveyed the happenings at the temple and then headed back out of the city to their lodgings in Bethany.

The next day, arriving back at the temple, Jesus sees more of what he noted the previous day: what has become the normal daily life in the temple’ outer court.  Jews from around the world want to have their sins atoned for at the temple, so they make a long journey to Jerusalem.  Too burdensome to haul the animal they would sacrifice that distance, instead, they bring money – Roman currency.  The temple will only accept temple currency, so the worshipers have to first visit the money changing station, where they are taken for a ride.  Then, they have to buy an animal so that can participate in worship through sacrifice.  The prices for animals are also marked up.  Priests and money changers get rich while worshipers leave the temple broke.

We see God’s thoughts on this crass greed that taints something holy when Jesus turns over the tables.  That’s the divine act, and I think it was as dramatically disruptive as we might imagine.  He certainly had everyone’s attention when then said, quoting Isaiah 56:7, “My house shall be a house of prayer for all nations, but you – you religious leaders, priests, money changers - you have made it a den for robbers.”

Following our pattern, ‘A,’ is his actions of turning over tables, driving animals, and making this pronouncement.  What is ‘B,’ the human response?  There are two.

Verse 17 says he was teaching.  For one to teach, there must be those who listen and learn.  So, one human response from present was to listen to what Jesus had to say.  We know this because we have the Gospel of Mark.  Someone present wrote down what Jesus said and did, or remembered it and later dictated it to Mark who wrote it.  Paying attention while Jesus talked was one human response to the divine action.

The other comes from the chief priests and scribes.  These were the men – and in those day they indeed were all men – called by God to teach his word, lead in worship, and keep the community on the path to holiness.  These divinely ordained leaders responded to the action of God by looking for a way to kill Jesus.  Mark tells us they were afraid because the crowd was “spellbound by his teaching.”  These leaders feared losing their privileged position, even it they lost it because of an act of God.  They would manipulate that crowd they so feared to turn on Jesus.  God acted, in Jesus’ turning over money tables and condemnation of corruption, and the humans, the leaders anyway, responded out of fear, not faith.

We see three ways of rejecting God’s actions.  First is direct opposition.  This was the reaction of the scribes and leading priests.  The other two ways of rejecting God’ initiatives are seen in American culture today: to ignore Jesus and to reduce Jesus.

Those who ignore Jesus are generally outside the church.  The coming, death, and resurrection of Jesus is God acting to save the world.  But people in the world today don’t seem to care that God did that.  The mother of my daughter’s friend invited her to come to a fun outing.  It was very nice, and this family is wholesome and wonderful and I love them and especially I love how much they care about my daughter.  They invited her to come to an outing on Sunday; Easter Sunday.  Why would they invite a Christian youth to an outing on Easter Sunday?  Easter isn’t the center of their world like it is for a follower of Jesus.  They think to themselves, ‘we’ll distract this Christian and take her was from worship.’  They didn’t think about it at all.  They acted as if God is an afterthought, one option among many for how one invests’ one’s time, energy and thought.  Ignoring God is a way of rejecting God.

The other rejection happens in churches that teach a very limited Christianity.  The coming of Jesus alters reality throughout the cosmos and yet some believers only teach that Christianity is all about an individual going to heaven when he or she dies.  That’s it.  That’s the Gospel. 

Of course, individual salvation is an important part of the Gospel.  I need to reconcile for my sins and the only I can is coming to Jesus in faith and accepting his death for me.  I must do this.  I must receive what He has done.  However, when a pastor or a church teaches only an individual salvation story, they miss and their members miss, the grander story of Jesus dying on the cross to save the world.  There is much, much more going in the death and resurrection of Jesus than simply securing an individual’s personal salvation.  Jesus ushers in a new age.  With his resurrection, new creation has begun.  Churches today that fail to teach this reduce the Gospel.  Reduction of the Gospel is a rejection of God’s action.  It’s the opposite of a faith response.

            A faith response recognizes or at least senses that we need to live in the new creation.  We started out with the disciples obeying Jesus’ instructions to the letter, but prior to crucifixion-resurrection, they were locked into the the old way of thinking.  In Mark 10, the disciples James and John ask Jesus to allow them to sit on his right and left when his sits in glory.  This is rejection of God’s action as Jesus makes clear in his response to their request. 

            The rest of the disciples get furious at the request made by James and John and the group descends into a donnybrook as they argue about greatness.  Elevating our own greatness is not a way to live in the new creation nor is it a faith response to action of God.  Jesus insists that in his kingdom, the leaders serve everyone else. 

