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Mar 07 2011
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Sermons

What do Charlie Sheen and Jesus Christ Have in Common?

Creative Commons LicenseA Sermon for Transfiguration Sunday
First preached at First Congregational Church of Saugatuck on March 6, 2011.
Texts: Matthew 17:1-9 and Exodus 24:12-18
Wordle: What do Charlie Sheen and Jesus Christ have in common?

Charlie Sheen. The man is a walking train wreck. In case you’ve somehow managed to miss this story, Mr. Sheen went on a few drug-induced benders recently, causing the hiatus of his sitcom. That would have been enough for media attention, but he’s gone on an unashamed, I’m a winner, you’re just jealous, viral media crazy-blitz.

Everyone makes mistakes, but most of us don’t go and crow about it on talk radio the next day, and then on Good Morning America, and then on the Today Show, and then on CNN, and then an interview with that most respected of all world news outlets, TMZ. And just when you think it’s over, he says something even crazier, like: “I’m an F-18, bro.” Or “These resentments, they are the rocket fuel that lives in the tip of my saber.” Yes, you heard that right. Resentments are the rocket fuel that lives in the tip of Charlie Sheen’s saber. Train wreck, in slow motion, with instant replay.

So here’s the big question of the day. What do Charlie Sheen and Jesus Christ have in common? I’m no Letterman, so I could only come up with a Top Five. (Many thank to Jerry Donovan for his help!)

5.   Jesus creates miraculous amounts of alcohol; Charlie consumes miraculous amounts of alcohol.

4.   Both speak in metaphors difficult to translate into English.

3.   Jesus makes great wine. Charlie just whines.

2.   Neither sees anything wrong with hanging out with hookers.

1.   One of them is God’s gift to the world, the other thinks he is.

Kidding aside, I think Jesus and Charlie do have something in common. We have a problem, us 21st century Christians. We read this book, and we love it so much, and we respect the people in it so much that we have a hard time identifying with them. All great literature is about identifying with the character. You recognize yourself in Tom Sawyer or Atticus Finch. They’re complete fiction, yet you see something in them that you want to be. Great fiction is the lie that tells the truth.

So look at our text today, the transfiguration. Who are the characters in the scene? Jesus, Moses, Elijah, Peter, James and John. Six characters, and we identify with none of them. Jesus walked on water. Moses walked through the Red Sea. Elijah called down fire from the sky. What did you do last week? I got stuck in three inches of slush! I can’t compete with these guys.

It reminds me, in a small way, of how we deify celebrities. We put them up on a pedestal, as if they were role models. They’re not role models. They’re pretty people who are good pretending to be someone they’re not. Which is good, because that’s pretty much what we expect them to do 24/7.

No falls off a pedestal. We put them up there, and then we rip it out from under them. It feels good to have someone to look up to, someone to follow. It frees us from the responsibility of defining ourselves. As good as that feels, it feels so much better to look down on them afterward. It proves that you’re a better person. “I may be messed up, but I’m no Charlie Sheen.”

It’s never really about them; they’re just the backdrop for our story. They are the measuring stick we use to inspire or comfort ourselves. We forget… well that’s not really accurate, we willfully choose to ignore, that they’re human.

Back to our text. Why are Moses and Elijah in this story? The short answer is that Moses represents the Law and Elijah the prophets. Together, they symbolize the entire Old Testament. Remember, Jesus didn’t come to break the Old Testament. He loves his Hebrew Scriptures. He wants to fulfill the Hebrew Scriptures. Moses and Elijah need to be here to show the continuation of their work in his ministry. But I think there’s more to it than that. They’re here on this mountaintop for a reason. Both of these men have stood on the mountaintop.

Moses stood on Mount Sinai, and received the tablets of the law. The cloud descended on the mountaintop. God spoke from the cloud, and thunder rolled down toward the people. When Moses came down, his face glowed with reflected glory, and they were so terrified they made him cover his face.

Elijah stood on Mount Carmel. He faced down 450 prophets of Baal. God answered his prayer with a fire so hot that it burnt the wood, the offering, the water, the stones, and scorched the earth. When he came down off that mountain he ran ahead of the king’s chariot all the way to Jezreel.

