The Resurrection Changes Our Identity

May 24 2020

Acts 19:1-10

       It is hard for me to believe that this is Memorial Day weekend. Most of my memories about Memorial Day center on the observance on Memorial Day at the cemetery because of my kids being in the Dover band they performed as part of the service there. How strange that this year there will be none of that because of the corona virus. It was a real challenge for my kids when they were in band because they had to wear their uniforms of course, which were heavy and hot, and march in the humid weather of late May. Yet in spite of the challenges their performance of pieces like “The Battle Hymn of The Republic” added to a moving service punctuated by the reading of the Gettysburg Address and Flanders Field. As I recently heard it explained, Memorial Day is a day of remembrance not celebration, a day to ponder on the price paid so that we could be where we are at and live in the manner that we do. As Christians, we must remember the fallen but we have to be careful not to glorify war but rather to look forward to that day when nations will beat their swords into plough shares. For us, we live in these in between days, between the coming of Jesus and his coming once again, and the ushering in of that new day that when it dawns nations will no war no more.

         Sometimes there is so much news of war, divisiveness and hostility that we as followers of Jesus can forget what Jesus taught us is our primary work. We hear Jesus speak to us once again from the fifth chapter of Matthew, blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called children of God. Now what Jesus teaches here is pretty straight forward yet the most difficult aspect of what he expects of us, this peacemaking may be a little hard for us to wrap our minds around. I mean, if I go a day without getting in a fight with any one I hardly think this is what Jesus meant by peacemaking. To understand peacemaking though I believe that we first have to know how Jesus understood peace. Peace in Hebrew thought was known as the word shalom. Shalom is a word loaded with meaning such as to be whole, sound, completeness, well-being, harmony; these hardly enter into what we normally think of when we think of peace. When you go deeper into what shalom means you find that it is the bringing together of opposites hence the reason that “shalom” is used by the Jews as their “Hello” and their “Goodbye”. It is only when seeming opposites are brought together that one can say that there is peace. So, knowing this then, peacemaking is the work of bringing opposites together, working at bringing a sense of wholeness back to a world that is broken and in pieces, when we do this we bring peace.

         When we begin to see that peacemaking is about wholeness then when we step back and look at where this admonition by Jesus comes at in the flow of Jesus’ teaching we find that peacemaking comes after the beatitude that says the pure in heart will see God. To have a pure heart is to have a heart fully devoted unwavering in its love for God, a wholehearted faith in God as the one who can give life to the dead and who calls into existence the things that do not exist. So, it is only when we have an inner wholeness within our heart that we are then called by God to be a person who works at bringing wholeness into a broken world. Broken people are unable to heal a broken world. In order to be healed and be made whole requires an act of God in the form of the movement of his Holy Spirit hovering over our life recreating us into the image of Jesus.

         This brings us to our scripture for today. In our story, Paul on his missionary journey has made his way to the city of Ephesus located in modern day Turkey. While at Ephesus, Paul encountered some disciples yet Paul in his brief encounter with them could figure out that something was missing in their witness. Paul did a little investigating asking them “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed? The disciples must have had a puzzled look upon their face and they replied to Paul’s question “No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit!” Paul inquired further “Into what were you baptized? To which these disciples replied “Into John’s baptism” This is a reference to John the Baptist, the forerunner to Jesus who called his fellow Jews to come to the Jordan to be baptized. This was a call for them to repent, to turn from their sinful ways and to be washed clean in the living waters of the Jordan. John knew that the coming day of the Lord was approaching and John wondered, who would be able to stand when God would at last arrive. So, the baptism of John focused on repentance, the confession and subsequent turning away from the sin in ones life and the seeking of God’s forgiveness of the sin confessed. For these disciples of Paul, this was the only baptism that they knew of; this was the only baptism that the Jewish faith knew of. This once again is where the resurrection of Jesus has changed everything. This very important change is found in what these disciples had no clue of, the Holy Spirit.

         The people who entered into the baptism of John found themselves in an endless cycle of sinning, repentance forgiveness then back to sinning again. They were never free of the enslavement of sin, its constant pull was always tugging at their heart. The truth is that the human will, the human spirit is weak being unable to make the flesh, our life conform to the good that it knows to do. This is what Paul found to be true and what he wrote about in the seventh chapter of Romans where we read “So I find it to be a law that when I do right, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God in my inner being but I see in my members another law raging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members” All the baptism of John did was to give those captive to this law of sin, as Paul puts it, a way to recognize this sin and fight against it. The war raging within them became visible as they washed in the water desiring to be cleansed, set free from the constant struggle to do the law that they delighted in.

         This sin that dwells in our members, this is the sin Jesus condemned in the flesh upon the cross. Jesus through the Holy Spirit offered himself as a sacrifice without blemish. Jesus had faith in the will of his Heavenly Father trusting in his ways and his power even unto death. Three days later this faith of Jesus stepped out alive from the grave, vindicated by his Heavenly Father truly the Son of God. Jesus was glorified because he emptied himself and became a servant willing to serve through the offering of his life in order to bring life to the world. Jesus, in the seventh chapter of John, taught his disciples that when he was glorified out of his heart would flow streams of living water, his way of speaking about the Holy Spirit who brings life to the bodies of death held in slavery to sin. Those who believed in Jesus, those who had the same faith Jesus had in his Heavenly Father, that this God can give life to the dead, that this God can bring into existence that which does not exist, those who believe this these are the ones who receive the Holy Spirit. 

The way that those who believe receive the Holy Spirit is revealed by none other than John the Baptist who tells us in the first chapter of John, that the Heavenly Father had told John as he had baptized Jesus that this Jesus was the one, the one who not only had been anointed with the Holy Spirit but he was the one who would baptize with the Holy Spirit. It is the risen and ascended Jesus who pours out the Holy Spirit, who comes to us like a stream of living water which we become immersed in. This living water flows over us, transforms us, empowers us and frees us from the slavery to sin.

