Pastor Tommy Thompson
Isaiah 2:1-5
Romans 13:11-14
Matthew 24:36-44
Advent 1B / Nov 28 2010
Happy New Year! ... Advent is here; it has intruded into our ordinary time like an unexpected and extravagant gift left at our door step. Whether we are ready or not...whether we were expecting it or not, Advent it is here with its message of joyful newness and transformation.
This really is what Advent is all about: newness and transformation--joy! God’s coming is not something to run from but something to prepare for --something to run to...like that time I observed a husband and wife running toward each other at an airport. The husband had obviously been away for a while...when their eyes met, there was nothing stopping their eventual embrace. This is what God’s coming to us is like...running towards one another for that ultimate, eternal embrace.
The new year begins with this kinda of joyful end-time perspective.
And when we speak of end we don’t mean “end” like the “end” of a movie, as if it is over with no sequel, or the end of a race, or even worse, the end of a good relationship. The end Advent longs for and celebrates is the “end” in the sense of the “goal” or the “fulfillment.” Truly, this end is a beginning...a new beginning. This new beginning is the focal point of the prophet’s Advent proclamation.
In the midst of destruction and despair, Isaiah sees the Word of the Lord. In ancient Israel words were more than those sounds that come forth from the mouths of human beings for the sake of communication. In ancient times, it was understood that words create worlds. They believed that the Word of God created this world. Now the prophet Isaiah gets to see the Word creating a new world which is the redemption of the current one.
The Word Isaiah sees is a promise. “In the days to come, the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established as the highest of the mountains and shall be raised above the hills; all the nations shall stream to it.”
What a word for God’s people who are currently reaping the consequences of their sin. Where all that is deserved is wrath, a river of mercy flows! God will, with our without His covenant partner, draw the nations to Himself. He will not give up on His beloved creation. He is going to act.
Note that what is seen by Isaiah in this vision is not the result of time progressing into some sort of utopia brought about by all the right social programs. No, what Isaiah sees here is God’s time intruding in our time like Advent into ordinary time, like the joy of a baby intruding into our lives even if we’re not quite ready for her. What Isaiah sees is the fulfillment of God’s invitation to Abraham except God is fulfilling the role Himself.
When God’s time intrudes into our time, the nations will stream to the house of the Lord...they will come seeking instruction in the ways of God...wanting to walk in the paths God has cleared for us to walk in -- the paths that lead to life and life more abundantly.
When God’s time intrudes into human history, God will teach and God will instruct.
When God’s time intrudes into human history, God will judge between the nations and arbitrate for many peoples. I love this picture. Many have taught us that God’s judgment is like a once and done decision. “you’re in; you’re out.” “you’re right; and you’re wrong.” “you’re innocent; and you’re guilty.” But that’s not the picture Isaiah sees. Rather, God himself becomes arbitrator. God brings the nations together, like an effective United Nations, and through divine diplomacy, settles matters between the nations equitably, without recourse to violence, force, or war.
God’s arbitration is so wise, so patient, so trust-worthy, it becomes more than ideal...His words create worlds. By God’s counsel, the nations chose to beat their weapons intended for destruction into instruments meant to cultivate life. The instruments of war are transformed into farm equipment. Swords are beaten into plowshares...spears into pruning hooks.
In this vision, the nations no longer learn war...instead all investments have been made into the account of world peace.
Note here that the vision anticipates difference and not uniformity. Nations are coming together in God and making compromises for the sake of unity. The future hope announced by the prophet Isaiah is a world of difference unified; Nations taking the necessary steps to come together without the intimidation of swords, guns, or bombs. True peace brought about by God’s time intruding in human history.
Once Isaiah reveals the new world God’s Word has called forth into existence, he gives the people of God the opportunity to take the first steps. “Come...let us walk in the light of the Lord!” In other words, “Okay, people of God, the promise of God, the hope of the world, has been revealed to us. Let us now take the first steps on the path that all the nations will tread one day....let us actualize hope through obedience!”
Isaiah’s vision of the world renewed through God’s Word reveals God as the primary actor. God fulfills Israel’s role as the One who draws the nations to the light of God’s presence. God becomes teacher/instructor and God is revealed as the ultimate arbitrator and judge. The outcome is life-giving...not widespread wrath poured out upon the nations.
For Israel, this is a future hope. All they know is that this will become reality “in the days to come.” It is from God; it is as good as certain. But Israel does not get to know when or even how God will do this.
Many years passed by...nations still waging war and learning war...all attempts of diplomacy seem to fail...there seems to be as many swords as plowshares in the world. Will it ever come to fruition?
Then it happens...God truly intrudes in the middle of human history when and where we least expect. God becomes Israel, literally. He takes upon Himself the flesh and blood of the people of Israel by being born into the world through Mary’s life-giving womb. And as soon as the Word takes on flesh, the nations stream, as the light of the star leads those sages from the East.
He grows and even at a young age the Word of the Lord goes forth from Jerusalem as he teaches the teachers in the house of the Lord. As he grows, the eloquence of His words create new worlds for humanity and all of creation.
And Jesus reveals to us God’s judgment and arbitration. He judges evil -- he takes it head on. It throws it’s worst at him. He takes it, and in His resurrection, His love conquers it.
He arbitrates beautifully. He doesn’t deny evil; he names it. He embraces the offender while excluding the offenders sin. He embraces the offended while healing the offended's hurt. In Him true reconciliation occurs. The reconciliation of God and humankind which leads to the reconciliation of man and man, man and woman, woman and creature, and even creature and creature.
It came unexpectedly. We didn’t realize the depth of God’s time. We might have expected God to come and bring the totality of Isaiah’s vision to fruition in seconds, minutes, days, or at most a couple of years. But God’s time intruded and continues to intrude. It has intermingled with human history and is hear to stay, bringing the world closer and closer to that day when there will be no more war, suffering, pain, or death. Truly salvation is nearer to us today than when we first became believers!
God’s time has been inaugurated in the midst of human history. The down payment of the future world has been paid. Christ is risen from the dead. All signs indicate that the night time is coming to a close and the dawn from on High is breaking upon us.
So Paul invites us to live already as children of the day and no longer as children of the night. With Isaiah, we are invited through obedience to actualize ultimate hope. Live the future day even now, giving the signals of the new day to the world who is being led to God’s holy mountain. Put away the works of darkness and put on the armor of light, which is nothing less than the Jesus we put on in our baptism!
Why? Because like the inauguration of this new world, the fulfillment, the goal, will intrude into human history when we least expect it and where we least expect it, just like it did in Bethlehem's cave and the garden’s tomb. When it does intrude, may our lives already be in line with it...so that what is revealed is consistent with the way the church had been living all along, giving the world one ginormous “aha” moment.
That day will come, as Jesus says, like a thief in the night...or like the flood in Noah’s time.
How will the ultimate intrusion find us? Living life as usual? Going from party to party even in the season of Advent, paying no attention to the prophets call for repentance and readiness?
It is advent. We have the opportunity of a life time. We do not know when ultimate intrusion will happen. Not even Jesus Himself knows...and he is content with not knowing...content because He fully loves and trusts the Father without question. We have the opportunity to join in faithful trust...to practice spiritual disciplines that make us ready for the coming day. There hasn’t been a better day for us a community to renew our interest and faithfulness in and to the means of grace.
Let us discern together as a community how God is calling us to take more and more steps in the the path that God has cleared for us, that the nations one day might walk in our footsteps.
Come, Lord Jesus, Come! Amen.
Sunday, November 28, 2010
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
From Purple to White: From Fasting to Feasting
Greetings in the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, whose reign is coming to fulfillment in this world!
What a joy it is to start a new year together in our Lord. Happy New Year!
No, I haven’t gone mad! If you remember last month’s article, the church tells time differently than the rest of the world. For us, the season of Advent begins the new church year. We begin by looking back to our present through the lens of future fulfillment. This is the constant theme of advent and its purpose. Advent means “coming.” Advent is the time when the church anticipates and expects the “Coming of Jesus Christ” to bring redemption to consummation. Some call this the “second coming” and others the “re-appearing” of Christ.
I believe Advent is the most difficult season of the year for Christians in the United States, where capital-consumerism has claimed the Christian feast of Christmas, stretched it out over two or more months, and changed its name to the “holiday season.” Somewhere along the way, much of the protestant church has ceased keeping holy time and, instead, has been shaped by the consumerist transformation of our feast into a civil holiday. Thus, rather than slowing down with the start of the new year at Advent, the church joins the world in the hustle and bustle of celebrating what it now calls the “holiday season.”
I wonder what would happen in our parishes if we decided to live more fully in the holy time Christ has opened for us? What if we slowed down, quieted ourselves, fasted from the world’s ‘holiday’ cheer, and actively waited for the coming of Christ as the season of Advent calls the people of God?
The most important and festive celebrations and events in life are followed by seasons of preparation. Sure, we could forego the courting and the period of engagement and skip right ahead to the wedding, but there’s a good chance that the relationship will be revealed as superficial, and the marriage will not last.
More important even than the wedding together of a man and a woman is the wedding together of heaven and earth through Jesus Christ. The bride, the church, must take her time getting to know her groom, Jesus Christ. We must listen to him, align our lives with His life, and live according to the rhythm of His heart-beat.
When we truly fast, we truly feast. When we truly prepare, goals come to fruition beautifully. For those who have truly courted and have been through that season of engagement, the wedding is such a joyous and festive occasion! When Christmas arrives with our Christmas eve service, we will celebrate and feast more than even those who have rightly prepared for marriage. And our celebration will continue from December 25 through the twelve days of Christmas and on into the festive season of Epiphany where we celebrate the revelation of God in Christ to all the world. Even after the world gets back to business as usual, burnt out from it’s two plus months of holiday cheer, the sound of the true God’s praises will resound from the church, inviting the world into something different and actually fulfilling.
God invites us to the disciplined life where we wait for the coming of the Lord. Maybe we could call this time house-cleaning, allowing the Holy Spirit to put the house of our lives in order for the coming of our Christ in final victory. Could we, by the Spirit’s power, live in advent with the church this year? Will we wait to put up the Christmas decorations? Will we fast from the throwing of yet another holiday cheer party?
It is December and there is more advent in December than Christmas. I will fast from seasons greetings; I will wait to give you festive greetings in the January issue when we are in the midst of the twelve days of feasting, celebrating the glory of the incarnation of Jesus Christ for the salvation of the world.
May the Holy Spirit strengthen us to stand firm in Christ even when our stand makes us peculiar and unpopular.
Christ’s is Coming,
Pastor Tommy
What a joy it is to start a new year together in our Lord. Happy New Year!
No, I haven’t gone mad! If you remember last month’s article, the church tells time differently than the rest of the world. For us, the season of Advent begins the new church year. We begin by looking back to our present through the lens of future fulfillment. This is the constant theme of advent and its purpose. Advent means “coming.” Advent is the time when the church anticipates and expects the “Coming of Jesus Christ” to bring redemption to consummation. Some call this the “second coming” and others the “re-appearing” of Christ.
I believe Advent is the most difficult season of the year for Christians in the United States, where capital-consumerism has claimed the Christian feast of Christmas, stretched it out over two or more months, and changed its name to the “holiday season.” Somewhere along the way, much of the protestant church has ceased keeping holy time and, instead, has been shaped by the consumerist transformation of our feast into a civil holiday. Thus, rather than slowing down with the start of the new year at Advent, the church joins the world in the hustle and bustle of celebrating what it now calls the “holiday season.”
I wonder what would happen in our parishes if we decided to live more fully in the holy time Christ has opened for us? What if we slowed down, quieted ourselves, fasted from the world’s ‘holiday’ cheer, and actively waited for the coming of Christ as the season of Advent calls the people of God?
The most important and festive celebrations and events in life are followed by seasons of preparation. Sure, we could forego the courting and the period of engagement and skip right ahead to the wedding, but there’s a good chance that the relationship will be revealed as superficial, and the marriage will not last.
More important even than the wedding together of a man and a woman is the wedding together of heaven and earth through Jesus Christ. The bride, the church, must take her time getting to know her groom, Jesus Christ. We must listen to him, align our lives with His life, and live according to the rhythm of His heart-beat.
When we truly fast, we truly feast. When we truly prepare, goals come to fruition beautifully. For those who have truly courted and have been through that season of engagement, the wedding is such a joyous and festive occasion! When Christmas arrives with our Christmas eve service, we will celebrate and feast more than even those who have rightly prepared for marriage. And our celebration will continue from December 25 through the twelve days of Christmas and on into the festive season of Epiphany where we celebrate the revelation of God in Christ to all the world. Even after the world gets back to business as usual, burnt out from it’s two plus months of holiday cheer, the sound of the true God’s praises will resound from the church, inviting the world into something different and actually fulfilling.
God invites us to the disciplined life where we wait for the coming of the Lord. Maybe we could call this time house-cleaning, allowing the Holy Spirit to put the house of our lives in order for the coming of our Christ in final victory. Could we, by the Spirit’s power, live in advent with the church this year? Will we wait to put up the Christmas decorations? Will we fast from the throwing of yet another holiday cheer party?
It is December and there is more advent in December than Christmas. I will fast from seasons greetings; I will wait to give you festive greetings in the January issue when we are in the midst of the twelve days of feasting, celebrating the glory of the incarnation of Jesus Christ for the salvation of the world.
May the Holy Spirit strengthen us to stand firm in Christ even when our stand makes us peculiar and unpopular.
Christ’s is Coming,
Pastor Tommy
Saturday, November 6, 2010
Resurrection -- The REAL Christian Hope
Tommy Thompson
24th Sunday after Pentecost
7 November 2010
“Resurrection--the REAL Christian Hope”
Joel Stein of the New York Times said, “Heaven is totally overrated. It seems boring. Clouds, listening to people play the harp. It should be somewhere you can’t wait to go, like a luxury hotel. Maybe blue skies and soft music were enough to keep people in line in the 17th century, but Heaven has to step it up a bit. They're basically getting by because they only have to be better than Hell.” silence...let em sit with that for a bit...
Have you ever stopped to think about our future destiny? Do you avoid the issue altogether so that, along with it, you might avoid the embarrassment of having to discuss things that seem so foreign?
Just what is the Christian’s ultimate hope?
For many years, many of us have sang songs that make a claim as to the what of Christian hope, like: “When we all get to heaven, what a day of rejoicing that will be...” or “When Christ shall come with shout of acclamation and take me home, what joy shall fill my heart...” or “I’ll fly away oh glory, I’ll fly away...” and yet another, “then he’ll call me some day to my home far away, where his glory forever I’ll share.”
Do you hear the consistent theme of these songs? They all make the claim that the future hope is heaven and that heaven is not here but somewhere far away. They all seem to suggest that the future hope of Christians is to escape or fly away from the world wherein we live.
If we were to continue exploring literature and music about heaven, we’d be able to add other themes to the list as well. Such as heaven is a place of disembodied spiritual bliss. In other words, the body (or physicality for that matter) is bad but the soul, or spirit, is good. Many believe the body is actually the prison of the soul or spirit and that death is good because death frees the soul from the body and allows the eternal soul to go to heaven from whence it came.
Somewhere along the way, heaven also got located. “Where is heaven?”, a child asks. Pointing to the sky, the adult says, “Up there.” Hence the association with clouds...and of course we cannot leave out the harps that come with the clouds.
You know, I wonder if this is why there is so much confusion in the church concerning Easter. I mean it just doesn’t make sense that Easter would be the most important and festive day and season of the year if the body/physicality/matter is the problem. I mean if we are meant to escape the body and enter into spiritual bliss...if the body is simply the jail cell of the soul, then why celebrate its resurrection, right?
So we sing songs about a disembodied spiritual bliss that we call heaven, yet we confess in the Nicene Creed that “we look for the resurrection of the dead” and in the Apostles Creed, that we believe in “the resurrection of the body.”