They’ve been on the mountaintop, not just once, but twice. Moses stood on Mount Nebo, and looked down into the Holy Land. He looked down on the promised land of God, the land he had spent 40 years of his life seeking, and he knew he would never make it. He made a stupid, arrogant mistake, and this was the price. He could see the Holy Land, but never go in.

Elijah stood on Mount Horeb. Well, stood isn’t really the right word. He cowered. He hid… in a cave. The man who faced down 450 prophets ran and hid when Jezebel’s messenger delivered her death threat. When God asked him what he was doing, he complained. Then God revealed himself not in the wind, or the earthquake, or the fire, but the still small voice. And the voice said, “What are you doing, here?” And he complained again in exactly the same words. He learned nothing.

We’ve studied Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount over the last few weeks. Matthew intentionally parallels the story of Jesus with the story of Moses so that the Sermon on the Mount echoes the giving of the law on Mount Sinai. If that was the first mountaintop, the victorious mountaintop, then what is this?

We Christians are sometimes so careful to deify Jesus that we forget, or we willfully choose to ignore, that he was human. Perhaps Moses and Elijah were there because he needed them to be. He needed to see what was coming as part of a larger story, the story of faith, the story of deliverance not from all suffering, but through and out the other side. You see this confirmed on the Mount of Olives when Jesus cries, “If it is possible, let this cup pass from me.” You hear it confirmed on the hill of Golgotha, when Jesus cries, “My God, my God, Why have you forsaken me?” Jesus was fully human.

But he must have learned something from these two. Or perhaps they reminded him of something he already knew. Because he follows “Let this cup pass from me” with “Not my will, but yours be done.” And he follows “Why have you forsaken me” with “Into your hands I commend my spirit.”

If you ever wondered what was the right thing to do. If you ever knew the right thing to do and wondered if you had the strength to do it, then you have something in common with Jesus. If after all that, you went and did it anyway, if you made God’s will a reality in this place, forgetting the cost, for the sake of your brothers and sisters, then I’d say you share a family resemblance. You and Jesus have something in common.

These heroes of faith are not porcelain statues to be observed from afar. They are human beings just like us. The word Christian does not mean Christ follower. It means little Christ. As he is for us, we are to be for others, even for Charlie Sheen.

Benediction: You may have noticed I left someone out. Three someones, actually. What about Peter, James, and John? Why are they in the story? First, they teach us that Jesus is not one among many. You don’t build three equal houses and put Jesus in one. God says, “This is my son. Listen to him.” And second, try as we might, we can’t stay on the mountaintop. All we can do is hold onto what we learned there and take it with us into the valley of everyday life. May God meet you on the mountaintop and walk with you through the valley and out the other side. In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, one God forever, amen.

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Apr 28 2010
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Sermons

Sermon on the 23rd Psalm: Sheep are Stupid

The 23rd Psalm is possibly the most recognized chapter in the entire Bible. It has brought comfort to thousands, perhaps millions. To my mind, this effectively proves what I have long suspected, that most of us have no clue what this book means.

The Lord is my shepherd. That makes us what? Sheep. I know only two things about sheep. 1. Wool. 2. Mutton. That’s it. Sheep are entirely outside my experience. So I did a little research this week.

Sheep Face by brew ha ha

Original work "Sheep Face" by brew ha ha Shared on a Creative Commons License

How many of you have been to a circus before? Did you see any trained animals? Bears? Elephants? Tigers? You know what you didn’t see? Sheep. You know why? Because sheep are stupid.

Did you know that sheep are the only domesticated animal that cannot go wild? Cats, dogs, birds, horses, pigs, even cows if you set them loose in the world they’ll get thin, they’ll get smart, and they’ll get by. Sheep?  Sheep get eaten.

In the animal kingdom, there are four survival stances: fight, flight, posture, and submit. We see this in armed conflict as well. I can shoot you, I can run away, I can fire a warning shot, or I can surrender. So how does the sheep stack up?

