Life Beyond Life (John 10:1-10)

Watch it here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2JfwueN84o

Fourth Sunday of Easter, May 3, 2020

*This message will be broadcast by Facebook and Instagram Live and posted to Youtube, but will not be preached to a live audience.  We – America, the world – are in the midst of the COVID-19 crisis which is causing people all over the world to avoid gathering in groups of larger than 10, and diligently maintain “social distance.”  It’s an effort to curb the rapid, worldwide spread of the Corona virus which can be deadly.

            Do you have something you’ve always wanted to do, but most likely never will?  I have several.  If I had to pick one, it would be surfing, the ocean not the web.

            Surfing looks so beautiful, so athletic, and free.  The best of poets cannot adequately describe the vastness of the ocean.  To ride balanced atop a board as waves throw you forward violently; to turn that furious fight into a graceful dance; that is life.  It is one thing to say, ‘I am alive,’ and another to say, ‘I am really living.’   When I imagine surfing at its very best, I think to myself, “That’s living life to the fullest.”  Sighing, I wistfully muse that it is something I’ll never experience.

            You might say to me, ‘Rob, if you really wanted that, you could have it.  First, you have to travel to a beach where there are waves.  Second, you have to research surfing classes taught at that particular beach.  Third, you have to enroll in those classes.  Fourth, you have to practice until you are really good.’

            I might respond, ‘That all sounds well and good.  But what you suggest requires a lot of money and a lot of time.  All my money and time mostly belongs to my family and my job.’

            You say back, ‘Yeah, you have responsibilities.  But, when you were younger, before the family, you didn’t choose to do what you needed to do to be in a position to learn to surf.  Now that you’re older, you could still learn to do it.  There are ways.’

            At this point, I come back with, ‘But, I just had this major ankle surgery.  And even before that, my knees were kind of shot.  I see surfer in a kind of squat as they balance on that board.  I don’t know if I can do that.’

            You respond, ‘O come on!  Your knees aren’t that bad.  You can do it.  There are one-legged surfers.  They get dogs up on surfboards.  Quit the sorry excuses.’

            ‘But,’ I say back, ‘I am kind of scared of sharks.  And, in recent years, I have become quite fearful of drowning.’

            You roll your eyes and remind me of how infinitesimally small are the odds I would be attacked by a shark, much less die in a shark attack.  Then you remind me of how I am always challenging people to face their fears.

            We go back and forth, and maybe you eventually convince me to get myself to the coast and get on a board.  Maybe I resist your persuasions and pressure but deep down feel disappointed in myself.  Either way, it’s the wrong conversation.

            I’d love to ride a wave or stand atop Mount Everest. Do I need those things to be able to say I am really living?  If I say ‘yes,’ then the thrill, the experience has become ultimate in my life.  If something other than Jesus is ultimate in life, it becomes an idol.  It occupies that space that Jesus ought to hold in your life.  And it can’t give you the fulfillment He can give. 

            She wants to get married, but is still single.  Life won’t be fulfilled for her unless she gets married.  Jesus ought to be our fulfillment.  If she’s sure her happiness will only be complete with a husband, marriage become the ultimate thing in her life.  It becomes an idol.  The same could be said about academic achievement or parenting or career success.  Becoming a parent, getting married, being named company president, receiving your doctorate, climbing Everest, making it onto an NFL roster, mastering the piano – these are wonderful things that bring happiness and can point to God’s glory.  If achieving one of these or something else is your life’s goal and you don’t make it, disappointment will come.  That’s natural.  Feel your disappointment.  It’s Okay.

            Understand this.  Jesus came for specific reasons.  In church we talk a lot about Jesus’ death and resurrection; we talk about his birth; we talk about his call upon the church, his teachings, and his promise to return at the end of history. We need to devote attentions to his coming and what it means.

In Mark chapter 1 Jesus frees people from demon possession and physical disease and disability.   The result of Jesus’ miracles is that evil and illness no longer prevented people from living good, full, enriched lives.  They were free to thrive.  In Mark 1:38 Jesus says that proclaiming the message is why he came. 

