God in Exile (Jeremiah 29:1-14)

Sunday, October 13, 2019

            It doesn’t feel like exile, this life I am living.  Do you feel like you live in exile? 

            Some might.  In our community and our church family, we have brothers and sisters who are far from home and cannot go back.  Life here may be wonderful, but it’s a life they been forced into, not one they chose. 

            How the heck would I know what exile feels like?  I’ve lived in this country my entire life.  “American” is all I know.  I feel safe here.  Some here have lived in Chapel Hill or Carrboro all your life.  What could be more like home than this?  Yet, here, even if we love it here, we’re far from the home God has for us. 

The flesh is the part of each of us prone to sin and reject God’s goodness.  Sin lurks and sooner or later we give in.  All human beings do.  The fallen state of the world is the outcome of generations of humans sinning.  Look at the horrors happening to immigrants at the U.S.-Mexican border.  Look at the evils of the Jim Crowe south.  Look at the ways addiction wrecks people’s lives.  These are but a few examples of the effects of sin.  Wherever on earth “here” is, when we feel at home here, that’s the flesh at work.  In addition to leading us into the sin, the flesh also prevents us from seeing the good God has for us.

            God did not intend for us – we who are made in his image – to live with cancer, opioids, mass incarceration, divorce, aborted pregnancies, corruption from our leaders, war, and hunger.  These little hells are manifestations of the fallen state of the world; God never meant for it to be this way.  Yet, it is this way, and we, the church of Jesus Christ, live in the world as it is.  God has placed us in the midst of the misery.  Why?

            Jeremiah prophesied for 40 years in Judah: 40 years of ominous forecasts for the nation.  He warned of coming calamity, punishment for Judah’s rebellion God.  This rebellion was seen in Judah’s willingness to worship false gods.  It was evident in the way Judah’s elite class abused and took advantage of the poorest, most vulnerable people in society.  Judah trampled those at the margins, so God, sent Judah into exile in Babylon.  The wealthy and educated of Judah, the governing class, became people on the margins in exile.  The Lord declares “I have sent [them] into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon” (Jeremiah 29:4). 

History says the Babylonians defeated Judah and destroyed Solomon’s temple.  Babylon overwhelmed many ancient peoples, Judah being just one.  That’s the ‘objective’ historian’s assessment.  By faith we know the Babylonians who appeared to be so mighty were nothing more than tools God used to get the attention of His people.  A century later those same Babylonians were be routed by Persia.  Unwittingly, they served God’s purpose.

How long would God’s people have to stay 1000’s of miles from home, in exile among godless heathens?  In the letter he sent, Jeremiah told the people not to listen to the prophets who promised exile would be short and they’d be home quickly.  Jeremiah was no second Moses telling the foreign king to “Let my people go.”  His message was very different.

“Build houses and live them.”  How long does it take to build a house?  “Plant gardens and eat what they produce.”  Ok, we’ll be here at least an entire growing cycle.  What edible crops come to harvest the quickest?  “Take wives and have sons and daughters.”  Whoa!  That’s a minimum of 9 months.  Well maybe the growing of the crops and the building of the house and the gestation period can all overlap. 

“Take wives and have sons and daughters; take wives for your sons, and give your daughters in marriage that they may bear sons and daughters; multiply there and do not decrease” (Jer. 29:6).  This exile will last until you become grandparents.  Grandparents are not mentioned much in the Bible.  Lifespans weren’t what they are now.  People often died before they ever became grandparents.  How long with the exile last?  Your entire life.

God did not create Israel or Judah for the purpose of rejecting Him.  God did not set up Babylon to be an imperial power that ravaged and enslaved her enemies.  God doesn’t cause human beings to be evil to each other.  God gives us free will.  Wonder why evil has run amuck in the world?  Remember, God allows humans being to choose his way or their own way.  When, in the flesh, they choose to reject Him, God allows the consequences to play out. 

However, God also works in the brokenness of the world to save it; to save all of us.  God didn’t create the evil conditions, but God doesn’t abandon us to evil either.  God uses exile as the moment He begins creating something new.

We exist to live in relationships of love with God and each other.  We don’t have what God intends for us right now, in the world as it is, fallen in sin, and certainly people who don’t know Jesus are not living the life God intends for them.  So, God places us – his church - in the midst of the world’s pain as his agents pointing hurting, lost people to His light.  Our purpose is to go to before God on behalf of our city, and to go to our city as agents of God’s goodness.  God has set us here for everyone’s benefit.