To confuse matters even more, when we read the New Testament, we hear that the Apostles main purpose was to proclaim that Jesus had risen from the dead. The resurrection is all over the New Testament, as a matter of fact. Not only is it all over the New Testament, but it was the topic of conversation in much religious debate in the first century Jewish world.
If resurrection is what we confess in the creeds, which we had long before we had a bible, and that the hope of resurrection that we confess in the creeds is all over the place in the Bible, then where did this whole idea of disembodiment and escape come from?
It certainly did not come from our story. Our story claims that God created the heavens and the earth and that God saw it is very good. If God has blessed physicality, who are we to suggest that it is evil or that we would need to escape from it?
The Bible doesn’t tell the story of how God gave up on creation in response to human sin. Instead it tells the story of how God has been working toward the creation’s healing and restoration. God has not and will not abandon his project of creation; instead he sent His Son Jesus Christ to redeem it from the evils of sin...to restore it...to beautify it...to fulfill it.
Thus, for Jesus to become human...to take upon himself our physicality...to live as one of us without sin...to give himself over to death and then overcome death through resurrection is to redeem physicality and inaugurate the renewed creation.
You see, resurrection is everything. The Triune God has not given up on us or the physical creation he spoke into existence. The resurrection of Jesus Christ and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost is the proof of this reality! We are not called to escape the world but to receive the world as God intended when he created us in his image and likeness and made us stewards of it.
The bible names Jesus as “the first-born from the dead.” It names his resurrection as the “first-fruits” of the new creation. Both of these phrases suggest that Jesus is not the last to rise from the dead the but the first. “First-born” suggests that more siblings exist. “First-fruits” suggests that more fruits are to come.
Brothers and sisters, we are those siblings! We are that fruit! Christ has risen; therefore we too shall rise. This is the Christian hope. This is the hope of God’s world...not soul flight...not disembodied spiritual bliss up there somewhere....no, that is platonic philosophy...Resurrection is Christian faith.
This hope for resurrection goes way back...as far back as the book of Job where it is exclaimed, “My Redeemer lives, and at the last he will stand upon the earth; and after my skin has been thus destroyed, then in my flesh I shall see God, who I shall see on my side, and my eyes shall behold, and not another.”
Job’s professed hope is firmly grounded in faith in a good Creator who blessed that which he made. Job realizes that there is something wrong with physicality, but he doesn’t throw the baby out with the bath-water. He realizes that his skin will rot...yet he proclaims that, somehow, in his flesh, he shall see God who will stand upon the earth.
Wow! What insight the Holy Spirit gave to Job as he pulled back the curtain just enough to give him a foretaste into the future when God the Son would stand upon this earth that he created in order to redeem it! This foretaste engendered hope in a man who should want to escape as much anyone else--his life was a wreck...yet resurrection and NOT escape is what Job proclaims as he claims that even after his skin rots, he will, in his flesh, see God.
This hope in resurrection from the dead was not new to the New Testament. What was revolutionary in the New Testament wasn’t the idea of resurrection but the reality of resurrection happening in the middle of history to one man who represented all people.
This is the huge difference between the pharisees of the first century and those who believed in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The Pharisees along with many jewish people believed that the resurrection was the hope of the world but that it would happen at the end of time. Jesus came in the middle of history and fulfilled that hope within Himself on behalf of the world. This belief is what made Christians stand out.
But why the middle of history? Why not just go ahead and complete it? I believe the bible suggests that God has invited human beings to join him in his project of creation from the very beginning by creating us in his image and likeness. It makes sense that he would also invite us to join him in his project of new creation or redemption, doesn’t it? The resurrection occurred in the middle of history that you and I might be called “children of the resurrection” as Jesus calls us in Luke 20.
Note the context of Jesus’ defense of the resurrection in Luke 20. He is speaking to the Sadducees who did not believe in the resurrection. The Sadducees were among the powerful elite in Jesus’ world enjoying wealth, status, and prestige within Judaean society. They didn’t believe in the resurrection... they claimed it to be a newfangled thing, invented by late prophets like Daniel. They claimed you couldn’t find it in the first five books of the bible...but “behind the smokescreens of theological argument and silly stories about women with seven husbands, they knew that the resurrection doctrine was a threat to their own position! They knew it meant that God was turning the world upside down. The Sadducees didn’t know the Bible or God’s power; that’s why they denied the resurrection and supported Rome” (Wright).
Brothers and sisters, we have tasted the future and we will taste it again in a few moments at Christ’s holy table! The Holy Spirit has opened our minds and hearts to the Bible...the baptized know God’s power. Being children of the resurrection, our call is not to live with the world as the world until we die and escape this world but “to live as resurrection people in between Easter and the final day, with our Christian life, corporate and individual, in both worship and mission, as a sign of the first and a foretaste of the second.” (Wright)
You see, “People who believe in the resurrection, in God making a whole new world in which everything will be set right at last, are unstoppably motivated to work for that new world in the present.” (Wright)
So let us sing songs of the new creation. Let us proclaim to the Joel Stein’s of the world that there is something much brighter and much more exciting than even a luxury hotel in store for those who, in faith, become children of the resurrection! We’ve got more than clouds and harps to offer! Alleluia!
So let us come to this holy table where we receive future perspective so that we might take that future out into the world that God has NOT given up on! Glory to Jesus Christ! Glory forever!
24th Sunday after Pentecost
7 November 2010
“Resurrection--the REAL Christian Hope”
Joel Stein of the New York Times said, “Heaven is totally overrated. It seems boring. Clouds, listening to people play the harp. It should be somewhere you can’t wait to go, like a luxury hotel. Maybe blue skies and soft music were enough to keep people in line in the 17th century, but Heaven has to step it up a bit. They're basically getting by because they only have to be better than Hell.” silence...let em sit with that for a bit...
Have you ever stopped to think about our future destiny? Do you avoid the issue altogether so that, along with it, you might avoid the embarrassment of having to discuss things that seem so foreign?
Just what is the Christian’s ultimate hope?
For many years, many of us have sang songs that make a claim as to the what of Christian hope, like: “When we all get to heaven, what a day of rejoicing that will be...” or “When Christ shall come with shout of acclamation and take me home, what joy shall fill my heart...” or “I’ll fly away oh glory, I’ll fly away...” and yet another, “then he’ll call me some day to my home far away, where his glory forever I’ll share.”
Do you hear the consistent theme of these songs? They all make the claim that the future hope is heaven and that heaven is not here but somewhere far away. They all seem to suggest that the future hope of Christians is to escape or fly away from the world wherein we live.
If we were to continue exploring literature and music about heaven, we’d be able to add other themes to the list as well. Such as heaven is a place of disembodied spiritual bliss. In other words, the body (or physicality for that matter) is bad but the soul, or spirit, is good. Many believe the body is actually the prison of the soul or spirit and that death is good because death frees the soul from the body and allows the eternal soul to go to heaven from whence it came.
Somewhere along the way, heaven also got located. “Where is heaven?”, a child asks. Pointing to the sky, the adult says, “Up there.” Hence the association with clouds...and of course we cannot leave out the harps that come with the clouds.
You know, I wonder if this is why there is so much confusion in the church concerning Easter. I mean it just doesn’t make sense that Easter would be the most important and festive day and season of the year if the body/physicality/matter is the problem. I mean if we are meant to escape the body and enter into spiritual bliss...if the body is simply the jail cell of the soul, then why celebrate its resurrection, right?
So we sing songs about a disembodied spiritual bliss that we call heaven, yet we confess in the Nicene Creed that “we look for the resurrection of the dead” and in the Apostles Creed, that we believe in “the resurrection of the body.”
To confuse matters even more, when we read the New Testament, we hear that the Apostles main purpose was to proclaim that Jesus had risen from the dead. The resurrection is all over the New Testament, as a matter of fact. Not only is it all over the New Testament, but it was the topic of conversation in much religious debate in the first century Jewish world.
If resurrection is what we confess in the creeds, which we had long before we had a bible, and that the hope of resurrection that we confess in the creeds is all over the place in the Bible, then where did this whole idea of disembodiment and escape come from?
It certainly did not come from our story. Our story claims that God created the heavens and the earth and that God saw it is very good. If God has blessed physicality, who are we to suggest that it is evil or that we would need to escape from it?
The Bible doesn’t tell the story of how God gave up on creation in response to human sin. Instead it tells the story of how God has been working toward the creation’s healing and restoration. God has not and will not abandon his project of creation; instead he sent His Son Jesus Christ to redeem it from the evils of sin...to restore it...to beautify it...to fulfill it.
Thus, for Jesus to become human...to take upon himself our physicality...to live as one of us without sin...to give himself over to death and then overcome death through resurrection is to redeem physicality and inaugurate the renewed creation.
You see, resurrection is everything. The Triune God has not given up on us or the physical creation he spoke into existence. The resurrection of Jesus Christ and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost is the proof of this reality! We are not called to escape the world but to receive the world as God intended when he created us in his image and likeness and made us stewards of it.
The bible names Jesus as “the first-born from the dead.” It names his resurrection as the “first-fruits” of the new creation. Both of these phrases suggest that Jesus is not the last to rise from the dead the but the first. “First-born” suggests that more siblings exist. “First-fruits” suggests that more fruits are to come.
Brothers and sisters, we are those siblings! We are that fruit! Christ has risen; therefore we too shall rise. This is the Christian hope. This is the hope of God’s world...not soul flight...not disembodied spiritual bliss up there somewhere....no, that is platonic philosophy...Resurrection is Christian faith.
This hope for resurrection goes way back...as far back as the book of Job where it is exclaimed, “My Redeemer lives, and at the last he will stand upon the earth; and after my skin has been thus destroyed, then in my flesh I shall see God, who I shall see on my side, and my eyes shall behold, and not another.”
Job’s professed hope is firmly grounded in faith in a good Creator who blessed that which he made. Job realizes that there is something wrong with physicality, but he doesn’t throw the baby out with the bath-water. He realizes that his skin will rot...yet he proclaims that, somehow, in his flesh, he shall see God who will stand upon the earth.
Wow! What insight the Holy Spirit gave to Job as he pulled back the curtain just enough to give him a foretaste into the future when God the Son would stand upon this earth that he created in order to redeem it! This foretaste engendered hope in a man who should want to escape as much anyone else--his life was a wreck...yet resurrection and NOT escape is what Job proclaims as he claims that even after his skin rots, he will, in his flesh, see God.
This hope in resurrection from the dead was not new to the New Testament. What was revolutionary in the New Testament wasn’t the idea of resurrection but the reality of resurrection happening in the middle of history to one man who represented all people.
This is the huge difference between the pharisees of the first century and those who believed in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The Pharisees along with many jewish people believed that the resurrection was the hope of the world but that it would happen at the end of time. Jesus came in the middle of history and fulfilled that hope within Himself on behalf of the world. This belief is what made Christians stand out.
But why the middle of history? Why not just go ahead and complete it? I believe the bible suggests that God has invited human beings to join him in his project of creation from the very beginning by creating us in his image and likeness. It makes sense that he would also invite us to join him in his project of new creation or redemption, doesn’t it? The resurrection occurred in the middle of history that you and I might be called “children of the resurrection” as Jesus calls us in Luke 20.
Note the context of Jesus’ defense of the resurrection in Luke 20. He is speaking to the Sadducees who did not believe in the resurrection. The Sadducees were among the powerful elite in Jesus’ world enjoying wealth, status, and prestige within Judaean society. They didn’t believe in the resurrection... they claimed it to be a newfangled thing, invented by late prophets like Daniel. They claimed you couldn’t find it in the first five books of the bible...but “behind the smokescreens of theological argument and silly stories about women with seven husbands, they knew that the resurrection doctrine was a threat to their own position! They knew it meant that God was turning the world upside down. The Sadducees didn’t know the Bible or God’s power; that’s why they denied the resurrection and supported Rome” (Wright).
Brothers and sisters, we have tasted the future and we will taste it again in a few moments at Christ’s holy table! The Holy Spirit has opened our minds and hearts to the Bible...the baptized know God’s power. Being children of the resurrection, our call is not to live with the world as the world until we die and escape this world but “to live as resurrection people in between Easter and the final day, with our Christian life, corporate and individual, in both worship and mission, as a sign of the first and a foretaste of the second.” (Wright)
You see, “People who believe in the resurrection, in God making a whole new world in which everything will be set right at last, are unstoppably motivated to work for that new world in the present.” (Wright)
So let us sing songs of the new creation. Let us proclaim to the Joel Stein’s of the world that there is something much brighter and much more exciting than even a luxury hotel in store for those who, in faith, become children of the resurrection! We’ve got more than clouds and harps to offer! Alleluia!
So let us come to this holy table where we receive future perspective so that we might take that future out into the world that God has NOT given up on! Glory to Jesus Christ! Glory forever!
Thursday, October 21, 2010
Marching to The Beat of A Different Drum
It won’t be long…as a matter of fact, it probably already is happening. The Christmas tunes are being put in the CD players, the decorations are being put on the shelves and the “unbeatable” Christmas sales are already being printed. For the world around us, Christmas begins somewhere after Halloween and ends on December 26.
We can easily get drawn into the hustle and bustle of the “holiday season” and burn ourselves out before the celebration of Christ’s coming among us ever arrives. Though this is certainly not the only reason or even the primary reason for us to slow down and not celebrate to soon, it is a good one.
As you have observed by being in church, there are a couple times a year that the color purple makes is presence known in our sanctuary. Both times are seasons of penitential preparation before a major season of festive celebration.
Divine feasts are so important that we must be made ready for them by observing a season of patient waiting, penitence, and searching. This just happens to be what the season of Advent is all about. The Scripture readings call us to wait upon the Lord…to keep watch for the coming of the Lord…to be alert…to be ready. In Advent the church is called to ready herself for the coming of the Lord in Glorious majesty. The purpose of Advent is revealed in the opening prayer for the season:
“Almighty God, give us grace to cast away the works of darkness and put on the armor of light, now in the time of this mortal life in which your Son Jesus Christ came to visit us in great humility; that in the last day, when he shall come again in His glorious majesty to judge both the living and the dead, we may rise to the life immortal; through him who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.”
I invite you to join me in a fast from pre-mature celebration and truly enter into this season of penitential and hopeful waiting upon the coming of our Lord. You have permission to wait until the twelve days of Christmas to be festive. You don’t have to join in the hustle and bustle.
The feasting will come and it will continue even after the secular world has stopped making a profit. For now let us prepare our lives and hearts for the coming of God.
We can easily get drawn into the hustle and bustle of the “holiday season” and burn ourselves out before the celebration of Christ’s coming among us ever arrives. Though this is certainly not the only reason or even the primary reason for us to slow down and not celebrate to soon, it is a good one.
As you have observed by being in church, there are a couple times a year that the color purple makes is presence known in our sanctuary. Both times are seasons of penitential preparation before a major season of festive celebration.
Divine feasts are so important that we must be made ready for them by observing a season of patient waiting, penitence, and searching. This just happens to be what the season of Advent is all about. The Scripture readings call us to wait upon the Lord…to keep watch for the coming of the Lord…to be alert…to be ready. In Advent the church is called to ready herself for the coming of the Lord in Glorious majesty. The purpose of Advent is revealed in the opening prayer for the season:
“Almighty God, give us grace to cast away the works of darkness and put on the armor of light, now in the time of this mortal life in which your Son Jesus Christ came to visit us in great humility; that in the last day, when he shall come again in His glorious majesty to judge both the living and the dead, we may rise to the life immortal; through him who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.”
I invite you to join me in a fast from pre-mature celebration and truly enter into this season of penitential and hopeful waiting upon the coming of our Lord. You have permission to wait until the twelve days of Christmas to be festive. You don’t have to join in the hustle and bustle.
The feasting will come and it will continue even after the secular world has stopped making a profit. For now let us prepare our lives and hearts for the coming of God.