            Then he demonstrates this in the closing verses of Mark 10.  Walking to Jerusalem with anxious thoughts of crucifixion on his mind and surrounded by crowds with Messianic stars in their eyes, his progress is blocked by the wailings of blind Bartimaeus.  To be blind in the ancient world was to sit at the bottom of society’s social ladder and others made that clear, telling Bartimaeus to “hush, and stop bothering the teacher.”

            Jesus took a different approach.  He stopped and paid attention to the blind man ignored and overlooked by everyone else.  Bartimaeus’ human response to this divine action was to tell Jesus exactly what he wanted.  He wanted to see again.  In the new creation, God pays attention to everyone, even those ignored and forgotten.  If God loves in that way, then in our human response to God’s love, we ought to love everyone and overlook no one. 

            Throughout the narratives on and around Palm Sunday, we see God act.  Through Jesus God enacts new creation.   We can ignore what God’s doing, or oppose it, or reduce it.  Or, we can respond in faith, and begin living in the new creation.  God has acted.  How will we respond?

AMEN

"The Perfect Priest" (Hebrews 5:1-10)

 

Fourth Sunday of Lent, March 24, 2021

 watch it here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PjbAKdOR7Vo

            A Methodist pastor and two Baptist pastors, along with an Episcopalian priest and a Catholic priest walk into a room.  It’s not the start of a joke.  It’s the people in the prayer group I attended many years ago.  The Catholic priest and I became friends.  Too often, Catholic priests are associated with sexual exploitation scandals.  That wasn’t Father Tuck, my friend.  Sure, he wasn’t perfect.  None of us are.  But he was truly a gentle, humble servant of God, who wouldn’t hurt anyone and did not fit media or movie stereotypes of what priest is.  He is someone I admire.

            What is a priest?  What does a priest do?  We’ll come back to this.

            Before we do, consider something churches did before social distancing: the children’s sermon.  The pastor calls the children around him or her, very close.  The pastor says, “I am going to describe something.  You tell me what it is.  It is green and slimy.  It hops around.  It says, ‘Rib-it.’  What is it?”  He asks, smiling at the children.

            A boy raises his hand and says enthusiastically says, “Jesus!” 

The puzzled pastor looks at the boy and says, “Really?  Are you sure?”

            The boy responds, “Well yeah.  I mean, it sounds like a frog, but we’re in church, so the answer has to be ‘Jesus,’ right?”  That, by the way, was a joke!  But isn’t it always the case?  In church, the answer is always Jesus, right?  Actually, this morning, I am going to propose that, indeed, the answer is Jesus. 

            Inside and outside the church, from the writings of theologians who are devoted believers, and from the works of theologians and Bible scholars who aren’t believers at all, as well as in casual conversation among church goers and church avoiders, the debate about who Jesus is seems to never end.  Who is Jesus in relation to God?  Who is Jesus in relation to us?

            Thus, our invitation to explore our own faith through wrestling these questions: What is a priest, and what does a priest do?  And, who is Jesus?  How do these questions come together, and do they matter?

            Hebrews 5:1 says, “Every high priest chosen from among mortals is put in charge of things pertaining to God on their behalf, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins.”  While the priest in 1^st century Judaism was not equivalent to Catholic, Anglican, and Orthodox priests today, the priestly function is similar.  Offerings had to be made to God because of sin.  Our willingness to disregard God’s ways and try to be masters of our own fate leads to fatal consequences for us.  We need someone in a priestly role to stand between God and our sins.

Sin is the refusal to live the way God intends humans to live.  Sin is doing harm to others.  Sin is seeking one’s own gain at the expense of others.  Sin is seeing people in need and refusing to help, even when we are able to help.  Sin is greed, rage, gossip, gluttony, and deception.  Sin is living as if God’s will doesn’t matter.  Sin is denying that God is Lord and master of our lives.  Self-harm is sin because God has created us for purpose and for relationship.  When we self-harm, we act as if the relationship with God doesn’t matter and as if our lives have no purpose.  God says they do.  Ignoring God is sin because God won’t be ignored.  Hedonism and excess are sins.  God wants us to experience delight, pleasure and extravagance within the limits God sets, and with what God gives as the source of our delight and pleasure. 

