Knowledge by Inquiry, Knowledge by Faith (1 Corinthians 15:1-5

Sunday, June 12, 2016

(On this Sunday, we baptized J_______).

        As Jeremy went under the water, I pronounced him “dead.”  This is not only about J______.  Recall your baptism.  I or another pastor took you down under the water, dead and buried in sin.  Then you are raised and we say, “Raised to new life in Jesus Christ.”  Sin leads to death, but because of Jesus, his death on the cross and his resurrection, we have new life.  We become new creations. We do not remain buried in the ground to return to ashes.  We are raised.

        For what?  Jeremy has entrusted himself to Jesus.  You and I, if we have put our faith in Christ, also have entrusted ourselves to Him.  We are saved, born again, bound for resurrection.  Our baptism shows this.  What about our lives?  For what are we saved?

        In the 16^th century in Europe, a group of Christians called Anabaptists insisted that babies could not be baptized.  Baptism was for people who were able to consciously choose to follow Jesus and when baptism happened it had to be by immersion.  In the reformation, Protestant Christians separated from the Catholic Church.  Anabaptists, the ones denying the acceptability of infant baptism separated from other Protestants like Lutherans and the Reformed Church.

        As a result, over 1000 Anabaptists were arrested and killed by both Catholics and by other Protestants.  Their main crime was they allowed themselves to be re-baptized.  Women were drowned for this, and men burned at the stake for doing what Jeremy did today, undergoing immersion, believer’s baptism. 

        Dirk Willem was one such Christian, an Anabaptist follower of Jesus.  Imprisoned, awaiting execution in his home town of Asperen, Netherlands, he escaped.  He made a rope of cloths tied together, and fled over the wintry countryside as a guard gave chase.  He risked running right across a frozen pond.  The ice held, but when the guard followed, it gave way dooming him to a certain, frozen death. 

        Raised to new life in Christ.  For what?

        Dirk Willem stopped running, turned around, and helped the man who a moment ago had been chasing him.  Dirk had escaped and was in the clear, but he believed what Jesus said when Jesus said to love our enemies.  He pulled that man from the frigid waters and the man was ready to let him go, but this all took long enough for others to catch up.  For living as a part of new creation, as one who is of the Kingdom of God, Dirk Willem was burned at the stake on May 16, 1569.

        Near the end of his letter to the Corinthian Church, the Apostle Paul zeroed on the core Gospel.  Chapter begins, “Now I would remind you brothers and sisters, of the gospel … [on] which you stand” (15:1).  It all comes down to this.  Paul’s final word for them in this letter is the essential Gospel.

        Competing narratives vie for our soul.  Every one of us lives under the covering of a dominant story.  Maybe it is a national story or a social class story or a race story.  Whatever it is, this was true of the Corinthians; it was true for Dirk Willem which is why he was willing to go to his own death to save the man who represented the powers that killed him; and, it is true for you and me.   Competing stories position themselves to be the dominant story of our lives.  Paul wanted the Gospel to be the dominant story for all who would read this letter.

        Verse 2, we are saved if we believe.  Verse 3, Christ died for our sins, was buried, and raised.  Please note that each portion is equally critical in our story.  There is not more weight on the cross.  The cross is essential.  The burial is and so is the resurrection.  The gospel includes all of it.  Later in this chapter, Paul declares that if Jesus was not raised in a bodily resurrection, it’s all for nothing.  Without the resurrection, the cross is just a torture device.  Without the cross, the resurrection never happens. 

        And in beginning in verse 5 and running through verse 11 is another, equally essential element of the Gospel: the appearances of the risen Lord Jesus.  This testimony is here because Paul wants the original readers of this letter and every subsequent generation of readers to know that there were multiple eye-witnesses who attested to a literal, bodily resurrection. 

        New Testament writers worked to place the resurrection as an event history, something that literally happened.  In the opening verses of his Gospel, Luke asserts that he is writing history.  He took the same approach in the book of Acts.  In John’s gospel, the author claims to be an eye-witness to all that has been described including the resurrection (John 21:24).  A similar claim is made in Second Peter (1:5) and here in 1 Corinthians 15, Paul names several eyewitness. 

Theologian Paul Fiddes labels this approach to knowledge of Jesus as ‘scientific,’ affixing to the discipline of historical research the same standards of inquiry used in science (see Past Event and Present Salvation, chapter 3).  Fiddes thinks the resurrection cannot be determined by means of scientific inquiry because it is an event that cannot be reproduced within the boundaries of the laws of nature.  It is a supernatural event so the fact that it happened cannot be established by historical research.  Fiddes is not denying a bodily resurrection.  He just denies that we can prove it by the conventions historians use.  Rather, we know the resurrection happened because we know it by faith.  Fiddes believes this approach to knowing is as valid and as important as the knowledge we gain by scientific inquire.  In dealing with salvation, he feels both ways of knowing – by faith and by scientific inquiry - are essential.

While he doesn’t delve into how we know, theologian James McClendon accepts the resurrection as an event in history.  Two theologian-historians, N.T. Wright and Mike Licona, have written lengthy volumes explaining why the best conclusion to be drawn from the available evidence is that Jesus actually did rise from the grave.  Whether that is enough to say that inquiry can establish the historicity of the resurrection, I cannot say.  But all the scholars I mentioned, Fiddes, Wright, Licona, and McClendon along with many others would agree that scientific inquiry cannot establish what the original followers of Jesus thought the cross and resurrection meant.

To understand meaning, we have to live in that other sphere of understanding Fiddes name – knowledge that comes by faith.  Fiddes says, “the living and incomparable Lord cannot be pinned down under the microscope of scientific investigation.  [We] need the eye of faith, and the power of the Holy Spirit to bring matters into focus before we can say [and believe] that ‘God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself’” (p.37).  Paul and the other New Testament writers always operated with the eye of faith.  Even when they tried to establish hard, objective facts by way of insisting upon the eye-witness nature of their reports, those reports were packaged persuasively in an attempt to lead the reader to faith.  The apostle was at the same time objective, faith-based, and evangelistic. 