In John 10:10, he reiterates this purpose.  “I have come that they might have life and have it abundantly.”  This verse falls in a narrative flow that goes all the way back to the beginning of John 9 where  the disciples meet a blind man.  They want Jesus to tell them whose fault it is that this poor soul cannot see.  Was it his sin or his parents’ sin (9:2)?  Jesus blows their minds when he tells them that this blindness shouldn’t reveal sin, not while he’s around.  Rather, blindness will reveal God at work.  Then, he heals the man’s blindness.  A great controversy ensues.  This miracle endows Jesus with authority the formal authorities, the Pharisees, lack.

They have to affirm the man is healed so he can be re-instated at the synagogue, but doing so reveals their impotence in the face of sin and blindness.  By acknowledging what Jesus did, they acknowledge their own blindness and inadvertently forfeit the power they so dearly held.  For those Pharisees, being religious authorities is the ultimate.  Instead of serving the worshiping community in their role as Bible teachers, the role itself has become an idol they serve.

John 9 ends with the healed man worshipping Jesus (9:38) and the religious authorities angry at him.  Chapter 10 continues the pattern of John’s gospel.  After a miracle or an encounter, Jesus then teaches.  The heart of the lesson is that Jesus is the true teacher, the real shepherd.  The point is made that he knows his sheep, his followers, and they know him.  The aforementioned religious leaders are strangers the sheep don’t recognize (John 10:5) and thieves the sheep ignore (John 10:8).

Jesus is the one who leads the sheep to pasture, which is what the sheep need for a healthy life.  Jesus gives us what we need.  Beyond necessity, Jesus gives abundance.  Surfing is thrilling.  Climbing a mountain or the corporate ladder is a rush.  But only with Jesus are we really living, and truly thriving in a full life.

When I was in high school, I had a faith mission.  I had turned my life over to Jesus at age 11.  By the time I was 16, I was fully invested in Jesus.  As a Baptist that also meant I needed to share Christ with friends who did not have faith.  Something troubled me about this.  It seemed that the commonly held perception was Christian kids are well-behaved, but non-Christian party animals have all the fun.  My mission was to debunk this myth and show that Christians have even more fun because we’re part of a better story.  I don’t know how successful I was in my mission to let people know that being a follower of Jesus is awesome.  I do know I was on the right track.

Jesus give fullness of life to all who follow him.  Earlier this week, I told my friend Phil I was going to be talking about the second half of John 10:10.  He immediately asked, “What does it mean in the Greek?”  When I hemmed and hawed, he said you better look it up.  I’m glad I did.

“I have come that they might have life and have it abundantly.”  ‘Perissos’ literally means superabundance, more than enough, ‘more than we could ask or imagine.’[i]  This word, in verb form, is used in Romans 5:20. “Where sin increased, grace abounded all the more.”  The grace we have through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, doesn’t just keep up with our blunders or account for our mistakes or cover our sins.  The grace of God is so plentiful it ‘superabundantly’ washes away our sins.[ii] 

We surely have the promise of a blessed eternal life in resurrected bodies lived with Jesus in the New Earth promised in Revelation 21.  That eternal hope, which we realize later, after death, matters.  The promise for our life, right now, matters just as much.  Following Jesus doesn’t make life easier, but it does make the struggle worth it and we even have joy in our striving.  Walking with Christ doesn’t solve every problem, but it does mean we’re in a community of the people – the church – who walk with us through each trial.  Abundant life is the best life we can hope to have by any description.  You can have abundant life.  Jesus came that you might be free from sin, injury, and any other obstacle that blocks your path to joy.  He makes your joy complete. 