The priest brings God’s word to us and approaches God on our behalf.  In Genesis 18, when God is about to destroy two cities, Sodom and Gomorrah, Abraham bargains with God in order to try to save those cities.  In Exodus 32, God threatens to destroy the Israelites in the wilderness because they have created a calf made out of Gold and worshiped it instead of God.  Moses pleads with God on the people’s behalf and God changes God’s mind and does not destroy the people.  Abraham and Moses function in priestly roles standing between a sinful people and a holy God. 

Hebrews 5 tells us this is what the priest does.  However, the priest is no holier than the people   Someone says a priest “is a holy man,” or “a man of God.”  Verses 2-3, however, clearly show that the priest is as sinful and in need of mediation as anyone else.  Hebrews 5 implies that priests and pastors should be the most compassionate of all people, because they themselves are sinners.  God has no patience for pastors and priests who thunder down in judgmental, condemning tones.  We clergy must be patient, gentle, and kind.  We know how much people need God’s grace because we see our own need for it.

So, we have the answer to one of our earlier queries.  What is a priest and what does a priest do?  A priest, or a pastor carrying out a priestly function, stands in the gap between an angry, holy God, and the sins of the people.  The priest prays for the people.  The priest comes before God on behalf of the people. 

What about our second question?  Who is Jesus and what’s he got to do with this conversation about priests?

The dual nature of Jesus – fully human and at the same time fully God – defies understanding.  Hebrews presents all aspects of the paradox.  Hebrews chapter 1 describes Jesus as “the reflection of God’s glory” (v.3) and the one worshiped by angels (v.6).  Psalms 45 and 102 are quoted in Hebrews 1 to explicitly state that the Son is God and Lord.  In other words, the second person of the trinity, Jesus, is fully God. 

At the same time, Hebrews 5 shows that God has become human.  Jesus’s humanity was no illusion which he could step out of at time.  Verse 7 describes his humanity as “the days of his flesh.”  He emptied himself of divinity and lived as a human being (Philippians 2).  Jesus, though, did not sin. 

He never hated anyone, not the religious leaders who challenged him, not Judas the disciple who betrayed him, nor Peter the disciple who denied him.  He loved each one, each Pharisees and temple priest who, feeling threatened by his wisdom, did everything they could to take him down.  He loved all the disciples who abandoned him.  When Herod mocked him, Pilate condemned him, and the Roman soldiers flogged and then crucified him, he asked God the Father to forgive them all (Luke 23:34).  He demonstrated complete obedience to God and absolute love for all people.  Jesus is the only person who never needed a priest.  In this respect, he is not like any of us. 

Jesus never felt the guilt of hurting someone else with a lie, petty jealousy, neglect, greed, or exploitation.  He never coveted what someone else had.  He never acted out his anger with abusive violence.  He never objectified anyone. 

Yet when this sinless one accepted his calling, to be the sacrifice that would atone for humanity’s sin, he feared the abandonment, abuse, death, and separation from God as much as anyone would.  In fact, his grief and fear exceeded what ours would be because he knew God the Father so intimately.  He knew what he was losing, even knowing the resurrection would soon come.  To take all the loss sin brings on himself, even for a few days, was devastating for Jesus.   Hebrews 5:7 says he prayed with “loud cries and tears to the one who was able to save him from death.”  God heard his prayer “because of his reverent submission” (v.7).  God the Father heard Jesus’ plea, loved him, and then let him die.

Jesus asked to be let out of death, but submitted himself to God’s plan.  We read that he “learned obedience through what he suffered; and having been made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him” (5:8).  Did Jesus need to “learn obedience?”  Does God learn things?  Hebrews says, yes, when that God becomes human, he does learn.  Suffering was Jesus’ teacher.  Isn’t God always whatever it is we think God is?  Through the school of pain, Jesus learned the cost of our salvation.  Knowing it, he willingly paid it. 

This is why Jesus is the perfect priest.  With his sacrifice of himself, made on our behalf, we never again need a sacrifice.  Pastors and priests encourage us, pray for us, pray with us, teach the Bible, and lead the faith community.  Pastors and priests have a role in the church.  That role is in service of the perfect priest, Jesus. 

He covers sin and he conquers death.  Moreover, he knows our struggles because he’s been through them.  God the Father appreciates our pain because in order to secure our eternity, He had to accept the death of His beloved son in our place.  God has walked in our shoes. 