We understand the events of salvation, the crucifixion, the resurrection, and the appearances of the risen Lord Jesus both by science and by faith.  I have spent a bit time explaining both ways of understanding specifically because we live in a post-enlightenment era.  We are science and technology dependent.  There are individuals who are happy to let science take care of our healing at the hospital and our entertainment with 1000 devices and our banking and our shopping and our military defense.  In all these ways, some individuals trust in technology, but when it comes to heaven, then switch and trust in God.  And never do the science and the faith meet. 

For others, that won’t do.  When everything rides on the next scientific advance, to then rely on something outside of science for the afterlife is just superstition.  Science has to have a say in our faith understanding.  However, science (including historical proof as science) cannot have the final say.  The resurrection is outside the parameters of science.  God is outside the parameters of science.  So is meaning.  Thus when we, as followers of the crucified/risen Lord who come from the scientific age, express our faith we need to do so in a way that is rooted in faith but understood by those rooted in science.  We have to talk about salvation in a way makes that makes sense to people today.

Jesus lived in first century Palestine.  Fact.

He was crucified when Jewish leaders collaborated with Romans leaders.  He was crucified, dead, and buried.  Fact.

He rose from death and appeared to his followers.  Call this fact or belief, but it happened.  Jesus literally rose in a bodily resurrection and first century people saw him. 

What we believe about God and salvation rest on these facts which we declare to be irrefutable. What these things mean has to do with the relationship that comes when the Holy Spirit reaches out to us and we respond.  This is faith knowledge and faith-living.  We declare both, what we know and the life we will commit to live in believer’s baptism by immersion. 

But then, what this all means, is only seen in how we live.  Prior to the resurrection, it was hard.  Jesus repeatedly told his followers that like him, they needed to walk the hard road, persevere through persecution, and endure in godliness and faith.  They just wanted to jump ahead straight to the New Age, bypassing hardship.  McClendon observes that if the disciples had had their way, there would have been no cross.  If Jesus had his way, there would have been 13 crosses (McClendon, p.235).  And we have to take up our cross and follow Him.  When we do that, when we’ve evaluated the evidence and responded to the Holy Spirit and we decide that because of what we’ve found and what we’ve felt we should then walk the footsteps of Jesus, then we have a full-bodied, lived salvation.

So, we study and pray. We think and feel.  We calculate, evaluate, and meditate.  All of it is done in hope and trust, believing that God will make us ready when our moment comes and our pursuer is about to fall through the ice.

Remember the opening story of the Dirk Willem who stop his escape to rescue the guard falling through thin ice.  In that moment, he was not engaged in deep theological analysis.  He was not moved by a deep warmth from God, I don’t think.  He was scared and running for his life.  But he stopped because deep inside himself he could hear the voice of Jesus telling him to love his enemy.  This enemy would drag him to the stake where he would be slow-roasted to death. 

When we are attacked verbally or relationally or maybe physically, when we are hit, do we hear Jesus telling us to love our enemies and do we obey?

When it gets really hard, do we run as fast as we can to safer ground, or do we stand and point to the crucified, risen Lord and declare, I am standing with Him and trusting in Him, no matter what?

When being a Christ-follower is costly, do we backtrack and settle for a watered down faith indistinguishable from any other worldview, or do we pay the cost, carry our cross, and follow Him?

The gospel is salvation: through the cross and the resurrection, Jesus saves us from sin and death and saves us to life eternal in His kingdom.  We know this salvation that we have through measured, reasoned study of the facts.  We know this salvation that we have through our deeply personal, emotional response to the Holy Spirit who whispers to our hearts that we are forgiven and beloved.  And our salvation is known when the watching world sees our lives and sees Jesus.

AMEN

When We Dream (Joel 2:28-29)

Sunday, November 22, 2015

          We have prayed that God would grant wisdom and give revelation to HillSong Church.  These seven weeks have had an inward focus.  Our direction is Godward.  We have collectively, as a family of worshipers, as brothers and sister in Christ, pointed our faces toward the Lord.  We have joined voices and together asked God to speak.

          In the process, we have reflected upon who we are God’s people.  There is a sense of what a Christian should be.  We describe, generally speaking, what a church should be.  We have emphasized what HillSong Church is called to be in the first quarter of the 21^st century. 

          These prayers will not cease as we conclude this church-wide emphasis on discernment.  Understanding who we are in Christ is a constant process.  However, it is now time to reflect on what has been revealed; this is also the time to cast our gaze down the road and ponder where we are headed and also to see who, from afar, is coming toward us.

          We have talked about HillSong being safe place.  We strive to be a place of welcome where one can come and be loved and be encouraged and nurtured.  This will always tested as we who make up the community are born-again, spirit-filled yet also tempted by our weaknesses and by the devils’ wiles.  We, the people yearning to create safe space, sometimes are the ones who make it unsafe.  But we press on, we try again, as we welcome the next one through the door.

          In the safe space, our community, we worship.  In worship, our hearts are laid bare before the Lord and we pray that we actually meet God in those encounters.  In meeting God, we are forever changed.  We are made new – new creations. 

As new creations, we are then sent into the world to announce that something has happened.  God has done something.  God has come in human form, in the flesh.  That’s Jesus!  He is God in the flesh and in Him the Kingdom of God has come near.  In Him, people have forgiveness of sins and rescue from death.  We are sent to proclaim that He is Lord and King and people can have life in His name.  We are sent to help people become His disciples.

