Gospel Say, What?:Decisions, Decisions!

 March 24 2024

Mark 15:1-39

         As many of you might be aware, this year is an election year. When I say this I am sure that there are some of you that are wondering why I would even bring this up because most people know that two things we no longer discuss is politics and religion and here I am doing both. The only reason I am bringing up our countries election is that one of the hardest aspect for us to wrap our heads around is this whole idea of being ruled by a king. I mean, when the Queen passed away, there was no call for an election to see who would be next to sit on the throne. No, everyone knew that the Queen’s son, Charles, would be next in line to be king. For the people of Great Britain, having a king or a queen is just a normal way of life; they have done so for thousands of years. To us though, here in America, the whole pomp and circumstance seems to be one more thing that has run its course and isn’t necessary any longer.

         I say all this because in this series of messages for Lent that I entitled, Gospel Say, What?, we are thinking about the good news that Jesus is our King. One of the difficult aspects of this truth that Jesus is our king is that we aren’t really sure what it is like to be ruled by a king. So to us as people who are ruled by a democracy, a government of and by the people, it is kind of great to find, that here in todays scripture, we hear of a story about an election. As the story tells us, there are two names on the ballot: Jesus Bar-Abbas and Jesus Bar-Joseph. The election isn’t about a specific office; we could only hope. No, this election has much greater stakes because the winner of this election gets to go home alive. The one who loses this election receives only the executioners cross. Such a choice you would imagine would require some contemplation and thought to carefully decide such a crucial issue yet this does not seem to be the case in our story. As fast as the call was made for an election to be held between these two candidates, it was just that fast that the election was decided. By unanimous acclimation, all votes were cast for Jesus Bar-Abbas.Now this vote was somewhat surprising because in a previous poll that was taken earlier in the week when the one candidate, Jesus Bar-Joseph, arrived in the capitol, it seemed that he would certainly be a lock to win any election. I mean, when he arrived, he was welcomed like any candidates would long to be, with cheering crowds who sang his praises. They even threw their coats down on the ground, a statement that shouted that here was certainly one who was cut out to be king. This one, the crowds sang, was the very one who would restore the kingdom that David had brought about so long ago.

         So, yes, just days earlier, this one called Jesus Bar-Joseph, seemed a shoo-in to win any contest. Yet, here he was, defeated easily by this one called Jesus Bar-Abbas. Though their names seemed so similar, they were in fact polar opposite in how they believed change would come to not just their own country, but to the world as well. Jesus Bar-Abbas was a self-acclaimed rebel, proudly taking part in an armed insurrection against the Roman infidels, taking out these occupying forces without so much as a thought. He would have most likely agreed that the only good Roman was a dead Roman. How very different this other guy was, showing up here in the capitol surrounded by Roman forces riding on a donkey. Who cares what the prophet Zechariah wrote, if you want to win an election and the hearts of the people, you sure don’t come into such a situation announcing that now is the time for peace. I mean, don’t you get it, Jesus Bar-Joseph, that if you want the world to change, you got to fight for your rights. Heads have to roll, revolution has to happen! Don’t you know Jesus Bar-Joseph kingdoms come through a declaration of war not an offer of peace? And so, Jesus Bar-Abbas won the election, to live to fight another day. Jesus Bar-Joseph, the true king, was elected to die upon a criminals cross, the king who came in peace would himself become for us an offering for peace.

         While it is obvious that this is how Mark desires we understand that last week of the earthly life of Jesus, that this is how this tragedy of God’s own people played out, that the king of peace would be rejected while a murderous thug was cheered as a hero and a savior, there is more that this scene of two men standing before the crowds is to represent. In these two men, with similar names, standing side by side, was a very similar image that those in the crowd would possibly have been familiar with. They would have perhaps remembered that on the most holy day of the year, what we call the Day of Atonement, the day when whatever stood between God and his people would have been dealt with, there was a strange ritual performed. Two male goats, alike in every way possible would come before the High Priest in the Temple. The reason that there was two goats is found in the sixteenth chapter of Leviticus, where we are told that the Day of Atonement is the day when the people of God will perform two very important rituals. The first ritual would be the means by which the sins of the people would be dealt with, covered over, by the blood of the first goat. This dealing with the sins of the people has to do with a person’s guilt, this knowing that we have done wrong in the eyes of God. Atonement of our sins then, is personal, it is a knowing that a life has been given, the life of the first goat, so that its blood might cover over our sin, a life covering over the death caused by our sins so that our sins are forgotten, and our guilt can be removed.

         So this atonement of sin deals with personal sins and how, through our confession, and our sorrow for our sin, we come and receive this gift of life that God has provided to deal with the sin that had come between us. Atonement then, dealt with the sins that God’s people had committed against him. But in Leviticus we also learn that this day is not only for atonement as there was also a second ritual which had to do with the people being cleansed before God. The question this begs us to ask is just what is it that needs cleansing from our lives so that we can begin again? The answer is that we need to be cleansed from our shame, the shame we have from when we have sinned not just against God but when we have sinned against each other. When people hurt each other, commit sin against each other, these acts are remembered creating shame in the one who had come against a brother or a sister. When we break our promises, when we are jealous of someone’s life, when we cross boundaries that we should have respected, people look at us differently. We lose honor in the sight of our community. And God understands this and so on the very same day that he provided a way for the guilt of his people to be dealt with he, at the same time, came up with a way to deal with the shame that infects a community. God told the High Priest, as a representative of the community, to take those sins that were committed between members of the community and place them upon the second goat. Here was a dramatic ceremony where the people could feel their sins be lifted from them and from between them, sent out upon a goat to be carried away into no-mans land.

         I believe that Mark could not help but think of the Day of Atonement, when he remembered that day when these two very similar men stood before the crowds of Jerusalem. There was Jesus Bar-Joseph, the one we know as King Jesus, the one who was willing to be the sacrifice whose blood would cover over the sins of the whole world, his life laid upon our body of death so that our guilt for our sins might be dealt with. But what about this other Jesus, this one whose last name was Bar-Abbas? If we think of him as being like the second goat then here was the one upon whom the shame of the people was to be found but instead of being carried away, this time the shame of the people as carried in the life of Bar-Abbas turned and came back to them, their shame remained among them. This is what I believe is what Mark also wanted us to consider in this scene. Perhaps the people’s choosing of Bar-Abbas reminded Mark of what the prophet Jeremiah had said of God’s people so long ago, as found in the sixth chapter, where God says, “For from the least to the greatest of them, everyone is greedy for unjust gain; from prophet to priest everyone deals falsely. They have healed the wound of my people, lightly, saying, ‘Peace, peace’, when there is no peace. Were they ashamed when the committed abomination? No, they had no shame at all. They did not even know how to blush. Therefore they shall fall among those that fall; at the time I punish them, they shall be overthrown”. This is how Mark is portraying the crowd that rejected Jesus on that fateful day. They were people who had lost their sense of shame. They had no deep desire to have their dishonor cleansed from them and it has to cause us to wonder, just why this is so? The answer is found in their election of Bar-Abbas as the one who should live because he was the one blatantly living his life in the power of death. Viewing death as the ultimate power causes those who have this understanding to be selective in the lives they will honor by allowing them to live. So all lives become to be seen as being honorable only as far as they are judged to be worthy of another’s honor. So, if one does not honor a person’s life then they can no longer feel dishonor or shame when they sin against them. Those who are seen as being great are those who are absolutely clear just which lives deserve the honor of life and which people are rightfully deserving of dishonor, or shame.  This is why Jesus, instead taught that whoever insults or treats someone with abuse, showing no honor to them, these are those who are guilty of sin. Jesus goes on to say that those who refuse to show honor to every life, this picking and choosing which life we will cast shame and contempt upon, such actions are liable to get us kicked out of life itself.