The entire story arc in the Old Testament flows from God leading Abraham to the Land to flight from the Land during famine to Moses leading the people out of Egypt back to the Land.  It appears that the land is at the center of the story, but that’s not the case.  The holiest of moments come when Moses receives God’s word for His people while they landlessly wander in the wilderness.  The pinnacle of life with God in the Bible story comes in the wilds of Sinai when all the people have is their complete dependence on God.  The Land is just a fulfillment of God’s promise.  God will always make His word good, in any land, anywhere on earth.

Landholding is rebellion against God, claiming for ourselves what God has given as a gift of grace out of His generosity.  Clinging to the past or holding tight to the life we know and control – that’s idolatry.  We think that past, known life is so great that we forget to trust that God’s tomorrow is infinitely better than our cherished yesterday.  We put more faith in what we know than in what God promises. 

So, God lets us fall into exile.  God leads us into the valley because God wants us to meet Him there.  When we thought life was so good, or at least understandable and manageable, we didn’t see God.  We forgot we needed Him. 

Land-loss is whatever it is that you or I lose when we decide we will not look back to the past or try to make our way to a past life.  What your life used to be; what the church’s life used to be; what the community used to be; we don’t look back. Moving forward from the past and from the life we had, good or bad, is an act of faith.  Walter Brueggemann writes, “Exile is the way to new life in new land.  One can scarcely imagine a more radical, less likely understanding of history.  In New Testament categories, death is the way to new life” (Luke 9:23-27; Romans 6:1-11).[i]

Last week we took comfort in Lamentations 3 and the promise that God’s mercies are new every morning.  Even with new mercies, we’re in exile, and that’s no accident.  The only way for the people of God is the way forward from right where we are.  There’s no going back, and when we truly understand what God has done in nailing our sins to the cross and giving us new life in Christ, we won’t want to go back.  Made new in Christ, we embrace the call to exile. We’re made for the Kingdom.  As we live our lives answering the exile call, God prepares us for our eternal home, the one we’re missing so much right now, even if we don’t fully understand it. 

So, if the world is broken and we’re called to live in the middle of the mess, what do we do?  Conveniently for us, Jeremiah answers that question directly.  Build houses.  Plant gardens.  Get married.  Have families.  Be rooted in the world.  Expand, do not decrease.  Don’t sink into holy huddles praying for the end of time.  Live!  We are active participants in the life of Carrboro and Chapel Hill, Hillsboro and Pittsboro,Durham and Raleigh.  We are God-worshiping Jesus followers who live to draw others to Jesus. 

But, building, planting, and living daily life is just the beginning of how we answer the call to exile.  What else does Jeremiah instruct?  “Seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you, and pray to the Lord on its behalf.”

HillSong church, soon to be Hillside Church, seeks the welfare of the city.  Physical disability makes life hard in ways God did not intend.  Jesus associated physical pain and sickness with evil from Satan.  Earlier this year, we built a ramp on someone’s home.  We plan to do similar projects in the future.  It was a collaborative effort that resulted in a wheel-chair bound individual having an easier time. We believe this contributes to our city’s wellbeing and our part in story is an expression of our obedience to the God who is at work in exile.

More recently, we opened a food pantry in our church because we believe hunger is evil.  No one in our city should have to deal with food insecurity.  Here in exile, we want to show our neighbors that God cares about them.  God wants all bellies to be filled.  By hosting the food pantry, we join God where God is at work.

Through hospitality we seek the city’s welfare, whether hosting the food pantry, the scout troop, the preschool, another church’s funeral service, or other groups that come in.  We welcome them with friendliness as we share the message that we care.

In addition to building, planting, and living, and seeking the wellbeing of the city by joining God where God is at work in the city, Jeremiah says, “Pray to the Lord on the city’s behalf.”  Jeremiah told the exiles to work for and pray for the very enemies who had dragged them into exile.  Jesus says the same thing.  “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” (Matthew 5:44).  The Jews in exile may have feared that the Babylonian God had defeated Yahweh.  Jeremiah exploded that reasoning.  You’re not in exile because God lost.  You’re in exile because God sent you there.  God is God in exile.  God is God everywhere.

That neighbor you cannot stand?  Pray for him.  You’re both exiles.  The president who makes your skin crawl, either the current one, the previous one, or the next one?  Pray for him (or her).  Jeremiah’s call to prayer called on God’s exiled people to care deeply about the “other” even though that other was also “enemy.”  Jesus extends that call to us.  To meet God in exile, we have to plant ourselves in exile, work for the good of the city, and pray for those around us. 

In a couple of months, we become Hillside Church, a community that follows Jesus, loves others, and shares hope.  God has given us a mission to bring people in our town to Him that they might know him, turn to him in faith, and join us in the journey out of exile and to our true home in his Kingdom.  We’re planting our church in exile as a step of faith, trusting we will meet God here and He will lead us to where we need to be. 