Fight: Sheep have neither offensive nor defensive weapons. No fangs, no claws, no shell, no spray, nothing. On the upside, they do come equipped with about 8 pounds of Velcro all over their body, so you can grab them pretty much anywhere and drag them to the ground

What about flight? For starters, they’re slow. Their eyesight is just as poor as their hearing. They have little strength, less stamina, and no sense of direction. Best of all, they have an over-active startle reflex, and they don’t blend into anything. So even if they could run, they can’t hide.

Posture. Dogs bark, cats hiss, rattlesnakes rattle… Sheep baaa. Baaa! That’s the barnyard equivalent of  “Please don’t eat me, please don’t eat me, please don’t eat me!” Fearsome, yeah? Dogs raise their hackles, cats arch their back, rattlesnakes coil and lift their head to make themselves appear larger. What can sheep do? How do you puff up when you’re already fluffy?

Sheep know one trick and one trick only. They flock. We used to think flocking was complex behavior. We’d look at the precision of a flock of birds and imagine how hard it would be to fly planes that close together. We know how hard it is to get a hundred people moving in the same direction, but computer science has taught us that flocking is very simple. All you need is a hundred tiny brains, each big enough to hold two rules. 1. If you see a sheep, get closer. 2. Don’t bump into anyone. Here’s how it works.

Here’s the herd. Over here is Little Joe Sheep. Joe sees a wolf. Startle reflex kicks in and he starts to run. No one wants to get bumped, so they all start to run. No one wants to be alone, so they all run together. Notice that the entire flock is running, and the only one who knows why is Joe, and Joe is probably already dead. They keep running until they get tired, the wolf stops to eat Joe, and they live to baa another day. That’s it. That’s their entire survival strategy. Please don’t eat me. Eat Joe. He’s tasty. Run awaaaay!

And God says, “That’s you.” It’s the language of the Psalms and it’s the language of Jesus, when he calls himself the good shepherd. When I was a youth minister, we’d go to camp and the kids would sing this song: I don’t wanna be a Sadducee. I don’t wanna be a Sadducee. Cuz they’re so sad, you see? I just wanna be a sheep baa baa baa baa. I just wanna be a sheep baa baa baa baa. Pray the Lord my sould to keep. I just wanna be a sheep baa baa baa baa.

We have no clue what we’re saying! Sheep are dumb, stubborn, and willful. Even when they have a shepherd around they’re not safe because they still get lost, get drowned, and get trapped. Pick another animal. Any other animal. A rat! Sure, they’re flea infested, disease-carrying scavengers, but at least rats are smart. But God says, “Nope. You’re a sheep.”

shepherd by Reza Vaziri

Original work "shepherd" by Reza Vaziri Shared on a Creative Commons License

Fine. If we’re sheep, let’s learn about the shepherd. If you read Genesis, you’d think being a shepherd is a good thing. All the big names are shepherds. Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses. But when the Israelites are taken into exile, they go through a cultural shift from nomad to city dweller. By the time of Jesus, shepherds have such low social status, that their testimony isn’t acceptable in court.

Besides being despised, their job is dangerous. Every shepherd carried a staff for the sheep and a rod for the wolves. The sling was dual purpose. If a sheep started wandering off, you could drop a rock in front of its nose and it would run back to the flock. David showed you what else it’s for.

Suppose it was a good day. No thieves. No wolves. You still have to take care of these stupid sheep. You have to go fetch them when they get lost. They have four legs. You have two. Which means any place they can get into, but not out of, is definitely difficult and probably dangerous for you.

This is the holy land. It’s not like there are green pastures and still waters all over the place. This is hard land divided by dark valleys. Every morning you walk to the pasture. At mid-day you make them lay down, so they can get the most out of their food. In the afternoon, you take them to still water, because they’re scared of running water, because of they fall in, they drown. In the evening, you walk them home. If any are too young or too sick to keep up, you carry them.

Your corral looks like a big circle, a thorny hedge with a tiny opening. You sit in the doorway and hold your staff low so they can only enter slowly, one at a time. One by one, you check them out and count them, and assuming everything’s fine, you lay down in the doorway so that nothing gets in or out except over your body. Tomorrow, you do it all again.