Saturday, September 25, 2010
Opening Gates, Hearts, and Minds
Pastor Tommy Thompson
18th Sunday after Pentecost
Luke 16:19-31
26 September 2010
“Opening Gates, Opening Hearts, Opening Minds”
Today’s Gospel lesson carries on from last Sunday’s Gospel lesson. Jesus taught his disciples to be even more shrewd with wealth for the purposes of the coming age than those of this world are for the purposes of the age that is passing away. What we didn’t know last week was that there were eves-droppers in the room! Jesus just can’t get away from those Pharisees can he!? That the Pharisees were listening in is revealed in the short passage of Scripture that is directly after last Sunday’s reading and directly before this Sunday’s reading.
We are told that the Pharisees overheard what Jesus had taught his disciples and that they ridiculed Jesus for his teaching. It is the response of the Pharisees to Jesus’ teaching about the use of money that triggers Jesus’ telling the parable that is the content of our reading today.
Context is everything when reading the Bible. If we didn’t go back and look at what triggered Jesus’ parable, we might have made secondary issues the main issue. We might have thought this passage was all about heaven and hell...or the after-life. But that’s not at all what Jesus is trying to communicate here and that’s not at all the way the Pharisees would have heard it at that time.
Instead, Jesus is using the worldview of the Pharisees to engage them in a parable that will strengthen his challenge concerning the proper use of unrighteous wealth, making the claim that he is not teaching something different from what the Pharisees claim to be experts in --the law and prophets. If they would heed these, they’d embrace him and the message he came to announce. He’s holding up a mirror and asking them to see themselves for themselves.
The language he uses in this parable, including his language about the after-life is for the sole purpose of engaging these pharisees who have challenged his teaching. Thus, he is not here teaching us about what happens after we die from a Christian point-of-view. Instead, he tells a story that includes the first century Jewish, Pharisaic point of view concernign what happens when persons die before the general resurrection, in order to continue and intensify the teaching from last’s week’s Gospel lesson.
The way Jesus does this is brilliant. He presents two characters and develops a contrast between the two characters. First is the rich man. The details say it all...details that we may not immediately grasp. First of all the rich man is described as wearing “purple” and “fine linen.” That doesn’t mean as much to us...but it is not too different than naming the finest and most expensive of designer clothing in our world today. Only few wore purple in Jesus’ context...and even more, to wear purple and fine linen was unheard of for most. The Romans had set standards regarding who could wear purple and even how much purple they could wear! Clothing colored with Tyrian purple dye was a striking luxury and reserved only for the elite. As if this wasn’t enough to make his point, Jesus adds that the rich man also wore fine linens. The process by which wool was “fulled” in a basin with special clay in order to render the cloth brilliantly white was time-consuming and very costly. It is one thing to wear white, another to wear purple, but only the most prestigious of society wore white garments underneath their purple robes.
To magnify this man’s luxurious lifestyle, Jesus describes the rich man as having a gate, providing security for himself and separating him from the riffraff of the city. Very few in the first century world lived in a house with a gate. But this man has a gate...a gate that has the potential to be opened, but finds itself shut more often than not.
He wears purple, he wears fine linen, he has a house with a gate...and he feasts sumptuously EVERY DAY! The story of the prodigal in Luke 15 describes the killing of THE fatted calf on the farm in order to celebrate a feast. For a meal to qualify as a feast, it was a lavish, extravagant meal...most families would have to sacrifice the only calf in order to celebrate a feast...which meant something extraordinary had happened--like the prodigal coming home. But this man is described as feasting sumptuously EVERY DAY! ...It is not normal for folks to feast like this EVERY DAY. But this rich man does. He is among the elite who feast whenever they want on whatever they want...and they have so much that they use bread as a napkin, flinging it out the window after they’ve wiped the grease of their faces.
If you haven’t gotten the idea, this man was filthy rich, and this was immediately apparent to His Pharisee hearers who seek as much as anything to be seated in places of honor.
Then there’s the poor man. The rich man is dressed to the nines; the poor man has nothing to wear. We can look at him and see that he is covered in soars. The fact he was laid or thrown at the rich man's gate seems to suggest he is crippled (maybe he was put there in hopes that the resources of the rich man would come to his rescue?)...in the eyes of Pharisees, he is outcast...untouchable. He longs to eat the bread that falls from the rich man table...the word used here is usually used of animals eating...not humans. The bread he wants to eat is what the rich man wipes his mouth with! The dogs are licking his soars...these dogs are not the dogs we have grown to love as man’s best friend...but vultures ready to rip into his flesh. This man is as poor as one can be without being dead...and he lives just outside of the rich man’s home.
But there is something that should be said about the poor man. He has a name. This is the only parable Jesus has ever told where he gives his character a name. His name is Lazarus, the equivalent of the Hebrew name, Eleazar which means “God helps.” There’s something to be said about how God gives a name to those who we strip of all identity...
So far the picture painted by Jesus’ words are of two different people with two totally different life-styles. But then the story takes a turn and that which is common to us all makes them both a visit--death. Both the rich man and the poor man, Lazarus, die (as to how they died, I’ll leave that to your imagination)...
As expected, the rich man has the resources and is buried in the appropriate manner...likely in his fine clothes. But then the unexpected happens to Lazarus. The Pharisees would have expected him to be carried off by vultures, forgotten and hopeless. But remember, God is his help. Angels and not vultures carry him away. And it is not just anywhere they carry him. Lazarus is carried to the bosom of Abraham. For the Pharisees, this is paradise.
Wait a minute! Lazarus? In the bosom of Abraham? But he was an outcast? His poor state certainly meant he was cursed of God...how is he in the place of honor?
Where is the rich man? Certainly his wealth, his royal and prestigious social status meant he was blessed of God...But he is being tormented.
Boy has Jesus just turned the Pharisees’ theology on its head!
But the rich man still hasn’t learned. He still sees Lazarus as inferior to himself. He still sees Lazarus as nothing but an errand boy if anything! He begs Abraham to send Lazarus to bring him comfort! Abraham’s response in the words of Clarence Jordan’s deep south paraphrase, “Lazarus ain’t gonna run no mo’ yo errands, rich man.” Even though Lazarus is not the so called rich man’s errand boy, he couldn’t help the rich man even if it were so...a great chasm separates them and it cannot be crossed. Those gates the rich man never opened....they’ve shut him out for good.
Once the rich man gets the point, he begs Abraham to at least send Lazarus to his father’s house to bear witness to his brothers that they should not keep living as did the rich man lest their fate be just like his. But Abraham responds, “They have Moses and the prophets. If they won’t listen to the law and prophets, then they won’t listen even if someone were to rise from the dead!” ... and Jesus will ...
What a powerful response to the Pharisees...those who are suppose to be experts in the law and prophets do not recognize the fulfillment of the law and prophets standing right in front of them...and they, unlike those two disciples who end up recognizing him after he rose from the dead, won’t recognize his truth even after he has risen from the dead! Instead they ridicule the fulfillments’ teaching! These pharisees are blinded by their own fascination with themselves and the things of the age that is passing away. At least there was that one pharisee named Paul who was blinded by the light...that pharisee became a witness. He got it. Instead of ignoring the lazarus’ by the gate, he was an instrument used for healing the folks at the gates. He opened gates...he didn’t close them...But not these pharisees.
But Jesus leaves them with an immense challenge anyway...
The rich man could’ve opened his gate but he didn’t. He could’ve pulled up one of the many empty chairs at his table for Lazarus...but he didn’t. He could have ate less and potentially extended his own life (maybe he ate himself to death?), but he didn’t. He could have dressed in a different color so that Lazarus had SOMETHING to wear, but he didn’t. All these were opportunities to open gates that didn’t have to be shut. If he’d only opened these gates, which were not hard to open, THE gate would’ve been opened for him...but he didn’t. The gates he kept shut ended up shutting him out.
What gates are we holding shut? These gates are actually shutting us out! How ironic! How many hurting, hungry, or diseased faces flash before our eyes on the way to Sunday dinner? How many of us have grown so numb to those outside the gates we’ve created that we don’t even see them laying there anymore? Most of us fit the description of the rich man...we feast sumptuously whenever and on whatever we want...if we want beef tenderloin, we get beef tenderlion...lobster, we get lobster...chicken, we get chicken...crab, we get crab...more exotic, we get more exotic. And yet we know the name of someone who gets little to nothing. If that’s not a gate that COULD be opened, then I don’t know of a gate that can be opened. Who are we really shutting out anyway?
This Sunday is not much different that last Sunday. We, like the pharisees, may not have liked what Jesus had to teach last week...we may have left thinking that time would pass and we’d forget the challenge that was placed on our lives and life would be great beyond measure once again...but that Jesus...he keeps coming back. We thought we’d get off the hook...but instead, he asks us again, How are we using unrighteous wealth to make friends for eternity? How are we opening gates? Opening minds? Opening hearts?
All this reminds me of another story about a man who lay at a gate. His name wasn’t Lazarus, but he, like Lazarus, was put by a gate. This man asked for money, something the rich man in our story had but something that Peter and John in this story did not. But even though they didn’t have money, they had something. They said, “I have no silver or gold, but what I have I give you; in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, stand up and walk.”
Two similar stories with two different responses. Which will be yours?
It is left open...it is for you to decide...It is for me to decide. Will I accept the testimony of not only the witnesses but of Jesus himself and open gates or will I ignore them and keep them closed even in the name of religion? I, like the rich man, should not be too surprised if THE gate of life is closed on me if I choose not to open gates for others in the here-and-now.
Glory to Jesus Christ. Glory forever. Amen.
18th Sunday after Pentecost
Luke 16:19-31
26 September 2010
“Opening Gates, Opening Hearts, Opening Minds”
Today’s Gospel lesson carries on from last Sunday’s Gospel lesson. Jesus taught his disciples to be even more shrewd with wealth for the purposes of the coming age than those of this world are for the purposes of the age that is passing away. What we didn’t know last week was that there were eves-droppers in the room! Jesus just can’t get away from those Pharisees can he!? That the Pharisees were listening in is revealed in the short passage of Scripture that is directly after last Sunday’s reading and directly before this Sunday’s reading.
We are told that the Pharisees overheard what Jesus had taught his disciples and that they ridiculed Jesus for his teaching. It is the response of the Pharisees to Jesus’ teaching about the use of money that triggers Jesus’ telling the parable that is the content of our reading today.
Context is everything when reading the Bible. If we didn’t go back and look at what triggered Jesus’ parable, we might have made secondary issues the main issue. We might have thought this passage was all about heaven and hell...or the after-life. But that’s not at all what Jesus is trying to communicate here and that’s not at all the way the Pharisees would have heard it at that time.
Instead, Jesus is using the worldview of the Pharisees to engage them in a parable that will strengthen his challenge concerning the proper use of unrighteous wealth, making the claim that he is not teaching something different from what the Pharisees claim to be experts in --the law and prophets. If they would heed these, they’d embrace him and the message he came to announce. He’s holding up a mirror and asking them to see themselves for themselves.
The language he uses in this parable, including his language about the after-life is for the sole purpose of engaging these pharisees who have challenged his teaching. Thus, he is not here teaching us about what happens after we die from a Christian point-of-view. Instead, he tells a story that includes the first century Jewish, Pharisaic point of view concernign what happens when persons die before the general resurrection, in order to continue and intensify the teaching from last’s week’s Gospel lesson.
The way Jesus does this is brilliant. He presents two characters and develops a contrast between the two characters. First is the rich man. The details say it all...details that we may not immediately grasp. First of all the rich man is described as wearing “purple” and “fine linen.” That doesn’t mean as much to us...but it is not too different than naming the finest and most expensive of designer clothing in our world today. Only few wore purple in Jesus’ context...and even more, to wear purple and fine linen was unheard of for most. The Romans had set standards regarding who could wear purple and even how much purple they could wear! Clothing colored with Tyrian purple dye was a striking luxury and reserved only for the elite. As if this wasn’t enough to make his point, Jesus adds that the rich man also wore fine linens. The process by which wool was “fulled” in a basin with special clay in order to render the cloth brilliantly white was time-consuming and very costly. It is one thing to wear white, another to wear purple, but only the most prestigious of society wore white garments underneath their purple robes.
To magnify this man’s luxurious lifestyle, Jesus describes the rich man as having a gate, providing security for himself and separating him from the riffraff of the city. Very few in the first century world lived in a house with a gate. But this man has a gate...a gate that has the potential to be opened, but finds itself shut more often than not.
He wears purple, he wears fine linen, he has a house with a gate...and he feasts sumptuously EVERY DAY! The story of the prodigal in Luke 15 describes the killing of THE fatted calf on the farm in order to celebrate a feast. For a meal to qualify as a feast, it was a lavish, extravagant meal...most families would have to sacrifice the only calf in order to celebrate a feast...which meant something extraordinary had happened--like the prodigal coming home. But this man is described as feasting sumptuously EVERY DAY! ...It is not normal for folks to feast like this EVERY DAY. But this rich man does. He is among the elite who feast whenever they want on whatever they want...and they have so much that they use bread as a napkin, flinging it out the window after they’ve wiped the grease of their faces.
If you haven’t gotten the idea, this man was filthy rich, and this was immediately apparent to His Pharisee hearers who seek as much as anything to be seated in places of honor.
Then there’s the poor man. The rich man is dressed to the nines; the poor man has nothing to wear. We can look at him and see that he is covered in soars. The fact he was laid or thrown at the rich man's gate seems to suggest he is crippled (maybe he was put there in hopes that the resources of the rich man would come to his rescue?)...in the eyes of Pharisees, he is outcast...untouchable. He longs to eat the bread that falls from the rich man table...the word used here is usually used of animals eating...not humans. The bread he wants to eat is what the rich man wipes his mouth with! The dogs are licking his soars...these dogs are not the dogs we have grown to love as man’s best friend...but vultures ready to rip into his flesh. This man is as poor as one can be without being dead...and he lives just outside of the rich man’s home.
But there is something that should be said about the poor man. He has a name. This is the only parable Jesus has ever told where he gives his character a name. His name is Lazarus, the equivalent of the Hebrew name, Eleazar which means “God helps.” There’s something to be said about how God gives a name to those who we strip of all identity...
So far the picture painted by Jesus’ words are of two different people with two totally different life-styles. But then the story takes a turn and that which is common to us all makes them both a visit--death. Both the rich man and the poor man, Lazarus, die (as to how they died, I’ll leave that to your imagination)...
As expected, the rich man has the resources and is buried in the appropriate manner...likely in his fine clothes. But then the unexpected happens to Lazarus. The Pharisees would have expected him to be carried off by vultures, forgotten and hopeless. But remember, God is his help. Angels and not vultures carry him away. And it is not just anywhere they carry him. Lazarus is carried to the bosom of Abraham. For the Pharisees, this is paradise.
Wait a minute! Lazarus? In the bosom of Abraham? But he was an outcast? His poor state certainly meant he was cursed of God...how is he in the place of honor?
Where is the rich man? Certainly his wealth, his royal and prestigious social status meant he was blessed of God...But he is being tormented.
Boy has Jesus just turned the Pharisees’ theology on its head!
But the rich man still hasn’t learned. He still sees Lazarus as inferior to himself. He still sees Lazarus as nothing but an errand boy if anything! He begs Abraham to send Lazarus to bring him comfort! Abraham’s response in the words of Clarence Jordan’s deep south paraphrase, “Lazarus ain’t gonna run no mo’ yo errands, rich man.” Even though Lazarus is not the so called rich man’s errand boy, he couldn’t help the rich man even if it were so...a great chasm separates them and it cannot be crossed. Those gates the rich man never opened....they’ve shut him out for good.
Once the rich man gets the point, he begs Abraham to at least send Lazarus to his father’s house to bear witness to his brothers that they should not keep living as did the rich man lest their fate be just like his. But Abraham responds, “They have Moses and the prophets. If they won’t listen to the law and prophets, then they won’t listen even if someone were to rise from the dead!” ... and Jesus will ...