For this reason, we can approach God with absolute confidence.  Whatever we carry that holds us down – guilt, loss, regret, broken dreams, disappointment, fear; whatever it is, God in Jesus has overcome it.  We can receive salvation and believe with confidence that we are sons and daughters of God, loved completely by God.  That’s the hope our priest secures for us. 

More than half way through Lent, with Good Friday and Easter on the near horizon, we know the God we worship.  We know the Jesus we follow.  We can grow in our knowledge as we debate finer points of theology, or we can rest easy in the salvation He has secured.  Either way our perfect priest is for us, all the way.  Because of Him, we have life.

            AMEN

Lifted Up (John 3:1-21)

Fourth Sunday of Lent, March 14, 2021

watch here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8lEop4wGho

 

            I thought about comparing the death of Jesus on the cross with the COVID-19 Vaccines now available.  The vaccines give us hope that we can beat this disease that has killed so many people worldwide.  When we commit to Jesus, is that being vaccinated against sin? 

Wanting to get the analogy right, I went to the source of all-knowing, Google, and typed in “What do vaccines do?”  Up popped the answer.  “Vaccines train our immune systems to create proteins that fight disease, known as ‘antibodies’, just as would happen when we are exposed to a disease but – crucially – vaccines work without making us sick.”[i]  The vaccine doesn’t protect us against COVID-19.  The vaccine readies our own bodies to protect us. 

            I could see immediately that there is no analogy there.  The vaccines help our own bodies fight off disease.  There’s no vaccine for the disease of sin.  There’s no spiritual program to which we can commit or ritual we can undergo that will ward off sin or its effects.  We all sin.  Sin kills and there’s nothing anyone can do it about it, not even God.  Instead, what God does, something only God can do, is take the inevitable death sin brings on himself.  Jesus’ death on the cross is God’s son, the Second Person of the Trinity inhabiting human form, dying the death brought about by the sins we all commit.  There’s no vaccine for sin. 

            Instead, there is salvation from God.  As we see in John 3, this salvation is as radical we could imagine.  The story is told through the eyes of a religious leader, a Pharisees named Nicodemus who comes to see Jesus.  Pharisees were often antagonistic to Jesus.  Maybe Nicodemus visited at night so his Pharisee peers wouldn’t know he was genuinely seeking God’s truth and he thought Jesus had it.  “Rabbi, we know you … have come from God” Nicodemus says.  Jesus responds by explaining that he, Nicodemus, and all people must be born again. The Pharisee does not understand.  So, Jesus sets the story in within the flow of Israel’s grand narrative. 

            The original readers of John’s Gospel would have read with Israel’s story in mind.  The very first community to read John as scripture was probably a group of Christ-followers in Ephesus between 80 and 100 A.D.  They knew all the Old Testament stories.  They also believed Jesus was the son of God, God in the flesh, crucified, and resurrected.  They believed he had fulfilled the promises of the Old testament.  From the preaching of the disciples, they knew of the resurrection.  The original readers of the Gospel read as informed insiders.  Depending on his age, Nicodemus himself may have been a member of the Ephesian church and present the first time the Gospel of John was read publicly.

            In the story, Jesus tries to help Nicodemus understand the idea of ‘born again’ by tying it to a story Nicodemus would have recalled without even thinking about it.  Jesus said, “Just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life” (3:14-15).  Nicodemus, and decades later, John’s readers, knew what “lifted up” meant.  Do we?

            Jesus is referring to the Torah, specifically, Numbers 21:4-9.  Moses is leading Israel out of Egypt on the march to the Promised Land.

⁴ From Mount Hor they set out by the way to the Red Sea,^[b^] to go around the land of Edom; but the people became impatient on the way. ⁵ The people spoke against God and against Moses, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we detest this miserable food.” ⁶ Then the Lord sent poisonous^[c^] serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many Israelites died. ⁷ The people came to Moses and said, “We have sinned by speaking against the Lord and against you; pray to the Lord to take away the serpents from us.” So Moses prayed for the people. ⁸ And the Lord said to Moses, “Make a poisonous^[d^] serpent, and set it on a pole; and everyone who is bitten shall look at it and live.” ⁹ So Moses made a serpent of bronze, and put it upon a pole; and whenever a serpent bit someone, that person would look at the serpent of bronze and live.