“Safe-New-Sent;” these words have become a mantra at HillSong.  But this is not all God has revealed.  Relationships matter.  We are a relational people.  Watch what happens when the worship service ends today.  People don’t flood to the exits.  I have been in church services where when the final song is over, people head for the exits like the building is on fire.  Here, people linger to talk, laugh, and embrace.  We love each other.

And our relationships are expanding.  New people come all the time.  Now, new congregations are in the fold with Zion Karen Baptist Church and Iglesia del Amor de Dios meeting in our buildings.  When our elders and deacons met a month ago, one of the observations we took away from our conversations was God is bringing the nations to HillSong.  And we are thrilled about that.

As a relational people living in fellowship with a divine calling to welcome the sojourner and seek out the lost that we might help them find the way to salvation, where do we go from here?

I appeal to the words of the prophet Joel.  He spoke of judgment and called a sinful people to repentance, but then, God showed him a new day dawning.  Here’s what God says through the prophet Joel.

^28 [a] Then afterward
    I will pour out my spirit on all flesh;
your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,
    your old men shall dream dreams,
    and your young men shall see visions.
²⁹ Even on the male and female slaves,
    in those days, I will pour out my spirit.

          The dreams that come don’t originate with us. God says, “I will pour out my spirit.”  God’s Spirit visits us, and then the dreams come.  The good in our lives, the purpose which drives us to live and to live in a certain way comes from God.

          Joel shows that we dream God dreams.  To be people of faith, to follow Jesus, is to believe in visions and to experience dreams.  What’s more, this is all of us.  This is not reserved for the spiritual superheroes among us.  Nor is this purview of the privileged or the experienced or those more honored than others.  Children prophesy, senior citizens see things they’ve never seen before, and slaves dream and show the truth of God.  The revelation of God is generously shared as God desires to give it.

          But, what in the world does this mean?  The prophecy from Joel is beautiful and inspired and incomplete, because it doesn’t seem to ever become reality. 

          Then Jesus.

          Jesus comes along, and then Joel makes sense.

          In the book of Acts a series of events takes place.  First, Acts picks up right after the resurrection.  Jesus, who died and was buried, is walking about in his body resurrected.  The disciples see Him depart.  He goes to Heaven, to the right hand of the Father.  Then, after 40 days, the Holy Spirit rains down in tongues of fire on the disciples gathered in Jerusalem for Pentecost.   As they are filled, they speak the languages of all gathered there.

          It doesn’t make any sense.  These are Galilean fishermen, not educated linguists.  Yet with unmatched eloquence, they tell the story of God coming in the person of Jesus, dying, and offering salvation to the world.  The crowd, astounded, doesn’t know what to make of it all.

          That’s when Peter stands and says this.

¹⁴ But Peter, standing with the eleven, raised his voice and addressed them, “Men of Judea and all who live in Jerusalem, let this be known to you, and listen to what I say. ¹⁵ Indeed, these are not drunk, as you suppose, for it is only nine o’clock in the morning. ¹⁶ No, this is what was spoken through the prophet Joel:

¹⁷ ‘In the last days it will be, God declares,
that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh,
    and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,
and your young men shall see visions,
    and your old men shall dream dreams.
¹⁸ Even upon my slaves, both men and women,
    in those days I will pour out my Spirit;
        and they shall prophesy.
¹⁹ And I will show portents in the heaven above
    and signs on the earth below,
        blood, and fire, and smoky mist.
²⁰ The sun shall be turned to darkness
    and the moon to blood,
        before the coming of the Lord’s great and glorious day.
²¹ Then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.’

          Peter’s way of making sense of all that happens is to appeal to scripture – the prophecy of Joel.  But Joel only makes sense when understood in terms of the resurrection.  Why can Peter say that the spiritual phenomena that happened at Pentecost is the fulfillment of Joel’s prophecy?  Because Jesus was raised.  That spirit was and is the Holy Spirit of the Lord filling His people.

          Joel’s prophecy continues to be fulfilled as we gather, worship, glorify God in Jesus Christ, and band together as His people.  In this context, the church together, the Spirit pours new revelation and calls us to the work of holy living and holy love in the midst of a hurting and dying world. 

          Where do we go from here?  We worship – together.  We give and receive forgiveness – together.  We passionately discuss the issues of our day.  Sometimes those conversations heated, but it is for the sake of the Gospel because when we go over the issues of the day, what we are really talking about is how sin continuously wounds men and women.  When discuss, because we are Spirit-filled Christ followers, our discussion always comes back to figuring out, in the power of God, how we help heal the wounded.  This too is something we do together.  We live into the calling God has placed on us.

          An issue pressing the world right now, shows this point.  I have been in a number of conversations, debates, about how a nation like America ought to respond to the attacks in Paris and to the crisis of thousands of displaced Syrians.  Some argue that sound foreign policy is to send those Syrians elsewhere.

We don’t even think about sound foreign policy.  We know that our security is in the Lord, not in our government.  We want those who hurt at our doors so we can love them and help them.  Refugees who cannot find a shore?  This is our moment.  To care for them is to live into our calling.

Also, this morning, we have seen where we go from here.  In Baptism, in new members sharing their stories, our fires as a relationship people called together are rekindled.  The newly baptized believer and the newly welcomed member sharing there are hearts as we open our hearts to them and to all who come – this is what we are about.  This is who we are.

Next is Advent, that season in which we remember the coming of Christ and anticipate His return and the final, complete establishment of His Kingdom when Heaven and Earth come together. 

I pray that you will dream dreams the Holy Spirit plants in your heart.  I pray each of us will see our individual relationships with God become deeper, more real, and richer in the season ahead.  I pray God will shape HillSong Church so that in this place His love rules, and people grow into a full understanding that we are His.

AMEN

One More Step - Acts 10-11

Sunday, May 10, 2015

            Can anyone withhold the water?  The questions hits at the climactic moment that began when Peter was praying and in a vision was told that God would open his promises to all people, even non-Jews.  God would do this through Jesus.