What a powerful response to the Pharisees...those who are suppose to be experts in the law and prophets do not recognize the fulfillment of the law and prophets standing right in front of them...and they, unlike those two disciples who end up recognizing him after he rose from the dead, won’t recognize his truth even after he has risen from the dead! Instead they ridicule the fulfillments’ teaching! These pharisees are blinded by their own fascination with themselves and the things of the age that is passing away. At least there was that one pharisee named Paul who was blinded by the light...that pharisee became a witness. He got it. Instead of ignoring the lazarus’ by the gate, he was an instrument used for healing the folks at the gates. He opened gates...he didn’t close them...But not these pharisees.
But Jesus leaves them with an immense challenge anyway...
The rich man could’ve opened his gate but he didn’t. He could’ve pulled up one of the many empty chairs at his table for Lazarus...but he didn’t. He could have ate less and potentially extended his own life (maybe he ate himself to death?), but he didn’t. He could have dressed in a different color so that Lazarus had SOMETHING to wear, but he didn’t. All these were opportunities to open gates that didn’t have to be shut. If he’d only opened these gates, which were not hard to open, THE gate would’ve been opened for him...but he didn’t. The gates he kept shut ended up shutting him out.
What gates are we holding shut? These gates are actually shutting us out! How ironic! How many hurting, hungry, or diseased faces flash before our eyes on the way to Sunday dinner? How many of us have grown so numb to those outside the gates we’ve created that we don’t even see them laying there anymore? Most of us fit the description of the rich man...we feast sumptuously whenever and on whatever we want...if we want beef tenderloin, we get beef tenderlion...lobster, we get lobster...chicken, we get chicken...crab, we get crab...more exotic, we get more exotic. And yet we know the name of someone who gets little to nothing. If that’s not a gate that COULD be opened, then I don’t know of a gate that can be opened. Who are we really shutting out anyway?
This Sunday is not much different that last Sunday. We, like the pharisees, may not have liked what Jesus had to teach last week...we may have left thinking that time would pass and we’d forget the challenge that was placed on our lives and life would be great beyond measure once again...but that Jesus...he keeps coming back. We thought we’d get off the hook...but instead, he asks us again, How are we using unrighteous wealth to make friends for eternity? How are we opening gates? Opening minds? Opening hearts?
All this reminds me of another story about a man who lay at a gate. His name wasn’t Lazarus, but he, like Lazarus, was put by a gate. This man asked for money, something the rich man in our story had but something that Peter and John in this story did not. But even though they didn’t have money, they had something. They said, “I have no silver or gold, but what I have I give you; in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, stand up and walk.”
Two similar stories with two different responses. Which will be yours?
It is left open...it is for you to decide...It is for me to decide. Will I accept the testimony of not only the witnesses but of Jesus himself and open gates or will I ignore them and keep them closed even in the name of religion? I, like the rich man, should not be too surprised if THE gate of life is closed on me if I choose not to open gates for others in the here-and-now.
Glory to Jesus Christ. Glory forever. Amen.
Saturday, September 18, 2010
Triune Economics 101
Pastor Tommy Thompson
17th Sunday after Pentecost
Luke 16:1-13
19 September 2010
Today’s Gospel lesson just might get me in trouble. One of the many discoveries I’ve made in ten years of ministry is that money is one of those issues church men and women would rather not discuss.
I remember once when I was serving a church in a different state from this one, my District Superintendent told me, “Tommy don’t mess with their money...you can mess with just about anything else, but don’t you mess with their money.”
But today the Gospel lesson intentionally discusses the use of money. What is a preacher to do?
First and foremost, I believe a preacher is to set the context for Jesus’ most famous discourse on the use of money.
So let me be clear...Jesus is not like us...he is not a fragmented post-modern thinker. He does not teach on money as a separate, though important issue from everything else...We are used to this kind of thing...we compartmentalize life...today is about money, next week is about sex, the following week is about religion and so on. But this is not the way Jesus thinks or speaks...for Him, all of life is connected and flows out of his over-arching identity and mindset as the Son of God who will become the Messiah of Israel and the Savior of the world.
We must keep in mind as we hear Luke 16 afresh that Jesus is on the way to Jerusalem where the climax of salvation history will come to fruition--namely, his death and resurrection. Everything Jesus says and does from the moment he set his face toward Jerusalem must be understood in light of His journey to Jerusalem, even this so called “obscure” teaching on money.
An observation we should make is the fact that Luke 16:1 identifies Jesus’ hearers as “the disciples.” Jesus is not here responding to questionable behavior from the religious elite...he is not responding to the crowds...instead, this is one of those intimate moments in Luke’s Gospel where Jesus turns to his disciples to teach them for the sake of teaching them while they are on the way to Jerusalem, where his death and resurrection will bring salvation history to its climax and fulfillment. Though we should always take in every letter of every word that comes out of the mouth of our Savior, we should most especially listen when he is intentionally teaching his disciples.
In the last few weeks, we’ve been with Jesus at the table where Jesus teaches us by his actions and words to give without expectation of return...something that simply was not done in the first century Greco-Roman world. In an economy of reciprocity, where folks became a benefactor in order that the tables may be turned and one’s patrons might become one’s benefactors, Jesus teaches that his disciples shall become benefactors most especially for those who cannot reciprocate. Thus Jesus invites us out of an economy of reciprocity and into the divine economy of solidarity.
Jesus’ teaching reveals God’s life that the Son has enjoyed before the foundations of the world. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit live in mutual love and solidarity. In the Spirit, the Father empties Himself into the son and the Son receives the fullness of the Father. In the Spirit, the Son empties Himself into the Father and the Father receives His fullness. The economy of God is an everlasting donation of the self and receptivity of the other: This is the divine economy of love.
It is this economy of love that God intended for this world. God intends for us to participate in His life of love, living out his economy in His world as those who are stamped with His image and created in His likeness. But we chose to rebel against such self-giving and other receiving love and our desire turned away from God and away from the other and inward, toward only ourselves. In sin, we have become self-centered, unable to give to the other without calculating how much good it would do for ourselves. In the words of Seth and Scott Avett’s song,
I am sick of wanting and it's evil how it's got me
And every day is worse than the one before
The more I have the more I think I'm almost where I need to be
If only I could get a little more
Something has me, oh something has me
Acting like someone I don't wanna be
Something has me, oh something has me
Acting like someone I know isn't me
Ill with want and poisoned by this ugly greed
It is this condition, named so well by the Avett Brother’s song, that Jesus has come to heal. He has come to give us more than simply a medication to make us numb to the real issue of our illness.
This is what Luke 16 is all about. Jesus tells us disciples a story about a dishonest manager who knew his age well and acted shrewdly out of such knowledge of the world he lived in. Jesus uses this story to invite us, his disciples to know the age to come so well that we act shrewdly out of such knowledge of this coming age.
Here is the story: “There was a wealthy man who had a manager. Charges were brought to the wealthy man that his manager had been squandering his property. So the rich man called his manager out on the issue. ‘What is this I hear about your? Give me an accounting of your management...and by the way, “YOU’RE FIRED!!”
What is the manager going to do!? In the first century world, it was normal for folks to sell themselves as slaves in hopes to become a wealthy man’s manager...that would increase that persons prestige in the community and guarantee them shelter and food in the master’s estate. Please understand, this manager is not simply about to lose a job. He is losing his association with the wealthy master which has brought him a level of prestige in the community--so much so that he cannot even fathom considering manual labor or begging. Not only is he losing his prestige and honor but also he is losing shelter, food...his place in the master’s household. This is a huge loss. What is the manager going to do!?
He decides, while he is still associated with his wealthy master, that he will visit some of the master’s patrons. To one he asks, “how much do you my master?” the patron responds, “A hundred jugs of olive oil.” The dishonest manager cuts the debt in half!Now let’s put this in perspective. The greek word for “jugs” here is roughly equivalent to forty liters. Forty times one hundred is four thousand liters of olive oil! That’s a huge debt. Now it is one thing to forgive half of a twenty dollar debt but it is quite another to forgive half of a 10,000 dollar debt. Luke records one more instance of the manager releasing one of his master’s clients of a portion of his debt: “How much do you owe?” “One hundred containers of wheat.” The manager instructs the client to cut the debt by 20% and make it 80 containers of wheat. Keep in mind here that the greek word for jug mentioned before is roughly 1/10 of the greek word for container used here.” one hundred containers of wheat is the same as saying 40,000 liters of wheat. That’s a whole lot of wheat folks. To reduce that debt from 100 containers to 80 is very significant, and in the eyes of the client, very merciful.
The dishonest manager becomes the shrewd manager in the eyes of his master now. The manager knows his master will save face and is not going to reinforce the debts...that would be humiliating. He also knows the world in which he lives. Now these clients of the master will become his benefactors...it is a an economy of reciprocity after all! He has guaranteed himself an opportunity for honor, food, shelter, and then some and has created a much brighter situation for himself than manual labor or begging by creating a brighter situation for these patrons...these so called friends.
It is such prudence that the manager’s master commends. But Jesus still refers to him as dishonest. It is important that we see here that Jesus does not applaud the manager’s dishonest behavior. Instead, he uses this example of knowing one’s world well and acting prudently out of that knowledge to teach his disciples to act as shrewdly according to the way of the age to come.
The dishonest manager used unrighteous money to his advantage by knowing his economy well. How might we know our world, the age to come, and its economy so well that we use the unrighteous means of this age that is passing away for its honor and glory? This is the point of the story.
What if we, the children of light, were as shrewd in our use of the money of unrighteousness for the purposes of the Kingdom of God as the children of this world are for the purposes of the kingdoms of this world?
For the past few weeks, Jesus has been revealing the age to come to us and its economy. We’ve been taught to give without expectation of return...We’ve been taught to be benefactors without expecting the tables to be turned. We’ve been taught to live out what Jesus’ death and resurrection has accomplished in our daily lives.
Jesus offered Himself, all of himself for all without expectation of return...without expectation of the tables being turned. He rose from the gave, overcoming the sin that has diseased us by the power of his self-giving and other-receiving love. He ascended into heaven, joining our redeemed humanity with the life of God. His kingdom will have no end!
Those of us who have been baptized into his death and resurrection are called to live out the ethos of the future kingdom and not any ethos of this world that is passing away. Death and resurrection leads to redemption. Thus as we live in this world, we die to the things that are passing away and live to the things of God, furthering redemption in God’s world. This includes money.
We, the baptized, are now citizens of another Kingdom with a new economy...the economy of grace...of love. As citizens of the Kingdom of God who live according to this new economy, how shall we use money that does not belong to us in the first place?
According to Jesus, we shall use money for the sole glory of the in-breaking Kingdom of God. We are invited to imitate the shrewdness of the manager but not the self-centeredness of the manager. We are called to forgive debts and give out of a sense loving solidarity...simply because there is need....not because there is something in it for us.
By using money in this way, we fulfill John Wesley’s call to early Methodists based on this very passage: (1) Earn all you can, (2) Save all you can, in order that you may (3) give all you can.
...Wow, Jesus knows how to challenge us doesn’t he!? We thought we were being faithful by keeping 95% for ourselves and giving 5%....some of us really thought we had arrived the day we started giving 10% of our income to the church...10% of our time...and so forth. But Jesus is calling us to a holistic view of life...a life where EVERYTHING said and done flows out of our sense of being the baptized...disciples of Christ...citizens of the age that is dawning in the midst of the darkness of this world.
He has come to heal us, to invite us to participate in His life fully. It is those who have become open to the healing Jesus has offered that begin to experience transformation. Seth and Scott Avett’s song continues offering a renewed realization:
Temporary is my time, ain't nothing on this world that's mine
Except the will I found to carry on
Free is not your right to chose
It's answering what's asked of you
To give the love you find until it's gone
A need for something, now let me break it down again
A need for something but not more medicine
May the Holy Spirit empower us that we may be healed from the illness of sinful greed and want so that we might live out the ethics of the future kingdom in the here and now...receiving money as solely that which can be used to reveal God’s economy of grace and love, that we might hasten the coming of God’s kingdom where we live in loving solidarity with one another for all eternity.
Glory to Jesus Christ. Glory forever! Amen.
17th Sunday after Pentecost
Luke 16:1-13
19 September 2010
Today’s Gospel lesson just might get me in trouble. One of the many discoveries I’ve made in ten years of ministry is that money is one of those issues church men and women would rather not discuss.
I remember once when I was serving a church in a different state from this one, my District Superintendent told me, “Tommy don’t mess with their money...you can mess with just about anything else, but don’t you mess with their money.”
But today the Gospel lesson intentionally discusses the use of money. What is a preacher to do?
First and foremost, I believe a preacher is to set the context for Jesus’ most famous discourse on the use of money.
So let me be clear...Jesus is not like us...he is not a fragmented post-modern thinker. He does not teach on money as a separate, though important issue from everything else...We are used to this kind of thing...we compartmentalize life...today is about money, next week is about sex, the following week is about religion and so on. But this is not the way Jesus thinks or speaks...for Him, all of life is connected and flows out of his over-arching identity and mindset as the Son of God who will become the Messiah of Israel and the Savior of the world.
We must keep in mind as we hear Luke 16 afresh that Jesus is on the way to Jerusalem where the climax of salvation history will come to fruition--namely, his death and resurrection. Everything Jesus says and does from the moment he set his face toward Jerusalem must be understood in light of His journey to Jerusalem, even this so called “obscure” teaching on money.
An observation we should make is the fact that Luke 16:1 identifies Jesus’ hearers as “the disciples.” Jesus is not here responding to questionable behavior from the religious elite...he is not responding to the crowds...instead, this is one of those intimate moments in Luke’s Gospel where Jesus turns to his disciples to teach them for the sake of teaching them while they are on the way to Jerusalem, where his death and resurrection will bring salvation history to its climax and fulfillment. Though we should always take in every letter of every word that comes out of the mouth of our Savior, we should most especially listen when he is intentionally teaching his disciples.
In the last few weeks, we’ve been with Jesus at the table where Jesus teaches us by his actions and words to give without expectation of return...something that simply was not done in the first century Greco-Roman world. In an economy of reciprocity, where folks became a benefactor in order that the tables may be turned and one’s patrons might become one’s benefactors, Jesus teaches that his disciples shall become benefactors most especially for those who cannot reciprocate. Thus Jesus invites us out of an economy of reciprocity and into the divine economy of solidarity.
Jesus’ teaching reveals God’s life that the Son has enjoyed before the foundations of the world. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit live in mutual love and solidarity. In the Spirit, the Father empties Himself into the son and the Son receives the fullness of the Father. In the Spirit, the Son empties Himself into the Father and the Father receives His fullness. The economy of God is an everlasting donation of the self and receptivity of the other: This is the divine economy of love.
It is this economy of love that God intended for this world. God intends for us to participate in His life of love, living out his economy in His world as those who are stamped with His image and created in His likeness. But we chose to rebel against such self-giving and other receiving love and our desire turned away from God and away from the other and inward, toward only ourselves. In sin, we have become self-centered, unable to give to the other without calculating how much good it would do for ourselves. In the words of Seth and Scott Avett’s song,
I am sick of wanting and it's evil how it's got me
And every day is worse than the one before
The more I have the more I think I'm almost where I need to be
If only I could get a little more
Something has me, oh something has me
Acting like someone I don't wanna be
Something has me, oh something has me
Acting like someone I know isn't me
Ill with want and poisoned by this ugly greed
It is this condition, named so well by the Avett Brother’s song, that Jesus has come to heal. He has come to give us more than simply a medication to make us numb to the real issue of our illness.
This is what Luke 16 is all about. Jesus tells us disciples a story about a dishonest manager who knew his age well and acted shrewdly out of such knowledge of the world he lived in. Jesus uses this story to invite us, his disciples to know the age to come so well that we act shrewdly out of such knowledge of this coming age.
Here is the story: “There was a wealthy man who had a manager. Charges were brought to the wealthy man that his manager had been squandering his property. So the rich man called his manager out on the issue. ‘What is this I hear about your? Give me an accounting of your management...and by the way, “YOU’RE FIRED!!”