 

Are we horrified to hear that the Lord sent poisonous snakes that bit and killed complaining Israelites?  Are we just as horrified that this people God rescued from slavery and sustained in the wilderness, and called to be his holy people, then complained?  How often do we humans shrug our shoulders at sin and then become indignant with God when sin brings consequences?  How could God let this happen, we ask. Less frequently do we say, How could we insult God and reject His rule as we have?  For healing, those bitten had to look upon their sin, a bronze serpent lifted up. There is no escaping sin.  We must face it, repent, and accept God’s forgiveness.  Only God can remove sin, and out of His love for us, He does. 

Nicodemus would immediately recognize the story, as would John’s readers.  But what did Jesus mean by “the Son of Man must be lifted up?”  He hints at what’s coming. Instead of saving a few Israelites in the desert, God would save all people for all time with the death of his son, Jesus. 

The death was very specific – crucifixion; lifted up for all to see.  New Testament scholar Alicia Myers writes, “Jesus’ body, the very location of God’s glory, is the most staggering revelation of the gospel.”[ii] In explaining his death on the cross by illustrating it with Moses’ elevated serpent, Jesus draws together the double entendre.  Nicodemus and John’s readers would know ‘lifted up’ means to be hanged, as in a lynching or crucifixion.  Both the Pharisee and the late first century church would also know ‘lifted up’ means to glorify, as in ‘they lifted up God’s name.’ 

In Jesus, the two meanings coalesce.  The shame of the cross glorifies God as an expression of His love; the cross also takes care of all our sin; and, the cross gives us the hope of eternal life.  This story involving Moses, Nicodemus, Jesus, and the late first century church also involves us.   How we respond to the story determines our part in it.  We cannot just read John 3, close the book, and move on as if it doesn’t matter.  It does. We are actors in this play that is played out in real life – our lives. 

We have two options for response – to believe or not believe in Jesus as Son of God, God incarnate, and as our Savior and Lord.  In recent weeks, you have heard me say that Jesus was not interested in believers but in disciples.  According to the late theologian Walter Wink of Auburn Theological Seminary, the author of John’s Gospel used the idea of “believe” in a specific way.  It’s something much more involved than intellectual assent or commitment that doesn’t cost us anything to make.

Wink writes, “This idea [of belief] seems to be that one must commit oneself to Jesus.”[iii]  Jesus mentions “believe” in John 3, verses12, 15, & 16, and this just after trying to help Nicodemus understand being born again as well as grasping his own need to be born again. Wink concludes both “born again” and “believe” connote the same idea.  “To believe … is to throw one’s whole life on the side of Jesus.”[iv]  To believe is to commit, for the rest of one’s life, to Jesus as Lord, master of all of life.  When we say we believe, in terms of John’s gospel, it costs us everything because we submit everything in our lives to Jesus’ lordship.  We are in bondage to Him forever.  Paradoxically, this gives us the greatest freedom we’ll ever know.

Who is it that is freed from sin by believing when Jesus is “lifted up?”  For Nicodemus and the rest of the very first followers of Jesus in decade immediately following the resurrection, this was a first century Jewish story that reached its climax in the revelation that the crucified one was the long-anticipated Jewish Messiah.  All four gospels strongly imply and the book of Acts explicitly asserts that Gentiles – non-Jews – are also in this story when they repent and declare that Jesus is Lord.  In fact, the “in-group” shifts.  Believers, both Jew and Gentile are brothers and sisters in Christ.  Non-believers, Jews and Gentiles who reject Jesus, are not.

When we say submission to Christ brings us freedom, who is the “us” being talked about?  The answer to this question comes from a startling revelation found throughout John’s gospel and especially in John 3. 

Who does Jesus save from sin and death?  John 3:16 says, “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal live.”  Twentieth century Baptist scholar George Beasley-Murray calls this verse “the fundamental summary of the message of [John’s] Gospel and … the canvas on which the rest of the Gospel is painted.”[v] 

Most of the time the idea of ‘the world’ is set in contrast to the Kingdom of God.  The world is rebellious and is perishing.  John 3:16 reminds us that as hell-bound as the world might seem, it’s made up of people.  God calls out the sins of society, but God loves the world.  How much?  God allowed his beloved son to be crucified that the world might have the chance to look upon him hanging on the cross, and believe.  The world rejects God.  God loves the world so much; he’ll give up everything for it.

The cross is uncomfortably public.  Christianity is public.  We live our discipleship in the world, in the public eye.  People need to see their need for salvation, and they need to see from where salvation comes.  They need to see so they can believe in Jesus, Jesus lifted up.  This is how God saves not just Israel or not just the church, but the entire world.