The Bible says there are three kinds of shepherds. The hired hand, who does the bare minimum: feeds them, waters them, and when the wolf comes, abandons them. The bad shepherd drives them. He pushes from behind and smacks them to keep them in line. As a result, the sheep become even more stupid and more skittish. They never learn to exercise whatever intelligence God gave them, so they never thrive. They just survive.

The hired hand abandons them, the bad shepherd drives them, but the good shepherd knows them, and they know him. He doesn’t have to drive them from behind. He leads them from the front, so that whoever attacks has to go through him first. He calls them by name and they come to him. If two good shepherds shared a meal and their flocks became intermixed, they would stand at opposite ends of the field, call out, and the sheep would sort themselves out. The good shepherd is their guide through danger, their gate to safety, their rescue when lost, their healing when hurt. The good shepherd is their life.

What does this mean for us? Three things. First, when we see the phrase, “for his name’s sake” we need to pay attention. If it’s for God’s sake, it’s definitely for our benefit, but probably not for our comfort. All we want is a nice life: enough food, water, and shelter, no pain, no work, no danger. God isn’t satisfied with nice. God is good. Notice the very next phrase after for his name’s sake? “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death.” Sound fun to you?

Second, be like the shepherd. Don’t push. Lead. Don’t yell. Call. Share your life and build trust so that when you speak, your people listen. You don’t need to influence everyone. You just need a little flock of people who know you, who trust you, because you know them. You get to decide whose opinion matters, and it’s not the critic.

Third, we are not nearly as tough, smart, or independent as we think we are. And neither is anyone else. I met a man once, a biker who gave his life to Christ, and he talked about what a relief it was not having to be in charge any more. He had spent a chunk of his life making sure that no one, no one, disrespected him or his crew. He had to be constantly aware, not just of what other people were doing, but what they might be thinking. The weight of it drove him to violence and addiction. It wasn’t until he accepted that he was not in charge that he was free to be himself without worrying what anyone else thought.

We are sheep in wolves’ clothing. Trying to be cool. Trying to be in charge and independent. Who are we trying to impress? Other sheep? We think hanging out on the fringes makes us cool. Actually, it makes us dinner. Smart sheep stay close to the shepherd.

Benediction:  The 23rd Psalm brings us comfort because we usually hear it at funerals, or in the hospital, or when things go wrong. When life proves to us that we are not in charge, that despite our best efforts, we are not in control, then we find comfort in the shepherd’s arms. How much joy do we miss, how much time do we waste, trying to prove to ourselves and each other that we’re not really sheep, and we don’t need help? Now go, and may the good shepherd who loves you anyway be your guide, guard, and companion every step of the way.

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Apr 27 2010
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Articles and Ponderings

What I Believe… Mostly… For now…

My vicinage council was last Saturday, and it was great! A couple folks from church asked me to post my presentation here since they couldn’t make it. It’s a snapshot of my theology for those interested in how my brain works. Notably absent is any discussion of scripture. It was rightly the first question asked by the council. I’ll type up a summary of my response and add it later.

Classical Christianity recognizes two core mysteries of faith: trinity and incarnation. Since the common foundation of both is love, Christians ought to be above all else loving. Since we experience both through covenant, Christians ought to be a covenant people. Since the hearts of God is triune, Christians ought to be a community. Since God revealed himself through incarnation, Christians ought to be missional. We are a loving covenant community on a mission from God.

We love as Christ loves. Our love is sacrificial; it conquers through suffering. Our love is creative; it refuses to accept things as they are. Our love is subversive; it refuses to “fight fair”. And ultimately, our love is not really our love at all. It is God’s love active in and through us. The more we reflect God’s love, the more truly we are Christians.

If we are true friends, we take care of each other. We seek and offer advice. If need be, we warn each other. We make recommendations. We are involved in each other’s lives, and we drop everything to help in emergencies. It’s what friends do, and it’s what churches do, because that’s the nature of a covenant relationship. This is why the Cambridge Platform defines the marks of a congregational church as: mutual care, consultation, admonition, participation, recommendation, and to minister relief.

A wise man once told me that for love to be real it must be free. Our time together today is a perfect example. We are free to invite you or not. You are free to attend or not. You are free to recommend that I be installed or not. The congregation is free to heed your recommendation or not. But if we consistently choose the not, are we really living in relationship? As we freely accept and live out these covenant bonds, we become tiny images of the trinity.