What is the manager going to do!? In the first century world, it was normal for folks to sell themselves as slaves in hopes to become a wealthy man’s manager...that would increase that persons prestige in the community and guarantee them shelter and food in the master’s estate. Please understand, this manager is not simply about to lose a job. He is losing his association with the wealthy master which has brought him a level of prestige in the community--so much so that he cannot even fathom considering manual labor or begging. Not only is he losing his prestige and honor but also he is losing shelter, food...his place in the master’s household. This is a huge loss. What is the manager going to do!?
He decides, while he is still associated with his wealthy master, that he will visit some of the master’s patrons. To one he asks, “how much do you my master?” the patron responds, “A hundred jugs of olive oil.” The dishonest manager cuts the debt in half!Now let’s put this in perspective. The greek word for “jugs” here is roughly equivalent to forty liters. Forty times one hundred is four thousand liters of olive oil! That’s a huge debt. Now it is one thing to forgive half of a twenty dollar debt but it is quite another to forgive half of a 10,000 dollar debt. Luke records one more instance of the manager releasing one of his master’s clients of a portion of his debt: “How much do you owe?” “One hundred containers of wheat.” The manager instructs the client to cut the debt by 20% and make it 80 containers of wheat. Keep in mind here that the greek word for jug mentioned before is roughly 1/10 of the greek word for container used here.” one hundred containers of wheat is the same as saying 40,000 liters of wheat. That’s a whole lot of wheat folks. To reduce that debt from 100 containers to 80 is very significant, and in the eyes of the client, very merciful.
The dishonest manager becomes the shrewd manager in the eyes of his master now. The manager knows his master will save face and is not going to reinforce the debts...that would be humiliating. He also knows the world in which he lives. Now these clients of the master will become his benefactors...it is a an economy of reciprocity after all! He has guaranteed himself an opportunity for honor, food, shelter, and then some and has created a much brighter situation for himself than manual labor or begging by creating a brighter situation for these patrons...these so called friends.
It is such prudence that the manager’s master commends. But Jesus still refers to him as dishonest. It is important that we see here that Jesus does not applaud the manager’s dishonest behavior. Instead, he uses this example of knowing one’s world well and acting prudently out of that knowledge to teach his disciples to act as shrewdly according to the way of the age to come.
The dishonest manager used unrighteous money to his advantage by knowing his economy well. How might we know our world, the age to come, and its economy so well that we use the unrighteous means of this age that is passing away for its honor and glory? This is the point of the story.
What if we, the children of light, were as shrewd in our use of the money of unrighteousness for the purposes of the Kingdom of God as the children of this world are for the purposes of the kingdoms of this world?
For the past few weeks, Jesus has been revealing the age to come to us and its economy. We’ve been taught to give without expectation of return...We’ve been taught to be benefactors without expecting the tables to be turned. We’ve been taught to live out what Jesus’ death and resurrection has accomplished in our daily lives.
Jesus offered Himself, all of himself for all without expectation of return...without expectation of the tables being turned. He rose from the gave, overcoming the sin that has diseased us by the power of his self-giving and other-receiving love. He ascended into heaven, joining our redeemed humanity with the life of God. His kingdom will have no end!
Those of us who have been baptized into his death and resurrection are called to live out the ethos of the future kingdom and not any ethos of this world that is passing away. Death and resurrection leads to redemption. Thus as we live in this world, we die to the things that are passing away and live to the things of God, furthering redemption in God’s world. This includes money.
We, the baptized, are now citizens of another Kingdom with a new economy...the economy of grace...of love. As citizens of the Kingdom of God who live according to this new economy, how shall we use money that does not belong to us in the first place?
According to Jesus, we shall use money for the sole glory of the in-breaking Kingdom of God. We are invited to imitate the shrewdness of the manager but not the self-centeredness of the manager. We are called to forgive debts and give out of a sense loving solidarity...simply because there is need....not because there is something in it for us.
By using money in this way, we fulfill John Wesley’s call to early Methodists based on this very passage: (1) Earn all you can, (2) Save all you can, in order that you may (3) give all you can.
...Wow, Jesus knows how to challenge us doesn’t he!? We thought we were being faithful by keeping 95% for ourselves and giving 5%....some of us really thought we had arrived the day we started giving 10% of our income to the church...10% of our time...and so forth. But Jesus is calling us to a holistic view of life...a life where EVERYTHING said and done flows out of our sense of being the baptized...disciples of Christ...citizens of the age that is dawning in the midst of the darkness of this world.
He has come to heal us, to invite us to participate in His life fully. It is those who have become open to the healing Jesus has offered that begin to experience transformation. Seth and Scott Avett’s song continues offering a renewed realization:
Temporary is my time, ain't nothing on this world that's mine
Except the will I found to carry on
Free is not your right to chose
It's answering what's asked of you
To give the love you find until it's gone
A need for something, now let me break it down again
A need for something but not more medicine
May the Holy Spirit empower us that we may be healed from the illness of sinful greed and want so that we might live out the ethics of the future kingdom in the here and now...receiving money as solely that which can be used to reveal God’s economy of grace and love, that we might hasten the coming of God’s kingdom where we live in loving solidarity with one another for all eternity.
Glory to Jesus Christ. Glory forever! Amen.
Sunday, August 22, 2010
A Contrast of Two Mountains
Rev. Tommy A. Thompson
Hebrews 12:18-29
13th Sunday after Pentecost
22 August 2010
“A Contrast of Two Mountains”
Hebrews 12:18-29 is an amazing text of Scripture, full of images and descriptions that invite our minds and hearts to journey away from our present context and into the ancient world of the text. When we enter that ancient world in which the Scripture lives and breathes, we experience everything from thunder and lightening, blaring trumpets, deep darkness, clouds and smoke, to jubilant and festive angelic choruses. All these experiences take place on two mountains: Mount Sinai and Mount Zion.
In order to really understand what is being claimed in the sermon of which our Epistle lesson is apart, it is important that we hear some of the texts that present the experiences to which the preacher alluded to when preaching this ancient homily. More often that not, New Testament writers primary source material for writing and preaching is what we understand as the Old Testament. I believe hearing the texts from the Old Testament that influenced the preacher of Hebrews will allow us to hear Hebrews 12:18-29 with fresh and original perspective.
When you hear these ancient texts read, come present to what you are feeling. What kind of emotions are stirred in you in response to these texts?
Exodus 19:12-13 -- You shall set limits for the people all around, saying, “Be careful not to go up the mountain or to touch the edge of it. Any who touch the mountain shall be put to death. No hand shall touch them, but they shall be stoned or shot with arrows; whether animal or human being, they shall not live.” When the trumpet sounds a long blast, they may go up on the mountain.’
Exodus 19:16-22 -- On the morning of the third day there was thunder and lightning, as well as a thick cloud on the mountain, and a blast of a trumpet so loud that all the people who were in the camp trembled. Moses brought the people out of the camp to meet God. They took their stand at the foot of the mountain. Now Mount Sinai was wrapped in smoke, because the LORD had descended upon it in fire; the smoke went up like the smoke of a kiln, while the whole mountain shook violently. As the blast of the trumpet grew louder and louder, Moses would speak and God would answer him in thunder. When the LORD descended upon Mount Sinai, to the top of the mountain, the LORD summoned Moses to the top of the mountain, and Moses went up. Then the LORD said to Moses, ‘Go down and warn the people not to break through to the LORD to look; otherwise many of them will perish. Even the priests who approach the LORD must consecrate themselves or the LORD will break out against them.’
Exodus 20:18-21
When all the people witnessed the thunder and lightning, the sound of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking, they were afraid and trembled and stood at a distance, and said to Moses, ‘You speak to us, and we will listen; but do not let God speak to us, or we will die.’ Moses said to the people, ‘Do not be afraid; for God has come only to test you and to put the fear of him upon you so that you do not sin.’ Then the people stood at a distance, while Moses drew near to the thick darkness where God was.
What kind of emotions were stirred in hearing these texts about God’s presence on Mount Sinai?
If you feel a bit frightened, nervous, bewildered, small, humbled by overhearing the activity of these texts, you are not alone.
God is presented in these texts as the Almighty, the Holy One, the One whose holiness is so great, human beings must be careful not too get too close...God’s presence is too great for human beings on Mt. Sinai. They are warned, do not look...do not touch! Fire and smoke...darkness and trumpets...things that obscure God’s identity more than reveal it. This God is holy and is presented as one who must not be approached without serious precautionary measures!
We live in a world where people put “Jesus is my best friend” on their bumpers. We have commercialized God...God is our buddy...our genie in the bottle...We are not used to seeing such vivid images of God as Almighty, transcendent, powerful, Ruler of all...I’m not sure about you, but when I heard these texts the last thing I thought was “best-buddy”...
On the flip side, because of these experiences among many others in the Old Testament, many persons do not see God as “best-friend” but as one who must be feared and revered and nothing else. God is not approachable...there is no space in God for me, that’s for sure.
Whatever emotions these words stirred up in you, one thing is for certain: on this particular mountain, the Lord must be feared...it is a fear that is so strong that it is palpable...kinda like the darkness that came over the land of Egypt during the ninth plague...it was a darkness that could be felt!
That’s the experience of the first mountain of Hebrews 12:18-29. But the point of bringing up this mountain with all its dark and fearful experiences is to remind Christian worshipers that their gathering on Sundays is not on this mountain!
“You have not come to something that can be touched, a blazing fire, and darkness, and gloom, and a tempest, and the sound of a trumpet, and a voice whose words made the hearers beg that not another word be spoken to them. (For they could not endure the order that was given, “If even an animal touches the mountain, it shall be stoned to death.” Indeed, so terrifying was the sight that Moses said, “I tremble with fear.”)
You have not come to that mountain, brothers and sisters, but to another:
“But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering, and to the assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God the judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel. See that you do not refuse the one who is speaking; for if they did not escape when they refused the one who warned them on earth, how much less will we escape if we reject the one who warns from heaven! At that time his voice shook the earth; but now he has promised, “Yet once more I will shake not only the earth but also the heaven.” This phrase, “Yet once more,” indicates the removal of what is shaken—that is, created things—so that what cannot be shaken may remain. Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us give thanks, by which we offer to God an acceptable worship with reverence and awe; for indeed our God is a consuming fire.”
Welcome to Mount Zion, the city of the Living God, heavenly Jerusalem. The experience of God on this mountain is not dark and gloomy...it is not a darkness that can be felt but a deep abiding joy that one cannot help but to sing. On this mountain, innumerable angels sing in full chorus. The church of God of all ages has assembled to join in the everlasting song...and Jesus is the center of all attention! What a mountain and what an experience!
But I’m curious...What happened to make the experience of God different on this mountain? Why is Mount Zion so joyful, yet Mount Sinai seems so dark and gloomy? Why is one mountain characterized by fear and the other exuberant festivity?
Something had to change for these experiences to be different. But who or what did? It’s not simply because of the mountain. Surely God doesn’t have mood swings when He comes to Mount Sinai...but only happy days while on Mount Zion. Obviously God hasn’t changed...even on Mount Sinai God is described as “Consuming Fire.” If God has not changed, who has?
Did you catch that three-letter word that hinted at the reason for the jubilant celebration on mountain two? The word “new.” Something “new” has happened. This is what has changed the experience of God on the mountain...the new thing that has happened through the blood of Jesus Christ, the blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel. Abel’s blood cries out for revenge, but Jesus blood does something totally different -- it reconciles.
Brothers and sisters, a new covenant has been made! Because of this covenant, you no longer have to fear God as the unapproachable One of whom you better not look at the wrong way lest you die! Because of what God has done in Jesus Christ, you have been reconciled to God. That’s what has changed ... our standing before God.
On mountain one, our sin caused such severe alienation and enmity that we literally trembled in fear in His presence...even with all its obscurity!
But now we stand before him, his presence being fully disclosed to us and check out our response! We join angels and archangels and all the company of heaven who sing the unending hymn to the glory of His Name!
Jesus has lived our life! Jesus has died our death! and Jesus has overcome our death and joined our life with God’s life once and for all!
There is but one response to such an amazing gift: jubilant and festive worship! Notice there is no apathy on mountain two. There is no indifference on mountain two. Also note that all these angels and saints of God are not getting excited and happy over just any and everything...It is something very particular -- the Victory of God in and through Jesus Christ!
The point of Hebrews 12 was to encourage Christians whose lives were not by any means peaches and cream that they were a part of something new, something great, something lasting...everlasting...the new covenant that had been ratified by the blood of the ever-slaughtered and victorious Lamb of God! Hebrews 12 was an invitation to those early Christians as it is to us to enter into worship with utter joy and thanksgiving in response to the mighty and gracious work of God in Christ on our behalf!
Faith receives this future kingdom in the present...it believes in the promise as if it were already fulfilled and it joins the heavenly chorus just as festively and joyfully as it is around God’s throne, making the world agree with our early Methodist brother, Ezekiel Cooper, who said that the worship of the new creation will differ only quantitatively and not qualitatively from our worship in the here-and-now!
You have not come to a darkness, fear, and dread that can be felt and touched like our ancestors did on Mt. Sinai...No! you have come to the future kingdom in the here-and-now via Christian worship. “Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us give thanks, by which we offer to God an acceptable worship with reverence and awe; for indeed our God is a consuming fire.”
Amen.
Hebrews 12:18-29
13th Sunday after Pentecost
22 August 2010
“A Contrast of Two Mountains”
Hebrews 12:18-29 is an amazing text of Scripture, full of images and descriptions that invite our minds and hearts to journey away from our present context and into the ancient world of the text. When we enter that ancient world in which the Scripture lives and breathes, we experience everything from thunder and lightening, blaring trumpets, deep darkness, clouds and smoke, to jubilant and festive angelic choruses. All these experiences take place on two mountains: Mount Sinai and Mount Zion.
In order to really understand what is being claimed in the sermon of which our Epistle lesson is apart, it is important that we hear some of the texts that present the experiences to which the preacher alluded to when preaching this ancient homily. More often that not, New Testament writers primary source material for writing and preaching is what we understand as the Old Testament. I believe hearing the texts from the Old Testament that influenced the preacher of Hebrews will allow us to hear Hebrews 12:18-29 with fresh and original perspective.
When you hear these ancient texts read, come present to what you are feeling. What kind of emotions are stirred in you in response to these texts?
Exodus 19:12-13 -- You shall set limits for the people all around, saying, “Be careful not to go up the mountain or to touch the edge of it. Any who touch the mountain shall be put to death. No hand shall touch them, but they shall be stoned or shot with arrows; whether animal or human being, they shall not live.” When the trumpet sounds a long blast, they may go up on the mountain.’
Exodus 19:16-22 -- On the morning of the third day there was thunder and lightning, as well as a thick cloud on the mountain, and a blast of a trumpet so loud that all the people who were in the camp trembled. Moses brought the people out of the camp to meet God. They took their stand at the foot of the mountain. Now Mount Sinai was wrapped in smoke, because the LORD had descended upon it in fire; the smoke went up like the smoke of a kiln, while the whole mountain shook violently. As the blast of the trumpet grew louder and louder, Moses would speak and God would answer him in thunder. When the LORD descended upon Mount Sinai, to the top of the mountain, the LORD summoned Moses to the top of the mountain, and Moses went up. Then the LORD said to Moses, ‘Go down and warn the people not to break through to the LORD to look; otherwise many of them will perish. Even the priests who approach the LORD must consecrate themselves or the LORD will break out against them.’
Exodus 20:18-21
When all the people witnessed the thunder and lightning, the sound of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking, they were afraid and trembled and stood at a distance, and said to Moses, ‘You speak to us, and we will listen; but do not let God speak to us, or we will die.’ Moses said to the people, ‘Do not be afraid; for God has come only to test you and to put the fear of him upon you so that you do not sin.’ Then the people stood at a distance, while Moses drew near to the thick darkness where God was.
What kind of emotions were stirred in hearing these texts about God’s presence on Mount Sinai?
If you feel a bit frightened, nervous, bewildered, small, humbled by overhearing the activity of these texts, you are not alone.