AMEN

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[i] Walter Brueggemann (1977), The Land, Fortress Press (Philadelphia), p.122.

To Drink with Jesus (Mark 10:32-45)

            Let’s meet for coffee.  I receive or extend this invitation almost every week of my life, often multiple times in a week.  What’s so special about coffee? Nothing!  The phrase ‘let’s meet for coffee’ actually means, ‘I want to sit with you and talk with you and get to know you.’  The translation of ‘let’s meet for coffee’ is ‘I want to get to know you.  You matter so much, I think the best way for me to spend my time is in your presence.’  Let’s meet for coffee.  I say it or hear it from church members; people who are new in our church; new pastors in the area; people outside our church who want to talk with me in my role as pastor; people who want to spend time we me as just “Rob,” not “Pastor Rob.” 

            It’s got nothing to do with coffee.  You could meet over cokes or beers or for lunch.  Let’s meet for coffee is an invitation to relationship. 

            It’s a question Jesus puts to each of us, yet He asks it this way.  “Can you drink the cup that I drink?”  Are we able to drink the cup with Jesus and undergo the baptism Jesus experienced, a baptism that included water and a cross and a burial? 

            Mark’s Gospel, and especially Mark chapter 10, has Jesus on the move. Last week’s passage, 10:17-31, began, “As he was setting out on a journey.”  Today’s reading, 10:32-45 begins, “They were on the road, going up to Jerusalem, and Jesus was walking ahead of them.”  This is God in human flesh, a man like other human beings, but unlike any other.  The disciples know they’re moving toward the city, but they trail behind in a cluster unsure of where this all is headed.  They are amazed, it says.  And the crowd following is afraid!  Afraid?

            Things around Jesus are intensifying, moving more quickly, becoming more serious.  “See, we are going up to Jerusalem,” he says.  “The son of man will be handed over to the chief priests and scribes, and they will condemn him to death; then they will hand him over to the Gentiles; they will mock him, and spit upon him, and flog him, and kill him; and after three days, he will rise again” (10:33-34).  Jesus has to look back to say this to his closest friends because, as Mark said, he’s walking alone, ahead of them.  They can’t keep up and aren’t sure if they want to.  Sharing coffee with him will lead them down dangerous paths.

            So James and John pretend they only heard the “rise again” part of what Jesus said.  They jog to catch up.  “Teacher,” they say, very respectfully, “We want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.”  They’re like that rich man we read about last week who bragged that he had kept all the law with perfect obedience.  No, they’re worse than him. At least he knelt before Jesus.  And all he asked was that he promised a place in God’s kingdom.  He just wanted to get in.

            James and John do not kneel before Jesus.  They walk alongside him.  Well, they hang back for the part about being mocked, spat upon, and crucified.  But when he says, “rise again,” they’re ready to listen and even more ready to speak.  “We want to sit at your right and left hand in your glory.”

            Do we do that?  Do we assume that when we take on ourselves the title “Christian,” we are on God’s side; or, more accurately, do we assume, God joins our side?  Thus anyone who opposes us, opposes God, and God joins us in opposing them?  This could be in politics or in interpersonal relationships.  Are we with Jesus when he talks about being crucified, or are we hanging back?  Do we, like James and John, when we hear “rise again” come running with our requests that Jesus give whatever we ask for?

            As he did with the rich man in the previous episode, Jesus joins James and John in their shortsightedness. “What do you want me to do for you?” He asks.  He’s about to go to cross, about to suffer absolute humiliation, torture, and then death; and he’s doing it for all of humanity.  To be with him is to give of yourself as he gave of himself.  They only want to be with him when it’s good for them.  “Allow us to sit one at your right hand and one at your left in your glory” (v.37).  They want reward without sacrifice, glory for themselves without regard for anyone else.  Jesus gives of himself for everyone else.

            What do we want when we think of God and faith and life?  Do I live in way that I am all about me, my needs, my wants?  The results I am concerned about the results that affect only me?  Am I am indifferent about the suffering of people around me?  Am I unaffected by the tears other people cry?  If so, then I am not drinking with Jesus.

            That’s what he asks James and John.  They talk about glory, assuming they and Jesus and God are on one side with opponents on the other.  Jesus said, “To sit at my left or right hand is not mine to grant.”  He defers all authority to God, including his own life and death, suffering and happiness.  Jesus puts it all in God’s hands.  James and John want him to guarantee their glory.  He asks, “Can you drink the cup that I drink?”  Ignorantly, arrogantly, they declare, “We are able.”