We are a disciplined community, with boundaries and practices. In the student/teacher relationship, the teacher defines the boundaries and sets the practices that shape the character of the student. The boundary in this case isn’t the kind we’re used to. It’s internal. Christians through out history have spent far too much time trying to define the edges, the limits, of Christianity, when we should be focused on the center. As long as we are gathered around Christ, we are naturally in fellowship with each other.

The local church, in every aspect but especially when gathered in worship, is our greatest opportunity to practice and experience loving community. We need the witness of Scripture to correct and guide us. We need the intelligent and prayerful interpretation of the preacher. We need to experience the power of the sacraments. We need to stand united in prayer and praise, even if it’s only for a few brief moments once a week. Because when we fail to do those things, we lose touch with the root of all life, and we suffer.

But Sunday morning is not enough. How can I say I know someone if I refuse to experience some part of their pain, or their joy? How can I say we live in community, when my involvement in your life ends when you leave the meeting? This is true in our personal relationship with God, in our communal relationships within the church, and our fraternal relationships in our regional and national associations.

We are called from our old lives to new life in Christ, but that is not the end. From that starting point, we are sent into the world. We are each a tiny image of the incarnation, and as a church we are an empathic community that constantly enters into the lives and families and cultures of this present world. This explains mission work, youth work, prison work, hospital work, service projects, and a thousand other things churches do every day without ever really stopping to wonder why.

Free and loving interdependence is the ordering reality of the universe. We are interdependent whether we recognize it or not, and we are free to ignore that reality (at our peril) if we so choose. By acknowledging this reality, our Congregational ancestors shaped a way of doing church that reflects the very heart of God.
Are we really a loving covenant community on a mission from God? Or are we more often a clique on a mission of self-interest, or a club on a mission of self-preservation? Loving communal, missional, and covenantal are all other-centered adjectives. Therefore, opposite of Christianity isn’t paganism, or drunkenness, or homosexuality, or liberals, or rap music, or anything else that televangelists condemn. The opposite of Christianity is self-centeredness. If people find just as much of that at church on Sunday as they do at work on Monday, maybe that’s why so few want to come.

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May 05 2008
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Sermons, The Third Way

Up and Out

Audio here

Title: Up and Out (Confirmation Sunday – shared sermon)
Texts: Acts 1:1-11, Luke 24:44-53
Date: May 4, 2008

UP – Rev. Robert J. Brink
There are three moments in the story of Jesus that we might label, “thin places.” Places where the physical world, and the spiritual world seem for a moment to touch. The first is his baptism, when the spirit descends in the form of a dove, and a voice calls from heaven, “This is my son, in whom I am well pleased.” The second is the transfiguration, where Jesus shines like the sun and again a voice calls out from heaven, “This is my son, listen to him.” The third thin place is the ascension, when Jesus gives his great commission to his disciples, promises to send them the Holy Spirit, and then ascends to the right hand of the Father.

What are we to make of this story? It’s not very appealing. There are no masterful teaching moments, no confrontations. He just goes away. If he had stayed with them forever, that would have made a better story, but he doesn’t. If he had gone away and sent the Spirit at the same moment, that would have made for a better story, but he doesn’t. He makes them wait, without him, in Jerusalem. They have to wait until Pentecost before the Spirit comes. And in the meantime, where is he? Off with God somewhere, unreachable.

At least that’s what I always thought. Then I went to seminary and learned something interesting. When Jesus ascended into heaven, he wasn’t leaving his humanity behind. He was bringing it along. So now some piece of us, some part of who we are is united with the very heart of God. It’s not as if he got up there, and said “Phew, I’m glad that’s over, now to get back to this whole eternal perfection thing.” The change Jesus made goes much deeper than that, so that for all eternity, there is a piece of God that identifies with us completely, that understands us at our best and our worst. And since there is no division within God, that piece is not really a piece at all, but is brought up and in, and united with the whole, so that there is no piece of God that fails to understand, no corner of God that sees us as the enemy.