         This refusal to honor the life in others, this is the shame on display that day when the crowds chose Bar-Abbas. Look at the great contrast between the life of Jesus Bar-Abbas and Jesus Bar-Joseph. Bar-Abbas was known as one who showed no honor to his enemies, the Romans. He felt nothing when he slayed them in rebellion. Jesus our King, though, took the abuse and the shame and the contempt of those same Roman soldiers allowing them to do to him their very worst. They mocked him, pressing a crown of thorns down painfully upon his head. They all began to salute Jesus and hailed him as the King of the Jews in a condescending manner. They struck him with reeds, and they spit on him. They brought him to the place of the skull, the very place of death. There they took the cross piece he had carried upon his shoulders and they hammered nails through his hands and hoisted him up off the ground leaving him to gasp for air as pain tore through his body. The Roman guards showed Jesus absolutely no honor, and obviously, no mercy. They had no shame, felt no dishonor at what they had done because they never had any honor for Jesus let alone any other Jew. Yet, the Roman guard were not alone for many of the very people of God, walked in front of this dying King, showing him no honor, shamefully refusing to show even the slightest respect for Jesus, saying to the crowds that here was one who had saved others but he could not even save himself. If only this Messiah, this one who says he is God’s anointed king, if only he would show some real power, and tear himself loose from that cross piece and come down here, this is when we would show him the honor of believing in him.

         And so, at last Jesus, died. He breathed his last, we are told, and in that moment, news rang out that the curtain of the Temple, that barrier between the Holy and the common, was torn in two. A curtain some sixty feet wide and high and over four inches thick, ripped apart by the invisible hands of God. We can and must understand that here, in the death of Jesus, this place, which was previously off limits because of the incredible holiness of God, has now been opened to everyone. Yet I believe that this act was perhaps more because it appears that in this act of the death of his Son, our Heavenly Father demonstrated his immense grief and he did so in much the same way that people showed their grief, by tearing their clothing. That which clothed the Holy God was torn as the Father acted out in horrific grief as his only Son tasted death all so that everyone might once again discover the honor life deserves.

         In that moment, that moment when Jesus gave one last gasp, this is when the power of this life honoring act of Jesus was displayed. It was at this moment of power, this is when a Roman centurion made the first confession of faith, exclaiming, “Truly this man was the Son of God.” This centurion saw Jesus, responding to the judgment that his life was not going to be shown the honor that all life is due, instead showed mercy to these same people, extending life to all. In doing so Jesus, demonstrated that he honored each and every life. What the Roman centurion had surmised is that if the God who dwelt in the Temple had torn the veil when this man had gave up his last breath, then this one upon the cross had to be one who was loved intensely by this God. In the world of the centurion, if this Jesus is loved by the God who holds all power, then by that same power, those who had killed his beloved should have been destroyed. Yet, here he was standing among the living while Jesus remained among the dead. Instead of judgment, condemnation and death, this Roman had experienced mercy, the giving of life at the hands of a Jewish man who had said he was king. This Jesus had honored the life of this centurion by declaring that he should receive life instead of death. Such life honoring love so experienced causes all who come to the cross to exclaim in faith that here truly is the Son of God. Here in this one upon the cross is one who shows us by his death that all life is worth honor, for Jesus gave his life so that all might know the true honor that it is due to them. Yet even so, Jesus calls us to follow him and be people of the cross, those who refuse to shame another because we know the truth that Jesus gave his life so that all people might find honor and be honored because of what Jesus has done for them.  Amen!

           

Maundy Thursday: A Meal of Remembrance

 March 28 2024

Matthew 26:17-30

         One of the peculiar things that happens when you cross over the sixty year mark is that birthdays no longer seem to have the same excitement that they used to have. Its not just my own birthday which doesn’t seem to give me the same thrills but, as much as I hate to admit it, I didn’t even celebrate my wife, Jennifer’s, birthday either. I did not get her a card nor did I bake her a cake and I feel awful about it. You see, even though I have got in a rut about celebrating birthdays, I still realize that they are important. Birthdays are the way that those around us remember the way we came into the world and the people in our life rejoice at our being born. Every year, my Mom reminds me of how she was freezing green beans and making applesauce and how I so rudely interrupted her work. She tells of how my grandmother had to come and watch my older siblings so that she could head to the hospital. Growing up, my Mom also made sure that there was an angel food cake with sea foam icing lathered all over it waiting for me on my special day. We all know that this is what birthdays are all about, about remembering our beginnings and celebrating the years of life that have followed. I guess, you could say that birthdays, with cake as its centerpiece is a meal of remembrance.

         Much in the same way, what is called in scripture the Passover is also a meal of remembrance. Like our birthday celebrations, Passover is also about telling the story of the birth, but not the birth of an individual, but the birth of a holy nation, a kingdom of priests. You see, Passover, through storytelling and the eating of a meal, recounts the story of how a people enslaved by the Egyptians were set free through the mighty acts of God so that they might become known as the very people of God. The recording of the actual events that the Passover tells is found in the twelfth chapter of Exodus. There we hear of how the king of Egypt, the Pharaoh, refused to allow his slaves, the people of Israel, to be set free even though Moses, the servant of God, had brought plague after plague upon his country. So God decides to bring upon the country of Egypt one more plague to bear against the hardness of Pharaoh’s heart. In preparation for this final plague, God tells Moses and the people of Israel, that every family was to select a lamb and on the fourteenth day of the month every family was to slaughter their lamb. They were to take some of the blood of the lamb and with a hyssop branch they were to wipe the blood over the doorposts and the door frame. They were to roast the lamb, and they were to eat it with their sandals on their feet and their staff in their hand so that when the time came they could leave Egypt quickly. The reason for this was that this was the night of the Lord’s Passover. This meant that death was coming upon Egypt, and every first born, from the child of the king to the child of the slave was in peril but the homes where the blood was applied, there God would hover over these homes so that death could not enter there so that they could say that death had, “passed over”, all those who obeyed the Lord. 

         So death came upon Egypt and even the first born son of Pharaoh died that night. In his grief, the Pharaoh conceded to let the people living in Egypt go free and they left in haste to begin their new life as the holy nation of Israel. This is the birth story that is retold every time the people of Israel celebrated the Passover. It is this Passover celebration that  the disciples are making arrangements for here, at the beginning of Matthews account of the Last Supper. One of the most important items that these disciples had to be sure they had was wine, lots of wine. You see, the Passover meal called for each person to drink four glasses of wine over the course of the evening. The first cup of wine was drank at the beginning of the meal after the evening prayer had been said. Then they served the unleavened bread, lettuce and the bitter herbs, a reminder of the bitter life their ancestors had experienced in slavery. After this first course, the roasted lamb was brought to the table. When all the food was on the table, a son of the household would ask their father, “Why is this night different from every other night?” Then the father would recite how their ancestors were slaves down in Egypt and how God, in his mercy, sent Moses down to rescue them. The father would go on to tell of the mighty acts of God in the saving and release of his people. Then grace was said over the meal, and the meal was eaten, and a second class of wine was drunk as the meal continued. A third cup of wine was drunk after the meal and then some psalms were recited and the meal ended with, you guessed it, another cup of wine.

         The reason we need to know what was the norm on that Passover evening is so that we can realize how Jesus took this ancient story vital to the old covenant and transformed it to be a meal of remembrance for the new covenant. The first noticeable difference is that at the last supper, the Passover is not being celebrated with family, the biological family of any of the disciples. No, now there is a new family that Jesus is creating out of those who have the same desire that Jesus does, that God’s kingdom come, God’s will be done here, just as in heaven. The first cup of wine is prayed over and then given to those gathered there but now there are new words said, “This is my blood of the new covenant which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.” As the meal is served, there seems to be only the unleavened bread upon the table. As the bread is taken, and blessed, it is then given to those around the table, and new words are spoken, “Take eat; this is my body.’ While the taste of the bread and wine still fresh in their mouths, the Psalms sung after the meal is being sung and they are out the door and on their way to the Mount of Olives. Surely they had to wonder what had happened to the Passover meal? What had happened to the bitter herbs, the roasted lamb? What had happened to the telling of the story of that terrifying night when God rescued the first born of Israel from certain death? What had happened to the second, the third and fourth glasses of wine?