God is presented in these texts as the Almighty, the Holy One, the One whose holiness is so great, human beings must be careful not too get too close...God’s presence is too great for human beings on Mt. Sinai. They are warned, do not look...do not touch! Fire and smoke...darkness and trumpets...things that obscure God’s identity more than reveal it. This God is holy and is presented as one who must not be approached without serious precautionary measures!
We live in a world where people put “Jesus is my best friend” on their bumpers. We have commercialized God...God is our buddy...our genie in the bottle...We are not used to seeing such vivid images of God as Almighty, transcendent, powerful, Ruler of all...I’m not sure about you, but when I heard these texts the last thing I thought was “best-buddy”...
On the flip side, because of these experiences among many others in the Old Testament, many persons do not see God as “best-friend” but as one who must be feared and revered and nothing else. God is not approachable...there is no space in God for me, that’s for sure.
Whatever emotions these words stirred up in you, one thing is for certain: on this particular mountain, the Lord must be feared...it is a fear that is so strong that it is palpable...kinda like the darkness that came over the land of Egypt during the ninth plague...it was a darkness that could be felt!
That’s the experience of the first mountain of Hebrews 12:18-29. But the point of bringing up this mountain with all its dark and fearful experiences is to remind Christian worshipers that their gathering on Sundays is not on this mountain!
“You have not come to something that can be touched, a blazing fire, and darkness, and gloom, and a tempest, and the sound of a trumpet, and a voice whose words made the hearers beg that not another word be spoken to them. (For they could not endure the order that was given, “If even an animal touches the mountain, it shall be stoned to death.” Indeed, so terrifying was the sight that Moses said, “I tremble with fear.”)
You have not come to that mountain, brothers and sisters, but to another:
“But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering, and to the assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God the judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel. See that you do not refuse the one who is speaking; for if they did not escape when they refused the one who warned them on earth, how much less will we escape if we reject the one who warns from heaven! At that time his voice shook the earth; but now he has promised, “Yet once more I will shake not only the earth but also the heaven.” This phrase, “Yet once more,” indicates the removal of what is shaken—that is, created things—so that what cannot be shaken may remain. Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us give thanks, by which we offer to God an acceptable worship with reverence and awe; for indeed our God is a consuming fire.”
Welcome to Mount Zion, the city of the Living God, heavenly Jerusalem. The experience of God on this mountain is not dark and gloomy...it is not a darkness that can be felt but a deep abiding joy that one cannot help but to sing. On this mountain, innumerable angels sing in full chorus. The church of God of all ages has assembled to join in the everlasting song...and Jesus is the center of all attention! What a mountain and what an experience!
But I’m curious...What happened to make the experience of God different on this mountain? Why is Mount Zion so joyful, yet Mount Sinai seems so dark and gloomy? Why is one mountain characterized by fear and the other exuberant festivity?
Something had to change for these experiences to be different. But who or what did? It’s not simply because of the mountain. Surely God doesn’t have mood swings when He comes to Mount Sinai...but only happy days while on Mount Zion. Obviously God hasn’t changed...even on Mount Sinai God is described as “Consuming Fire.” If God has not changed, who has?
Did you catch that three-letter word that hinted at the reason for the jubilant celebration on mountain two? The word “new.” Something “new” has happened. This is what has changed the experience of God on the mountain...the new thing that has happened through the blood of Jesus Christ, the blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel. Abel’s blood cries out for revenge, but Jesus blood does something totally different -- it reconciles.
Brothers and sisters, a new covenant has been made! Because of this covenant, you no longer have to fear God as the unapproachable One of whom you better not look at the wrong way lest you die! Because of what God has done in Jesus Christ, you have been reconciled to God. That’s what has changed ... our standing before God.
On mountain one, our sin caused such severe alienation and enmity that we literally trembled in fear in His presence...even with all its obscurity!
But now we stand before him, his presence being fully disclosed to us and check out our response! We join angels and archangels and all the company of heaven who sing the unending hymn to the glory of His Name!
Jesus has lived our life! Jesus has died our death! and Jesus has overcome our death and joined our life with God’s life once and for all!
There is but one response to such an amazing gift: jubilant and festive worship! Notice there is no apathy on mountain two. There is no indifference on mountain two. Also note that all these angels and saints of God are not getting excited and happy over just any and everything...It is something very particular -- the Victory of God in and through Jesus Christ!
The point of Hebrews 12 was to encourage Christians whose lives were not by any means peaches and cream that they were a part of something new, something great, something lasting...everlasting...the new covenant that had been ratified by the blood of the ever-slaughtered and victorious Lamb of God! Hebrews 12 was an invitation to those early Christians as it is to us to enter into worship with utter joy and thanksgiving in response to the mighty and gracious work of God in Christ on our behalf!
Faith receives this future kingdom in the present...it believes in the promise as if it were already fulfilled and it joins the heavenly chorus just as festively and joyfully as it is around God’s throne, making the world agree with our early Methodist brother, Ezekiel Cooper, who said that the worship of the new creation will differ only quantitatively and not qualitatively from our worship in the here-and-now!
You have not come to a darkness, fear, and dread that can be felt and touched like our ancestors did on Mt. Sinai...No! you have come to the future kingdom in the here-and-now via Christian worship. “Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us give thanks, by which we offer to God an acceptable worship with reverence and awe; for indeed our God is a consuming fire.”
Amen.
Saturday, August 7, 2010
Don't Be Afraid--Be Ready!
Rev. Tommy Thompson
12th Sunday after Pentecost
Luke 12:32-40
8 August 2010
“Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.”
Why did the author of Luke’s Gospel desire to comfort the early church,with such words? What was their reality? What gave them reason to be afraid?
Maybe some of us gathered here today know what it is like to be afraid. Something is going on in our lives...or in our larger context that frightens us. You hear these words as God’s comfort in the midst of a terrifying situation.
But the rest of us don’t have a whole lot to be scared of. Life is good...the bank account tells us that there’s more from where the last came from...the fridge is full...the closets are stuffed. The cars are shining. Our kids’ toy boxes runneth over. When life is this good, why would we need to be afraid, right?
But life wasn’t so comfortable for the early Christians to whom Luke’s Gospel greets with Jesus’ words of comfort. They had good reason to be afraid.
You see these disciples, these who were of the first to go through the baptismal waters, were dead serious about living out the reality of their baptism in the world. They believed that in Jesus Christ, God’s new order had broken into the present. These Christians gave all they had to ensure that it was clear that their hearts were oriented toward this kingdom and none other.
But the problem is that when these Christians made the radical decision to believe with Abraham that God is doing a new thing by joining in the performance of the new thing, that meant leaving behind the old things.
For these early Christians the “old things” were the “things” of the Roman Empire. These things one does not leave behind without severe consequence. For some the cost was their very lives.
The disciples to whom the Lukan Gospel addresses with Jesus’ words of comfort were not ignorant of the way Christianity turned the world of the first century Roman empire upside down...or shall we say back right-side-up. They had experienced persecution first hand for refusing to reverently and worshipfully acknowledge the emperors cult among other things. They knew of people, people they loved dearly, who were dressed in the skins of lambs and fed to the wolves for the entertainment of Roman citizens...friends in Christ who were tortured or burned alive for confessing Jesus as Lord rather than Caesar.
All this just because they were baptized in the triune Name of God.
Our early brothers and sisters of the faith had good reason to be afraid. They were afraid that the persecution would get worse before it got better. They were afraid that family might dis-own them for claiming Jesus as the Messiah. They were afraid that maybe the new orientation of their lives was all for naught. The kingdom of God was supposed to have broken into the present through Jesus’ death and resurrection. By being baptized into this death and resurrection, a new life was supposed to result not only for the baptized but for the entire creation for whom Christ died and was raised.
These first Christians believed that what happened in and through Jesus had really changed the entire cosmos...not simply their own lives. But if this is true, then why are they suffering rather than thriving in the world God is supposedly making new?
These early saints believed that the Kingdom would come to fulfillment, would be consummated, not long after Jesus had ascended and the Holy Spirit had been poured out on God’s people. It is very likely that they expected this to happen in their lifetime.
Why the delay? Why the waiting? People are suffering...faithful people are dying.
I wonder if this wasn’t their primary fear. Have we put all our eggs in the wrong basket? Have we invested all our treasure in a non-existent bank account?
Could you imagine the fear? You share the faith of Abraham in believing that God is doing something new in and through your life, yet the promise always seems to be in the extreme far distance and never in the here-and-now.
It is no wonder Abraham lost faith after many many years had past. It is no wonder that the people of God began to be afraid that the fullness of the kingdom that had already broke into the present may never come to full fruition.
As we live for a moment in this first century tension, let that tension define for us the true nature of the Kingdom of God. The Kingdom of God came in Jesus Christ. Through Jesus life, death, resurrection, and ascension, God’s reign is being revealed in this world. However, the full disclosure of that reign is still to come.
The early Christians believed that this age with all its polities and rulers is passing away and that God’s new age, inaugurated by Jesus is coming to fruition. Thus, Christians always live in a tension of ‘already’ but ‘not yet.’ Living in the tension between inauguration and consummation is a dangerous and daunting task. Thus Jesus’ words of comfort being offered to His church are more than in order.
______________________________________________________________________
Against this first century backdrop the rest of the Gospel lesson comes into focus for us. Rather than admonishing these early Christians to cash in and give up on the kingdom of God, the author of Luke’s Gospel invites them to be unafraid in living the way of their King, Jesus Christ, in and through this world.
Rather than inviting the little flock to occupy themselves with the building up of treasures with an eye toward self security in this life, he calls the disciples to be concerned with ensuring they possess treasures in heaven, the realm from where God’s reign shines forth into this world.
Continue to invest fully in the gift of the Kingdom of God, Luke says, and not in the grudging banks of Rome.
Continue to invest fully in gift the Kingdom of God, Luke invites us, and not in the grudging banks of Capital Consumerism!
For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. In other words, where your treasure is, there your life will be oriented also.
The call of the Gospel in the midst of the daunting task of disciple in the tension of already and not yet is to continue to be faithful in response to grace...to treasure the Kingdom and its way above all else.
We could take the easy way out, continuing to pat ourselves on the back for the self-security we have made for ourselves by the accumulation of money and things...the bank accounts, the full fridge, the stuffed closets, the shining cars and the overflowing toy boxes... The world teaches that he who has the most toys wins, but the Gospel teaches us that He who has invested his life in the possessions of a world that is passing away will pass away with it.
Instead of inviting us to live the life of temporary comfort, the Gospel calls us to re-embrace the reality that God’s world is coming to fruition in this world. Don’t neglect the vows of your baptism and be re-baptized into the age that is passing away just because Jesus and the fullness of the kingdom are still not operating in full throttle in the world.
Rather, be ready, because the kingdom WILL come. God’s reign WILL be made perfectly manifest.
Jesus invitation to the fearful disciples is to trust Him. He assures us that the Kingdom will come in fullness but he tells us that we do not know when this will be. As a matter of fact, Scripture teaches us that not even Jesus himself knows when the full manifestation of God’s reign will occur. Jesus is okay with not knowing because he knows His Father. He invites us to the same kind of trust. Be ready. You don’t know when...
I remember not too long ago Leslie was out with a few of her friends for the day and I was at home with Hannah and Daniel. Hannah woke up that morning and asked me, “Daddy, when is mommy coming back home?” I responded, “Hannah, I don’t really know exactly when, but she will be back.” Because Hannah was sure that mommy would return and because Hannah was also sure that the time of mommy’s arrival was uncertain, Hannah got busy. She happily cleaned her entire room...the whole time telling me, “Daddy, when Mommy sees my room, she’s gonna be so happy.” She worked so hard on that room. I remember when she was finished. She presented the room to me and said, “Look at my room! It is ready! I can’t wait to show mommy!”
I remember Hannah pulling back the curtains in the living room, looking out the window and into the driveway with eager anticipation of her mommy’s return.
That is the sentiment of Jesus’ parable. Be ready! You do not know when the master will return. Be dressed for action...not for sleep! The return of the Lord is a good thing. It will bring an end to persecution...to suffering...to poverty...to violence...to hatred...to death...to the ways of this fleeting world. Hannah could not wait for her mommy to find her ready for her arrival...how much more should we eagerly and joyfully await the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with the fulfillment of all things!
But how do we “clean our rooms?” How do we “ready” ourselves for the coming of our master?
Did you notice anything peculiar about the parable? Did you notice the twist? If you didn’t, you should have at least expected a twist. In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus’ parables are full of ironic twists. Samaritans don’t write blank checks for wounded Jews. Shepherds don’t leave ninety-nine sheep to seek on that is lost. And masters returning late at night do not tighten their belts and serve their slaves! What Jesus says here in the parable turns the first-century roman world upside down. The premium is placed on servanthood, not on being the master. As I hear Jesus words a picture is painted in my mind that may have been painted in yours as well... “During supper, Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going to God, got up from the table, took off his outer robe, and tied a towel around himself. then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples feet and to wipe them with the towel that was tied around him.”
Brothers and sisters, it is no accident that when you look at the font this morning, you see another bowl of water, a towel, and a pair of sandals below it. This is the life that flows forth from baptism. “Jesus said to them, ‘Do you know what I have done to you? You call me Teacher and Lord--and you are right, for that is what I am. So if I, your Lord and teacher have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For i have set you an example , that you should go and do likewise.’”
Rather than living the American dream as if it is the ultimate dream...rather than living in this world as if all we have are these few years between birth and death, Jesus invites us to be ready by imitating His life in the world. By imitating that life, we bring the future into the present...because in the future our Lord is revealed as tightening his belt and serving us! If you want to be ready...to live in the here-and-now as citizens of the already-not-yet kingdom, then tighten your belts and serve the least. Do it with joyful anticipation, wanting to be caught by the master bringing his kingdom to fruition.
“Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.”
Amen.
12th Sunday after Pentecost
Luke 12:32-40
8 August 2010
“Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.”
Why did the author of Luke’s Gospel desire to comfort the early church,with such words? What was their reality? What gave them reason to be afraid?
Maybe some of us gathered here today know what it is like to be afraid. Something is going on in our lives...or in our larger context that frightens us. You hear these words as God’s comfort in the midst of a terrifying situation.
But the rest of us don’t have a whole lot to be scared of. Life is good...the bank account tells us that there’s more from where the last came from...the fridge is full...the closets are stuffed. The cars are shining. Our kids’ toy boxes runneth over. When life is this good, why would we need to be afraid, right?
But life wasn’t so comfortable for the early Christians to whom Luke’s Gospel greets with Jesus’ words of comfort. They had good reason to be afraid.
You see these disciples, these who were of the first to go through the baptismal waters, were dead serious about living out the reality of their baptism in the world. They believed that in Jesus Christ, God’s new order had broken into the present. These Christians gave all they had to ensure that it was clear that their hearts were oriented toward this kingdom and none other.
But the problem is that when these Christians made the radical decision to believe with Abraham that God is doing a new thing by joining in the performance of the new thing, that meant leaving behind the old things.
For these early Christians the “old things” were the “things” of the Roman Empire. These things one does not leave behind without severe consequence. For some the cost was their very lives.
The disciples to whom the Lukan Gospel addresses with Jesus’ words of comfort were not ignorant of the way Christianity turned the world of the first century Roman empire upside down...or shall we say back right-side-up. They had experienced persecution first hand for refusing to reverently and worshipfully acknowledge the emperors cult among other things. They knew of people, people they loved dearly, who were dressed in the skins of lambs and fed to the wolves for the entertainment of Roman citizens...friends in Christ who were tortured or burned alive for confessing Jesus as Lord rather than Caesar.
All this just because they were baptized in the triune Name of God.
Our early brothers and sisters of the faith had good reason to be afraid. They were afraid that the persecution would get worse before it got better. They were afraid that family might dis-own them for claiming Jesus as the Messiah. They were afraid that maybe the new orientation of their lives was all for naught. The kingdom of God was supposed to have broken into the present through Jesus’ death and resurrection. By being baptized into this death and resurrection, a new life was supposed to result not only for the baptized but for the entire creation for whom Christ died and was raised.