            Can anyone withhold the water?  Somehow, Peter and other Jews present who had put their trust in Jesus could see as Jesus’ Holy Spirit fell upon these Romans – the centurion Cornelius and his household.  They could see it!  They couldn’t believe their eyes, but they could see it. 

            Can anyone withhold the water?  The Spirit’s work began in Peter as he responded even when God led him beyond boundaries he thought he would never cross.  The Spirit’ work began when Cornelius, lacking the benefit of a Jewish heritage, nonetheless sought God.  The Spirit’s driving of these men and the people around them inexorably led to this moment when they stood before each other and seeing with Spirit-filled eyes recognized they were brothers in Christ.  The baptism confirmed it.  The baptism sealed it.  The baptism served as testimony to all that new birth had taken place.

Peter had not fully grasped that Jesus would reach to the world beyond Israel.  He knew this in his head, but it did not register in his heart until he prayed on that rooftop and God changed his view.  Jesus would shatter the barriers that stood as walls dividing people and Jesus would do this through his, Peter’s, preaching.  As Peter prayed, there was a knocking at his door.  Emissaries from the Roman Centurion Cornelius were looking for him and the Holy Spirit compels Peter to go with these men. 

These Romans brought Peter to Cornelius, a man seeking the truth.  The truth found him.  He and Peter came together and shared their visions.  Peter preached.  He said,

“I truly understand that God shows no partiality, 35but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him. 36You know the message he sent to the people of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ—he is Lord of all.

            Jesus is Lord of all and faith in him rips down the structures humans erect to keep a few in positions of prestige and power while most are kept at heel in the dust, powerless in poverty.  Jesus the Lord, lifts up the downtrodden, freeing them from their disadvantage.  Jesus the Lord gives the privileged the humbling they need.  Without it, often the wealthy, privileged class – including many of us – fail to see how much they need God and need their fellow human beings.  In baptism, we testify to the truth that no matter who we are, we have died in sin and been resurrected in Christ.  What is great about us is Him alive and at work in and through each of us. 

            Peter’s speech is interrupted by the Holy Spirit dealing not with him but with Cornelius, and the other Romans there.  The Holy Spirit fell on them.  The Christian Jews with Peter couldn’t believe it.  To this point, the message of Jesus had been taken to the far reaches of the world, but to Jews who lived in the far reaches of the world.  Now, a mere 50 miles from Jerusalem, the great divide had truly been bridged.  God’s Spirit was poured out on Gentiles. 

            The movie The Fellowship of the Ring, is the first of the Lord of the Rings trilogy.  Hobbits are the main characters.  The Hobbits were small people physically and they were small in perspective.  Their entire vision of the world was limited to the simple farming villages where they lived.  And they didn’t mind keeping it that way.  They were happy. 

            But the job of delivering the ring of power fell to a hobbit, Frodo.   Frodo would have to travel many miles through the darkest, most evil parts of the world.  His best friend, Sam, was determined to go.  Even through Sam was a simple man who would just as soon stay on the farm and never leave, he was going with Frodo.  As they walked, he stopped and said, “Well, this is it Mr. Frodo.”

            “What is it, Sam?”

            “This is the farthest I have ever been away from home in my life.” Sam took the next step and it led to places he had never imagined.

            Peter stood before Cornelius who was full of the Holy Spirit and he had a decision.  In mileage he was not far from home at all.  But in understanding and in terms of perspective and in faith, he was about to go father away from home than he had ever been before.  He would never go back.  And, he took that step.

“The Peter said, ‘Can anyone withhold the water for baptizing these people who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?’  So he ordered them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ.”

Having received the Spirit, in baptism we take that step.  We go father from home than we ever have gone.  And there is no going back.  Nothing ever looks the same.  No relationship, no person – we see with Spirit eyes.

When a paradigm shifts, everything changes.  The availability of automobiles led to the near extinction of passenger railroad travel.  People don’t cross country by train.  As TV’s entered every home, we went through a paradigm shift.  It changed radio forever. 

Peter’s step to baptize Cornelius is the greatest paradigm shift in history.  He did it because he could see that the Holy Spirit was operating outside of his established boundaries and if he wanted to be where the Spirit was at work, he had to step outside those boundaries himself.  He saw where God was at work and he joined him there. 

For us to feel the full impact of Easter and resurrection, we have to practice the Spiritual discipline of Reconciliation.  This means we accept all people – white and black, rich, poor, and middle class, from every country, with accents we find different – we welcome all people.  It goes beyond that. 

Each one of us like Peter must take that step, go beyond our frontiers, experience that great paradigm shift of history.  Each one us has to reach that point where we are farther in ideology, expectation, understanding, perspective, and faith than we’ve ever been.  Then we take the next step. That point might be in another country, but, it might be in North Carolina, or in a neighborhood in Chapel Hill.  It might be in this room.  The place is in a person. 

There is someone we cannot love.  We’ll gladly spend the rest of our lives in a filthy, disease-ridden third world prison cell for the sake of the gospel.  But we will not go and in the name of Jesus love with that person.  That person is different for each of us. But we each have that person.  It would astound us to see the Holy Spirit poured on that person.  The hatred, the bitterness, the animosity is too great.  Who is that person for you?

Years ago, I was very new in the ministry.  I looked around for mentors – people who would give me advice and opportunities.  I was lucky.  Several veteran pastors took me under their wings in my first decade of ministry.  They gave me opportunities, so when I became a senior pastor myself I had already visited hospitals.  I spoke at funerals and did baptisms.  I was indebted to these seasoned church leaders because they helped me greatly by inviting me into their churches and letting me try out pastoral tasks.

One of these beloved friends, however, floored me with something he said.  He was telling me how he had to explain to one of his church members that he could never baptize a black person, not in his church.  I was stunned.  The way he told the story, it was as if he were spewing common sense that once explained would make sense to everyone.  He told it to me in a knowing way as if it would be obvious to me.  He could never baptize a black person.