I’d still love to go surfing!  I have a few other bucket list items too.  What I really want is for people to see that the life of a Jesus follower is fun, full of laughs and frequent happy times, and meaningful.  I want to share that.  Whether or not I am successful, either in crossing off bucket list items or leading people to Jesus, I know I already have abundant life.  I know this because it is not up to me or anyone around me.  It is not up to destiny, effort, or luck.  Life beyond life is something Jesus secures.  And he has secured it.

He has risen from the grave.  He is Lord.  We have abundant life because he gives it; he gives superabundantly.

AMEN

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[i] Ephesians 3:20. 

[ii] Bromiley, Geoffrey W. (1985), Theological Dictionary of the New Testament: Abridged in one Volume, edited by Gerhard Kittel and Gerhard Friedrich, translated by Geoffrey W. Bromiley, Grand Rapids (William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company), p.828-829.

Maundy Thursday Message - 2014

Jesus the Giver (John 6:35-51; 13:1-11)

Thursday, April 17, 2014 – Maundy Thursday

            Nelson Mandela spent years and years in prison in South Africa, yet he survived that ordeal, made it out, became president, and forgave those who unjustly imprisoned him.  He gained a reputation for courage, grace, focus, and great inner strength.  Martin Luther King Jr. is known for non-violence.  He dreamed of an integrated America before it happened.  He spoke with charisma and people wanted to follow him; or kill him.  They did both.

            Here in our own town, there are stories of men and women of great character and integrity.  One example of many is former basketball coach Dean Smith.  He is known as much for his faith and social conscience as his brilliance as a coach.  He is respected for his character.

            I could go on with examples.  The one thing others cannot take away is integrity, yet people compromise their own values far too often.  Though it cannot be taken, we give our integrity, we forfeit our reputation, and as a result we struggle to trust one another.  Jesus’ character was never in question.

            This may sound like an example of stating what is ridiculously obvious – Jesus was a good man.  Well, no kidding!  Was that even in question?  And yet, to look closely at why we accept this without question helps us know how to stand before Jesus.  We take up a vulnerable posture in which all we can do is present ourselves fully exposed, our souls completely bare, and then receive whatever he dishes out.

            Why?  It begins with what Jesus did in gathering his disciples for a meal the night he would be arrested.  The gospels indicate strongly he knew what was coming.  Whether he knew it would be that evening or sometime very soon, he knew.  His actions were intentional, done so that after the crucifixion/resurrection dust had settled; his disciples could look back, remember, and learn from what he did.  

            They would have reclined around a table kind of at the height of a coffee table.  And Jesus washed their feet.  I thought why is it such a big deal that he washed their feet?  Along with that question, I wonder, why do I feel compelled to wash feet just because Jesus did it?

            In his culture it was an act of service done by a servant or in many cases by a slave.  It was a lowly chore.  That was a world where people traveled by foot; they walked dirt roads; and they wore sandals.  I would guess those feet were a kind of dirty we rarely see, we of shoes, sock, carpets, pavement, and bathtubs.  It was lowly and here the master lowered himself in a shocking way.

            In our culture the issue is intimacy and self-reliance.  I’ll wash my own feet, thank you.  I’ll do it at my house and then I’ll hide them.  If you must look down there, notice my shoes.  I love you, but I don’t know if I want us to move to that level of intimacy in our friendship.  I’m not sure I want my foot in your hands.

            In Jesus’ day, they did not want to wash the feet of others.  In our day, we don’t want others to wash our feet.  In both cases, the act is a significant step out of normal.  And there’s the genius of it.  Jesus said to his contemporaries in this act, you are no better than the servant who washed feet.  In our day he says to us, you need to open your hearts and let me in and let your brothers and sisters in Christ in. 

            Sure, we are capable of washing our own feet.  But are we vulnerable enough to let people into our hearts to the point that we truly are a family in Christ.  Will we allow him to smash down the barriers we erect to keep everyone, sometimes even our spouses, at a safe distance?  Can we invite Jesus so deeply that we have the intimate love here in our family of believers that Jesus insisted be what defines us?