         What the early Christians had figured out is that Jesus desires us to see the cross as the place where the bitter herbs were now to be found in the sufferings that Jesus endured.The true Passover lamb was Jesus himself, who was laid not upon a wooden table but nailed to an old wooden cross. What the disciples had experienced in the upper room that night was to be seen as being but the first part of this new Passover meal that Jesus had come to create. The upper room was the time when Jesus gave the promise that his body would indeed be broken and his blood would be shed. It was at the cross, though, that this promise was fulfilled. The first cup of the meal had been drunk there in the upper room, but the second cup, this is the cup that Jesus takes upon himself, the cup which makes him fall to his knees and begs his Heavenly Father to take from him. Yet, the Son accepts the will of the Father; the cup is taken and consumed. The third cup was given to Jesus at the place of the skull, Golgotha, where he was offered wine mixed with bitter gall. Jesus tasted this but could not drink much more than a sip. Then they crucified Jesus. As he hung there upon the cross, crying out in agony, we are told that one of the guards took a hyssop branch.This hyssop branch points us back to the story of the Passover because the Israelites used hyssop branch to put the blood upon their door posts. The hyssop branch at the cross though, was soaked in sour wine and lifted up to Jesus, and having drunk the cup of wrath, Jesus cried out and yielded up his spirit, his very life, to his Father. The new Passover meal Jesus created for his followers has at last come to its end. The promises of the upper room had become the reality of Golgotha and the cross.

         This meal that Jesus created is also a meal of remembrance for it too is a meal which celebrates a birth, the coming into this world of a new family. Jesus had taken a group of people from all walks of life, Zealots and tax collectors and fishermen and many others who were gathered along the way, and he united these former slaves of sin, and they became, as Peter tells us, “…a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people known as God’s own possession…”. The story of this rescue is the Lamb of God, who shed his blood, to put an end to their past so they might have a new beginning in the family of God.This blood was applied to the mercy seat so that at last the will of God was made possible, heaven and earth at last united. The Lamb of God, his body broken, to open up to us a new and living way for us to enter into the most holy presence of God. This is what was promised during that supper on that fateful night when a new Passover was created. A new Passover where there is just only one family, the family of God,  who has the blood of the Lamb of God on their doorposts, the holy assurance that our life is covered under the shielding presence of our God. We are those who have been granted this peace by God, that death will certainty pass over us and a new life is ours just beyond the river. This new family was born on that first Maundy Thursday for these disciples were not just a loose association of friends but through the mighty acts of God they were united in their love for Jesus, the one who always will be the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

         Yet, what we must not forget about that first Maundy Thursday is that the new Passover Jesus created was not finished there in the upper room. No, the Passover experience continued in the life of Jesus as he warred against his flesh in the garden and he drank the cup of suffering in order to do the will of God. He drank the cup of judgment of his enemies and gave back to them only mercy. He drank the cup of condemnation, the very sentence of death and gave in return, his very life for the life of the world. Knowing this, how can we not help but believe that this meal of remembrance is to be for us the place where we remember that just as their was a cross for Jesus that there is a cross for us as well. We remember Jesus, not just as our Savior but as our very way of life as well. As we rise from the table we are to go from here with the life of Jesus living in us. We are to go and accept that we too may have to drink the cup of suffering to do the will of God. We are to go and be ready to drink the cup of judgment of a world which declares the cross mere foolishness. We must go and be ready to drink the cup of condemnation knowing that this is but a reminder that this world is not our home. This is how we go and fulfill the command of Jesus given to us that Passover evening, that we love one another just as Jesus has first loved us. As we go from here, may this meal bring this cross shaped love to our remembrance so that this cross shaped love may bear the truth about who we now are, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people who know that they really are the very possession of God, now and forever! Amen!

Gospel Say, What?:A Ruling Mercy

 March 17 2024

Mark 8:27-38

         Have you ever noticed how looking at something from a different vantage point or a different perspective can help you understand it better? I was thinking about this very thing as I considered a quote that I had used in a previous message in light of our scripture for today. When I used this quote previously I agreed with the overall sentiment of what was said. Today, though, I thought I would instead play the devil’s advocate and seek to understand this problem from a different viewpoint. The quote is by a well known leader in the Southern Baptist Convention by the name of Russell Moore. He says that the moment of clarity for him, that there was something seriously wrong with Christianity in America, came when several pastors told him essentially the same story of how they had quoted the Sermon on the Mount in their preaching, the whole, turn the other cheek idea, and when they did they had someone who came up to them afterwards and said, “Where did you get those liberal talking points?’ The pastors response to this was, “I’m literally quoting Jesus Christ”, which usually would have ended the conversation but the person countered this by saying, “Yes, but that doesn’t work anymore.” Now, you can understand, I hope, the very serious issue here but I thought, in all fairness, we should at least consider just where such comments are coming from. The clue to understanding what the real issue is can be found in the labeling of the teachings of Jesus as being, “liberal teaching points”. In classifying the teachings of Jesus as being liberal, these people are using terms associated with government. Now, if the teachings of Jesus are going to be pressed into service of government then, yes, they most certainly will be considered to be weak and to be real honest, they most likely will not work real well in the governments that rule the countries of this world. 

So yes, if the teachings of Jesus are viewed from a stand point of running the world, these people are absolutely correct, the teachings of Jesus are very liberal and they do not work very well in the typical way of governing people. Many people might find this odd, however, what I have just said begins to make sense when we consider scripture. Take for example the story of Jesus being tested in the wilderness as found in the fourth chapter of Matthew, where in the last temptation by Satan, Jesus is taken up to a very high mountain and there Jesus was shown all of the kingdoms of this world and their glory. Satan tells Jesus that all of these kingdoms would be given to Jesus if he would but fall down and worship Satan. Jesus counters this offer by saying, “You shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve.” It seems that what Jesus is speaking about here is simply our religious life but if you look closer what you find is that he is actually speaking of a different way of governing people. To worship only God and serve him only is to be an alternative to the rest of the world governments that find themselves in the service of Satan himself. So, if we consider our worship of God we know that we do so because God in his mercy has found us worthy of life and, in return, we find God worthy of our life, serving him through acts of mercy. It is these acts of mercy, this is what those who see things from the vantage point of government find to be a problem, what they label as being, “liberal”. The reason for this as we find in the thirteenth chapter of Romans is that the governing authorities are agents of judgment. As Paul says here, if one does wrong we are to be afraid because the judgment of the governing authorities is backed by the sword. So imagine a system that is based on judgment, fear, and the power of death and trying to introduce service and mercy into that system, and, yes, such acts of mercy do indeed look weak next to the terror that governing authorities can impose. Yet, this is not the final word on the subject because as we find in the book of James, the second chapter, “For judgment is without mercy for the one who has shown no mercy. Mercy triumphs over judgment.” So, perhaps, mercy only looks weak to those who have never experienced its real power.