My trusted mentor had not taken that step beyond his frontiers.  Sunday after Sunday, he preached the Gospel.  Year after year, he baptized new believers.  But the heart of the Gospel called for a change he was not ready to make.  He had to keep the Gospel small enough for him to maintain control.  That never works.

I did not confront my mentor.  I did not say to him, “Hey, what you just said is totally racist and antithetical to the way of Jesus.”  I should have.  I regret that I did not have the readiness or courage to confront the evil that is racism.  I maneuvered adeptly, moved on, and became a senior pastor who within my first two years of ministry had baptized Sudanese people, whites, and Hispanics. 

I remained friends with my mentor.    We don’t dump our friends just because they say foolish things. We love them.  But I did not love him enough to name an evil that lurked in him.  I do not mean he was evil.  In many ways, he was a good pastor.  And he did a lot for me.  However, His need for control and his refusal to follow Jesus beyond his own comfort zone created space in him for an evil – in this case racism – to set up shop and corrupt the good work he did.  Late in his career, he realized his errors.

In Maya Angelou’s book I know Why the Caged Bird Sings, a dentist in Arkansas refuses to help 8-year-old Marguerite even though she is doubled over in pain with a tooth ache.  He declares he would give dental service to a dog before he put his hand in a black person’s mouth.  That dentist will never get it – the fullness of Jesus’ resurrection – until he loves someone who is black.  For him persons of a certain race represent that person.

Who is it in your life?  What boundary is God calling you to cross?  Where do we need to go to truly live the Gospel?  This is the farthest from home I have ever been.  There – that is where we see the Holy Spirit come down and baptism confirms the story. 

It might be someone who hurt you.  You’d rather see that person suffer than to be saved by grace as he comes faith in Jesus.  Loving the one who injured you is going farther than you’ve ever been.  You won’t bask in the full glow of Easter until you forgive that one and pray that Jesus would come to him.  If you are there when the Holy Spirit is poured out on that person and if you say Peter’s words, ‘Can anyone withhold the water for baptizing this one I hated but now love because of Jesus,’ then you’ve been through the paradigm shift.  You and that person will embrace at the cross and stand in the light of the empty tomb together.

            I saw Peter and Cornelius meet.  It was a worship service where we joined three congregations: a Spanish congregation, our English congregation, which was comprised of people from Asian, black, and Latino backgrounds, but was 70% Caucasian; and a primarily black church.  The preacher was a woman from the black congregation. 

            She preached the gospel as powerfully as I have heard it.  A woman from Argentina translated into Spanish.  The black woman would say a few lines, and the Argentine sister repeated them for the Spanish speakers.  It worked well – both women had done this before.  However, just as the preacher was hitting the high note, describing the unconditional love and limitless grace of Jesus, the translator stopped cold.  She couldn’t speak.  Her heart was pierced by the preacher’s words and the love of Jesus.  Her throat choked up and tears flowed.  She was overwhelmed by grace.

            The preacher stopped and came to her.  There they stood.  The larger than life African American woman preacher, embracing a small Argentine woman being showered by the grace of Jesus; I don’t know what it looked like when the Jewish Christians were astonished to see the Holy Spirit rain down on Gentiles that day in Cornelius’ house.  I bet it looked similar to that day when those two women were wrapped up in Jesus’ love.  I got to see it.  I was astonished. 

            I believe we can be astonished again as we step farther than we’ve ever been.  We step to that person.  We do, and we are there to see the Holy Spirit poured out.  We see God bring people together right here, in Resurrection reconciliation. 

AMEN

The New You (Colossians 2:11-15)

Sunday, June 1, 2014

            Often while reading articles online the advertisements in the side bar will be for weight-loss programs.  Whether it is a diet, a miracle pill, an exercise plan, or a combination of all three, the ad is the way for you to shed 10lbs in a short time.  Photos always accompany the ad.  Before, the woman was pushing 300lbs.  After, she, who is over 4, struts down the beach in a bikini looking like she could be on the cover a magazine. 

            It is effective.  I saw a headline this week that reports obesity as a serious problem is on the rise in every country.   The simple answer to the problem is to eat healthier foods, eat less processed and fat-filled food, and exercise.  Just walking for 30 minutes a day can make a difference.  But the point in the ad photos, the “before” and “after” is the change.  We want to be healthy.  We want to look good.  For a lot of people this means changes need to happen.

            Colossians 2:11: “in him also you were circumcised with a spiritual circumcision, by putting off the body of the flesh.”  Circumcision is painful.  We who have gone through it are quite happy that it happened so long ago, we don’t remember.  That’s bloody, visceral imagery.  Jesus tapped into this in John 15 where he says, “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinegrower. ² He removes every branch in me that bears no fruit. Every branch that bears fruit he prunes to make it bear more fruit.”

            Circumcising, pruning; does there need to be so much snipping and slicing and cutting for us to grow close to God?  Yes.  If we could photograph the totality of a person – the mind, the body, the spirit, the soul – there would be a “before,” and an “after.”  Like the 200 pounder trying to get down to 170, the one who wants to be in Christ has to get rid of something.  The allegiance to the world, the sin nature, the corruption that has infested God’s good creation – humanity – that all has to go.  Paul calls this the circumcision of the heart in Romans 2:29, and in Colossians 3:12 he talks about clothing one’s self with the stuff of the Kingdom as opposed to that which comprises our sinful nature.  It is taking off the sin as one takes off a tattered garment.  It is circumcising the heart so that the will is freed of the evils of sin.  It is pruning, cutting off the unfruitful, wasteful bits of life.