            In the account of the foot washing in John 13 and in our acting it out, we see Jesus character.  He, the Lord, is a servant.  He models servant-love and demands that we give servant love to one another, to those society would call the ‘least of these,’ and to our enemies.  The foot washing is one way Jesus breaks us down so he break into our lives, our hearts.

            Because of his willingness to show servant-love as he calls us to servant love is one reason we admire Jesus’ character.  Another is his sacrifice.  When we gather around the communion table, we take the bread.  We hold it up and say, ‘this represents the body of Christ.’  We eat it because he said, ‘do this in remembrance of me.’  The broken bread is his body, broken by our sins.  The wine or grape juice represents his blood – the blood of the New Covenant.  Because he died for us and because we confess our sins and receive forgiveness, we have life in the New Covenant. 

            The Gospel of John is abundantly clear that Jesus the man knew exactly what he was doing.  Yes, he was fully God.  At the same time, he was fully human.  When nails drove through his hands, it hurt as much as it would hurt you or me.  Yet, he knew it was coming and went to it for the world, for you and me.  In chapter 10, he says, “I lay down my life.  … No one takes it from me but I lay it down of my own accord” (10:18). 

            In John 19, having been arrested, the beaten, poor Galilean rabbi stands before the splendor and might of Rome, an inquiry from Governor Pontius Pilate.  Yet, Jesus seems to control the entire dialogue.  Frustrated, Pilate asks, “Do you refuse to speak to me?  Do you not know that I have the power to release you and the power to crucify you?”  Already bloodied from the thorns and the whip, Jesus says back, “You would have no power over me unless it had been given you from above” (19:10-11). 

            Jesus chose the cross.  It was God’s plan from the start.  I don’t think God forced Judas to betray him or forced the chief priests to hand him over to Pilate.  I think each player in the drama made his own choices.  But God knows the human heart and the human weakness when it comes to sin and temptation.  Jesus took the sin on himself. 

            When we talk about his great character, we can say many things.  I have chosen to focus on how he expressed servant love, and how Jesus gave of himself as an act of sacrificial love.  Service and sacrifice:  these attributes are what Jesus is all about and they indicate how we are to stand before him. 

            When Jesus knelt, Peter protested.  “You will never wash my feet,” he told his master (13:8).  “Unless I wash you,” Jesus responded, “you have no share with me.”  There is nothing we do.  We present ourselves as we are in all our dirtiness, shame, and failure before God.  There’s no initiative from us; no skill or exceptional achievement.  There is no gain or hard work that gets us there.  Broken, we come and Jesus is the actor, the doer.  He washes.  If we do not come in this way, receiving what the giver gives, we never can be one with him.

            Similarly he says, “Unless you eat the flesh of the son of man and drink his blood, you have no life in you.”  Nothing in any of the four gospels means literal cannibalism.  Joined with the bread and cup accounts in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, we know that here in John 6, Jesus meant we eat the bread and cup as a symbol of us taking him into ourselves.  But when I say, “taking in,” I mean receive.  We accept that we are sinners, but that his body scarred and blood spilled make a way for us.  If we do not, then we do have the eternal Jesus gives. 

            At the foot washers’ basin and at the communion table, we are receivers and Jesus the giver.  Our hands are open as are our hearts.  Nothing is held back or hidden.  We come acknowledging that we belong to him.  We are his and the best that is in us is what he gives. 

            This is not necessarily easy.  People who work hard and achieve a lot want take pride in standing on their own accomplishments.  Taking on the posture of receiving may be one of the biggest obstacles blocking the path to life-changing faith.  We are forced to trust.  Many will not.  Pride is a root cause of sin, yet many of the proudest people in the country sit in churches every week.  We are proud of our children, proud of our families, proud of churches, and proud of ourselves.  Nothing any pastor says will dent that pride in the least.  That entrenched pride produces unmovable wills which is sad because it means people bearing the identity of a Christian are in fact keeping themselves from God.