These first Christians believed that what happened in and through Jesus had really changed the entire cosmos...not simply their own lives. But if this is true, then why are they suffering rather than thriving in the world God is supposedly making new?
These early saints believed that the Kingdom would come to fulfillment, would be consummated, not long after Jesus had ascended and the Holy Spirit had been poured out on God’s people. It is very likely that they expected this to happen in their lifetime.
Why the delay? Why the waiting? People are suffering...faithful people are dying.
I wonder if this wasn’t their primary fear. Have we put all our eggs in the wrong basket? Have we invested all our treasure in a non-existent bank account?
Could you imagine the fear? You share the faith of Abraham in believing that God is doing something new in and through your life, yet the promise always seems to be in the extreme far distance and never in the here-and-now.
It is no wonder Abraham lost faith after many many years had past. It is no wonder that the people of God began to be afraid that the fullness of the kingdom that had already broke into the present may never come to full fruition.
As we live for a moment in this first century tension, let that tension define for us the true nature of the Kingdom of God. The Kingdom of God came in Jesus Christ. Through Jesus life, death, resurrection, and ascension, God’s reign is being revealed in this world. However, the full disclosure of that reign is still to come.
The early Christians believed that this age with all its polities and rulers is passing away and that God’s new age, inaugurated by Jesus is coming to fruition. Thus, Christians always live in a tension of ‘already’ but ‘not yet.’ Living in the tension between inauguration and consummation is a dangerous and daunting task. Thus Jesus’ words of comfort being offered to His church are more than in order.
______________________________________________________________________
Against this first century backdrop the rest of the Gospel lesson comes into focus for us. Rather than admonishing these early Christians to cash in and give up on the kingdom of God, the author of Luke’s Gospel invites them to be unafraid in living the way of their King, Jesus Christ, in and through this world.
Rather than inviting the little flock to occupy themselves with the building up of treasures with an eye toward self security in this life, he calls the disciples to be concerned with ensuring they possess treasures in heaven, the realm from where God’s reign shines forth into this world.
Continue to invest fully in the gift of the Kingdom of God, Luke says, and not in the grudging banks of Rome.
Continue to invest fully in gift the Kingdom of God, Luke invites us, and not in the grudging banks of Capital Consumerism!
For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. In other words, where your treasure is, there your life will be oriented also.
The call of the Gospel in the midst of the daunting task of disciple in the tension of already and not yet is to continue to be faithful in response to grace...to treasure the Kingdom and its way above all else.
We could take the easy way out, continuing to pat ourselves on the back for the self-security we have made for ourselves by the accumulation of money and things...the bank accounts, the full fridge, the stuffed closets, the shining cars and the overflowing toy boxes... The world teaches that he who has the most toys wins, but the Gospel teaches us that He who has invested his life in the possessions of a world that is passing away will pass away with it.
Instead of inviting us to live the life of temporary comfort, the Gospel calls us to re-embrace the reality that God’s world is coming to fruition in this world. Don’t neglect the vows of your baptism and be re-baptized into the age that is passing away just because Jesus and the fullness of the kingdom are still not operating in full throttle in the world.
Rather, be ready, because the kingdom WILL come. God’s reign WILL be made perfectly manifest.
Jesus invitation to the fearful disciples is to trust Him. He assures us that the Kingdom will come in fullness but he tells us that we do not know when this will be. As a matter of fact, Scripture teaches us that not even Jesus himself knows when the full manifestation of God’s reign will occur. Jesus is okay with not knowing because he knows His Father. He invites us to the same kind of trust. Be ready. You don’t know when...
I remember not too long ago Leslie was out with a few of her friends for the day and I was at home with Hannah and Daniel. Hannah woke up that morning and asked me, “Daddy, when is mommy coming back home?” I responded, “Hannah, I don’t really know exactly when, but she will be back.” Because Hannah was sure that mommy would return and because Hannah was also sure that the time of mommy’s arrival was uncertain, Hannah got busy. She happily cleaned her entire room...the whole time telling me, “Daddy, when Mommy sees my room, she’s gonna be so happy.” She worked so hard on that room. I remember when she was finished. She presented the room to me and said, “Look at my room! It is ready! I can’t wait to show mommy!”
I remember Hannah pulling back the curtains in the living room, looking out the window and into the driveway with eager anticipation of her mommy’s return.
That is the sentiment of Jesus’ parable. Be ready! You do not know when the master will return. Be dressed for action...not for sleep! The return of the Lord is a good thing. It will bring an end to persecution...to suffering...to poverty...to violence...to hatred...to death...to the ways of this fleeting world. Hannah could not wait for her mommy to find her ready for her arrival...how much more should we eagerly and joyfully await the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with the fulfillment of all things!
But how do we “clean our rooms?” How do we “ready” ourselves for the coming of our master?
Did you notice anything peculiar about the parable? Did you notice the twist? If you didn’t, you should have at least expected a twist. In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus’ parables are full of ironic twists. Samaritans don’t write blank checks for wounded Jews. Shepherds don’t leave ninety-nine sheep to seek on that is lost. And masters returning late at night do not tighten their belts and serve their slaves! What Jesus says here in the parable turns the first-century roman world upside down. The premium is placed on servanthood, not on being the master. As I hear Jesus words a picture is painted in my mind that may have been painted in yours as well... “During supper, Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going to God, got up from the table, took off his outer robe, and tied a towel around himself. then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples feet and to wipe them with the towel that was tied around him.”
Brothers and sisters, it is no accident that when you look at the font this morning, you see another bowl of water, a towel, and a pair of sandals below it. This is the life that flows forth from baptism. “Jesus said to them, ‘Do you know what I have done to you? You call me Teacher and Lord--and you are right, for that is what I am. So if I, your Lord and teacher have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For i have set you an example , that you should go and do likewise.’”
Rather than living the American dream as if it is the ultimate dream...rather than living in this world as if all we have are these few years between birth and death, Jesus invites us to be ready by imitating His life in the world. By imitating that life, we bring the future into the present...because in the future our Lord is revealed as tightening his belt and serving us! If you want to be ready...to live in the here-and-now as citizens of the already-not-yet kingdom, then tighten your belts and serve the least. Do it with joyful anticipation, wanting to be caught by the master bringing his kingdom to fruition.
“Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.”
Amen.
Saturday, July 10, 2010
Homily for seventh Sunday after Pentecost
Rev. Tommy Thompson
7th Sunday after Pentecost
11 July 2010
Luke 10:25-37
“How Far Should Love Reach?”
Today we get THE question. So let’s cut the small talk and get right to business...what must I do to inherit everlasting life? That’s the question that so many of us want to ask and that’s the question that so many of us want a straight answer to...right?
What must I do to inherit everlasting life? Anyone here ever asked that question? When you ask the question, do you really want the truth? Have you ever asked the question with an open mind? Or do you ask the question so that you may have the opportunity to comfort yourself with your favorite preconceived answer.
We 21st century Western, American people want the answer to be simple...we do not want it to require much of our time, much of our lives. Please, little to no commitment...we have grown accustomed to this request. We prefer to get the bargain without the 2 year contract being signed, thank you very much! We prefer to be able to cancel the subscription at any time without any penalty being paid...commitments...contracts...covenants...we sophisticated 21st century Western people have outgrown those outdated words, you know.
This is why I must warn you. Jesus is going to address one of the deepest and most pressing questions human beings have ever asked. But I am afraid that we may not hear him. Jesus is not a 21st century spoiled rotten caucasian male. He is not one who runs away form the c words...commitments, contracts...covenants...Are we sure, really sure...that we want to join the lawyer of Luke 10 and ask this committed servant named Jesus what we must do to inherit everlasting life? Do you have an open mind? Can you retire your own age-old response at the expense of you being made uncomfortable with what Jesus has to say?
Because today the Gospel won’t settle for anything less. We must have an open mind if we truly dare to ask this question. We can comfort ourselves with our favorite and most pleasing answers all we want, but today we are given the opportunity to hear and respond to the real answer to our question. What must I do to have everlasting life?
This is the question the lawyer asks Jesus in Luke 10:25. Let us join the lawyer and ask the question in unison: “Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
Jesus‘ immediate response to us is a question...he puts the ball back in our playing field. You tell me...what is written in the law? I’m pretty sure we are sophisticated enough to join the lawyer and give the appropriate response: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your being, and with all your strength and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.”
I’m feeling pretty good about myself now. I have impressed the 2nd person of the Trinity...the Son of the Father...the One who all things have been handed over to...surely now i will inherit everlasting life.
But Jesus does not let us off the hook with a simple Sunday school response, does he? Instead he turns our answer into a challenge. Don’t simply say it, but do it; not only with your lips, but with your lives.
Uh oh...he did it. Here he goes expecting something of our lives...our time...our commitment...so we join the lawyer and we ask question. “yeah; okay...but how far should love reach?” What is the minimum requirement? We simply want in, Jesus...we wanna know we have everlasting life. So tell us...how far should love reach?
Isn’t that really the question the lawyer asked in response to Jesus? He wanted to know where the boundaries stopped. Certainly Jesus won’t expect us to get our hands messy in someone else's affairs. Surely Jesus understands that some people are unloveable...some people are less than human...some people are to be despised...So the lawyer asks the question and we join him.
I imagine me asking this sarcastically and maybe even defiantly: and just who is my neighbor?
In response to our attempt to justify ourselves...to put ourselves in the clear for our failure to love ... to make excuse for our exclusiveness, Jesus gives one of the most familiar parables in all of Scripture. Unfortunately when they become this familiar, usually they get twisted all out of shape. So with an open mind, let us here afresh the story Jesus shares with us in response to our desire to justify our drawing the boundary lines short of certain people groups, etc. etc.
A certain man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho and fell into the hands of robbers. They stripped him; they beat him; and the went away leaving him half dead. Now suppose a priest was going down that same road; and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side of the road. So likewise, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side of the road.
But a Samaritan, while traveling came near him; and when he saw him, he was moved with compassion. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring oil and wine on them. He even put him on his own animal, brought him to an inn and took care of him. If that’s not enough...the next day he took out two days wages, and gave it to the innkeeper and said, take care of him and when i come back, i will repay you whatever more you spend.
Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?
Before we answer this question. We must realize all that is going on in this story...how it would have been heard by a first century Jewish person who was familiar with the social issues and geographical locations of the day.
Jerusalem is located at about 2,500 feet above sea level. Jericho, in the Jordan rift valley, is about 800 feet below sea level. This road that a certain man traveled upon descended nearly 3,300 feet in 17 miles. Besides being a dangerous journey due to climate and terrain, this road was also known as a very violent road, where robbers would wait for someone like this man from Jerusalem, likely a merchant, to travel down. This was because the terrain offered easy hiding for the bandits who terrorized travelers.
What is so intriguing about this story is that this Samaritan stops on the dangerous Jericho road to assist someone that he does not know in spite of the self-evident peril of doing so; he gives of his own goods and money, freely, making no arrangements for reciprocation; in order to obtain care for this stranger, he enters an inn, itself a place of potential danger; and he even enters into an open-ended monetary relationship with the innkeeper, a relationship in which the chance of extortion is high! I believe what Jesus is trying to tell us is that the great commandment to love God and neighbor is a love that makes us vulnerable, and that the only way to inherit eternal life is by living this life of vulnerability now!
Imagine how you would feel if you were in a similar situation in the most notoriously violent section of Norfolk, VA. Imagine you were just robbed and beat up and left half dead there. You’d probably be imagining that someone will be coming soon not to help you but to finish you off! And then it happens....he approaches...you breath a sigh of relief....you see someone that looks like someone you normally would associate with...but today your shoes are not quite as shiny...your shirt is covered in blood...they cannot recognize that you are wearing designer apparel because it has all been stolen. So they quickly pass you by...trying their best to get out of that section of town before the same thing happens to them.
Now, imagine a person that you normally classify as scum...one who you believe would never be described by Jesus as a neighbor. You see, Jewish and Samaritan relationships in the first century were the equivalent of the worst of racial prejudices of our own time. So imagine you see this person approaching you....he doesn’t dodge you like the white collar guy just did...your worst nightmare! In your mind, this person is the equivalent of a first century Samaritan in the eyes of many Jewish persons...who are you thinking of? Is he black, is he wearing those “gangster clothes”? Is he Islamic? Latino? Hindu? Is she poor? Is he gay? ... this person who you have always regarded as scum...less than human...a person you’d never be seen with in public...doesn’t dodge you...but then to your surprise he doesn’t finish you off either...but instead, you see tears rolling down her cheeks...she is broken out of compassion for you. He goes out of his way. She scoots over her briefcase, and makes room for you to sit in the seat of her car, knowing that you are a bloody mess...he makes sure that you get medical attention...she knows you’ve been robbed so she pays for you to stay in a motel until you are able to get things sorted out...he sees to it that you have clothes and shoes and food for days to come. Someone we never considered being our neighbor...someone we thought we didn’t have to love to inherit eternal life....someone we scratched off our list a long time ago just showed us what a neighbor truly is.
It is interesting the way Jesus turns the question around—he didn’t ask in response to the lawyer’s question, “now who is your neighbor based on this story,” but “which one acted as a neighbor?” By Jesus’ rephrasing of the question, he dismisses the idea that some are neighbors and some are not; By asking the question this way, Jesus proclaims to us that anyone and everyone is our neighbor and that such an identification opens wide the door to loving action.
The point is that I am called to be everyone’s neighbor, regardless of socio-economic status, the color of their skin, the way they wear their clothes, and yes, even the way they live their lives...even while I accept that anyone can be a neighbor to me, regardless of the walls of prejudice I have built to keep certain persons out...
Want to inherit everlasting life? Then cease trying to figure out “who is my neighbor” and live like your baptized. Live in Christ. Live in the one who humbled himself, took upon the flesh of us whose sin made us enemies. He walked the dangerous road. He was stripped and beat, but he was left completely dead. Jesus life, death and resurrection demonstrates to us that love and vulnerability go hand and hand and only vulnerable love overcomes the evil of sin and the sting of death! For Jesus has risen from the dead, trampling down death by death, and to those who were in the tombs, bestowed life!
How far does love reach? When we look at the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, we find that love has no boundaries....for the love of God has reconciled the entire universe!
Jesus really challenges us here, leaving no room for exclusion, but only room for embrace!
In the end, none of us know what the response of the lawyer actually was. All we know is that he demonstrates that he understands Jesus. Jesus gives him the imperative based on this understanding to “go and do likewise.” The lawyer has heard the good news—now the question is , Will he do it? And I believe the same question remains for us—will we do the good news or simply agree with it? Amen.
7th Sunday after Pentecost
11 July 2010
Luke 10:25-37
“How Far Should Love Reach?”
Today we get THE question. So let’s cut the small talk and get right to business...what must I do to inherit everlasting life? That’s the question that so many of us want to ask and that’s the question that so many of us want a straight answer to...right?
What must I do to inherit everlasting life? Anyone here ever asked that question? When you ask the question, do you really want the truth? Have you ever asked the question with an open mind? Or do you ask the question so that you may have the opportunity to comfort yourself with your favorite preconceived answer.
We 21st century Western, American people want the answer to be simple...we do not want it to require much of our time, much of our lives. Please, little to no commitment...we have grown accustomed to this request. We prefer to get the bargain without the 2 year contract being signed, thank you very much! We prefer to be able to cancel the subscription at any time without any penalty being paid...commitments...contracts...covenants...we sophisticated 21st century Western people have outgrown those outdated words, you know.
This is why I must warn you. Jesus is going to address one of the deepest and most pressing questions human beings have ever asked. But I am afraid that we may not hear him. Jesus is not a 21st century spoiled rotten caucasian male. He is not one who runs away form the c words...commitments, contracts...covenants...Are we sure, really sure...that we want to join the lawyer of Luke 10 and ask this committed servant named Jesus what we must do to inherit everlasting life? Do you have an open mind? Can you retire your own age-old response at the expense of you being made uncomfortable with what Jesus has to say?