         This is what the disciples Paul had encountered were missing out on. It is no wonder that Paul urgently wanted them to experience this transforming power. Yet there is more that we must understand about this baptism of the Holy Spirit. The book of Hebrews is a beautiful message of how much better the new covenant is from the old. One of the ways that the new covenant is better than the old is that we now have a high priest named Jesus who stands before the throne of our Heavenly Father to intercede for us. Jesus offered up the once for all sacrifice of himself that has has perfected for all time those who are being made holy. Jesus our high priest has made it possible for us to enter into the most holy of places, the very presence of God. In the tenth chapter of Hebrews we read more of what the sacrifice of Jesus has done for us as we read “let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith  with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water” Now, when we hear this it is not hard to think of baptism when we hear of washing with pure water. But there is more going on here that can only be known if you have an understanding of the Old Testament especially the book of Leviticus. What the writer of Hebrews has written here is the way a priest would be consecrated and ordained for service in the Temple. They would be sprinkled with blood and washed by the High Priest. The saying “to draw near” is also a Temple term which means to come into the presence of God to serve him. To add to all of this, the only place where people were anointed with the exception of kings and prophets was the priests in the Temple. I say all this to help explain something that has been left to fall by the wayside and that is that when we are baptized we are in essence being ordained as part of the priesthood of all believers.

         The Holy Spirit indeed does set us free from the slavery or service of sin but at the same time that same Holy Spirit is creating in us a servants heart, for a servants heart is the heart of Jesus. When we read in our scripture that Paul baptized the disciples he had met in the name of Jesus, this means that he was praying that the essence and characteristics of Jesus, his servants heart, his sacrificial love, his unity in faith with his Heavenly Father, Paul is asking for all of this and more be evident in the lives of these disciples. As Jesus is the High Priest those baptized in his name were to be priests just like him interceding on the behalf of others, to do as Jesus did to bring God to his people and to bring people to God. When we read that Paul laid hands on these disciples this is an act of commissioning, ordaining these disciples into the office of priest. When Paul commissioned them this is when the Holy Spirit came upon them, and they spoke in tongues and prophesied, witnessing to the work of heaven appearing in life on earth.This is exactly what Peter writes about in the second chapter of his first letter, where we read “As you come to him , a living stone rejected by men but in the sight of God chosen and precious you yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ”. And further in the letter we read “you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim his glorious deeds.” Baptism is when we become a part of this priesthood, to serve our God in the Temple of his world. 

          This baptism of the Holy Spirit, this great river of living water flowing from the heart of our Savior, our High Priest who intercedes for us, this not only makes us whole but it makes us people who seek to bring wholeness back into our world, to be peacemakers. Only as we have this as our identity Jesus tells us can we then identify as a child of the most high God. The reason for this is understandable because our Heavenly Father is a God who is a peacemaker being willing to give his only Son that through the shedding of his blood those of us who were far off could be brought near, the holy bringing his opposite, the unholy people to his side in order to bring peace to our world. Such peace can never come through the efforts of our flesh because it is the war within our members as Paul taught us that is the reason for the war among us. Jesus teaches us that it is the flesh that wants to know, “What shall we wear?, What shall we eat?, or What shall we drink? And it is the striving after these desires that leaves us anxious and fearful and this fear leads us to anger and this anger leads to strife. Jesus goes on to teach us to seek first the kingdom of God, the kingdom that one can only enter by water and the Spirit, seek this life Jesus tells us. Seek the life of service and intercession and God promises us that we will have all we need. Only as we have the peace that God will supply what we need can we make peace by offering what we have, even ourselves in order to bring the world back together. 

         This is how the resurrection of Jesus has transformed our identity. Jesus commands that we do two things; baptize and observe the Eucharist, the last supper of Christ. It is in this baptism that Jesus calls us to observe that we repent of our sin, that we experience God’s mercy but there is more, so much more. From the risen, glorified Jesus flows the river of living water, the Holy Spirit which is poured over us at our baptism, creating in us a servants heart, ordaining us as priests. In the Old Testament, the high priest on his headpiece had a sign stating that he was a possession of God. On the breastplate he carried with him were the names of all the tribes of Israel, all the people he represented and served in the presence of God. This for us should be our example. In our minds we should never forget that we are God’s treasured possession. He loves us and cares for us; we are at peace with him. Then on our hearts let us carry the names of the people whose burdens God calls us to bear. This is what it means for us as priests to declare the glories of God for God’s glory is always found in serving others. Amen.  

The Resurrection of Jesus Changes Salvation

May 17 2020

Acts 15:1-21

         I really enjoy professional football in spite of all its problems and controversies. The NFL draft came at a time when I was getting really tired of the never ending Covid-19 news so I decided to watch a little bit of it.What I enjoy about the draft is trying to figure out why certain teams pick the players that they do. Everyone knew Cincinnati would pick a quarterback because they desperately needed one. Their pick of Joe Burrows just made sense. Then there were other choices, like the Green Bay Packers picking a quarterback when they already had one of the leagues best quarterbacks in Aaron Rodgers that made a lot of people scratch their heads. What people wanted is for the General Manager and the coaching staff of Green Bay to justify their using their pick in the draft on a quarterback instead of using it to pick a wide receiver that they needed a lot more. This is the part of the draft that intrigues me, the reasoning behind the choices that the teams make. You see, their choices are a judgment call. The teams do their homework, they scout all the players and then the time comes when they have to make a decision. Now, once they announce that decision then they have to justify their decision, they have to explain why they made the choice that they made. For some weird reason, I find the reasons that the teams give for who they pick in the draft fascinating. The reasons for their choices have to be able to be defended and understandable when on the surface they don’t appear to be either.

         It might be hard to believe but the NFL draft has a lot in common with what the Bible calls salvation. Here is why this is so. When the Bible speaks about a persons salvation, like in the letters of Paul, Paul often writes about justification. A good example is in the third chapter of Romans where Paul writes “we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the Law”. So, often when we read this we want to make this word “justify” into some theological word but in all reality it is the same language used by a team after the draft. To justify is to merely give the reasons for a choice that was made. What Paul is writing about is the reasons why God chooses the ones he chooses and that reason is faith. God’s choosing of the ones who have faith is what the Bible refers to as salvation.