            I pray tonight, Maundy Thursday, you and I would not be among the proud.  I know we have been.  I wrestle with pride and tonight, I am asking God to help me let it go.  Would you do that?  Would you ask God to free you from having to stand on your own?  Would you look to Heaven and in your spirit confess your sins and your helplessness?  Having confessed would you then open yourself to Jesus and receive what he gives?  In washing feet and being washed, we honor our servant God and we are cleansed by him.  In eating bread and drinking juice, we take him into us as we admit that we are nothing without him.

            He is the great giver, giving life to all who will die to self and receive from him.  Can we do that tonight?

            We will have silent prayer and then be invited forward for the Lord’s Supper.

Abundant Life

Jesus said, “I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.”

Do we believe it?Do we believe he was truly the son of God, God in human flesh? Do we believe he came? Do we believe we are among the “they” whom he promised abundant life? Do trust the abundance he offers?

I throw out this flurry of questions because life is full of stuff. Sometimes it is expensive stuff like the latest smart phone or electronic gadget. Sometimes it is a lot of stuff, like the numerous half flat yard-sale purchases basketballs in my garage. Sometimes our stuff has long since ceased meaning anything, but we chafe at the thought of throwing things out. We don’t consider the possibility that we might be fulfilled with less.

If it isn’t stuff, it is experience. We want to be thrilled. We want to be soothed. We want to be relaxed. We want to be stimulated. So gourmet chefs cook for us, chiropractors bend and contort us, acupuncturists stick us, pharmacists numb us, trainers work us, tour guides amuse and inform us, therapists listen to us, and (some) preachers talk (or yell) at us.

There is nothing wrong with experiences. Stuff is not inherently sinful. But sometimes people make choices like an object or a process or an activity is absolutely essential for the happiest possible life. Without the thing or the memory or the anticipation, we are less than we could be. Jesus gets tacked onto the life we want to live. He certainly is not the heart of life. He is relegated to a small part in the lives of so many who would identify themselves as His followers.

Jesus did not come to fit into our lives. He came to be the master of our lives, and He came, why? That we might have abundant life. He defines what abundance is. There is competition for definition. Other voices – temptation, our own sinful nature, the consumerism of our age, Satan – will try to tell us what abundance is. Who will we trust?

Here is Jesus, speaking in John 10.
7 So Jesus again said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep. 8 All who came before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not listen to them. 9 I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture. 10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly. 11 I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. 12He who is a hired hand and not a shepherd, who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees, and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. 13 He flees because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep. 14 I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, 15 just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep.

Consider all that Jesus promises – pasture, abundance, salvation, relationship. Consider that work of the thieves and robbers: they deceive the sheep (we are the sheep). They steal, kill, and destroy. They flee when danger comes. Jesus lays his life down for us.

When considering Sabbath, turn off the TV (and PC and Smart Phone and IPOD, I-Pad, and I-Touch). Put your keys and wallet in the desk drawer to be left there. Ignore the phone when it rings.

Now, am I suggesting we sit and do nothing? Not exactly. I am suggesting that when we set aside time for Sabbath-keeping, whether it is a half-day or an entire day, we begin by asking Jesus to fill us. Ask Him to help us understand and receive the abundance He gives. A number of activities might open us to Him – walking; a laughter-filled family meal; an intimate meal with a spouse and intimacy following; throwing Frisbee on the lawn; gathering around the fireplace for time together; time in the garden. These are just examples, but for the most part, they are quiet and simple. The stimulus is limited because we want to make space for God.

Of course making space for God is not all there is to Sabbath, but it is all I’ll cover here. I think we would be wonderfully blessed if we emptied ourselves and simplified things during Sabbath. And once emptied and pared down, we ask Jesus to show us the abundance. I think we’ll be surprised and maybe overwhelmed with what He does. What He has to give is better than anything we can find, even on Google. Google has a ton of websites, but only Jesus gives abundant life. So carve out time for Sabbath, and seek His abundance, and trust Him enough to wait for it.