If not which scene do we want to enter?
April 10, 2011
John
3:16-21
16“For
God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone
who believes
in him may not perish but may have eternal
life.
17“Indeed,
God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in
order that the world might be saved
through him. 18Those
who believe in him are not condemned; but those who do not believe
are condemned already, because they have not believed in the name of
the only Son of God. 19And
this is the judgment, that the light
has come into the world, and people loved
darkness rather than light because
their deeds were evil. 20For
all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that
their deeds may not be exposed. 21But
those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be
clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God.”
We
come into the next scene and observe quietly from the side the images
we read…
Its night time…a man is seen skulking about…thinking
his identity is protected by the darkness
For he, Nicodemus, is a leader of his people, but here
he consults with the rebel…
the one that is causing the troubles…
the one that offers intriguing possibilities about the
Kingdom of God…so long anticipated…
But when the rebel teacher shares the plane, the leader
is incredulous…”born from above…What does that mean?
But wants to believe…but this isn’t making any
sense…
Light and dark…night and day,
the images of hope and despair, of ignorance and
enlightenment
textures of fear and longing…
these provide the packaging and the process of our next
“scenario of salvation”
In
these verses from John’s gospel we find ourselves engaged with
several profound tensions…
The World vs. God
The cosmos, of thought and place, all that includes both
religious and political institutions
All poised to question God’s ultimate purposes and
involvement with the creation!
Saved vs. condemned
A longing for the spiritual security of knowing that
your behavior is approved by God
A plan to seize the opportunity that might be “at
hand”
Versus the despair of knowing that a key moment was
missed for ever
Belief vs. behavior
Nicodemus: Is what I thought was right, now wrong?
Are the ideas that I had insufficient to make me right
with God?
How does what I think relate to what I do?
Eternal vs. temporal
How big is God’s time?
How do we escape from the limitedness of our earthly
moment?
All these at play in this nocturnal dialogue…
And
then we must ask: What about those who “love darkness”
Nicodemus, wrapped in protective darkness seeks the
light…
But others prefer to remain unseen, undetected and doing
what makes them feel good
Others simply prefer (!) to “do evil”
Jesus
teaching here is clear:
Belief leads to eternal life!
But clearly belief, as suggested by the underlying Greek
word, is a trust that goes beyond intellectual apprehension
It is behavior that based in a confidence that the
unseen, transcendent God is present and at work
It is relational conduct that brings love and
compassion, justice and peace into the daily lives of all of God’s
people
And
Jesus suggests that each person approaches a choice point…a crisis,
a moment in which personal judgement is critical…
…the decision comes as each person considers his/her
own relationship to God…particularly as they are confronted by God
in the person of Jesus…
Accepting Jesus teaching…
the person moves toward the kingdom…
begins to live within eternity…
manifests the “saved” (shalom) life and emits the
light of God’s love
Eternity, timeless and without boundaries, God’s
gracious purpose calls us to respond
Althought it may be undeserved, God’s graciousness
enfolds us as we, like Nicodemus, work out our own salvation…w/fear
and trembling
That we might be saved: whole, enlightened, spiritually
healthy, tuned to God’s purposes, in just and loving relationship
with our neighbors…
That is what we would like…
But is
there a guarantee?
Nicodemus was seeking more assurance
No there is judgement…Krisis point
Deed or no deed
How we “deed up” determines how much eternity we
get…?
Understanding that then (and now) there is possibility
for both outcomes: condemnation or salvation…
the word “believe” must be seen as “trusting”
that the positive actions of just and loving behaviors,
even when greeted with violent responses, is what God wants at all
times and in all places
We must struggle to achieve that level of trust/faith!
A moment to unpack a little history…
We remember that there were two kinds of Baptists
Particular/Calvinist
Hard core Calvinists believed in
Predestination
God had already decided who would be elected to the
Kingdom
People “discovered” (in moments of conversion) this
election in their lives as they were empowered to be “good church
folks”
Those beyond election…were out of luck
General/Arminian
Believing that God was gracious and good
And really wanted to save everyone,
their theology stretched to make it possible for
everyone who so decided, to approach God
Unfortunately, this theology has become over the years
“popularized” to the point that most feel that God will save
everyone (universalism) ultimately
What this does is take each individual “off the hook”
But
we have to come back to the story this morning and claim that
believing in Jesus…is seen in deeds of light
Deeds that each individual does with a full
consciousness of God’s purpose
Deeds that build up community and bring healing to human
relationships
Deeds that are decided within the heart and mind of each
believer who so trusts God to be present at all times, in all places…
This
scenario suggests that for us today salvation emerges from a
relationship between the seeking human being and the God whose
intentions and purpose is “that the world might be saved through
[Jesus]”
To participate in this scenario we must understand the
impact and consequence of our own deeds
That each of us lives within a Web of relationship
through which God’s love may move through us and into the world
around us
This means that we (in a post-modern cosmos) are engaged
in systemic involvment with family, community, government, ecology
and our salvation/healthiness must intend to bring reconciliation and
healing to all those whom we affect.