         Many of us when we hear the word “salvation” have a certain idea of what is meant by that word. To some it is a decision that one made through a prayer, or through a confession where we gave our life to Jesus, we surrendered our life to Jesus or we put Jesus on the throne of our heart. As important as this moment was though we should not assume that this idea of salvation is exactly what the Bible is speaking about. If we take what we understand salvation to be and project it back into the scripture story we will find that the story stops making much sense. You see, in the first century when the people of Israel would speak about salvation what they meant is Israels rescue when God would return at the end of the age and at long last destroy pagan oppression. So, yes this is a very different idea of salvation then what most of us think about when thinking about salvation.

         In order to have some degree of certainty that God would rescue them, the people of Israel relied heavily upon their covenant with God. Only those who had a covenant relationship with God here in the present could be assured of salvation by God in the future. This covenant for the men of Israel was entered into through the rite of circumcision. Every male child in Israel at eight days of age was given this mark of the covenant just as their ancestor Abraham had done thousands of years before them. This is how the covenant with God was entered into and this covenant relationship was maintained through study of the Torah, the first five books of the Bible which teach the right way of living with God. So, membership in this covenant was demonstrated rather than earned. The importance of this covenant membership was that when the end of the age came those who were faithful to the covenant would be the ones who would be victorious united with God the ultimate victor. To be faithful to the covenant though did not mean that the people of Israel had to keep the Law completely as God in his grace provided a system of sacrifices to deal with the sins of his people. The question in the first century people had about their salvation is just what were the marks of membership that marked out the people who were really safe, the ones who would be on the winning side when God showed up at the end of the age? There were many answers to what these marks were depending on which Jewish sect one belonged to. So it isn’t all that surprising that there was some uncertainty as to who it was who would be present at the victory party in the future.

         Now, the reason we have to understand this idea of salvation is so that we can figure out why in the fifteenth chapter of Acts that a group of Pharisees who had came to believe in Jesus were insistent that any new Gentile, non-Jewish converts had to be circumcised and they had to keep the law of Moses. These Pharisees were insistent upon these requirements because this is the only way that they knew that people would be safe, would be on the winning team when God came to rescue his people. Yes, they believed Jesus was the king who would rule in the new age after God stepped in and set things right but for them the resurrection of Jesus did not alter the fact that only those who were covenant members would be saved by God. So, it wasn’t that the Pharisees thought that one had to earn ones salvation as much as they believed that the marks of a right relationship with God were the mark of circumcision and the mark of devotion to the Torah or way of God.

         Once this group of Pharisees had stated their position, the apostle and elders gathered together to consider whether this was the way things were or not. Peter who had an amazing experience with Cornelius, a Roman centurion, a Gentile, who did not have a covenant relationship with God. Peter conveyed how God had chosen him to take the message of Jesus Christ to Cornelius and his household. Cornelius and his household believed in the gospel and God, who knows the hearts of people bore witness to Peter of his acceptance of Cornelius by giving them the Holy Spirit just as he done with Peter and the Apostles at Pentecost. God did this to show that he made no distinction between the Jews and the Gentile having cleansed their heart by faith. This was Peter’s experience which seemed to be very different than the doctrine held by the Pharisees. The experience of Cornelius was also different than what we in our modern times believe is necessary for salvation because Cornelius had not been baptized, Cornelius had not come to the altar, Cornelius had never signed a decision form or said a Jesus prayer. In fact Cornelius had never even made any kind of public confession. Yet it was pretty evident that Cornelius was accepted by God because the Holy Spirit was poured out mightily upon Cornelius and his household. It was this experience that led Peter to have a new understanding of salvation. This is why he chided the Pharisees asking them why were they putting God to the test placing a yoke on the necks of the disciples that neither their fathers nor they have been able to bear ?” Peter brings up a pretty serious charge against the Pharisee believers when he charges them of putting God to the test even though to our modern sensibilities putting God to the test seems like an odd saying. In the sixth chapter of Deuteronomy Moses instructs the people of Israel that they were not put the Lord your God to the test, as you tested him at Massah.” To understand what is meant by putting the Lord to the test we have to understand what happened at Massah. This incident is recorded in the seventeenth chapter of Exodus. There we read of the how the people of Israel were moving through the wilderness at the command of God. They came to a place called Rephidim and our story records that interestingly enough there was no water for the people to drink at this location. Now, we have to stop here for a moment and consider what we just read. God is leading his people and he has led them to a place where there is no water and we have to wonder why would God do such a thing. Well, what happened is that the people quarreled with Moses demanding that Moses give them water to drink. Moses replied “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the Lord? So, here we learn that to test the Lord is the opposite of trusting the Lord. Testing the Lord is to question either the presence or the power of the Lord. The whole reason God led them to a place of no water was to test his people to see if they would trust him to provide even when the means to provide did not appear to be evident. God wanted his people to know him as the God who is the creator. What it means for God to be creator is to know the that he is a God who as Paul wrote about in the fourth chapter of the letter to the Romans, is a God who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist. This is what God did when he created the world. The Spirit hovered above the nothingness and God called forth the creation. God desires that we his highest creation might know him as the God who is able to make something out of nothing. This is what he was always trying to teach the people of Israel. When they were leaving Egypt and the Egyptian army was fast on their heels, God made a way through the sea for the people of Israel when there appeared to be no way to escape. In the wilderness, God led his people to a place where there was no apparent water to demonstrate once again that he is a God for which nothing is too great and in the end God had Moses gather the elders together to go and stand by a rock and when Moses struck the rock with his staff out flowed a gusher of water.