            Thus Colossians 2:11 - “in him also you were circumcised with a spiritual circumcision, by putting off the body of the flesh.”  N.T. Wright in the Tyndale New Testament Commentary says this phrase is quite tricky for scholars translating from the Greek (p.110).[i]  I found three potential ways of understanding what the apostle is saying.  I share each this morning because this idea of circumcising the heart is a matter of turning one’s self to God.  We turn away from all the sinfulness, death, and destruction around us and we turn ourselves to God.  That involves more than just one aspect of our lives and I think the three different pathways of understanding I read this week all fit.  

            The first comes from The Interpreter’s Bible, author Francis Beare where he writes that spiritual circumcision involves cutting off the “corrupt personality as a whole – what [humanity] is apart from the regenerating grace of God.”[ii]  Apart from God, we die without hope.  Death is permanent and any existence beyond death is an eternity without God, without God’s love and the fellowship of God’s family.  God is God of the living.  Every moment is a moment closer to our death and a Godless eternity.

            However, we have changed – become something different, a new humanity, because of Christ.  Colossians 2:10 says we come to fullness in Him.  And then our verse, verse 11.  We put off the body of flesh – we are no longer of the humanity under the fall.  We no longer are destined for death.  The change is not seen with the eye, but the reality is unmistakable from God’s point of view.  We put off the flesh and we are raised with Christ – raised from the death (Col. 2:12).  To read and understand Colossians 2:11, especially that phrase, is to realize our basic nature has changed because of spiritual circumcision. 

Baptism depicts this.  We go under the water – buried.  We are dead in sin and dead things are buried.  However, then we rise.  In the name of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, by the power of God, we rise to new life.  As new creations, we have put off the body of flesh.  We rise as eternal beings.

A second way of understanding this phrase in Colossians 2:11 is described by Fuller Theological Seminary Professor Arthur Patzia.[iii] This approach was taken by the translators of the New Living Translation which renders the phrase – “Christ performed a spiritual circumcision—the cutting away of your sinful nature.” 

This way of thinking is similar to the notion of transformed human nature but is more specific.  As people born again in Christ, “put to death” fornication, impurity and whatever is of earth, of the flesh (3:5).  We are told to “get rid of” all sinful attitudes and actions (3:8); simple to say, but is it impossible to do?  As members of the new humanity which is destined for eternal life not death, we are freed from sin’s grasp.  This theme runs throughout Paul’s letters.  First Corinthians 15 is one example.

“Death has been swallowed up in victory.
⁵⁵ “Where, O death, is your victory?  Where, O death, is your sting?”

⁵⁶ The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. ⁵⁷ But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Because of the power of God at work in us, we can actually stop sinning and live righteously.  Of course this does not come easily our consistently.  If it did, Paul would not have had to write letters like Corinthians and Colossians.  Even after we turn to Christ, even after Christ takes ups permanent residence in us, we still have the power to choose how we will think and act in life.  We are still vulnerable to temptation.  Choosing to sin is walking the way of death, yet we do it.  Paul urgently reminds us there is another way and the power to turn that way, the way of life, is in us because Christ is in us.  Putting off the flesh, Colossians 2:11, is us yielding to a painful but needed procedure – the work of Jesus cutting the sin out of our lives.  This requires of us that we sit still and stay focused on him.  Sitting still and staying focused comes about when we live spiritually disciplined lives, practicing prayer, confession, worship, and Bible reading.  In these and other ways, we are present for God so that the Spirit may work in us, pruning, and growing us. 

We have been discussing, this morning, three ways of understanding a phrase from Colossians 2:11 – “¹¹ in him also you were circumcised with a spiritual circumcision, by putting off the body of the flesh in the circumcision of Christ.” We have understood ‘putting off the body of the flesh’ to mean the creation of a new humanity, one destined for life in Christ.  We have understood it to mean freedom from sin – a freedom made available by Jesus’ death and resurrection.  We are alive and we are free in Christ.  Because of this, we are part of something great – the Kingdom of God

This idea that in Christ we are part of something new is a third way of seeing the spiritual circumcision described in Colossians 2. This perspective comes from N.T. Wright.[iv]

He says, “The Colossians now belong first and foremost to the family of God, and not to their human families to which they formerly belonged.  ‘Body’ [from verse 11] can easily carry the connotation of a group of people.”  Putting off the body of the flesh in spiritual circumcision, which is marked by baptism, means cutting off old solidarities.   Our primarily loyalty then is to one another and to others who are in Christ.

The first way of seeing the phrase, a sense of new humanity, describes what we are.  We are born again, born to eternal life.  The second identifies our potential.  We are free in Christ, free from sin and free to not sin.  This third path of understanding builds on the first two by showing where we belong.

Perhaps this third facet of understanding is the most challenging to accept.  Are you your family’s name?  Are you your nationality?  What is it that defines you?  To whom do you belong?

Am I a Tennant?  Am I an American? 

Often this is not in conflict.  I can bring honor to my family name as I serve Jesus by loving my neighbor and in doing so I build up my community and help my country.  The three loyalties complement each other.  Just as often, the loyalties are divided.  In Colossians there was a Judaizing presence; mystery cult religions were around, religions that identified many gods.  There were local Roman authorities.  All these groups vying for loyalty challenged Christ-followers because often group loyalty demanded actions and words that ran against the gospel and the way of Jesus.  To make a stand as a part of the community of Christ followers was to draw the ire and scorn of the surrounding people.  But, we have put off the body of flesh, the human group loyalty.  That has been pruned.  We are connected to those who are in Christ.  Paul called on the Colossians to stay true to the Gospel even if it meant banding together and enduring persecution.

I saw this many years ago.  A friend of mine went to a family funeral, which was in another town.  When she got back, I asked about it and all she would say is it was a “Chinese funeral.”  That tells me nothing.  Millions of Chinese are Uyghurs.  Their funeral would be a Muslim funeral.  Many millions more are atheist.  What happens at an atheist funeral?  The fastest growing Christian nation on earth is China.  A Christian funeral would be very different than an atheist or a Muslim one. 