Our part of salvation is to decide to bring
“timeless” values to our moment, our place in life…?
Which brings us back to that timeless Baptist value:
Visibility!
When we move from darkness toward God’s light, we
become more and more visible
Our deeds are open/public, there is only transparency
and no hiddeness
Our deeds of light and love are seen in this our place
but have global and long lasting results
Our deeds of light and love are transformative, changing
the insecure into the faithful and the unknowing into the enlightened
Our deeds of light and love are hopeful and inspire hope
all around us
In
this scenario, played out in darkness
Light
comes into our lives as we share in conversations with Jesus
Light comes into our lives as we put the ossified and
dehumanizing instititutions of political or religious function into
the long gone past and open the future with the eternal potentials of
God’s inbreaking kingdom
Light comes into our world as we proclaim to each
individual and each temporal instition: God has already acted…so
that the world might be saved!
April 17: Palm Sunday: "Today Salvation"
Luke 19:1-10
1He entered
Jericho and was passing through it. 2A
man was there named Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was
rich. 3He was
trying to see who Jesus was, but on account of the crowd he could
not, because he was short in stature. 4So
he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree to see him, because he was
going to pass that way. 5When
Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said to him, “Zacchaeus,
hurry and come down; for I must stay at your house today.”
6So he hurried
down and was happy to welcome him. 7All
who saw it began to grumble and said, “He has gone to be the guest
of one who is a sinner.” 8Zacchaeus
stood there and said to the Lord, “Look, half of my possessions,
Lord, I will give to the poor; and if I have defrauded anyone of
anything, I will pay back four times as much.” 9Then
Jesus said to him, “Today
salvation has come to this house, because he too is a son of Abraham.
10For
the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost.”
Luke 19:35-38
35Then they
brought it to Jesus; and after throwing their
cloaks on the colt, they set Jesus on it.
36As he rode
along, people kept spreading their cloaks
on the road. 37As
he was now approaching the path down from the Mount of Olives, the
whole multitude
of the disciples began to praise God joyfully with a loud voice for
all the deeds
of power that they had seen, 38saying,
“Blessed is the king
who comes in the name of the Lord!
Peace in heaven, and glory in the highest heaven!”
The beginning of Holy Week…
The most solemn and important moments in Christian
experience
The most coherent memory…(in
all four gospels, told almost identically)
It is from this
story that we claim our most profound identity as followers of Jesus
It is within this
story that the very mystery of God’s presence in our lives is
discovered
These moments
remembered from so long ago are the motivating reason that we come
here this morning…and every Sunday morning
Because we believe that Jesus, lived, taught, healed and confronted,
that he was captured and killed…after which his life became even
more powerfully the life that we live…
But if we have no palms…?
Reminds us that there are many memories…with different
details…
Luke has adapted his telling
of the passion to a European (Rome?) context.
Johns version had people do both…palms
and coats…
What ever the details, the point in the
telling is the respect and anticipation of salvation
It
is to capture the crazy sense of expectation that was present in the
followers and in those who anticipated God’s intervention into
their lives
The fulfilment of ancient promises…the
liberation of their nation…the end of oppression
For those lined up
along the path down from the Mt. of Olives salvation was about to
happen when this new messiah claims the kingdom that he has preached…
So for many in the crowds the questions swirled: When
is going to be complete?, how do I become a part
of this renewed kingdom, Me?
What about me?
These are the questions that most matter when we think
about salvation
Our questions raise not only political and
religious points but also existential, ontological and ethical
issues…
Or if we read Time magazine
this week… there seems to be a possibility that
there is NO HELL!
Does that put us out of business…?
I
haven’t read it yet…but I doubt it…
It may be a little more complicated…if we
read our scripture lesson carefully
No…especially as we look at the story of Zacchaeus
For here is a story of an encounter with Jesus, a scene in which
salvation is clearly present
But salvation
here has components that leave out entirely a heaven or a hell!
For Zacchaeus
salvation unfolds into his new life…
First, for Zacch salvation is a profound personal
transformation that emerged out of some internal longing
As a Jew he was
aware of the prophets and their preaching
As a Jew there
was a moral message in his religion
As a human
being, he must have been somewhat aware of the hardships he inflicted
on his tax victims…
Something was
eating him…
Something that he thought might be satisfied if he could just connect
with Jesus…whose reputation reached his hungry heart!
Second, salvation come in a very clear
social context:
Zacchaeus knew that if he was to be whole and healthy, he needed to
be about “right-wising” with those who he had
injured…paying back those he had defrauded, sharing his
wealth with those who had little
Clearly the salvation that came to
Zacchaeus that day could be described in economic and social justice
terms (a component of salvation that we should not forget today!)