If all this sounds a bit too big for our heads, that’s because it is. God is too big for our heads, so all that we know of God is what God has revealed. There is no way for us to build a ladder of logic that reaches to the sky, no experiment we could create that would prove it. All these things we accept on faith because there is no other way. That’s not an admission of failure, only a recognition of reality. God is too big for our heads.

God may be too big, but God’s revelation is not. God reveals to us things we could never have figured out for ourselves, things that hurt our brains even to think about, and yet they reveal something of the nature of God. The incarnation that we talked about last week is one of those revelations. This week’s ascension is another. Incarnation teaches us that when we look at Jesus we see God, and ascension teaches us that in some way far beyond our understanding, God has become one with us.

Obviously, that process is not complete. God has accepted us, but we have not accepted God. Imagine a couple that gets married but then doesn’t move in together, doesn’t share a bed, doesn’t share bank accounts, doesn’t even see each other except for an hour on weekends. Sure, they’re married, but they don’t have a marriage.

You confirmands have reached the age where you can make choices for yourselves. The vows you made are similar to marriage vows, except directed toward God instead of another person. You’re old enough to know what you’re saying. It will take a lifetime to figure out what you mean, of course, but you’re mature enough to begin. The question is, what kind of marriage will it be? Will you be married in word alone, or will you share a life together?

We’ve all received God’s love, but has it changed the way we live? He ascended so that we could be one with God, and someday he will descend again. We will come face to face with God. And for some of us it will be like coming home again, like remembering a cherished memory long forgotten, like putting on a glove you’ve worn so long it feels like a second skin. It will be the fulfillment of all we have longed for and worked for and hoped for.

But for others, it will be like cold water on the face, like a cloying smell, like ringing in the ears. It will be the unavoidable confrontation with the one we have worked so long and so hard to avoid. This is judgment, not a gavel and a man in a black robe making decisions. Judgment is revelation. Do not fear hell. Fear living your life in such a way that hell would be preferable to living with God.

Our world is full of thin places. Today one of them. It is a chance for us to ascend into the presence of God, to experience a fraction of what will be when we are at last reunited with our creator. You have been chosen. Rise and be loved.

OUT – Rev. Steven A. Peay, Ph.D.
Jesus had been with them as Luke tells us, “he presented himself alive to them by many convincing proofs, appearing to them during forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God.” All through his ministry Jesus focused on the kingdom of God, which he preached was “at hand.” The problem was that those listening to him couldn’t get away from the notion that a “kingdom” or “reign” was a place. Jesus was revealing, in himself, that it was not a place, but a person – himself. The kingdom of God was among them and they couldn’t get it. Even after the resurrection and the forty days together they asked, “Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?” Rob’s sermon title from last Sunday would work again here, “you just don’t get it.”

So, he reminds them again that what is important is for them to wait for the coming, in fullness, of the Spirit he has promised. He tells them, “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witness in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” There’s the point – Jesus goes UP and now we are sent OUT. The kingdom is now within us and we are to be witnesses to that kingdom right here and right now.

This is what Augustine preached to his folks in the early days of the church:
“Today our Lord Jesus Christ ascended into heaven; let our hearts ascend with him. Listen to the words of the Apostle: ‘If then you were raised with Christ, seek what is above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Think of what is above, not of what is in earth.’ For just as he remained with us even after his ascension, so too we are already in heaven with him, even though what is promised us had not yet been fulfilled in our bodies.
Christ is now exalted above the heavens, but he still suffers on earth all the pain that we, the members of his body, have to bear. He showed this when he cried out from above, ‘Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?’ and when he said: ‘I was hungry and you gave me food.’

Why do we here on earth not strive to find rest with him in heaven even now, by way of faith, hope, and love that unites us to him? While in heaven he is also with us; and we, though on earth, are with him. He is here with us by his divinity, his power, and his love. We cannot be in heaven, as he is on earth, by divinity, but in him, we can be there by love.” [Sermon for Ascension Day, quoted in Days of the Lord, vol. 3, p. 223-4]

So, we are already one with the Lord, joined by love, and now we are to go out to be his witnesses. We begin close to home and then move out more and more. Our outreach here at First Church needs a bit of work. We’re doing ok with the “uttermost parts of the earth,” but it’s the close to home we have to work on. Let’s be honest – when is the last time you spoke favorably about your church to a friend, co-worker or neighbor? When is the last time you invited someone to attend a worship service here with you? Study after study clearly shows that it is you (and I normally don’t like to do that) the folks in the pews, who are the most effective in getting people to come to church. Eighty-five percent plus of folks who are involved in a church are because a friend or neighbor invited them to come. That’s the point of being the Lord’s witness.