This rather lengthy introduction to todays scripture is really necessary for us to understand fully what this conversation is all about, the one that Jesus is having with Peter. Jesus is preparing Peter and the rest of the disciples for the dark days ahead. In this series of messages for this special time that we call Lent, called, Gospel Say, What?, we are considering just what does the gospel say to us. What we have found is that the good news is Jesus is king, the king who rules with the power of life, and we are to change our minds about how the world works and believe that the way of life taught to us by Jesus is the right way we are to live, no matter how liberal or weak that it might appear to others. It just makes sense then that if our focus is on Jesus being our king then we would at some point have to talk about the government he would establish to rule the world. This is obviously what Peter thought as well. Peter, in stating that he thought that Jesus was indeed God’s anointed king, said this perhaps to begin this necessary conversation of just what kind of government Jesus had in mind. Peter may have had a familiar song on his mind, what we know as the second Psalm, that said, “The kings of the earth set themselves and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and his Anointed, his Messiah, his Christ.” Peter most assuredly would have remembered that the song continued saying, “The Lord said to me, “You are my Son”; today I have begotten you. Ask of me and I will make the nations your heritage, and the ends of the earth your possession. You shall break them with a rod of iron and dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel.” Peter, after seeing all of the miracles, the feeding of thousands from what was found in a boys lunchbox, and watching Jesus walk with waves under his feet, knew that this friend of his was indeed the very one that this song was singing about, the Anointed one, the very one that God called his begotten Son. In Peter’s mind, he wondered why wait any longer, let’s bring on judgment day. Where is that iron rod, lets get that and start wailing against those arrogant Romans. Come on Jesus, call down the angel armies and show them just who it is that they are dealing with. Justice is on our side Jesus, they deserve death for all of the deaths at their hands. Let us go and taste that sweet revenge!Peter was responding just like we expect governing authorities to react because this is what justice, the very foundation of law, calls for, an equal exchange, you know, that whole eye for an eye thing, that tooth for a tooth kind of equality.

Can you hear Peter gasp, see the confusion on his face when Jesus does not exclaim with a battle cry. No, Jesus instead begins talking a bunch of nonsense, that he the very Son of Man, the one seen in the prophecy of Daniel, he was going up to Jerusalem, not to wipe out the Roman army, no, Jesus says he is going to allow himself to suffer at the hands of his enemies. Jesus goes on describing his rejection by the elders, the chief priests and the scribes, all will cast him aside and take his life. Yet this was not all because Jesus also said that after three days that he would rise. Peter must have thought that Jesus obviously does not know his scriptures. Didn’t Jesus know that the Son of Man in Daniel’s vision was going to be the king who would be served by all peoples, nations and languages.. It was not the king who would serve others, Jesus. Had not Jesus read that the dominion of the Son of Man was going to be an everlasting reign which would never pass away, that his kingdom was one that would never be destroyed? If, you are going to have a kingdom that will never be destroyed then how can you allow yourself to be destroyed at the hand of your enemies? And did you say, Jesus, that you would rise in three days? Don’t you know that Daniel prophesied that this was going to happen at the end of this age? Well, even if Peter was unsure as to what was going on with Jesus, Jesus, on the other hand, was quite confident that his version of how things were going to go down was, we might say, the gospel truth.

Peter knew that as the leader of this bunch of Rabbi wannabes he had to do something and do it fast. Peter, in anger reaches out his hand and grabs hold of the arm of Jesus, jerking him, shaking him, trying to get him to come back to reality. Peter acting out of pure emotion, had never even considered that he had assaulted the very king whose kingdom would have no end. Jesus responds by turning his face toward the other disciples. Did they see how Peter was acting? He was acting like all rulers of this world act, seizing hold of power. Peter demonstrated through his actions that he had allowed the lies of Satan to enter into him, the lies that the way of real power is through the taking of life. The taking hold of a life and forcing that life to be forced to serve in the very ways of death, this is what the hand of Peter grasping Jesus said in oh, so many words. This is why it is Peter who had to come back to reality not Jesus. Peter, as the pawn of Satan had to take his place at the back of the line because Jesus, we remember, had defeated Satan when he was tested in the wilderness. Jesus countered Satan’s control over the countries of his world by simply stating that, “You shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve.” Peter had set his mind on the ways of men instead of the ways of God. How very interesting that Peter when he was called to be a disciple as told in the gospel of Luke, the fifth chapter, knew the greatness of his sin and therefore, also knew of his great need of mercy to just be in the presence of Jesus for Peter knew that Jesus was indeed God who came as one of us. Yet, even though Peter worshipped God because God in his mercy found Peter worthy of life, what had not happened is that Peter had not served God alone. If God works through the power of mercy then in order to serve God alone we must serve God with actions of mercy, in essence working with God by doing acts of mercy that bring life not death. So, when Peter wanted to be part of God’s merciful kingdom and he decides to use the ways of the judgmental and condemning ways of the world, he in affect opposes all of what God is attempting to do. The new wine, the new way of mercy that Jesus brings, this simply cannot be put into the old wine skins, the old dying way of the world.

Nowhere does this difference between the old ways of the world collide with the new ways of our merciful Jesus then when we come to the cross. Jesus shouts loud enough for all to hear, “If anyone has a desire to follow me, they have to strongly reject themselves. They must take up their cross and follow me just as I take up my cross.” You see, the governing authorities of this age are controlled by laws, laws that are determined to be fair and just, if they protect a person’s rights. As all Americans probably know, our rights are the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Concerning how these rights are affected by Jesus and the cross, I am grateful to the insights of an author named Tom Noble who observed something quite interesting about what we hold to be our fundamental rights, the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. He saw that when Jesus went to the cross, and tasted death for all of us, he rejected his right to life. Jesus also rejected his right to freedom allowing himself to be shackled and imprisoned, his hands and feet nailed to a piece of wood unable to move at all. Jesus took the cross upon himself to walk the path of sorrow soundly rejecting his right to happiness. Jesus knew that there was a greater principle at work than his own personal rights and that is the very cause of mercy which triumphs over judgment. In the face of the world’s judgment against us, we, in response, can offer ourselves as an act of mercy, this is what is meant for us to carry our cross.

You see, when we live under the authority of law enforced by judgment, it is easy to see that we will become inwardly focused. This is perhaps why Paul says that sin actually increases when we are under the law because it is then that we live where our rights are upheld through the power of judgment and condemnation, causing us to be inwardly focused and enslaved by fear. In such a situation we strive to escape death for just one more day and we do so by filling our life with stuff. To this Jesus asks, if we gain the whole world over our whole lifetime, our life will be gone and what will we have to show for it? Can you feel the sorrow in the voice of Jesus as he asks us to really consider if our effort to stave off death for one more day is this really what life is supposed to be about?  Can you begin to understand this riddle Jesus gives to us that those who save their lives will lose them and those who give their lives for the sake of our king and for the good news, this is when our lives will be safe. I mean, if we give our lives in the service of the king of life, being a life giver, then doesn’t it make sense that our life is going to be safe with him.

What Jesus is asking us to do then is live in this tension of being in the world, a world governed by laws enforced through judgments, condemnation, and the very power of death, all the while being under the reign of Jesus whose rule is the very power of life. This means that as Paul explains in the twelfth chapter of Romans, when we encounter our enemy, one who counts us as unworthy of the honor that our life is due, we in return, out of mercy, we will find them worthy of life and offer them part of our life, our food and our drink, to honor their life. The testing of our life then, will be whether we stay committed to a life of the cross, a life which offers mercy in the face of judgment and condemnation. Or will we, like Peter, be ashamed at all this talk of giving life through acts of mercy? Will shame cause us to speak only of Jesus on the cross as we hide the cross that is ours to bear from the watching eyes of those around us. These are the tough choices we are faced with on our journey with Jesus. I pray that mercy rules in your life, now and always.Amen!

 

Gospel Say, What?: The Right Environment

 March 11 2024

Mark 4:1-20

         In my family, I am the middle child, which probably begins to explain a lot about who I am. I have an older brother, George, and an older sister, Hilary and a younger sister, Becky, and a younger brother, Jeff. I am the only one who stayed in the area, everybody else lives about as far apart as you can get. This past while, I was thinking about my sister Hilary because its about this time of year people start thinking about what they are going to plant in their gardens. Hilary loves to garden the only problem is that she lives in San Francisco. With its cool, wet, weather it is difficult to have much success in growing vegetables. Yet, Hilary keeps trying. That’s why she already has her tomatoes started in her house because she has learned that it takes tomatoes a lot longer to make a crop in the environment that she is living in.