AMEN

---

[i]https://www.google.com/search?q=what+does+a+vaccine+do%3F&oq=what+does+a+vaccine+do%3F&aqs=chrome..69i57j0l2j0i10j0i390.5314j0j4&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

[ii] https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/fourth-sunday-in-lent-2/commentary-on-john-314-21-5

[iii] Wink, Walter (2001), “’The Son of Man’ in the Gospel of John” in Jesus in the Johannine Tradition, Robert Fortna, Tom Thatcher, editors, Westminster John Knox Press (Louisville), p.120.

[iv] Wink, p.123.

[v] George Beasley-Murray (1987), Word Bible Commentary: John vol.36, Word Books, Publisher (Waco), p.51.

"The Gospel of the Cross" (1 Corinthians 1:18-2:5)

 

watch - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tCE6NC0IICs

3^rd Sunday of Lent, March 7, 2021

 

            Theologians get frustrated by the idea of “the Gospel;” at least, they should!  People all over the world have their own ideas of what the Gospel is.  With so many different viewpoints, is it possible to define it at all?  And if it can’t be defined, does it mean anything?

            Theologians are stimulated by the idea of “the Gospel;” at least, they should be!  With the different ways cultures around the world have lived out the Gospel, the depth and breadth of the Gospel’s meaning and beauty of the gospel’s expression seems inexhaustible! 

            “Time out!”  You tell me.  “I’m not a theologian,” you say.  “Why should I worry about the dozen different gospel definitions that spill out of the pointless musings of one or two theologians?”

            I see your “time-out” and acknowledge it.  The work theologians do is important for Christianity, yet I agree that you don’t have to do a theologian’s job.  However, when we claim to be Christ-followers, we accept all the to share the Gospel. Jesus does not recognize followers who refuse to bear witness to him. We understand that Jesus is not interested in believers or admirers.  Jesus seeks out disciples.  In Mark 3:11, Jesus silences demons who express their belief in him.  In John 12:23, Jesus ignores the fan-boy Greeks looking for an autograph and instead insists that his concern is his followers (v.26), disciples.  To follow him, is to share the Gospel.  To share the Gospel, we have to have some idea of what it is.

            So, what is it?  Since the first century, Christian thinkers have debated this question.  In 1 Corinthians 1 & 2, the Apostle Paul provides a foundation.  If we stand on this foundation, we will be able to live within the Gospel, we will be empowered to share the Gospel, and we will find ourselves freed by the Gospel. 

            In his work A Theology of the New Testament, the late George Eldon Ladd writes, “The Gospel is the proclamation of the historical fact and the redemptive meaning of the cross, which includes both present and future blessings.”[i]  Note, the gospel is event and meaning.  That Jesus died on a Roman cross outside of Jerusalem is an event in history.  Few historians, Christian or not, question this.  A lot of unfortunate people died on crosses under Roman oppression.

            This historical fact matters.  We believe Jesus was innocent and was God’s son, and in his death took on himself the eternal penalty all people deserve because of their sins.  So, the Gospel says this is a historical happening filled with significance.  In fact, Christians hold that the death of Jesus on the cross and the subsequent resurrection is the most important event in history.  Because of this historical fact and what it means, we can develop the mindset of disciples.  

            Paul says in 1 Corinthians 2:2, “I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and him crucified.”  In 1 Corinthians Paul teaches on more topics than in just about any other letter.  He addresses leadership within the church.  He condemns sexual sin while affirming sexual relations between a man and a woman in the confines of marriage.  He commends singleness and celibacy, but says if you must get married be sexually active; if you must be sexually active, get married.  He gives his most detailed instructions on how to celebrate the Lord’s supper, and on spiritual gifts in this letter.  He delivers his most developed teaching on the resurrection.  It’s all in 1 Corinthians.  After chapter 2, he doesn’t really address atonement – Jesus’ death on the cross for our sins.  So why does he make this sweeping remark: “I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and him crucified?”  He deals with much more than that. 

            He can touch on so many topics because he’s standing on the solid ground, the foundation of the crucified Christ.  In chapter 1, verse 23, he makes a point of saying that for Jewish people the thought that Messiah would die so shamefully, on a Roman cross, is a stumbling block. The Greek word for stumbling block is skandolon.  A crucified Messiah was a scandal for the first century Jews who had rejected Christ.  For Greeks, who generally rejected any value in the body and instead esteemed spiritual ideals, the thought of following a man who died was foolish.  And, of course, the Romans saw those they crucified as weak. 