         Now, that was a long explanation for such a short phrase that Peter used in saying that the Pharisees were testing God however when we know what the term originally meant we can know that what Peter was accusing the Pharisees of was not trusting in the power and presence of God. The Pharisee contention still clung to their old understanding even though the death and resurrection of Jesus had changed everything. What the Pharisees had not comprehended is that to know who is justified in their belief that they will be saved meant that one first had to understand the justification of Jesus. Jesus went to the cross having faith in his Heavenly Father who he believed is able to give life to the dead and to call into existence things which do not exist. Jesus put no hope in the power of his flesh but allowed the powers that be to use all of the power of their flesh to bring about the ultimate end that flesh can bring which is death. Where the Jewish realm declared Jesus guilty and the Gentile realm represented by Rome declared Jesus guilty, God declared Jesus not guilty by rising him from the grave three days after his death upon the cross. The resurrection then is God’s justification of Jesus, that he truly is the righteous holy Son of God. The resurrection being the justification of Jesus is our justification also.What the Pharisees missed is what had changed when Jesus was raised from the dead. On the cross Jesus condemned sin in the flesh meaning that all of us are held by the power of sin and in our present state apart from God we walk about in bodies of death. What we need is resurrection, the resurrection that comes about by faith in the God who gives life to the dead and calls into existence those things that do not exist. Through faith, God through the Holy Spirit hovers over the nothingness of our life and creates in us a new heart, a new spirit free from the power of sin. When the Pharisees insisted upon circumcision and adherence to the Torah as the marks that would justify a persons claim of future victory they were in effect stating that God was not able to make a people for himself by his own power. The Pharisees were dead wrong. God justifies who he calls his own people in the same way Jesus was justified as the Son of God, through resurrection. We know we are God’s people when we have a personal experience of God’s power which takes the nothingness of our life and creates something of beauty out of it. This is the experience of the new covenant that Jeremiah wrote about in the thirty first chapter where he prophesied that no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying “Know the Lord” for they shall all know me  from the least to the greatest.” We know the Lord, that he is a God who is able to give life to the dead and who calls into existence what does not exist because this is our personal experience. Jesus teaches us in the fifth chapter of Matthew that those who are pure of heart will see God and this is our experience of faith. Our hearts are pure when they are undivided in their faith in God knowing that only God can raise us from our dead life under the slavery of sin. When our hearts our pure in their devotion to God this is when we see God through the movement of the Holy Spirit. This was what Peter witnessed to in his experience with Cornelius and his family. Cornelius believed God with his whole heart and when he did the Holy Spirit came upon Cornelius and his household; everyone saw God move in an unmistakable way.

         The church council when it had heard the testimony of Peter decided that the resurrection of Jesus had changed everything even what they believed about their salvation. It would not be necessary for the Gentiles nor even the Jews to rely upon the actions of the flesh but instead they were to rely upon the actions of the Spirit. There was only one thing that needed to be clarified and that would be just what would be the mark of those who were justified of future victory? The answer is found in the new life free from the enslavement of sin. This is what Jesus was speaking about in the twelfth chapter of the gospel of John where he teaches “ if anyone hears my words and does not keep them I do not judge them; for I did not come into the world to judge the world but to save the world. The one who rejects me and does not receive my words has a judge; the word I have spoken will judge him on the last day.” And just what is this word that will judge us? It is the word that is God’s commandment that we love one another just as God first loved us we also are to love one another. Now that we have been set free from our body of death through faith in the God who is able to raise us to new life, now we are able to love as God has always intended us to do. This is why John in his first letter, the third chapter can tell us “this is how we know we have passed out of death into life because we love one another.” This then is our salvation, not merely some hope of winging our way to heaven when this life is over, not some safety against the flames of hell but the real life experience here and now of living the life God has always intended us to live. Through the power of God the life where loving each other, treating others in the same way we want to be treated, this life is finally a reality. So with every act of love we do we grow more certain of our future victory. In this way our future victory becomes our present victory when we live out this victory today, loving others more and more to the glory of God. Amen!

The Resurrection of Jesus Changes Sainthood!

May 10 2020

Acts 10

        The big controversy now in our fight against the corona virus is the wearing of face masks.  The idea behind wearing a mask is that if someone unknowingly has been infected with the virus then there is less of a chance that they will spread the virus to others if they are wearing a mask. So, wearing a mask is more about concern for others wellbeing then it is to protect the one wearing it. This might explain why there is a fair amount of resistance to people wearing a face mask. It is strange to go into one store and there are very few who are wearing a mask and then go down the street to another store and everyone is wearing a mask. When you experience this it makes you wonder why it is that some people have no trouble wearing a mask and others obviously do object to wearing them. Is it that the major benefit is for the people that a person encounters rather than the person wearing them, is this the reason why there is such resistance to wearing of face masks? It doesn’t take much thought that everyone at some point is going to be that other person who encounters a person who has the virus and is not wearing a mask and at that moment the whole reason for people wearing a mask might become apparent. The whole point is that the world has overnight become divided among those who understand why they need to wear a face mask and those who refuse to wear a face mask even if they understand that it might be important.  This is one of those divisions that is readily apparent; either you’re wearing a face mask or you’re not. There are other things in life, things like being a saint that are not so apparent. Most people will tell you that hey, they’re no saint as if being a saint is just something everyone knows what it is to be one and normal people like us don’t make the grade which is kind of sad because that is pretty much opposite of everything the Bible tells us about being a saint.