         What is interesting is that Jesus understood the importance of the right environment on the success of seeds to grow and mature. Jesus knew that if you are going to try and grow a crop all sorts of factors can keep seeds from becoming a harvest. Birds can swoop down and eat the seed before it has a chance to grow. Or the soil could have rocks and a hard pan that keeps the roots from developing. Or thorns and weeds can smother the seedlings that have just begun to grow. But, if seeds are planted properly in the right environment, some good, rich, topsoil, then that seed will grow and produce a stalk with a seed head which contains an abundance of seeds and this means a successful harvest. This is all well and good but what can not be forgotten is that, in speaking of planting seeds, Jesus is actually referring to people who hear a word. Just like a seed needs the right environment to grow so too this word that is heard needs the right environment for that word to grow and become a harvest.

         So, if we need the right environment for this word to grow and be effective, we have to ask, just where can we find this place where this word can be transformed in us? This is what we are going to figure out today as we continue in this series of messages for Lent called, Gospel Say, What? The gist of these messages is that Jesus tells us, right at the very beginning of his ministry, that the good news is that he is our king who rules over us with the power of life. This means that faith in the gospel is when we allow Jesus to be our king, a king whose rule will be evident in how we live. Last week, we looked at how Jesus is the king who defeats all the sources of our fear: our sickness, our sin and, of course, Satan; Jesus our king reigns over all of them. His love is always and forever with us, there is nothing, absolutely nothing, that can ever separate us from this love that our king Jesus has for us. So we at last can rest secure in his love and when we do we find that we can love all people, all the time. This love of God satisfies us so that no longer do we have to demand that the people we love show us some love in return. This is how we move from our birth families to live in God’s one, great, big, happy, family; God and humanity, united forever. This is the will of God, this wondrous unity that we can be a part of because we have a king who defeats every source of fear so that we can live a life filled with love. This, we explained last week, is how we are faithful to the first part of the great commandment, what the people of Israel call the Shema, because it begins with God saying, “Hear, Shema”. As found in Deuteronomy 6, the first part of this prayer that has become a commandment says, “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.” As Paul teaches us, if God is one then he is the God not only of the people of Israel but he is the God of all the nations as well. Therefore, when Jesus is our king, and the source of all our fears is defeated so that love can take its place, we can, at last, fulfill this commandment. While love can not be commanded, it can spring to life in the presence of the king whose power is life.

         When we consider how love can spring to life in those who were once held captive by their fears, I think we can begin to see how this weeks story about seeds needing the right environment seems to be in the same line of thought. If we listen again to Jesus explain the meaning of a farmer planting seeds, what we discover is that he is speaking about the sowing of the word. Just what word is it that Jesus expects us to hear? For those who first heard this story, it is not hard to imagine that they, as people who had said the Shema faithfully all of their life, would have known that this word that is to be heard is the word or prayer which begins with the command to hear. Jesus has just taught his disciples about this one, great, big, happy family God is bringing together, a fulfillment of the first part of the Shema, which goes, “Hear, O, Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.” So it makes sense that here, in the story of the farmer planting seeds, Jesus is going to address just why it is that this prayer which says, “You shall love the Lord your God with all of your heart and with all of your soul and with all of your might.”, had never really resulted in a life fully given to God as an offering of love.

         If we read the explanation that Jesus gives for this story of the farmer planting seeds in light of this prayer that has become our primary commandment, we first hear how God is the one who sows the word, the word that is to be heard, and that word is love. In this word spoken by God a plea is put forth for those who hear it that we are to love, and love with all that we are and all that we have been given. This word spoken is reminiscent of how creation was spoken into being with a word. The nothingness of chaos is transformed into creative order, all with a word. Perhaps, this word the sower sows is how people, the last bit of chaos bouncing around in the order of creation, are to be at last transformed into a created order called love.

         What is it then that prevents those who hear this word to love from doing so? Well, in the first case, Jesus tells us, that as, “soon as people hear the word, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word.” What is needed to understand the point Jesus is trying to make is to know just how does Satan operate. In the eighth chapter of John, Jesus tells us that Satan, “ … was a murderer from the beginning, and he has nothing to do with the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies.” In the second chapter of the book of Hebrews, we hear how Jesus came to, “…destroy the one who has the power of death, that is the devil, and deliver all those who through the fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery.” Satan, then, represents the lie that the taking of life is the ultimate power. Yet, this power, far from being a power which liberates, is instead a power which enslaves those who believe in the lie that the taking of life should be their way of life. Are you beginning to understand how such a lie can devour the word spoken by God, the word that calls us to love? Perhaps what should drive this point home for us is the teaching of Jesus found in the fifth chapter of Matthew where Jesus tells us, “You have heard it said to those of old, ‘You shalt not murder and whoever murders will be liable to judgment’. But I say to you everyone who is angry with his brothers and sisters is liable to judgment”. You see, when we allow Satan to have an audience and believe that the power of death is the ultimate power, then the door is opened up to all kinds of behavior which comes and destroys the order of love that God created us to order our lives by. The danger of anger is that it tears apart what God is working to bring together, this one, great, big, happy, family. Is it becoming clearer how vitally important it is for us to, as Paul puts it in the forth chapter of Ephesians, to never let the sun go down on our anger and give no opportunity to the devil?

         This lie that death is the ultimate power not only affects our heart, destroying the love which is supposed to be springing up in us, but this lie also destroys our relationship with God and our relationship with each other. When we believe in this lie then we never come to know the truth, that God is our source of life. If you believe that death is the ultimate power then it is death not life that will call the shots in your life. You might start out serving God, finding great joy in the presence of your joyful Master but if, as you serve him, you are asked to suffer or offer your very life to be obedient to the Master, you will yield to the lie. What will be revealed for all to see is that it really is not God who you listen to but instead you are taking orders from the one whose power is the very power of death. You will go from being joyous before the Master to losing face before all who watch your actions. The word Jesus uses for those who step back and lose faith when persecution or tribulation comes is, “scandal”. Life becomes a scandal when it allows itself to be controlled by death.

         This allowing the lie of Satan to infect our lives also leads to a total breakdown of peace not just our lives personally but our life together with each other. We enter into a vicious cycle of unrest when, in our being controlled by the power of death, we in our distorted belief, decide that the best way to be at ease about the future is for us to take what we have been given, what is called our might in Hebrew thought, and we make our stuff our treasure. In doing so, all we have done is to take this anxiety of our future and replaced it with anxiety of losing our treasure. Instead of taking what God has given to us to give life to those in our great, big, happy family, to ease the anxiety of others in need, we have instead just choked the very life out of our existence through our anxiety over our treasure.

         Are you beginning to see how very destructive a lie can be? This lie that the taking of life is the ultimate power may not make us murderers but it may be the way we justify our anger toward someone. This lie will also take the honor we find in offering our life to God and replace it with shame as we withdraw from serving God fully because of the fear of death. The peace and rest found in the giving of what we are given, this knowing ourselves as life givers, this is lost when this lie that ultimate power is taking life finds its home in us. Instead of being peacemakers we become agents of anxiety. We gather up treasures on earth to somehow become less anxious about tomorrow but then we become anxious about whether something will destroy our treasure today. The ones who we could have helped be less anxious about tomorrow by providing what they need for life today, now find themselves without any hope.