            It is not for us to stand before Jesus Christ our Lord and declare, “We are able.”  We offer this.  “We are willing.”  He makes us able.  In humble worship, we say, “We are here.”  He tells us where to go and what to do.  He tells us who we are in the world. We do not tell him who he is supposed to be for us. 

            “Can you drink the cup?” 

            “We are able.”

            No you aren’t.  Jesus tells them, “The cup that I drink, you will drink.  And the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized” (v.39).  And he’s already said what that means: mocked; spit upon; flogged; crucified; resurrected.  In order to have the seats in glory requested in verse 37, we have to follow Jesus.  He’s not looking for people to believe in Him.  He’s looking for people who want to follow Him.  Jesus has no interest in admirers.  People will say, “O Jesus, he was a great moral teacher; a wise rabbi; a true prophet.”  He has no time for empty, uninformed flattery like that.  Jesus is Lord and is to be recognized as Lord by people who will commit their lives to following Him.  To sit in glory, as requested in verse 37, one has to follow Jesus even when he walks the road of suffering described in verses 33-34.  He tells them they don’t understand it, but they will walk that road.

            Of course Matthew and Peter and Judas and Nathanial and the other disciples don’t find much to like about James and John’s request.  Who do these brothers, these sons of thunder think they are?  An argument ensues and Jesus will have none of it.  “You know among the Gentiles those whom they recognize as their rulers lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants.  … It is not to be so among you; but whoever wishes to be great must become your servant and whoever wishes to be first must be slave of all” (v.42-44). 

            Mark writes that when the other 10 hear James and John’s request they become indignant.  That might be a word that encapsulates our political moment in America: the politics of indignation.  Our president calls someone “horseface” or describes African nations as “-hole” countries or mocks a victim of sexual assault, and we become indignant!   He’s done things like this all his life.  Why would we be surprised?  Senate Democrats do everything they can, not to provide leadership for our country, but to block him.  And the Republicans among us become indignant.  Why?  Politics in America is not about leadership; it’s not about what’s good for our democracy; it’s not about what actually helps people; it’s about winning.  Why would we expect anything else?

            “It is not to be so among you,” Jesus tells us.  The community of His followers, the church, the body of Christ, must be different.  And our loyalty, our calling, our identity, is not primarily as American citizens, but as followers of the Lord Jesus Christ, subjects in the Kingdom of God.

Yes, we should vote.  As November approaches, we will pray for our nation, for our elected officials, for all the candidates, and especially for all the voters.  In your heart of hearts, you may pray that one party does very well.  You do so knowing that your brother Christ with whom your worship every week is praying just as earnestly that the other party does well.  That’s OK.  We can pray that entrusting our thoughts, dreams, and hopes to God.  We give it to God and trust God to do something with it. 

But more importantly, we give ourselves to God.  We do what God directs us to do.  We go where God sends us.  We vote as God leads us to vote.  We don’t pray that God would lead other people to see things the way we see things.  We pray that we would see the world as Jesus sees the world.  We renounce the politics of indignations because that is the way the world operates and we are in the world, but we are not of the world.  We are of the Kingdom of God where our Lord came “to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many” (v.45).  We follow Him in that, giving of ourselves that others may be blessed.  We sacrifice time, money, reputation, glory, power so that others, the undesirables and unwanted around us may know the love of God and the life Jesus gives to all the broken people who come to Him. 

            As we renounce the self-serving, ego-driven politics of indignation and instead live in self-giving love, we come to understand what it is to drink with Jesus.  We drink the cup and even in the parts that are painful, we see Him and walk in His blessing.  

            Keep this in mind as you look around and decide if you want to drink the cup of Jesus or become indignant because the side opposite you is making you mad as you knew they would.  Drinking the cup of Jesus sets one apart.  Remember the sequence at the beginning of the reading.  The crowd is trailing behind, afraid.  Ahead of them, but considerably behind Jesus are the disciples, thinking they knew what’s what, but actually quite confused.  Then, out front, Jesus walks alone to the cross and then to resurrection.

            When, and if, you decide you want to catch up and walk with him, you will be walking toward resurrection and glory.  However, there’s a valley of death between here and there that cannot be avoided.  To walk with him, we have to go there with him.  There is life and love and joy every step of the way, but every step is not easy because death never is.  And to drink His cup and walk with Him, we know we will be set apart from our neighbors, our families, and our culture.  He told the disciples and he tells us, the world is one way; it is not to be so with you.  We are invited to drink Jesus’ cup and walk Jesus’ path. 

            So, ponder that invitation.  Picture your life in the world, but not of it.  Knowing what it means, decide if you want to drink with Jesus.

AMEN

The One Thing You Lack (Mark 10:17-31)

I didn't get to post this last week because I was out of town.  So here it is today, my sermon from 10/14/2018.  Also today, I will post yesterday's sermon (10/21/18), and a reflection from my experience last week at the New Baptist Covenant Summit in Atlanta.