         I bring up this whole business about being a saint because in our story from the tenth chapter of Acts, sainthood is an issue that is quietly lurking in the background. Our story from Acts concerns Peter the head of the church after the death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus. Now, before we read about Peter and his encounter with a man named Cornelius in the tenth chapter, we read about Peter and his travels at the end of the ninth chapter. What is interesting is that in the thirty second verse of the ninth chapter we are told that as Peter went here and there among them all he came down also to the saints at Lydda. Luke, the author of Acts could have wrote that Peter had come to the brothers and sisters in Christ,  that he had come to the disciples or to the Christians or that Peter had come to the church at Lydda but he didn’t; no, he wrote that Peter came to the saints. Now, this might be a little weird to our ears and just so that we don’t start thinking that this was some quirk that Luke or Peter may have had when we look at the letters Paul wrote like his letter to the Romans we also find Paul used this title of saints. Paul’s letter written to those in Rome begins with this greeting, those “ loved by God and called to be saints.” This is not the only time Paul uses this word saints because in his first letter to the church at Corinth he states that he is writing to those sanctified in Christ Jesus called to be saints…So, this idea of believers of Jesus being saints was a very common idea which has to make us wonder why this is so? Well, we know that when Jesus was raised from the dead he was vindicated as being the Son of Man who is spoken of in the seventh chapter of Daniel. In a vision Daniel had while as a slave in Babylon, David saw one like a Son of Man approaching the Ancient of Days. Strange language to be sure but what Daniel saw was a human, one like Adam, who was righteous as God had always hoped his highest creation would be and since this one, this perfect human was without sin he was then able to approach almighty God, the Ancient of Days, without fear. He could assume the rightful place of glory that humanity was always supposed to hold. This is what David also envisioned when he wrote in the eighth Psalm that mankind was crowned with glory and honor. You, O God, have given him dominion over the works of your hand.” This promise of dominion is also found in Daniels vision because in the seventh chapter of Daniel we read, “And to him, the Son of Man, was given dominion, and glory and a kingdom that all peoples, nations, languages should serve him; his dominion is an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away.” To all this you might agree that this sounds pretty amazing, but the real question is what about the saints? Well, right after this part of Daniels vision, Daniel then sees four kings who arise who threaten the kingdom of the Son of Man but Daniel is told that it is the saints of the Most High who shall receive the kingdom and possess the kingdom forever. So, what we learn here is that saints are kingdom receivers and kingdom possessors. While the Son of Man is given an everlasting kingdom he does not keep this kingdom for himself but rather he gives it to those called the saints which is another name for the holy ones. Daniel goes on to tell us that the kingdom and the dominion and the greatness of the kingdoms under the whole heaven shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High; their kingdom shall be an everlasting kingdom and all dominions shall serve and obey them.” This I believe is what the title “saints” is referring to. Once it was understood that Jesus was the Son of Man, the second Adam, then those united to him, those receiving his kingdom these are the saints just as Daniel prophesied about so long ago.

         Daniel then gives us a god start as to who are the saints these holy ones of God who receive and possess the kingdom first given to the Son of Man. What Daniel doesn’t give us is just who these saints are. Just who is it that is one of God’s holy ones? To the people of Israel, the Jewish people it was obvious that they were the saints. They were the nation elected out of all the nations by God, to be separated unto God, to be his most prized possession, to be a royal nation of priests. Only they had received his Law and it is through them that the salvation for the world has been promised. The question then became this: now that Jesus had come and now that he was given up upon the cross for the sins of the whole world, and now that he was risen from the dead and had ascended to the right hand of the Father, had all that Jesus accomplished changed who God considered to be a saint?The answer is a resounding “Yes!” Since the death of Jesus was for the sins of the whole world then everyone is given a clean slate a new chance at being a holy person for God. This is good news yet the problem with this good news is that we just don’t have a very clear understanding of just what does it mean for us to be holy. For a lot of people when they hear the word “holy” they think it means to adhere to a long list of do’s and don’ts that seem to do nothing more than suck the joy out of life. Or holiness is associated with people who are not holy but rather holier-than- thou; people who use their supposed holiness to prove their superiority over others which is not holy behavior at all but is rather the behavior of a hypocrite. So, it goes without saying the there is a lot of negativity with this idea of holiness which is quite unfortunate. God tells us in the nineteenth chapter of Leviticus that we are to be holy just as he is holy. This sounds like some unachievable goal for us mere humans. Most of us can’t even to pretend to think that we could be like God. Yet God would not command it if he didn’t think it was possible otherwise he would be a cruel God which he is not. No, when God commands that we are to be like him what we must remember is that we were made in his image; we were created to be like him. The more we are like God the more we are as God created us to be and the better life will be because life is as it was always supposed to be. What is meant when we are told that God is holy is that God is a God of integrity. God is a God not just of love but rather steadfast love. Steadfast tells us that God will love us the same today, tomorrow and always. God’s love is a constant we can count on. This goes along with the other connected part of God’s name which is faithfulness. God can be trusted because what he says he will do is something that is as good as done the moment he speaks his promise to do it. These two attributes, God’s steadfast love and faithfulness are what define God’s holiness. It is these two attributes, steadfast love and faithfulness that God desires to see as an integral part of who we are as people. This is what God longed for to have the people of Israel witness to a life of holiness before a watching world.

         We have to remember just what God’s goal were for humanity as we dive into Peter’s encounter with Cornelius. We first encounter Peter as he is having a vision of what appeared to be a large sheet coming down out of heaven filled with all kinds of animals, reptiles and birds of the air. A voice then tells Peter to eat but Peter refused because he had never eaten anything common or unclean.” Now all of this is a pretty strange part of our story. To us with our modern sensibilities, this idea of common or unclean food is something that landed on the floor and we didn’t get to it before the five second rule was up. To Peter though there were for him and the rest of the people of Israel a list of foods written down within their sacred Law that were permissible for them to eat and a list of foods that were not to be eaten. Now, there has been a lot of speculation as to why some foods made the list and some foods didn’t but the best answer as to why some foods were clean and some were not was simply that God said so. If you look at the fourteenth chapter of Deuteronomy where the list of clean and unclean foods is found you find that the chapter begins with the warning that the people of Israel were not to be like the Canaanite people who possessed the Promised Land which God was giving to them. The Canaanite people worshipped the dead something that the people of Israel were forbidden to do. To this warning God reminds the people of Israel that they were a people holy unto God, they were his treasured possession of all the peoples on the earth. The theme of God’s choice is right at the beginning of the existence of the people of Israel. Out of seventy nations on the earth, God chose them simply because they were his most treasured possession. In like fashion God chose out of the different classes of creatures, the fish, the birds the beasts and livestock creatures that his people should eat. The ones God chose were called clean; the ones not chosen were unclean. Out of all the creatures God had created he selected which ones would give their life to feed his people and in turn give them life. So, at every meal the people of Israel would be reminded of not only God’s choice of the food they ate but also God’s choice of them both choices having much to do with life.