            In different ways, Jews, Greeks, and Romans, devalued the crucifixion of Jesus, but Paul says for everyone – Jews, Greeks, everyone – it is the power of God and the wisdom of God.  God did not magically make sin disappear.  Doing so would ignore the serious offense and awful consequence of sin. God does not force us to not sin.  This would strip us of our free will and we would no longer be God’s image-bearers.  God decided to love us so deeply, our sins would be paid for with the death of God’s beloved son, God-in-human-flesh, the sinless one, Jesus. 

            Paul says, in 1 Corinthians 1:21, salvation comes through the preaching of the cross to all who believe.  Note how many different actors God includes in the process of salvation.  First, there’s Jesus who willingly dies because he loves everyone.  Next, the Holy Spirit inspires disciples to believe in Jesus and follow him.  Third, there’s disciple who preaches the story and truth of Jesus.  It could be someone preaching to 1000’s in a large auditorium, or someone sharing the gospel with one other person.  Fourth, the listener receives the story, responds to the nudge of the Holy Spirit, and puts his or her faith in Christ.  Finally, the Father accepts that expression of faith and adopts that person as a son or daughter of God. 

            Just as Jesus’ death on the cross was a moment in history, so too comes a specific moment when an individual puts his or her faith in Christ.  Sometimes the new believer is baptized in that moment.  Other times, baptism comes later, as a visual expression new life.  We keep in mind that salvation is something that happens.  It is also a process that takes place over a lifetime. 

            Oxford theologian Paul Fiddes details the way salvation is a lifelong, continuous processg for a disciple in his book Past Event and Present Salvation: The Christian Idea of Atonement.  First, he explains that divine-human relationship can be repaired.[ii]  Our rebellion has severed our tie to God.  We need the connection re-established.  That repair happens in the death of Jesus on the cross. 

            Are things in your life broken?  Do you stare into a hopeless future convinced the broken things never get fixed?  The cross is all about repair.  The cross is a sign that the love of God moves us past our brokenness.  You can live life in a right relationship with God.  With the Holy Spirit in us, we can truly love each other. 

            Second, with the God-human break having been repaired, we come into human community in a new way.[iii]  Made new in Christ, we make up the church with others who have also been made new in Christ.  Thus, salvation effects not just the individual, but also the community.  “I am made new.” And, “we are made new.”

            Third, Fiddes observes that this repaired relationship and transformed community results from a complete upending of our understanding of God.  Fiddes writes, “If God has made a crucified man lord of the universe, then all the securities by which we live and all the achievements by which we justify ourselves and give ourselves esteem, are shown to be hollow.”[iv]

            What makes us feel safe?  The American army?  In other countries, our American power is a threat.  What makes us feel safe?  Our police force?  Many people in our communities feel their lives threatened by that very police force.  What makes us feel safe?  What achievements make us feel good about ourselves?  Our salvation rests on a Galilean peasant carpenter who was crucified, the most shameful of death.  God has declared that he, not some great warrior, king, or champion, but the crucified one is Lord and Savior. 

            Fourth, in Fiddes’ explanation, this salvation that upends our understanding of real power is, in addition to being an event, also an on-going reality.[v]  The Holy Spirit links our lives to what happened at Calvary 2000 years ago.  Through the daily transformation the Spirit effects in us, the love God shows on in the cross flows through us to the people we meet. 

            Paul could touch on so many topics in 1 Corinthians because he set his writing up on the foundation of the cross.  We stand on that same foundation, live our salvation, and share the good news with people who have not yet put their trust in Jesus.  We are freed by the Gospel.  Greed, racism, injustice, oppression, jealousy and so many other sinful ways of being that drive people apart do not bind us.  Freed from these godless obstacles, we are able to live in love and to give love. 

            Life will frustrate us.  That’s a given.  The Gospel, though, frees us.  Theologians can delight and struggle in the work of defining the Gospel and our faith is strengthened by their efforts.  For out part, we look to the cross and realize we are free.  We are free to live as children of God.

AMEN

---

[i] G. Ladd (1974), A Theology of the New Testament, William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company (Grand Rapids), p.385.

[ii] P. Fiddes (1989), Past Event and Present Salvation: The Christian Idea of Atonement, Westminster/John Knox Press (Louisville), p.4

[iii] Fiddes, p.13.

[iv] Fiddes, p.24.

[v] Fiddes, p.29-30