  

          The disciples heard what Jesus said, and they could not believe it!  Then, he said it again, more forcefully.

            What did Jesus say and why did it shock them so much?

            Jesus was in the region of Judea, beyond the Jordan River.  This is a period of history in which everyone traveled by foot.  You walked everywhere.  So you traveled at a walking pace.  Today, if some teacher set up and began to teach on the side of Interstate 40, the people whizzing by at 70 mph would not even notice.  In 30 AD it was common for itinerant teachers to teach spontaneously along the roadside.  When they did, they always drew a crowd. Those passing by were not headed to a movie theater or a stadium to watch a game or to the downtown shopping district.  The roadside preacher was a welcome amusement whether or not you liked what he had to say. 

            Most people liked what Jesus had to say, or were at least intrigued by it.  His teaching was both familiar and new.  He challenged his listeners even as he entertained them with humor.  He gave wisdom and truth.  And his teaching was powered by the Holy Spirit of God.  “Crowds gathered around him,” Mark writes, “and as was his custom, he again taught them” (10:1).

           

            This is what’s happening when Mark writes, “a man ran up and knelt before him.”  Jesus has just again collided with Pharisees; he was intent on teaching the Law in a way that gave people life and joy; the Pharisees wanted to use the Law to trap him (10:2-12).  Jesus won the rhetorical duel and laid down strict prohibitions against divorce in the process.  Then he welcomed the messy, chaotic joy of children leaping on and about him, and reprimanded his disciples who tried to keep the children at arm’s reach. 

            So, we see him clashing with authority, teaching strict adherence to the Law of Moses, and at the same time upsetting the social order by elevating the voiceless – children.  Now, a zealous man has made a show of kneeling before Jesus to tout his own righteousness.  He heaps flattery upon him because he wants to hear Jesus say, “O wise, righteous man, you are already bound for the kingdom of God.”

            Jesus does not say that.  Instead, he calls the man out for the flowery words. “Why do you call me good?  No one is good but God alone” (v.18).  The disciples have already heard demons call him “the holy one of God” (1:24).  Mark is not, at this point in the story, asserting Jesus’ divinity.  He’s hinting at it.  And this is another of those hints.  Jesus says this, “no one is good but God alone,” for his disciples’ benefit.  And Mark situates Jesus’ statement for his readers’ benefit.  The disciples knew Jesus was good.  They had seen it over and over. We, Mark’s readers know Jesus is good.  We’ve seen it and many of us have experienced it.  Get the hint?  The man who ran up kneeling and asking and boasting did not.

            Jesus tells him the path to the kingdom is one he already knows.  He must keep the Law of Moses.  In a statement of bald arrogance so glaring it’s hard to believe the man could blurt it out with a straight face he says, “I have!”  I have obeyed the laws of God since I was a kid.  That’s not true of anyone.  We all have moments when we lie or we steal or we gossip or we covet something our neighbor has or we fail to honor our parents or we ignore the Sabbath.  The one who honestly thinks he has totally kept the law lives in the worst kind of self-delusion.

            Jesus doesn’t call this man on his absurd claim.  If that man wants to live in a reality in which he observes the Law perfectly, Jesus will join him in that fantasy.  Jesus wants this man to hear the truth so clearly that he cannot miss it even hiding behind the walls of self-delusion he’s constructed.  Jesus looks at him and loves him.  He doesn’t want to hurt this man.  He wants to free him.

            “You lack one thing.”

            Now, we have to pay close attention to the action.  This man ran up to Jesus.  Knelt before him.  Asked his question, a clearly self-aggrandizing question.  And for good measure, he boasted of his own righteousness.  That’s the action so far.

            Now Jesus gives him new actions to take. “Go, sell what you own and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, and follow me” (10:21).  Go!  Sell!  Give!  Come!  Follow!

            Suddenly the man of action isn’t running any more.  Suddenly the man of obedience who has kept all of God’s laws since his youth, isn’t obeying any more.  Upon hearing what Jesus said, he is shocked.  He wanted to be promised Heaven.  But he didn’t want to change his life.  He wanted praise and promises from the great teacher who had again and again outshined the Pharisees in rhetorical flourish.  The great teacher doesn’t give what he wanted.  And he is a rich man.  One of the things to know about rich people is they usually get what they want. 

            “You lack one thing!”  Jesus says to him.  He says that to every one of us; to you; to me.  What is that one thing we lack?