My friend said her relative had a Chinese funeral.  What she did not say was it was a Buddhist funeral.  She was living a bifurcated life.  She wanted to be in our church family.  She believed what the Bible says about Jesus.  She wanted to follow Christ.  But she wanted to do so without releasing her loyalty to her mostly Buddhist family.  She was not prepared for the pruning Jesus was doing in her life.  She did not want to put off the body of flesh to which she belonged. 

It is not easy.  There will be times in every believer’s life when our allegiance is tested.  Would I forsake the Tennants if following Christ required me to do so?  I hope so.  That is what Colossians 2 calls for.  When the moment comes, would you see yourself first and foremost as in Christ?

This does not have to mean abandoning those we love.  Jesus was not calling on my friend to forever leave behind her Buddhist relatives, people she deeply loved.  If she did that, she’d never be able to show Jesus to them.  Jesus loves them more than she does.  He wants them in His family and maybe she is the key.

We are part of the new humanity when we are part of Christ.  We destined for eternal life in the Kingdom.  We live among those who die daily because they have not yet received the life Jesus gives.  Our mission is to help them see Him.

We are freed from sin.  It has no power over us.  We live in a world soaked in sin.  While we are to not participate in the sin around us, we are to love those still enchained by sin’s shackles.  And we are, through humble, patient love, to help people see the way they can be freed from sin by Jesus.

We are connected to the body of Christ.  We no longer belong to our nation or to our families but to the Kingdom of God.  We still live in the world as it is, loving our families and living in them as a witness to Jesus’ love and goodness. 

Colossians 2:12 says we are raised with him.  Verse 13 – he has made us alive.  This is the new you and the new me – the new us; we are of the new heaven and earth, destined for resurrection, freed from sin, and made to worship Jesus as we draw others to him.  The before and after won’t be seen on a banner or advertisement.  It is seen in how we live, how we relate to people around us. 

Paul says we have received the Lord Jesus Christ; now, we live our lives in him (2:6).

AMEN

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[i] Wright (1986), The Tyndale New Testament Commentaries: Colossians and Philemon, Intervarsity Press, Nottingham.

[ii] Beare (1955),”The Epistle to the Colossians” exegesis section, The Interpreter’s Bible Vol 11, Abingdon Press, Nashville, p.196-7.

[iii] Patzia (1984), New International Bible Commentary, New Testament series, vol.10, Hendrickson Publishers, Peabody, MA, p.54-55.

[iv] Wright, p.109-113.

1 John 1:1-2:2

            I recall being a party to something very embarrassing.  It was several years ago, I was in another country, and another pastor from America was with me.  He and I got into a theological argument that was so heated we forgot the gracious hospitality of our hosts, we ignored the other people around us, and 1ooo’s of miles from the United States we verbally sparred over secondary issues.  My wife had to point out to me how foolish I was.  Here we were, in a third world country, doing God’s work, and he and I shamed ourselves by arguing over trivial matters.  I tell my kids to never say the word “stupid,” but in that moment, this brother-in-Christ, and I were both stupid.

            What’s worth an argument?  When Christians are together, doing God’s work in a context of poverty, is that the time to bicker over theology?

            The author of one of the commentaries I read on 1^st John told of a Christian religious society at one of the Ivy League schools that had just on standard for all participants.  All members had to affirm the ordination of women.[i]  That was the only core issue.  You could believe Jesus is currently on the moon inventing new kinds of cheese and sending it to Wisconsin, and you’d be OK as long as you agreed women could ordained to preach this milk curd gospel.  Ordination of women was the issue.

            The same author pointed out the standard for membership in an organization called The Evangelical Society.  That group required its members to sign a statement affirming the inerrancy of scripture.  Mormons have radically different beliefs about Jesus than do Protestants and Evangelicals, but they would have no problem signing the statement as it is worded.  It was more important to claim inerrancy than to clarify what was meant by it.

            I once had my own witness as a pastor assaulted because of my views on the creation of the earth.  Obviously I believe God is creator – I believe that absolutely, without equivocation.  I believe the way man has observed and described what God did within the limits of our scientific powers of observation is best described by the Big Bang theory.  Our world has evolved and continues to evolve.  Someone heard me say that and heard that I accept that the world is billions of years old, not 10,000 or so, and this person said that because of my failure to read Genesis literally, he had to reject what I had to say about Jesus.  If I didn’t hold his views on creation, then my statements about salvation, taken straight from the Gospels and Paul’s letters were immaterial.

            What’s the core issue for Christ followers?  What’s worth arguing?  When must we stand our ground?  Is it the ordination of women?  Is it our stance on a political issue like abortion or the death penalty?  Is it something with an evasive meaning like inerrancy?  A lot of people hold to the inerrancy of scripture, but they don’t hold the same definition of “inerrant,” or they aren’t the same scripture.  Is one’s position in the creationism-evolution debate the determining factor in whether one is a true Christ follower?

            In 1^st John, the core issue is clear – the one thing that cannot be compromised.  The opening to the letter makes the point.  “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched – this we proclaim concerning the Word of Life” (1:1).  Scientists operate in the realm of five senses – that which can be proven by empirical observation. The authors of 1^st John declare that all they propose is built upon what they saw, heard, and touched.  Their fellowship, their relationship with God, and their relationship with other people, including all who read their letter are based on God’s appearing.

            We must agree.  God became flesh and walked the earth in the form of a specific man in history – Jesus.  God is Jesus.  Usually, we say, “Jesus is God.”  Try is this way – God is Jesus.  The awkwardness draws our attention.  We can argue about ordination of women, form of baptism and whether re-baptism is OK; we can discuss these and 100 other issues.  We must agree that God appeared to humankind in Jesus.  God is Jesus.  Jesus is God.  On this we stand.  All who claim the name Christian disciple must hold that Jesus is God and that God appeared in Jesus.  He walked among us.  He died for the sins of the world.  To have life in his name, we must believe in Him and put our faith in Him. 