         What Peter saw that day in the vision of the sheet coming down from heaven was all of the unclean animals he had never and would never eat.  This vision happened three times just so God could get his point across that what God had made clean, Peter should not call common or unclean. Peter of course, was trying to unravel the mystery of what he had just experienced but it was not long until the mystery was solved as men sent by Cornelius were at his gate. The Holy Spirit spoke to Peter that he was “to go with these men without hesitation.” It thus becomes pretty clear what Peter’s problem was. As a good Jew who ate only certain foods labeled as clean according to the Law, Gentiles who didn’t follow such rules were considered unclean. So, a clean Jew wasn’t to hang out with an unclean Gentile. What Peter’s vision was telling him that just as God had decided which foods were clean and unclean in the same way it was God and God alone who would decide who is clean, the blood of Christ was after all shed for everyone, to cleanse everyone from sin. While at one time it would have been unlawful for Peter to enter into  the home of a Gentile now Peter understood that the death and resurrection of Jesus had changed everything; now all people had to be understood as being clean because of the blood of Christ. God had made a choice, a choice to give his Son for the sins of the whole world, Jew and Gentile alike.So, Gentiles like Cornelius were now to be considered clean, they were ok to hang out with even though they didn’t eat all the right foods.

         Cornelius was a Roman centurion who was a devout man who feared God, a man who gave generously and a man who prayed continually to God yet in spite of all of this, under Jewish Law, Cornelius would never be thought of as anything more than a second-class citizen. To Jesus though, Cornelius was part of his family and Cornelius needed desperately to know who he and his household were in the eyes of God. As Peter explained to Cornelius, he now understood that God is a God who doesn’t pick and choose but he is a God who accepts anyone, from any nation who reveres him and does what is acceptable, loving others faithfully just as God has always done.Peter then went on to tell the story of Jesus, how Jesus went about doing good and healing all oppressed by the devil for God was with him. Yet in spite of all the good he had done, this Jesus was put to death on a tree by those who thought all along that they were the saints of God. Three days later though Jesus rose from the grave  and he commanded his apostles to preach  and testify that Jesus is the one appointed by God to be the judge of the living and the dead. Everyone who believes in this Jesus receives forgiveness of sins through his name. What Cornelius discovered through hearing the story of Jesus is that God had made his entry into sainthood very simple and easy; all Cornelius had to do is to believe in Jesus, to have faith in God the Father that he is the one able to make something of our nothingness. This faith is the faith that puts no hope in the power of our flesh knowing that sin finds its power through the weakness of our flesh. Only by yielding ourselves to the Holy Spirit, the only power able to conform our flesh to the way of Jesus can we be saints, the holy ones of God. When Cornelius placed his faith in Jesus at that moment he experienced the steadfast love of God as God was merciful to him and forgave his sins.

It was evident that Cornelius had placed his faith in Jesus because the Holy Spirit came upon him and his household with power. This gift of the Holy Spirit was given by God in response to the prayer of Cornelius. The life of Cornelius is a real life example of what Paul wrote about in the eighth chapter of Romans where he writes that “And he, our Heavenly Father searches our hearts and he knows what is the mind of the Spirit because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.”Our Heavenly Father calls people like Cornelius clean because he is the searcher of our hearts. It is our Heavenly Father who calls upon the Holy Spirit to interceded for the saints, to step into the lives of the saints. It is the Holy Spirit who is the one who creates those who place their faith in Jesus into God’s holy ones, peoples whose lives conform to the will of God. So, the saints, God’s holy ones, are holy not because of any effort on their own, nor because they follow some supposed list of holy behavior but rather it is because they yield themselves to the working of the Holy Spirit. When we remember that it is the saints who will receive and possess God’s everlasting kingdom we then also recall that Jesus taught that it is the meek who will inherit the earth. This word “meek” speaks about people who have let go of their need to be in control, free of their need to have their life validated by others and therefore they are free to surrender themselves to God. It is those who surrender themselves to the work of the Holy Spirit in their lives, surrendering to his recreating of who they are so that they conform to the image of Christ, these are God’s holy ones, his saints. The resurrection of Jesus witnesses to the power of God to take the nothingness of our dead lives and create out of this nothingness a life of holiness and beauty. This power is available to all Jew and Gentile alike through faith and trust that God who is able to do all that he promises us he can do, to trust in his love and faithfulness and in these alone find new life, a life that one day will receive an everlasting kingdom.  This is the hope of sainthood, the hope found in the holiness that only God can create in us. May you ground your life in the hope of this holiness today and always! Amen!

The Resurrection Changes our Worship!

May 3 2020

Acts 7:1-58

         It seems as if that with the coming of the month of May that life will be getting back to normal, a new normal but a normal none the less.Some businesses are finally allowed to open back up and going out in public is ok as long as a mask is worn. There are certain customs though which may never return like greeting each other by a handshake. Reaching out to shake another persons hand is so common place that it is hard to imagine that it will perhaps be a thing of the past.

         The way we worship when we once again as Christ’s church will also be affected. We will have to figure out how to do social distancing which may mean we have to sit somewhere other than our well worn spot in the pew. There won’t be any hugs or handshakes to pass the peace just a wave perhaps to convey the peace we desire. We will have to figure out how to serve communion because no matter how you slice the serving and eating of the elements is a touchy-feely kind of service. So, yes changes are coming and the hope we all have is that church one day will at long last feel like church not just some strange version of what we used to know as going to church.