Witness isn’t just by words, but by deeds. How we live our lives makes a huge statement about who we are and Whose we are. Even how we leave this building, leave the parking lot makes a difference. I like what one of our neighboring churches has as you leave the parking lot – now you are entering the mission field. That’s the point of OUT – we are to take the message of love, hope, peace and community we have received and share it.

I like what my old New Testament professor from Saint Meinrad Seminary, Bernard Brandon Scott, says about the angels’ question there in Acts. “The angels are asking ‘Why are you hanging around here? Get on with it.’ Just as Jesus offered no hint as to when Israel would be redeemed, so the angels offer no hint as to when Jesus will return. Our goal is to be witnesses, not to speculate about the signs of the future.” [New Proclamation Commentary Year B – Easter through Pentecost, p. 63] I don’t know if I can make it any plainer than that. Our faith tells us that God is looking for us and for relationship with us. Perhaps we should just “get on with it” and then witness to it?

As we have opened the Word, soon we will share the bread and the cup. The goal of both is to give us food for the journey out. Our mission is to go out from here and make a difference in the lives of people, in the life of this world in which we live. Jesus goes up, sends us the Spirit and sends us out. Our task is to go in peace and be his witnesses. I pray that we get it, realize that the kingdom is in us, and go live like it – out beyond these walls, as we used to say, “in front of God and everybody.” It’s our mission as Christ-followers: UP and OUT.

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Mar 09 2008
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Sermons, The Third Way

God Makes Dead Bones Dance

Date: March 9, 2008
Text: Ezekiel 37:1-10; John 11:1-6; 17-45
Title: God Makes Dead Bones Dance (audio)

Lent is a great time to talk about death. We’re walking week-by-week closer to the story of Jesus’ death and resurrection. Many of us have been struggling throughout lent to give something up, which is a small kind of death, a death to self. It’s good that lent only comes once a year because it’s hard to talk about death. It is also good that lent comes each year whether we like it or not, because death is something we need to talk about.

We live in a culture that minimizes death and idolizes youth. Death to self? We’d much rather talk about self-esteem, self-awareness, and self-actualization than self-denial. We distract ourselves from the world’s suffering with fancy toys. We distract ourselves from our own brokenness with frenetic activity. We need to stop at least once a year and try to see things as they really are.

We have a church without martyrs, a world without justice, and wars without end. These are easy to get excited about, obvious. Preachers stand up and say, “It’s a sin and a shame. We sit here in luxury while others starve.” And everyone nods their heads and agrees that it’s a horrible shame and a tragedy and we should all feel rotten for enjoying the privilege of being born American.

That’s the goal right? To make people feel ashamed? If everyone feels guilty, they’ll want to be forgiven, they’ll seek out a priest. This is the trap we call religion. Religions set themselves up as mediators between God and humanity. They claim a monopoly on forgiveness. So, it’s in their best interest to make you feel guilty. That’s what keeps you coming back.

You feel good while you’re here and then you walk out the door and it’s not five minutes but you’ve done something wrong again. And the wrongs just keep piling up until you can get back to church again on Sunday and get forgiven.

That’s the easy way. You just make people feel vaguely guilty and you offer them vague forgiveness, and send them on their way. Or you could go with the even easier way. You make people feel really guilty once and then promise them forgiveness forever.

Just pray the prayer written on the back of this tract and you’ll go to heaven. If you’ve ever committed the tiniest of sins, ever stretched the truth, ever had a sexual thought about someone who is not currently your spouse, ever failed to do something good when it was in your power to do it, then you’re a sinner worthy of the flames of hell. Better pray that prayer quick because you might die at any moment. You might die while you’re sitting right there in that pew, and if you haven’t prayed the prayer then you’re going to experience eternal conscious torment. All you have to do is pray the prayer.