         The good news is that life no longer has to be like this because Jesus our king has come and he invites us to come to him and change our minds. Jesus has come and he counters this lie that the ultimate power is the taking of life with the greater truth that ultimate power is found in the giving of life. Lest we forget this truth, Jesus goes on to tell us that he himself is truth. This one who came pronouncing himself as the king, this one is the one who is the truth that ultimate power does not lie in death but is found in the one who rules in the power of life. Jesus, as our king, lives out this power of life in our relationship with him. This power is found when we know that Jesus interceded for us. To intercede simply means to place oneself between another person and someone or something else, to act as a go between. An image of what this might look like is found in the fifteenth chapter of Genesis, where God, speaking to Abraham, tells him, “Fear not, Abraham, I am your shield…” Here, God is promising to come between, to intercede, to cover Abraham with his very self. Can you understand why God instructed Abraham to not be afraid? Why would Abraham be afraid if God promised to place himself between Abraham and whatever threatened to harm him? It is not hard to understand that Abraham, later in this chapter responds to this promise of God with a promise of his own, a promise to believe God and because Abraham believed in him, God counted him as one of his own. This promise of our king to cover us, to lay down his life to protect us, this is why we hold on to the truth, giving no room in our life for some nonsense lie.

         The right environment that our king Jesus gives to us is a life that is covered by his life. This is why Paul insists in the third chapter of Colossians that we are to seek the things which are above, not the things that are on earth. For we have died and our life is covered by our king Jesus who is one with God.” In John’s gospel, Jesus is portrayed as the Good Shepherd because he is the one who is willing to lay down his life for those in his care, his sheep. Jesus, in the fifteenth chapter of John tells us, “Greater love has no one than this that someone lay down his life for his friends.” Jesus, our king, lays down his life, covering us, and here in this greater love we are kept safe from the great lie so that our hearts set free from fear can at last believe. The good news is that our king has arrived and through his power of life, this laying down of his life for us, we now have the perfect environment for us to love God with all of our heart, all of our life and all of our might. In our experience of this greater love, our hearts believe in the truth that life really is the greater power. In this faith, we find our life is secure beneath the life of Jesus which covers us so when trials and persecutions come we do not waver in our service of our Master. And in the security found beneath the shield of God, we understand that what he has given to us is the means by which we can give as our King has first given to us. The might that we find in our resources is the power we use to take our life and guard over the lives around us. Jesus says this is when he calls us friends, when we go and love others with the same, great, love that he first loved us. And in this right environment of deep, rich, topsoil, there comes a harvest of life that death has no power over. Jesus knew the truth that this life ordered by love would one day be seen popping up like flowers in springtime in little gatherings, of thirty, sixty or a hundred people, those who are his friends, his church.To the glory of God. Amen

         

 

Gospel Say,What?:One, Great, Big Happy Family!

 March 3 2024

Mark 3:31-35

         I talk often about my three kids, Elizabeth, Sarah and Matt but, to be honest, we actually claim another young lady named Taylyn as one of our own. Taylyn came into our life in the fall of 2011. She was a friend of Sarah’s. Sarah has always had a knack of looking out for the people on the margins who need watching out for, and, knowing this, I told her if any of her friends needed a place to crash they were always welcome. You have no idea how interesting life can get when you make a promise like this. So, Sarah came home one day in the fall of her senior year and said that Taylyn’s Mom was kicking her out of the house and she had no where to go, so would it be alright if she could stay with us, just for a little while? As it turns out, it was actually Taylyn’s foster Mom who no longer wanted her. Taylyn found herself living with her because her parents were drug addicts. So, here was a girl who had experienced more abandonment than most people should in a lifetime. What she needed was someone who would be there for her as she made her way in the world and God called us to be those people for her. So, Sarah and I drove over to where Taylyn lived, found all of her belongings shoved into their garage and loaded it all up and brought her to live with us. Now, I would like to tell you that bringing a girl with abandonment issues into a family was an easy thing to do but in all actuality, it was rough. Matt and Elizabeth were not very happy having this stranger with hang-ups suddenly crash their party. When they wondered just why we would do such a thing, I told them that I simply did not have a choice. You see, the choice I made to pledge my allegiance to Jesus meant that I had no other choice than to bring Taylyn into our life and treat her as one of our own because the truth is that she really is family, one of those who make up the one, great, big, happy, family Jesus came to create.

         You see, what most people just don’t realize is that doing the will of God, something that we pledge to do every time we say the Lord’s Prayer, is tied into just who we consider to be family. At least this is what Mark records Jesus as telling us when he says that, ‘…whoever does the will of God, he is my brother and sister and mother.” Paul also understood this because he writes in the first chapter of Ephesians that our Heavenly Father has, “…made known to us the mystery of his will , according to his purpose that he set forth in Christ, as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in heaven and on earth.” We might say that God’s will is that we know ourselves as being part of one, great, big, happy family, us and God, at last together forever.

         Now, it should come as no surprise that uniting us together into one, great big, happy, family should be what God is up to because right at the beginning of his journey with his people, God instructed them that they were to pray a certain prayer which they did for thousands of years. That prayer is called the Shema, in Hebrew which means, “Hear”. Every morning God’s people were to, as it were, listen up, turn your ear toward God, step in and hear what God has to say to them. Every morning, they heard: “The Lord our God is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all of your soul, and with all of your power.”  Even though God’s people prayed this prayer, over and over again, the significance of what they were praying for was lost on them. We know this to be true because Jesus taught that this was not just a prayer but it is instead the greatest commandment, the ultimate way that we are to structure our life. So, we are forced to ask ourselves just how are we to structure our lives around this idea, ‘The Lord our God is one Lord.” What does this have to say about how we as people are supposed to live together, because after all this is ultimately what the law of God is all about. Well, listen to what Paul says about this very verse as he teaches us from the third chapter of Romans, “…is God of the God of the Jews only? Is he not the God of all of the other nations as well? Yes, God is their God as well since God is one…” What Paul had become convinced of was that if there was only one God then we as humanity must think of ourselves as one people. This is quite interesting because this is not the way that Paul had originally thought about God even though he had prayed the Shema faithfully every day. Paul was bent on persecution of the early Christians because their God simply could not be the same as his God, or could he be? What had changed his mind is that he had an encounter with King Jesus.

         You see, when people have encounters with King Jesus they begin to realize that here is a king who rules in the power of life. After Jesus made his proclamation, “The time is fulfilled, the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe the good news.”, he went forth from there proving the truth of this statement. Jesus demonstrated his authority over unclean spirits, he healed those who were sick and oppressed by demons. Jesus went forth and cleansed people who had a dreaded skin disease, and he not only healed a paralyzed man he also forgave his sins. Jesus even says, in so many words, that he had plundered the very house of Satan. All of these different situations had one thing in common and that is that they induced fear. Imagine how afraid one might be to suddenly be seized upon by demonic spirits, or to contract a skin disease which meant that you had to be expelled from your home and family? Imagine the dread to believe that you had offended God so greatly that you cannot fathom how you will ever have a right relationship with him again? Haven’t we all been terrified by the dark and evil forces of this world which seem oft so strong, and we wonder is God really the ruler yet?  In each and every terrifying situation, Jesus enters into them and commands that the fear be gone. Jesus gathers disciples to go with him, to witness to the truth that the King of life defeats every source which causes in us the fear of death. These followers would come away from their experience with Jesus having the same exclamation as Paul at the end of the eighth chapter of Romans, where he is convinced that, ‘…neither death nor life, nor angels or rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height or depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in our King, Jesus our Lord.” No matter what might cause fear to rise up in us we can be assured that the love of God will be there to counter our worries.

         The result of what Jesus our king did against these forces of fear is that he defeated all of them. In their place came a sense of peace, souls that at last had found rest. Here in his presence was what all previous Sabbaths pointed to, this time when God would return and  the people would enter into a time of rest from all of their fears. This is why Jesus could say that he is the Lord of the Sabbath because he is the one who has conquered all of our sources of fear and replaced them with an everlasting source of peace.