         It is times such as these that the book of Acts truly helps us get our bearings in uncertain times especially in the area of worship. You see with the death and resurrection of Jesus more than any other area of the lives of those early followers of Jesus worship was drastically changed. Going up to the stunningly beautiful Temple with its striking architecture and its ever hum of activity was no longer to be the focus of their worship. No longer were they to be concerned with the offering of an animal to the priests to be sacrificed; no longer were they to set their calendars by the observance of the feasts or to partake of the eating of the various foods that each festival had to offer. You see for the early followers of Jesus who were leaving behind their Jewish faith meant leaving behind a life marked by certain sensory moments; the smell of the burning sacrifice upon the altar, the hearing of the singing of the psalms as the people ascended the stairs into the Temple, the joy as the people gathered together in large throngs waving their harvest as they proceeded to the Temple. These were the sights, the smells, the moments that grounded their life. This is all what those early followers were willing to give up yet it is the sacredness of this normal that the Jewish people clung to that also explains their unwillingness to leave their Temple worship of God behind. For the followers of Jesus to boldly state that there was a new Temple and the name of this Temple was Jesus turned the whole world of the Jewish people upside down. They, much like us, did not like their normal way of life being questioned. The Jewish people hated the fact that Temple life was one day going to be an obsolete way of living and this was a large part why theJewish people persecuted the early followers of Jesus.

         We have to understand where this anger of the Jewish people was coming from to also understand the persecution and murder of Stephen. Stephen was one of seven men chosen to serve the widows in the daily distribution of food so that the apostles could have more time for the preaching of the word. These seven were men of good repute, full of the Spirit and wisdom. Stephen, our scripture tells us, was full of grace and power and did many wonders and signs among the people. This of course upset certain Jewish believers who saw clearly the power of God in someone who believed in Jesus who just as clearly was to them, not of God. This is what upset them because if Stephen could perform miracles through the power of God then the people would have to concede in the holiness of Jesus and this would shake their world. So these Jewish believers brought charges against Stephen  stating that Stephen had blasphemed against Moses and against God.  Specifically they stated that Stephan had said that Jesus was going to destroy the Temple and do away with the customs of Moses. These are the charges that Stephen was defending himself against that takes up most of the seventh chapter of Acts.

         Stephen  begins by reciting the history of the people of Israel beginning with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. He recites the story of Joseph and the enslavement of the people of Israel in Egypt and how Moses went down to Egypt  and through wonders and signs led the people out of Israel. It was Moses who went up on Mount Sinai and received the living oracles, the law to give to the people. Now up to this point the story of Stephen seems like a pretty impressive telling of the past of the people of Israel. It is right here though that the tone of the story begins to change because Stephen reminds them how it was their ancestors who refused to obey Moses, thrusting him aside and in their hearts turning back to Egypt. They built an idol, the golden calf and worshiped it instead of the living God. So their support of Moses and his customs had a much more checkered past than they were willing to let on.

         Stephen continues with the story of the houses of worship in Israel’s history beginning with the tabernacle, the house of meeting that Moses built according to the plan given to him from heaven. Then much later came the Temple built by Solomon.Yet, as Stephen quoting what was written in the sixty sixth chapter of Isaiah tells his audience which were the very same thoughts of Solomon when he dedicated the Temple, that the Most High does not dwell in houses made by hands. The phrase “made by hands” is the common way that the prophets would speak about the idols that the people of Israel would worship, that they gods made by hands. The implication is that the Temple had become an idol which was being worshipped in place of worshipping the living God. Well, Stephen continues with what Isaiah had written telling his audience that God teaches that “ Heaven is my throne and the earth is my footstool. What kind of house will you build for me says the Lord, or what is my place of rest? Did not my hand make all these things? Then Stephen summed it all up by just flat out telling these Jewish instigators the truth of who they really were telling them they were stiff necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, people who always resist the Holy Spirit. The reason for the history lesson is to point out that just as their ancestors had resisted Moses so now they were resisting Jesus. Stephen asked them just which prophet did their fathers not persecute? They killed the prophets who had announced the coming of the Righteous one and now they had betrayed and murdered him as well. They received the law given to them by angels yet they did not keep it. In other words even though they proudly declared themselves to be followers of the law the truth is that they did not keep the law as they killed Jesus a clearly innocent man.

         When Stephen stated the truth of who they were in all stark detail it is no surprise that the crowd became enraged. These were people who like the rest of the world believed in the power of the flesh. It is in the weakness of the flesh that sin finds its power which is death. With the blazing fire of the crowds anger staring down upon him, Stephen, full of the Holy Spirt gazed into heaven and he saw the glory of heaven and there was Jesus standing at the right hand of God. What the crowd would never understand being so lost in the darkness of their sin is that they were staring right at God’s new Temple because as we learn in the third chapter of the first letter to the church at Corinth, “Do you not know that you are God’s Temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you?” This is the new normal that the death and resurrection of Jesus had brought about. Just as Jesus had foretold when he turned the tables over in the Temple,  he told them “destroy this Temple and in three days I will raise it up.” Jesus was speaking of the Temple of his body where the Holy Spirit dwelt. The people of Israel did destroy the Temple of of the body of Jesus upon the cross. This was as God foredained because Jesus was the new High Priest of the new Temple offering his own blood as the once for all sacrifice for the sins of the whole world. The blood of Jesus purified and purged our sin becoming for us the mercy seat where we might draw near to God no longer separated by our sin. Three days later Jesus was raised from the dead. He taught his disciples for forty days then he ascended to the presence of God the Father, the Ancient of Days. This is what Stephen saw, the heavens opening up the Son of Man standing at the right hand of the God.” At these words of Stephen the crowd had had enough and they cast him out of the city and stoned him. Even so Stephen in his last breath forgave those who had sinned against him just as Jesus had done upon the cross.

         The death of Stephen shows that worship, especially worship at the Temple was an issue that separated the followers of Jesus from everyone else. These followers of Jesus had no Temple and no sacrifice which made them look like no religion at all to the rest of the watching world. So what does worship look like when it is us, the followers of Jesus who make up the Temple of Jesus. This is who Paul tells us in the second chapter of Ephesians. There Paul teaches that we are “ no longer strangers and aliens but we are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God built on the foundations of the apostles and the prophets, Christ Jesus the cornerstone in whom the whole structure , being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord” So it is the living Christ who is the very cornerstone of the Temple, the one who hold us true in three dimensions whose life causes the Temple to grow.