            Two things we must avoid are diluting this story and diverting this story.  We dilute the story when we find ways to lessen the blow.  In verse 23 Jesus says, “How hard it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!”  Then in verse 25 he drives the point home.  “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of the needle than for a wealthy person to enter the kingdom of God.”  The disciples and most people in their day believed material wealth was a sign of God’s blessing.  Wealthy people had to be closer to God; it’s why they were rewarded with wealth.  So, if what Jesus says is right, that it is impossible for the wealthy to enter the Kingdom, then certainly poor fishermen and villagers will be left out.  “Greatly astound they said to one another, ‘who can be saved’” (v.26)?

            Unable to tolerate such a conclusion, we find ways to convince ourselves that Jesus didn’t really mean that.  I even had a college professor who researched and discovered that there was indeed a gate called the “Eye of the Needle” gate, which was quite narrow.  Getting camels that gate was quite hard, but not impossible.  My professor, a history teacher, could not accept that salvation is impossible.  Jesus wasn’t talking about a narrow gate.  He meant apart from following him, not believing, but following him, salvation is impossible and especially so for rich people.  We must not dilute his teaching and rob the message of its force. 

            We must also not divert it.  Yes, Jesus did say it was impossible for the rich to be saved, but I am not among the rich.  You might know a lot of people who are wealthier than you.  But, if Jesus said to you, go and sell your possession; give all the money you make to the poor; and then, come and follow me.  Would you do it?  Would you do it joyfully?  Sell your car and your house and your computer and, gasp, your phone?  Mark did not include this episode from Jesus’ life for other people.  This is here for me and for you. 

            One other thing to note.  In Luke’s Gospel, chapter 8, we meet several wealthy women.  They use their means to support Jesus and the disciples financially.  He didn’t just turn stones into bread and multiply loaves and fish all the time.  Most of the time Jesus ate food the same way you and I do.  Someone bought it and then he ate it.  He did not tell those women who were supporting him to go, sell, give, and then come and follow.  He did not say that to Zacchaeus, the short, wealthy tax collector.  In the case of Zacchaeus, Jesus invited himself to the rich man’s house and ate a fine meal at the rich man’s table. 

            What gives?  Why in one case does Jesus tell the rich man, you have to give it all away?  In other case, he meets the rich man on the rich man’s terms and promises the rich man salvation without ever threatening the man’s rich’s?  What gives?  Which word does Jesus give to you or me when we meet him?

            “You lack one thing.”  This is true for every single person.  Before we enter the Kingdom of God, there is something we lack, something we must give up.  And we don’t get to choose what it is.  I know, Jesus, I’ll give up eating Shrimp!  (Don’t tell Jesus, but I’m already allergic to shellfish).  That man had to give up his riches because his riches are what came between him and God. 

            Most rich people like being rich.  At least, they think they do.  Whatever new things enter their lives have to fit in with their riches.  So if this guy is going to listen to Jesus, Jesus’ message cannot threaten his wealth.  Thus he has a problem because “to enter the kingdom of God one must submit to God’s rule so that God reigns over every aspect of life.”[i] For most rich people, it is the riches they don’t want to give up, not even for the promise of Heaven.

            Middle class and poor people are just as troubled because everyone has something they don’t want to give up.  “God, this is how I am and I am not changing and I am not sacrificing.  I think you made me this way, so your laws and life as a disciples has to accommodate me.” 

No!  That isn’t how life in Christ works.  When we run up and kneel before Jesus and say, “Jesus, tell us what to do so we can go to heaven when we die.”  Jesus says, “Do?  There’s nothing you can do.  Turn every aspect of your life – all your stuff, your most cherished relationships, your career, your appetites and attractions, all of it – turn it all over to me.”  That’s what Jesus says.  He demands to be Lord of all of it, all of life.  We lack the will to surrender.  We want to be assured of heaven even as we continue to live on our own terms.  Jesus wants to let God the Father take care of the Heaven part.  Jesus wants us to live this life totally committed to Him, surrendered to His Lordship, dependent upon his Holy Spirit.

Remember, he looked at the man and loved him.  The life of following Jesus would lead to hardship and sacrifice and it was better than anything that man’s riches could buy. The life of following Jesus is a happier, fuller, more adventurous, and more rewarding life than any other.  But that man could not bear to let go and surrender to God.  So he who came running up to Jesus full of himself walked away sad because all he had was himself. 

The disciples saw this exchange, and they were shocked.  Are we?

What do you have?  What are you holding that is dearer to you, closer to your heart than anything else?  Is the life Jesus has for you better than that thing you’re holding so tightly?  Would you risk following him to find out?  That’s what Jesus is asking you to do this morning, right now.

·         Take an inventory of your life.

·         Identify that which is more precious to you.