         All of this we can all agree really is good news, but you might be wondering just what does this have to do with God making us all into one, great, big, happy family? The answer is that only in an environment of everlasting peace, a peace founded through the actions of our life giving King Jesus, can we go from our birth families to living in the big family of God. You see, our birth families are God’s way that we enter into the world. Our families are the place where we hopefully experience love and where we can demonstrate our love to one another. It is in our birth families where all that we need for life is hopefully given to us, a place where we can grow and hopefully mature, a safe and secure place to figure out who we are. In spite of all these good intentions though, sometimes the people in our families may have left us down, they may not have always said or done the right thing, simply because we are all a lot more broken than we care to admit. So, families also need to be places of forgiveness and grace because it is a terrible burden to always have to be everything to everybody. What we figure out from life in our birth families is that the ones who love us are the ones that we show our love to. We do so because when we love those who love us we have a much better chance at getting what we need to live. 

         So, our birth families are where we begin and we go along until we have an encounter with King Jesus. Here is one who demonstrates that he is able and willing to conquer all our fears. Here is one who proves that he and he alone is our life giving King. No longer then must we consider that it is our families and the people who are in it are the ones who give us life. No, now we find that it is King Jesus who proves that he is worthy to hold our life in his hands. No longer do we need to love and expect love in return for now we know the love of our King Jesus which nothing can separate us from. Peace  comes upon us because Jesus our King has conquered all of our fears, and it is this peace that we now pass on to those around us. In this peace making, this is when Jesus says we have gone from life in our birth family to life in the one, great, big, happy, family of God. As strange as it might seem, here is where we hear King Jesus call us his brothers and sisters. 

         You see, this one, great, big, happy family God is bringing forth has to be made up of those who are willing to love without any expectations in return because this is the very way that God has so loved us. Jesus, in the fifth chapter of Matthew teaches us, “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you so that you might be sons and daughters of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes the sun to rise on the evil and the good and he makes it rain on the just and the unjust. For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Even the tax collectors love those who love them. If you only greet your brothers and your sisters, what more are you doing then anyone else in the world? Don’t all of the people of the nations love those who love them? You must reach the goal God has for you, to love those who show you no love in return because your Heavenly Father, he loves those who show no love to him.”  Of course, we know this is how our Heavenly Father loves all people because this is how he has loved us. As Paul describes in the fifth chapter of Romans, “it was while we were still weak, at the right time, our King died for those who were ungodly. ..God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, our King died for us…while we were his enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son…” You see, if we know that we have been loved with a love like this why should we ever care if someone does not respond when we love them?

         To live as people who know that there is only one, true, living God therefore, means that we must be willing to live as one, great, big, happy family. The only way that we can be this one, great, big, happy family of God is that we love each other with this same love that God first showed to us. Yet, the truth is that love simply cannot be commanded. Love like this can only be brought to life by the King who rules by the power of life. When our king Jesus conquerors every source of our fears, he creates an environment of peace where love can flourish. This is why even though the Shema was prayed for thousands of years this one, great, big, happy family spanning round the globe never happened. Only as God came to us as one of us, as one of the family, could we witness the authority of our King Jesus over all that frightens us. Only in the presence of the peace that comes in the presence of our king can we experience peace in our presence. Now we know that God in his power serves us by giving us life, a greater life, a life in his one, great, big happy family where all find love and love is given with no strings attached.

         This bringing all of life together in one, great, big, happy family is the very will of God. As Jesus teaches us in the sixth chapter of Matthew, “..your will be done as it is in heaven so may it be done on earth.” In heaven, there is one God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit who are three persons bound together in eternal love. So here on earth, we are many persons who are to be bound together in eternal love for this is the will of God that we, his people that he created, bear his image throughout the world. What better way to do this than to know ourselves as the one, great, big happy family of God? You see, there really is no God’s will for your life and something called God’s will for my life. This is simply is not what is found in scripture. No, there is the will of God, which is that everything in heaven and earth will be united together. When we know this, then the only question is, are we going to align ourselves with the will of God in how we live or are we going to go against the will of God to our own peril? Can you see how such a response can actually simplify how we do life with each other? I mean, if we understand that God is doing everything necessary to bring everything and everybody together into one, great, big, happy family, then when we interact with each other all we have to do is ask ourselves, am I doing something that goes along with this plan and purpose of God or am I actually doing something that is opposing this new creation that God is bringing forth? I heard a pastor the other day call these kind of decisions, top button decisions because just like if you put the top button of your shirt in the wrong hole every button after it will be wrong. If we don’t first align ourselves with what God is doing, if we don’t allow what our King Jesus has done to bring us into a place of peace, if you refuse to be a member God’s one great, big, happy family then none of our other decisions after that will be right. If you are ready to love with reckless abandonment, then hear Jesus say to you, welcome to the family, the one, great, big, happy, family of God. Amen.

          

         

Gospel Say, What?: If You Think You Know

 February 25 2024

Mark 1:1-15

         It is hard to believe how early Easter is this year. March 31^st is barely at the end of winter. This means that we are, right now, in the season of getting ourselves ready to be impacted by what Jesus has done for us through the cross and resurrection. The church calls this season which lasts forty days, Lent, because it occurs during the time of the year when the length, or lent, of the days is getting longer. Personally, Lent is always one of my favorite times because this is when the church seems to waken from her winter slumber. In the church I grew up in, Lent was always when there would be something special planned to help people get closer to Jesus, to walk with him on the way to Golgotha. This is also when people often choose to fast as a way of uniting ourselves, in a small way, with the sorrow associated with the sacrifice of Jesus upon the cross. Lent’s importance, then, is to help us get our lives focused once again on the mighty acts of Jesus which have been done on our behalf.

         You see, when we are forced out of our everyday, ordinary, way of doing things during this season of Lent then we can continue to grow more like Jesus. I can recall that when I was in the eighth grade that the pastor of our church invited the youth of the church to come before school every Wednesday during Lent, for doughnuts and a Bible study. I also remember that it wasn’t very pleasant to wake up extra early and face the gospel of Luke first thing in the morning. But the doughnuts help persuade me to tough it out and while I came for the breakfast, I stayed for the Jesus. The pastor got us into the gospel of Luke and we followed Jesus as he put his face like flint toward Jerusalem. This special time with Jesus, this is what this season of Lent is all about and this is why I enjoy it like I do.

         Well, as I think about that study of the gospel of Luke I couldn’t help but wonder if everyone I share that story with knows what I mean when I speak about the gospel. This is why this series of messages is called, ‘Gospel say, what?, because just because we think we know what the gospel says doesn’t necessarily mean that we actually know what the gospel really is all about. When we speak about the gospel of Luke we are talking about Luke’s account of the story of Jesus. Luke’s account is found alongside the accounts of Matthew, Mark and John, yet even so, is that all that the gospel is, just the story of Jesus, or is there perhaps more that makes up what we call the gospel? As we prepare to walk once again with Jesus as he heads toward Jerusalem, I want us to think about just what do we mean when we speak about the gospel. 