Because today the Gospel won’t settle for anything less. We must have an open mind if we truly dare to ask this question. We can comfort ourselves with our favorite and most pleasing answers all we want, but today we are given the opportunity to hear and respond to the real answer to our question. What must I do to have everlasting life?
This is the question the lawyer asks Jesus in Luke 10:25. Let us join the lawyer and ask the question in unison: “Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
Jesus‘ immediate response to us is a question...he puts the ball back in our playing field. You tell me...what is written in the law? I’m pretty sure we are sophisticated enough to join the lawyer and give the appropriate response: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your being, and with all your strength and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.”
I’m feeling pretty good about myself now. I have impressed the 2nd person of the Trinity...the Son of the Father...the One who all things have been handed over to...surely now i will inherit everlasting life.
But Jesus does not let us off the hook with a simple Sunday school response, does he? Instead he turns our answer into a challenge. Don’t simply say it, but do it; not only with your lips, but with your lives.
Uh oh...he did it. Here he goes expecting something of our lives...our time...our commitment...so we join the lawyer and we ask question. “yeah; okay...but how far should love reach?” What is the minimum requirement? We simply want in, Jesus...we wanna know we have everlasting life. So tell us...how far should love reach?
Isn’t that really the question the lawyer asked in response to Jesus? He wanted to know where the boundaries stopped. Certainly Jesus won’t expect us to get our hands messy in someone else's affairs. Surely Jesus understands that some people are unloveable...some people are less than human...some people are to be despised...So the lawyer asks the question and we join him.
I imagine me asking this sarcastically and maybe even defiantly: and just who is my neighbor?
In response to our attempt to justify ourselves...to put ourselves in the clear for our failure to love ... to make excuse for our exclusiveness, Jesus gives one of the most familiar parables in all of Scripture. Unfortunately when they become this familiar, usually they get twisted all out of shape. So with an open mind, let us here afresh the story Jesus shares with us in response to our desire to justify our drawing the boundary lines short of certain people groups, etc. etc.
A certain man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho and fell into the hands of robbers. They stripped him; they beat him; and the went away leaving him half dead. Now suppose a priest was going down that same road; and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side of the road. So likewise, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side of the road.
But a Samaritan, while traveling came near him; and when he saw him, he was moved with compassion. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring oil and wine on them. He even put him on his own animal, brought him to an inn and took care of him. If that’s not enough...the next day he took out two days wages, and gave it to the innkeeper and said, take care of him and when i come back, i will repay you whatever more you spend.
Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?
Before we answer this question. We must realize all that is going on in this story...how it would have been heard by a first century Jewish person who was familiar with the social issues and geographical locations of the day.
Jerusalem is located at about 2,500 feet above sea level. Jericho, in the Jordan rift valley, is about 800 feet below sea level. This road that a certain man traveled upon descended nearly 3,300 feet in 17 miles. Besides being a dangerous journey due to climate and terrain, this road was also known as a very violent road, where robbers would wait for someone like this man from Jerusalem, likely a merchant, to travel down. This was because the terrain offered easy hiding for the bandits who terrorized travelers.
What is so intriguing about this story is that this Samaritan stops on the dangerous Jericho road to assist someone that he does not know in spite of the self-evident peril of doing so; he gives of his own goods and money, freely, making no arrangements for reciprocation; in order to obtain care for this stranger, he enters an inn, itself a place of potential danger; and he even enters into an open-ended monetary relationship with the innkeeper, a relationship in which the chance of extortion is high! I believe what Jesus is trying to tell us is that the great commandment to love God and neighbor is a love that makes us vulnerable, and that the only way to inherit eternal life is by living this life of vulnerability now!
Imagine how you would feel if you were in a similar situation in the most notoriously violent section of Norfolk, VA. Imagine you were just robbed and beat up and left half dead there. You’d probably be imagining that someone will be coming soon not to help you but to finish you off! And then it happens....he approaches...you breath a sigh of relief....you see someone that looks like someone you normally would associate with...but today your shoes are not quite as shiny...your shirt is covered in blood...they cannot recognize that you are wearing designer apparel because it has all been stolen. So they quickly pass you by...trying their best to get out of that section of town before the same thing happens to them.
Now, imagine a person that you normally classify as scum...one who you believe would never be described by Jesus as a neighbor. You see, Jewish and Samaritan relationships in the first century were the equivalent of the worst of racial prejudices of our own time. So imagine you see this person approaching you....he doesn’t dodge you like the white collar guy just did...your worst nightmare! In your mind, this person is the equivalent of a first century Samaritan in the eyes of many Jewish persons...who are you thinking of? Is he black, is he wearing those “gangster clothes”? Is he Islamic? Latino? Hindu? Is she poor? Is he gay? ... this person who you have always regarded as scum...less than human...a person you’d never be seen with in public...doesn’t dodge you...but then to your surprise he doesn’t finish you off either...but instead, you see tears rolling down her cheeks...she is broken out of compassion for you. He goes out of his way. She scoots over her briefcase, and makes room for you to sit in the seat of her car, knowing that you are a bloody mess...he makes sure that you get medical attention...she knows you’ve been robbed so she pays for you to stay in a motel until you are able to get things sorted out...he sees to it that you have clothes and shoes and food for days to come. Someone we never considered being our neighbor...someone we thought we didn’t have to love to inherit eternal life....someone we scratched off our list a long time ago just showed us what a neighbor truly is.
It is interesting the way Jesus turns the question around—he didn’t ask in response to the lawyer’s question, “now who is your neighbor based on this story,” but “which one acted as a neighbor?” By Jesus’ rephrasing of the question, he dismisses the idea that some are neighbors and some are not; By asking the question this way, Jesus proclaims to us that anyone and everyone is our neighbor and that such an identification opens wide the door to loving action.
The point is that I am called to be everyone’s neighbor, regardless of socio-economic status, the color of their skin, the way they wear their clothes, and yes, even the way they live their lives...even while I accept that anyone can be a neighbor to me, regardless of the walls of prejudice I have built to keep certain persons out...
Want to inherit everlasting life? Then cease trying to figure out “who is my neighbor” and live like your baptized. Live in Christ. Live in the one who humbled himself, took upon the flesh of us whose sin made us enemies. He walked the dangerous road. He was stripped and beat, but he was left completely dead. Jesus life, death and resurrection demonstrates to us that love and vulnerability go hand and hand and only vulnerable love overcomes the evil of sin and the sting of death! For Jesus has risen from the dead, trampling down death by death, and to those who were in the tombs, bestowed life!
How far does love reach? When we look at the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, we find that love has no boundaries....for the love of God has reconciled the entire universe!
Jesus really challenges us here, leaving no room for exclusion, but only room for embrace!
In the end, none of us know what the response of the lawyer actually was. All we know is that he demonstrates that he understands Jesus. Jesus gives him the imperative based on this understanding to “go and do likewise.” The lawyer has heard the good news—now the question is , Will he do it? And I believe the same question remains for us—will we do the good news or simply agree with it? Amen.
Sunday, July 4, 2010
Homily for 6th Sunday after Pentecost
Rev. Tommy A. Thompson
Sixth Sunday after Pentecost
Luke 10:1-20
4 July 2010
“Harvesting: Hard, Dangerous, Urgent; Yet Fulfilling”
Harvest. What do you think of when you hear that word? Harvest. Do you think of a large table, spread with all your favorite foods? Of family and friends around the table with you, enjoying what God has given through the earth?
Some of us think of our gardens at home. We imagine walking outside to our tomato plant, plucking a beautiful and ripe tomato, taking it inside, washing it, slicing it and making a nice tomato sandwich.
But some of us don’t have such pleasant thoughts immediately. Some of us have known what it is like to put in the hard labor so that others might enjoy that large table spread with all their favorite foods. Some of us hear the word harvest and the image of sweat rolling off the forehead and down one’s brow comes to mind.
That is the image that comes to my mind.
I was raised in Robertson County, Tennessee, in a small town called Cross Plains, about 25 miles north of Nashville. If you lived in Robertson County and did not do at least a little bit of farming, there was something wrong with ya. As a matter of fact, that’s what made you “cool” at school. Did you have you own crop yet? In the fall, were your hands stained with tobacco oils? Did you have a nice tan from being out in the hay fields day in and day out? When we were old enough to drive, no one really cared about the sports cars...we wanted the big four wheel drives. That’s where I come from.
I remember that first summer I worked in the tobacco fields. A friend of mine had told me about the “BIG” money he was making so i thought i’d give it a whirl. Being fourteen yrs. old and hearing you can make 8.00 per hour was just about the equivalent of winning the lottery for me!
At that time I had done some farming...livestock and a little bit of hay. But boy, i had never experienced anything like this. Harvesting tobacco plants was hard work and an exact science; there was a method to it’s madness.
I don’t remember the entire science of it all...but I do remember enough.
First of all, we had to go out in the heat of summer to begin the process by bending over and chopping down each plant with a tobacco knife, and turning them upside down; The whole day our backs were bent over; we were sweating, back’s were aching, and blisters were opening...it was, in my opinion, the worst part of the job. This was hard work.
But after the cutting was over, we were far from finished. Next we had to walk back through the rows, picking up the plants that had been cut, using a tobacco stick with a spike on the end, we had to spike the plants onto the tobacco sticks. It seemed that just about every day someone was sticking the spike through their hands rather than through the plants! This was hard work and dangerous work.
When we were finished spiking the plants onto the sticks, we’d then pick up the sticks full of tobacco plants and place them on the tobacco trailer as it drove through the rows. But the job still wasn’t finished. Next we’d have to take the tobacco to the barn to house it. There were usually at least three tiers to the tobacco barn. Each tier had to be manned...We’d hand the plants up toward the top, with sweat and tobacco pieces falling into our eyes...it was hot in that barn...and it was no fun.
I remember one particular summer where we did not have enough laborers and as a result we couldn’t get the tobacco in the barn in time before it was wasted. I remember how upset my boss was even today. It was not only hard work, and dangerous work, but it carried with it a sense of urgency.
After we’d get the plants housed, we’d get a bit of a break until we had to fire cure them. This was my favorite part of harvesting tobacco...that smell...it filled the robertson county air every year just in time for football season. There is nothing like a cool friday night football game in Robertson County with the wonderful fragrance of smoked tobacco in the air.
Then came my 2nd favorite part of the process...stripping the tobacco of its leaves. After it had been fire cured, it was very messy...its juices would stain your hands and there was no cleaning it off for weeks. But this was our trophy as teenagers....we’d take those stained hands back to school showing everyone that we were big stuff.
It was only after the tobacco had been stripped that it could then be taken to the tobacco house for selling.
Harvesting tobacco was a very hard, dangerous, and time-sensitive job. Harvesting most every crop is this way. But we did it anyway. We did it because the 8.00 an hour, the reward of smells half-way through, and the trophy of stained hands made the work worthwhile.
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In Luke 10, Jesus looks at his 72 newly commissioned disciples and says “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.”
What comes to your mind when you hear the word harvest?
I know what came to mind when Jesus used the word with his newly commissioned group of disciples. The first century world did not have combines; they did not own tractors. They had hard work and determination. I don’t think anyone there that day would have heard the word harvest and immediately thought, “air conditioning, friends, family, a full spread of our favorite foods before us....good times.” No, they had their own images of sweat rolling from their foreheads. Harvest was hard work; especially in the first century world.
And Jesus has announced that a plentiful harvest was ahead of them...but the laborers are few. That’s never good news. You don’t have to beg over-worked harvesters to plead with the master of the harvest for more laborers...trust me, they will beat down the doors asking for relief...for help.
If that’s not enough to make clear to these disciples that this harvest is going to be very difficult, Jesus adds, “I am sending you out like lambs into the midst of wolves.” If anyone was thinking of only the results of the hard work of harvesting and not the act of harvesting itself, i think their mind is where it needs to be now. This is hard work and this is dangerous work! Lambs just don’t go out on a journey to wolf-town. That’s a death sentence!
Not only is this job arduous and dangerous, but it is time sensitive. This harvest is not like the harvest of pumpkins that we can harvest at a slower pace but more like peas...when they’re ready, you better get them or they will shrivel up in the heat. Jesus expresses the urgency of the matter: “Carry no purse, no bag, no sandals; and greet no one on the road.” In other words, don’t go home and pack...don’t get caught up in distractions...just go and get busy...this is important work...don’t let one plant shrivel up in the heat!
Brothers and sisters, this is the harvest of the Kingdom of God. The world that God has made has been diseased by sin and the smell of death is all around. But God offered the best medicine possible to cure the disease and save the crop. He sent His only Son, Jesus, to take upon Himself our nature. He lived as one of us, stained hands and all, yet did not sin. The world of the sin-diseased and dying did not now how to respond to such a holy, loving, and righteous human being, so we rolled up our sleeves and let him have it...we threw everything we had at him...and he took it...in his great love for us he took it...understanding the nature of our disease even while we spat in His face, and having compassion for us, he died for us, spiked hands and all. But the power of His love was more powerful than the sting of our disease! On the third day Jesus sprung forth from the tomb! Love has overcome sin and death and a new era has been ushered into existence...the new creation.
This is what we are harvesting brothers and sisters: new creation!
Too many of us have been sitting on the sidelines. We enjoy only the table that is spread before us...but we don’t realize the hard work that went into making that table possible. We see the newly baptized coming forth from the font and we celebrate. We watch new faces line up in procession to the meet the Lord at His table in Holy Communion. We experience goodness of Christian fellowship...and some of us have put on a few pounds to demonstrate it...but we do it all from the sidelines.
Those of us who see the fruit but are not part of the labor don’t comprehend why Jesus would ask us to pray for more laborers to be added to the ACTIVITY of harvesting. But those of us here today who have rolled up our sleeves for Jesus don’t need to be told twice! We who go out into to a world stained by death and sin know how arduous, difficult and urgent the work is...Yet we still do the work. Like me and my teenage friends, we are convinced that the fruit of our labor is well worth putting our lives on the line for the harvest! We have been told that we are being sent as Lambs into the midst of wolves...but we go anyway! Why? Because we have faith that the Lamb of God who overcame the wolves goes before us...Because we have experienced a foretaste of the kingdom of God where the slaughtered Lamb is the powerful Lion of Judah whose reign knows no end. Disciples are willing to be lambs sent out into the midst of wolves because we have received a foretaste of the fullness of God's kingdom where wolves and lambs experience transformation and learn to lie down together.
Workers in the harvest of new creation, will you join me in begging the master of the harvest to persuade more workers to roll up their sleeves in the world alongside of us that we might harvest the new creation in our community and beyond? Will you testify to them, sharing stories of how God’s grace has overcome in the fields so that they might have the courage to trust in that same grace?
Brothers and sisters, the harvest is here; the work is hard; the work is dangerous; and the mission is urgent. Will you join in the work so that you can truly appreciate the fruit of sharing in the joy of people springing forth from the baptismal font as resurrected new creation? Will you join in the harvest of God’s kingdom so that you can bask in the glory of watching a new disciple share in the foretaste of our future at God’s holy table? Will you join in the the harvest of God’s kingdom to watch God’s grace heal broken relationship, mend broken hearts and restore human lives?
The seventy-two returned with joy, astounded at the power of grace. It is grace that calls us, it is grace that leads us, and grace is the power by which the harvest is made reality. By God’s grace, I look forward to more and more of God’s people here at Grace church, returning to report back of the astounding nature of saving grace.
The report back of the seventy-two is a great big “It was worth every bit of it” sign. Brothers and sisters, believe me when I say, nothing you do for the kingdom of God will be wasted and its fruit immediate and future is worth every drop of sweat and blood that goes into it.
Lord of the Harvest, send more laborers into the fields so that Parksley and beyond might know the abundance of the new creation opened through your Son.
Glory to Jesus Christ! Glory forever! Amen.