·         In faith hand that thing over– possession, relationship, dream – whatever it is; hand it over to Jesus.  Maybe he’ll let you keep it.  Maybe he’ll transform it.  Maybe he’ll tell you to get rid of it.  The point is to trust him.  He is Lord and matters more than even that thing you love most.  So hand it over to Jesus.  You will have treasure in Heaven.

·         Then come and follow Him.

AMEN

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[i] David Garland (1996), The NIV Application Commentary: Mark, Zondervan (Grand Rapids), p.400

By Grace we have been Saved (Ephesians 2:5, 8)

            I have little tricks that I use when I am talking with people.  I use this in preaching too.  It’s not sinister or disingenuous, but it is intentional.  Whether in a one-on-one conversation, or in a sermon, I will say something to try to get you to like me, or at least trust me.  If I know I am about to give a message that will rile people up, raise someone’s hackles, maybe anger someone, then I at least want to gain credibility.

            I played high school football and rode the bench for a year in college.

            I was in the military, the National Guard.

            I am from the south; moved to Roanoke, VA in 1982.

            I am from the Midwest; lived in Michigan before moving to Roanoke at age 12 in 1982.

            I spent a summer working in a factory.

            I spent a summer working landscaping.

            I have traveled the world.

            I have a mixed-race family.

            I read Dostoevsky and Tolstoy and Solzhenitsyn.

            None of that is much of a big deal to anyone really, but if I think it will help me gain credibility, I weave it into conversations or into my presentation.  I want you to hear my accomplishments and my experiences.  I want you to think it is worth your time and your mental energy to listen to what I have to say.  I am trying to relate to you.  I hope you’ll find me relatable.  And at a deeper level, I hope you’ll find me worthy. 

           

            I am not unique in this.  People want to be liked.  People want to be respected.  You do.  I do.  People want to be welcomed and to belong.  You may use different methods to achieve this than I do, but I suspect you do it.  And achieve is the word, especially in the American cultural landscape.    

The spirit of the American way of thinking, our cultural ethos, highly values the self-made person, the rugged individualist.  Stand on your own two feet.  If you’re going through tough times, pull yourself up by your bootstraps. 

In the movie Saving Private Ryan, Captain Miller lay dying, knowing he had given his life in combat to save Private Ryan.  His dying words to Ryan are “You earn it.”  In other words, you better darn well live a life that was worth the sacrifice that was made for you. 

Can we a take a second to acknowledge the absurdity of this?  How can John Ryan live well enough to account for the entire squad of army rangers who died trying to save him?  What measurement determines whether a life is well-lived or not? 

In my own life, how foolish is it for me to recite my life resume in hopes that I’ll be worthy of your attention, your respect, and maybe even your friendship.  Such futility.  I say I played football, the other guy was named to the all-state team.  I come with my National Guard experience, the other guy was regular army special forces.  I causally mention that I read War and Peace, the other guy read it and actually understood it.  There is always someone smarter, someone taller, someone with a better physique, someone with a better education, someone who did cooler things in life, someone who achieved more, or has more than you and me.  Always. 

Trying to earn respect and affection and friendship is futile.  It is a complete waste of time.  Furthermore, the harder we work to prove ourselves worthy and good, the further we move away from the foundation of the Gospel.  I do not condemn all competition.  My sons are both playing sports.  I want them to try to be the best, the fastest runner in Cross Country, the hardest hitter in football.  Maybe you work in a competitive industry and part of your success is being a leader in attracting new customers.    

That’s fine.  Be competitive.  Try your hardest in whatever you’re doing in work and in life.  But, as followers of Jesus, we have to listen to what the word of God says about our value.  Upon hearing the Gospel story, we have to adjust how we value other people in light of how Jesus values us. 

We’re going to spend the next couple of months thinking about our church family as a household. Beeson Divinity School professor Sydney Park writes, “The house of God is not a physical construction, but a living organism composed of people who are now members through Christ’s sacrifice.”[i]

When you think of us as “members,” imagine your fingers and your toes and how connected these digits are to your body.  When we imagine church as the household of God, we see ourselves connected to each other in that way.  Cut off my finger, and something is missing.  Cut me off from you and you from me, each one of us from each other, and we feel it.  That’s the kind of intimacy and interconnectedness we want in our church. 

For me to be the pastor of this kind of tight-knit family, the shepherd of this community of self-giving love, I have to move away from constantly trying to win you over by reciting my life resume.  I can share about football and the army and school and Michigan and Virginia.  But my sharing should not be an effort to impress.  It should come out of my willingness to share my story.  You give me the gift of showing interest in my story.  And you give me another gift: you share your story with me.  We share our lives with each other. 