See how easy that is? But there’s still a catch. What if you didn’t pray well enough? What if you prayed, but then you forgot? What it you prayed it and you meant it, but then you changed your mind. Do you have to pray again? Once you claim your get out of hell free card, is it possible to lose it? Uh oh. I’d better go to church. It’s the religion trap all over again, only I don’t have to make you feel guilty every week; you feel guilty constantly all by yourself!

I’m not here to make you feel guilty. I’m not here to offer forgiveness. Forgiveness is already offered, without limit, without price tag. I’m in no position to barter between you and God. God has come to earth and eliminated the middle man. I’m here to say that this is the place where it’s ok to tell the truth… about what’s going on in the world, about what’s going on in our lives.

So let’s tell the truth for a minute. Half the world really does live on two dollars a day or less. But asking God’s forgiveness for children starving in Africa is like political campaigners spouting vague platitudes. “I’m a candidate for change. I want children to get a good education.” Wow. What a revelation. Just once I’d like to see a campaign ad that said, “Reading. Who needs it?” “A vote for me is a vote for stupidity.”

I hope we all agree that’s just a little bit ludicrous. So just for a few moments, lets stop beating ourselves up over the fact that we happened to be born American and some other folks weren’t. If we’re going to look for problems to solve, then lets look closer to home.

What’s the most common problem in our church? People are too busy. I didn’t say it’s our worst problem. We’ve got our share of baggage, just like everyone else. But our most common, most visible problem is we are horribly overbooked. We are running ourselves ragged. We feel disconnected from our friends and families, especially our families.

Can I bring you a message from your kids? If you gave them a choice between increasing your net worth by ten thousand dollars and having you home more, they would pick you. Unless you’re a jerk of course, then they’d take the money.

Too many of us are disconnected, stretched thin, dried out, scattered around like a bunch of dry bones. We’ve all got places in our lives that feel dead. And sooner or later, we’re all going to be dead.

But we don’t talk about it. Wouldn’t be polite. We just pretend everything is ok. Which is why so many of our young people cut themselves. They know the world is messed up, they know that they are at least in some way complicit, and they know they’re not supposed to talk about it. Especially if that brokenness extends into their own home. They’re job is to smile and get good grades so they can get a good job and afford the kind of life they’ve become accustomed to. So they take all those negative feelings and they stuff them until they go numb, until pain feels better than feeling nothing at all.

Death is the inescapable truth of the world we know, the world we live in every day. But our readings claim that death is no longer the supreme constant. It has been overthrown. Ezekiel and John both watch, jaws agape, as God reverses the flow of human events, repeals the second law of thermodynamics, and returns life to that which had lapsed into nothingness.

That’s the Bible in a nutshell: God created the world, but it became broken and began to fade, and now God is restoring it. God is pulling the scattered bones together, building connections, adding muscle, uniting us into a body. God breathes new life into us. At least that’s the plan. We still have a choice. We can collaborate in this work, or we can fight it.

Jesus stands at the tomb of Lazarus, orders them to roll the stone away, and calls out in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come forth!” Then silence as everyone holds their breath, wanting to believe, hoping it could be true. The silence stretches on for what seems like an eternity. And so Jesus calls again, “Lazarus, come forth!” Again silence. And a tiny voice calls out, “No thank you. Nobody here but us dead people. Nothing to see here. Move along. Don’t forget to roll the stone back on the way out.”

The church is not a building. The church is not an institution. The church is you and me being transformed into light and life and love. It’s not enough that we come together. It’s not enough that we move with purpose. God breathes the Spirit into us. And if we will only allow it, that Spirit will transform our lives from the inside out.

If we can accept that we are already forgiven, already loved, already alive, then we can stop hiding in tombs and join the celebration. We can watch as God changes our lives and our priorities. Perhaps we can learn to slow down, enjoy our lives, enjoy the young people. Perhaps we will see less war and less poverty. But changes like that only begin here, between hearts brave enough to be honest, and humble enough to be healed. May God make it so in us today.

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