            If you aren’t sure about Jesus, we are glad you are here and we aren’t going to get in your face.  We won’t try to jam Jesus down your throat.  We love you because love is essential to Jesus.  It is has to be the rule in His church.  We cannot truly be His unless we love. 

To be a church member and a true Christian, the core issue is Jesus.  God came in the flesh in Jesus.  That issue was being debated in the churches who received the letter we call 1^st John.  And God died for us to cover our sins.  Sin also was an issue in the late first century continues to be an issue today.

First John was probably written in response to heresies unfolding in the churches that had been founded by the same people who wrote the Gospel of John, disciples that included the Apostle John and others.  The young churches under their leadership were infiltrated by people who denied that Jesus came in the flesh and people who said sin didn’t matter.  These deceivers claimed to be sinless.  That’s what they said, anyway. 

Or if they admitted their sins, they said because God is spirit, sins of the flesh don’t matter.  Jesus was a spirit – not a flesh and blood man, and so sins committed in the body are inconsequential.  Both claims are outright lies – the claim that I do not sin; and, the claim that I might sin, yes, but my sins are of no importance because only intangible, spiritual realities last.  These deceptions are contrary to the Gospel.  The writers of 1^st John started off by connected words of life and salvation to what the authors saw, heard, and touched – the physical reality of God in the flesh, Jesus. 

            Getting very personal, the author says in the beginning of chapter 2, “My dear ones, I write so that you will not sin.”  Obviously sin happens, and he’s already made that point.  He knows those in the church will mess up sometimes.  Sin is a part of human reality.  He’s rejected the opponents who claimed to be sinless.  “I write so that you will not sin,” – this means so that we do not make the mistake of claiming perfection. 

We make mistakes, which is why we need Jesus.  First John 2:2 says He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins and for the sins of the world.  The death of this very real man, God in the flesh, covers all sin because sin needs to be covered.  As people of God, we have to take sin seriously and we have to acknowledge our absolute need for the forgiveness we have in Jesus.

            Once we receive that forgiveness, first John tells us to “walk in the light as he is in the light” (1:7).  In the light, all sin is acknowledged.  The ways of God are openly named and life is conformed to God’s standards and God’s expectations.  This is true of all our relationships.  In all our human interactions, we do things God’s way, the way of selfless, sacrificial love. 

            As we step into 1^st John, we see a progression for the life of one who follows Jesus.  First, the reality: the discipels have seen, touched, heard – God in the flesh, Jesus.  First John is based not on an indescribable mystery, but on his very real encounter with Jesus. 

Next, because we have met Jesus, for us in the form of the Holy Spirit, we identify falsehood, name it, and root it out.  The falsehoods 1^st John fought against was a denial of the incarnation and the lie that sin is not present or it is present but unimportant.  Naming the centrality of the life of and death and resurrection of Jesus, and declaring the presence of sin, we are then called to walk in the light because only in the light are we walking with Jesus.  Walking in the light means faith (believing the Biblical story about God), and obedience (submitting to God’s rule).  And God’s rule is love. 

            Where does it all lead?  Why was 1^st John written?  What’s the point?

            The best life a person can have is life in Jesus Christ.  Only in Him do we have truly blessed relationships with people and with God.  In friendships with Christians and nonChristians alike, we love best because God is at work in us and we are sensitive to and cooperative with His Holy Spirit.  And this best life, this life in Christ, reaches its peack when we share the story of salvation and the love of the Gospel. 

First John 1:4: “we are writing these things so that our joy may be made complete.”  For that first century community of committed Christ-followers, absolute fulfillment and happiness came in sharing the gospel with the church who would in turn share the Jesus story with the world.  Joy was present complete when the truth was believed and the sins forgiven and heresy demolished.  But joy was complete when the good news was told to the world.  Our joy is in our witness, our telling. 

As we go through six weeks in 1^st John, the authors’ joy will once again be increased.  Our little church will drink and be filled with the living word of God.  In Heaven somewhere, John rejoices.  We read this letter so we will grow in our knowledge of God.  In our reading our relationship with Him deepens.  In our sharing it deepens even more.

If you were here last week, you heard a new believer’s testimony read and you saw her proclaim new faith in Jesus by being baptized.  I had my own role in her story even though I was not here last week.  I wouldn’t say I “led her to the Lord.”  I think the Holy Spirit did that.  I don’t take any credit for ____’s salvation and I don’t give credit to any person.  Phil, Jonathan, Heather, and I – we are all grateful God allowed us a role in ____’s story.  We rejoice.

I want everyone here to experience that kind of rejoicing.  It comes when you are a witness and you honestly and fully tell of how you were saved by the love of Jesus.  You tell someone who doesn’t know Him.  And you pray for that person, and he or she considers the Gospel, and prompted by the Holy Spirit, becomes a Christ follower.  I want everyone here to know the thrill and joy of playing a part in another person’s salvation.   I think 1^st John shows what a joy that can be. 

So we end with invitation.  Maybe someone listening has not yet put his or her faith in Jesus Christ.  You are invited to come to Him today.

Maybe someone didn’t know that everything in faith, everything in life depends on God in the flesh, Jesus the Anointed.  Maybe someone thought he knew the Christian story but disregarded the seriousness of sin.  You are invited to pray a prayer of repentance today.

Maybe someone knows the story, believes it, repents of sin, but doesn’t share it.  We want your joy to be complete.  You are invited to pray and ask God to help you be a Gospel-sharer this week. 

Seekers, we invite you to pray to receive Jesus today. 

AMEN

As our musicians come, you are invited. 

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[i] Gary Burge, The NIV Application Commentary, p.60.