We move away from attempts to be found worthy, and instead reach for grace and generosity.  It is essential that we are honest about our weaknesses, wounds, and vulnerability.  We all have scars.  I don’t need to bleed all over the stage every Sunday, but it would be dishonest for me to stand up and pretend I am perfect and have it all together.  For us to be Christ to each other in this household of God, we have to recognize each other as wounded healers.[ii]

When we do that then we’ll be ready to embrace what I am quite certain is God’s call on this church.  This church is called to be the household of God.  That means whenever we gather, we answer this question: what must we do to help people feel at home here, in the household of God?  What changes must we make to help feel like they are at home here?

We’re not dealing with those questions today.  Today, we face the futile search for worthiness.  Today we openly admit that we aren’t going to impress each other, that we can’t, and we shouldn’t try.  Instead, we love each other exactly as we are.  No matter how messy or broken, we give each other the love of Christ.  Change comes for each person because when one meets Christ, change is inevitable.  He makes us new creations, but that is at God’s initiative.  Our starting point is love.

In Ephesians 1 and 2, note what is said about Jesus. 

He is Lord (1:3) – master of everything, master everywhere.  He’s not a lord, he’s The Lord.

He is Christ (1:3), the anointed one of God, sent to save God’s people from sin, death and destruction.  When Jesus came, we discovered the wonder that he saved Israel, but not only Israel.  All who come in repentance to the Jewish Messiah are saved.

He is eternal.  Verse 4 – “[The Father God] chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world.  “In Christ” is the key phrase.  God was at work in Christ before the foundation of the world.  Our lives only make sense when we understand them in Christ.

He is the means of our adoption as children of God, he is God’s means of grace, he is God’s beloved, and he is the vessel of redemption (1:4-7). 

Jesus is flush with grace; verse 7 God lavished grace upon us.  That means the best things in our lives, the realities that give us life are gifts we did not earn, but rather blessings God gives freely and extravagantly. 

He is the revealer of mysteries, the reconciler of all things, and the enabler of life (1:7, 9; 2:5).

Ephesians 2:6 says we are raised up with him.  Jesus rose from the grave, defeated death, and takes us with him.  Death is next after this life, but it’s not last.  Each one of us who is in Christ has resurrection ahead, after death. 

When Ephesians says in chapter 2, verse 9, that we are made for good works, that also happens as we are in Christ.

All the good we experience comes about because of who God is and we know who God is because we know God in Jesus Christ.  Jesus is the embodiment of God’s gift, giving us salvation, that which we do not deserve and have not earned.  In Christ, our sins are washed away, we are made new, given joy now, a meaningful life now, and promised eternal life with God after resurrection.

This is summed up in chapter 2 verse 5 – “by grace we have been saved.”  And then so we don’t miss the point, it is repeated in verse 8.  We are saved by grace through faith.  It is not our own doing.  It is the gift of God, not a result of our efforts.  Ephesians 2:10 says, “We are what he has made us.”

This is a core Christian confession, but we rarely stop to recognize just how hard this confession is to accept.  We Americans are individualistic in our thinking and merit-driven when we talk about value.  You assess another person’s worth based your evaluation of their worthiness.  I do it.  It’s an American thing and it is the antithesis, the opposite of how it works in the Kingdom of God.

For us to be the household of God, we must pray for release from this kind of individualistic, merit-based thinking.  We need to spend a long time asking God to free us from this and to guide us into grace.  We need to see the world and to see one another through the eyes of grace. 

Our default is to revert to assessing worthiness.  Do you deserve for me to give you respect?  Have I earned the right for you to give me your time and your attention?  That’s where we go automatically. 

The change comes when we are able to live in the grace God’s lavished on us and then that grace spills out from us onto those around us.  And we will begin existing as the true household of God when collectively we are characterized by grace.  When people come among us and they know they are welcomed and loved and they meet God here, then that will be the fruit, the evidence that we are a graced community. 

The reflection questions for this morning are “what do you have that you’ve earned,” and “what do you have that has come as a gift?”  Look over the attributes of Jesus mentioned in Ephesians 1 & 2.  Especially remember 2:5 & 8.  “By grace we have been saved.”  Imagine how life looks when it flows out of the gift of new life God has given.  We don’t see and interact with the world based on an achievement mindset.  Rather, we wake up every day basking the radiant light of the joy-filled grace God has poured into us.  And from there we step into the world.  When we do it that way, what does life look like?

AMEN

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[i] M. Sydney Park (2012) in Honoring the Generations, M.Sydney Park, Soong-Chan Rah, and Al Tizon, editors, Judson Press (Valley Forge, PA), p.3.

[ii] Peter T. Cha and Greg J. Yee (2012), Honoring the Generation, p.89.