         So we know now that we are the new Temple, a part of that Temple through being united with Christ. The roots of this understanding are found in the seventh chapter of the book of Daniel which Stephen quoted from when he poke about Jesus being the son of Man. The Son of Man was the one accepted by God to be the perfect human, the new Adam. Jesus being raised from the dead proved that his life was the life we as people were always supposed to live; this is the importance of Jesus being the Son of Man. The book of Daniel tells us that this Son of Man who was to be given a dominion, and a glory and a kingdom that all peoples, nations and languages shall serve him. This is what Jesus being ascended to the throne speaks to. Yet this is not all because further in the seventh chapter of Daniel we read that this kingdom and dominion and the greatness of the kingdoms under the whole heaven shall be given to the saints of the Most High; their kingdom shall be an everlasting kingdom and all dominions shall serve and obey them.” So the kingdom of Jesus is freely shared with the saints, the holy ones of the Most High. This oneness between Jesus and the saints, those who have placed their faith in their Heavenly Father, those who listen to the word of Jesus, this unity is what binds the living Temple together to make a place for the Holy Spirit.

         What is also amazing about this new Temple brought about by the resurrection of Jesus is that this Temple is what our Heavenly Father is searching for. In other words, we do not have to wonder where our Heavenly Father is, where is it that we can find his presence. Jesus, teaching in the fourth chapter of the gospel of John tells us first, that  the hour is coming when neither on this mountain of Samaria nor in Jerusalem will people worship the Father. These Temple sights will no longer be necessary with the death and resurrection of Jesus. Jesus continues that the hour is coming and is now here when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. It is amazing that while we are certain that our God has no needs that we could ever fulfill yet here we find that our Heavenly Father is still a God who is searching for people who rightly worship him. Now, while what Jesus states here seems like coming out of left field there are scriptures that help us discover that what God is seeking is what God has always been seeking. Jesus gives us hints to this when first in his ministry he is driven out in the desert by the Holy Spirit to be tested by the devil. In the fourth chapter of Matthews gospel,  starting at the eighth verse we read how the devil taking Jesus to a high mountain and shows Jesus all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. The devil told Jesus, “All these I will give you if you fall down and worship me” Jesus said to him “Be gone Satan! It is written “You shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve.” This scripture Jesus uses to come against this temptation comes from the sixth chapter, the thirteenth verse of Deuteronomy. There this scripture is translated as being “It is the Lord your God you shall fear. Him you shall serve and by his name you shall swear.” So, first we find that Jesus uses the word “worship” instead of fear which gives us the true meaning of this scripture. This fear is the fear of awe and reverence of God.  The second demand of this scripture is that we serve God. The word for serve here is the word used to describe the work of the priests in the Temple. Now, what is also interesting is that the work of the Spirit is create us to be servants. This is what we find in the third chapter of the First Corinthians where Paul tells us about the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Paul then in describing himself and Apollo, people in-dwelt by the Holy Spirit,  considers themselves as servant. This is what we also find in the second chapter of Philippians where Paul admonishes church to have the same mind and Spirit of Christ who considered himself a servant. Jesus himself taught to be the greatest of all meant that one had to be the servant of all. So there is a definite connection between the Spirit and our service of God. The swearing by the name of God spoken of in Deuteronomy 6:13 is a taking of an oath that upon  penalty of death we as God’s people will be true to God and God alone. This is what we learn in the fourth chapter of Jeremiah where we read “if you swearing “As the Lord lives”, in truth, in justice and in righteousness the nations will bless themselves in the Lord and in him shall they glory” This is the truth I believe Jesus is referencing in the fourth chapter of John. He is not referencing a propositional truth that such and such is the truth but rather Jesus is speaking about the truth of a person, being someone of integrity who swears to be true to living out the justice and righteousness God demands.

         So the worship we as God’s new Temple do is not so much about the customs, whether from Moses or anyone else, but rather is about the commandments of God. In the tenth chapter of Deuteronomy we find that what was written in the sixth chapter is elaborated so we have a better idea of what God requires of our worship. There we discover that worshipping God is to do what God requires, to walk in all his ways and to love him. This is what it means to revere God, to be in awe of who God is not just in what he does and has done. To serve God as his priest in this world, a world which is his Temple, means to execute justice for the fatherless, and the widow, loving the foreigner, the one whose customs, whose ways are unlike ours, these we are to give our food and our clothes to. God told the people of Israel to love the foreigners because the people of Israel were foreigners down in Egypt and they knew what is what like to be a stranger in a strange land. Perhaps, we have all felt like that from time to time.We are to swear by the name of God, the unchanging character of God, to be that true and unchanging in our loyalty towards God even in the face of death. This means we are to cling fast to God to be united with him. And the scripture ends by saying that God is our praise. Praise is but a small part to worship God when we worship God in Spirit and in truth.

         We see the truth of this teaching in the life of Stephen, as both in his life and death Stephen revered God. Stephen was full of the Holy Spirit and this Spirit formed him into a servant who executed justice for the widows by making sure that they were fed and cared for when they were unable to do so for themselves. Stephen was true to God even in the face of death forgiving his enemies in his last breath. We know he was united with Christ as one of his saints as we saw Jesus  the Son of Man stand in his defense.Through his witness, Stephen was living proof of what it means to be a living stone in the new Temple of Jesus Christ. Stephen worshiped the kind of Spirit and truth filled worship our heavenly is seeking. So in these times of so much upheaval in our church life let us not forget that being a follower of Jesus is not about buildings and singing praises. No, we are the living stones, the Spirit dwells in us to form us into God’s servants who worship as we walk in the ways of God, no matter where we are walking, no matter what day of the week it may be. May we always be faithful in our worship of God. Amen!