         We are confronted with our need to know what this gospel message is right here with these first few verses of the first chapter of Mark. The story Mark is telling to us starts out stating right here, this is the beginning of the gospel, or good news of Jesus Christ. Now, it isn’t too hard to figure out that the gospel is more than just a story about Jesus because there in the fourteenth verse of this first chapter we find that the gospel is the one and only message of Jesus. So, the gospel is more than the story of Jesus, it is rather the story that Jesus told. Right here, if we say we think we know what the gospel is then we might not really know at all what the gospel is all about. I say this because for most folks, when we speak of the gospel, the story we tell is that Jesus went to the cross for our sins and through his death our sins are forgiven and we are set free from the power of sin. To secure our salvation we must place our faith in Jesus, acknowledging that he alone is the assurance of our righteousness. What we receive in exchange is eternal life which is ours by faith through his grace. Yet if this is all of what the gospel is about how can Jesus here, at the beginning of his ministry, be proclaiming the gospel when the cross is some three years in the future? What is also unusual about this gospel proclamation of Jesus, is that he offers nothing in return for a listeners faith in his message. I mean, don’t most gospel messages we have heard promise something in exchange for placing our faith in the grace of Jesus? We have perhaps been told that if we believe on Jesus in our hearts, we are released from hell, we have the assurance of heaven, we are given the status of righteousness, or we receive forgiveness of our sins, or we are given freedom from the power of sin, or we are promised a reunion with God. Yet, listen again to what Mark records in this first verses of the first chapter, “Jesus came into Galilee, proclaiming the gospel, the good news, saying, ‘The time is fulfilled, the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.” So, upon hearing that the kingdom of God is here at last, we are to repent and believe, and there the message abruptly stops, and we are left wondering, is that it, is that all you have got to tell us Jesus? What is so good about this message, I mean, just what incentive do we have to cast our lot with this guy and buy into what he is saying if there appears to be nothing in it for us?

         This is why if we think we know the gospel we might not really know what the gospel is all about. We have to listen with fresh ears, hearing once again just what it is that Jesus is saying. Listen close this time, hang on every word, see if you can catch what Jesus is trying to say in these, his first words spoken to us, “The time is fulfilled, the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe this good news.” Every word that is uttered is overflowing with meaning. When Jesus speaks of the time being fulfilled, he is speaking about the very promises of God. Time is used by God to prove to us of his faithfulness. God tells us what is going to happen and when it will happen and we know that God in his faithfulness will make it so. We remember the promise God made with David that his house and his kingdom would be secure before the Lord, that his throne would be set up forever. Then in the second Psalm, we hear the writer say, “I will tell of your decree: The Lord said to me, You are my Son; today I have begotten you. Ask of me and I will make the nations your heritage, and the ends of the earth your possession.”Again from the one-hundred and tenth Psalm, “The Lord says to my Lord: ‘Sit at my right hand , until I make your enemies your footstool’. The Lord sends forth from Zion your mighty scepter. Rule in the midst of your enemies!” These and many other scriptures, tell of the hope of a king who would be out of the lineage of David, one who would come and be highly exalted, the very Son of God, the Lord to whom all other lords bow down to. This coming king is called at the beginning of the second Psalm, the anointed one of God which in Hebrew gives us the word, Messiah, and in the Greek, Christos, where we get the word, “Christ”. We have to remember that when we refer to Jesus Christ, the word, ‘Christ”, is as one author put it, more a claim then a name. To say Jesus Christ is to say that Jesus is the highly, exalted, king that God promised would come and rule over us. This is what Jesus was shouting to the world as he suddenly appeared there in Galilee.

         This understanding that Jesus is the Messiah, or the Christ, the anointed king, promised by God, this is vital to us grasping just what is so good about this good news of Jesus. Yet, once again, if we think we know what it means for Jesus to be our king we might not really know at all what it means for Jesus to be our king. You see, God spoke through the prophets so that we might get a clearer picture about this coming king. In the eleventh chapter of Isaiah, the first five verses, we are told, “There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse, and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit. And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord. He shall not judge by what his eyes see or decide disputes by what his ears hear, but with righteousness he shall judge the poor and decide with equity for the meek of the earth….”  Knowing this, can we catch the connection between this proclamation of good news and the baptism of Jesus in the Jordan? It was there, down by the riverside, that the heavens opened up, the Spirit came down upon Jesus, and there Jesus was anointed, the Father announcing that this one called Jesus was indeed his beloved Son. Jesus is called the Father’s beloved Son yet he is also God’s anointed king as well. What we need to know about Jesus our king is that Jesus is unlike any other king. You see, Jesus is the king on whom the Spirit rests, and this means that he is a king who rules with the power of life. We know this to be true because the one who tests Jesus in the wilderness is none other than Satan, the one whose power is found in the fear of death. This same power, the power of the sword, the very fear of death, is the power of all of the rulers on earth. Can you begin to understand, how Jesus who rules in the power of life, is a king who is both radically good and radically new in the way that he rules?

         How wonderful it is that into this world where the fear of death grips our hearts so tightly comes Jesus saying that here with him is something new, something good. Satan using the fear of death as a power of control must then be considered evil if good is Jesus using the power of life to bring life and ever more life to the world. This is the fullness of the gospel message of Jesus. You see, even here at the beginning of his ministry was the destiny of the cross for it was there at Calvary that Jesus gave his life in order to defeat death and the fear of death, the very power of evil, all so that we might have life. This is good news!

         When we have a better understanding of what this good news is that Jesus is offering to us then Jesus calls us to, “Repent.” Again, if we think we know what is meant by repentance we might not really know what repentance is all about. We might believe that repentance has to do with condemnation and judgment however when Jesus tells us to “repent”, he is speaking of something very different. Jesus calls us to come to him and through our encounter with him, we are to have a change of mind. How often do we get repentance out of the order we are supposed to have, telling people that they, first, need to repent, change their ways, before they can even think of having an encounter with Jesus. As Paul tells us at the beginning of the second chapter of Romans, “Or do you presume on the riches of God’s kindness, forbearance, and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?”. You see, it is only after we experience the kindness of Jesus that our thinking changes as to how the world actually works. This word, “kindness”, is in the same group of words as the word, “kindred”, which speaks to the experience of being in the same family. Perhaps this kindness of God is that he took it upon himself to become kindred with us, taking on our flesh, all so that we might know God as one of the family. To say that Jesus is our kin folk means that he is one who shares life with us, one who binds himself to us by cords of love, always doing what is best for all. Do you get how very strange this is that Jesus in his kindness welcomes us, of all people, to come on in and take our place at the table set in the royal palace. Yet Jesus does exactly this so that we might experience the power that there is in seeking the very best for each other, the power experienced when we offer ourselves in service to each other, the power of a life which is the very definition of good. Jesus gives us this experience so that we might change our minds about how God changes the world. Instead of living in a world controlled by fear that is rooted in death we, in this newness of life, discover a faith in the good, a faith which overcomes the world.

         So, after we start to think through just what is this good news Jesus is announcing we have to decide just what are we going to do with this message.We could be skeptics refusing to accept that there might be another way to live in this world than what we already know. Or we could accept that Jesus is on to something, being the very God who became one of us all so that we could know God as our kinfolk, and life could at last be lived in the power and service of life. This acceptance of what Jesus is teaching us is our faith. And again, if we think we know what faith is then we might not really know what faith is all about. Just what does it mean to have faith? Is faith saying the sinners prayer, as a one off statement of faith? Or perhaps we might think that to have faith means that we stand before the congregation and state that what the church holds to be the truth is exactly that, the truth? Is this really what it means to believe? I think that Jesus would say that the truth of whatever we believe is going to be found in the way we live. We will either live as those who accept the status quo or we will live true to this new announcement of the goodness that is ours to be found in this one called King Jesus. When we come to Jesus and through the Holy Spirit we are to be convinced that the true way to live is life in the family of God, a life where each member seeks the very best for each other. If this is what we say we believe then this is the way we must live. This is the truth that Paul teaches us in the fifth chapter of Galatians that faith always works itself out in our love for one another. Only through extravagant love will the world know that we are good news kind of people. To love is to live by the power of life, being life givers, and life supporters, and life affirming people. This is the new way to live and this is the good way to live because it is the Jesus way to live. You see, again, just as we found with our understanding of what the gospel is, you know, we may think we know Jesus but the truth is that we might not really know Jesus at all. So, in this Lenten season, let us press on to know who King Jesus really is, and let us live by faith in the good news he came to give to us. To his glory! Amen!