And third, connection
with the Traditions…
acting as a true “son of Abraham” Jesus
asserts that Zacchaeus would fully to inherit all the
Promises made by God
This ties him into an historical community
that is (as he was) confronted continually by God’s interactions to
move toward shalom and right relationship with all the children of
earth!
As we move (at least in our annual remembering of
the drama of salvation) toward Jerusalem
Can we use Zacchaeus as a model for us to deepen
our faith, clarify our spiritual longings and adopt to our present
moment?
We take this week to reflect on what is going on in our hearts: are
we internally motivated to change, grow, move
beyond comfortable habits?
How much time and effort do we expend
internally to see Jesus and discover the eternity
in his presence?
Do we feel any demand to radically restructure social
relationships and distribution of such power
that we might have politically and economically?
Is there anything that
we really imagine and claim as a powerful reminder of the reason
Jesus was greeted so enthusiastically in Jerusalem…Do we expect our
world to change? …or are we happy with it the way it is?
Those lining the pathway down from the Mt. Of Olives
were full of festival spirits…the Passover in the city
(more solemn than Fat Tues in New Orleans) but still a
buzz with anticipation, national fervor, religious sentiment, family
reconnections
Here was the reputed paripatetic, preacher prophet and
healer…the Messiah? The son of David…Son of Man…Son of God…Mary
and Joseph’s son (if you remember …back before he got famous)
While I’m sure the stories in the Gospels were written
and passed to us by those who remembered this critical week…
I’m sure there were lots of those in Jerusalem who
missed Jesus entry
Some were busy with holiday preparations
Some were not interested in the guy from galilee
Some were probably afraid to show up at a public rally
Some who just didn’t care…
We have so routinized our rituals, told the stories so
many times in so many ways…that it is difficult to get to the power
hidden in those ancient moments…
To reclaim that power, we have to reclaim the sense
of a present salvation…
Like the guy who got up and walked, like the woman whose
bleeding stopped, like Zacchaeus talking with Jesus…
Today! Salvation is today…now because…you have
faith…you seek the God who seeks you.
Many in the crowds lining the pathway
Were seeking political solutions to their problems…
Which
were not present…
…and which were not
forth coming..
They thought in the old ways…
and were willing
to wait…!
To
defer salvation to the future…or another world…or …
But some knew that the power that Jesus had to heal was
not immediately political…
although it had serious political consequences…
the power they
discovered in Jesus was a real, present power
It was dynamic
beyond the bounds of time
It touch them in
the NOW and lifted them to an encompassing vision of human community
that was related in love and compassion, of righteousness and
reconciliation
It was not to be
defered but embraced, put on like new clothes, energized as if one
was a new creature
Paul picks up the argument in
his second missive to the church in Corinth:
18All
this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and
has given us the ministry of reconciliation; 19that
is, in Christ, God was reconciling the world to himself,
20So we are ambassadors for Christ,
since God is making his appeal through us; we entreat you on behalf
of Christ, be reconciled to God. 21For
our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we
might become the righteousness of God.
Today we who line
the path of Jesus through Swansea…we are the ambassadors…
we
are the ones for whom salvation is present and powerful
We
are the ones who are entrusted with the “ministry of
reconciliation”
1As
we work together with him, we urge you also not to accept the grace
of God in vain. 2For
he says,
“At an acceptable time I have listened
to you, and on a day of salvation I have
helped you.” See, now is the acceptable time; see, now is the day
of salvation!
Now at
Holy Week, the world pauses to acknowledge the traditions of our
religion…(Time puts a theological story on the cover…TV reports
from Israel…the Pope gets televised for midnight mass)
but
for most of the world…
salvation
is not to be seized and embraced in these present seven days…(for
most of the world sees our story as an ancient and irrelevant legend)
For
most of the world now, salvation is only economic, only
political…maybe physical
But
for those who, like Zacchaeus are troubled and seeking…, we like
Zacchaeus must hear Jesus say “Today salvation has come to your
house” and like Zacchaeus, change so dramatically that others in
the crowd see in us (both word and deed) the present power of
salvation.
Our
message, like Jesus, like Paul:
.” See, now is the acceptable time;
see, now is the day of salvation!
Hosanna! …on to Jerusalem!
April 24: Easter ~
"The Good Shepherd and the Abundant Life"
The
text: John 10:7-19 (NRSV)
7So
again Jesus said to them, “Very truly, I tell you, I am the gate
for the sheep. 8All
who came before me are thieves and bandits; but the sheep did not
listen to them. 9I
am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and
go out and find pasture. 10The
thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may
have life, and have it abundantly.
11“I
am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the
sheep. 12The
hired hand, who is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep, sees
the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away—and the wolf
snatches them and scatters them. 13The
hired hand runs away because a hired hand does not care for the
sheep. 14I
am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, 15just
as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life
for the sheep. 16I
have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them
also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock,
one shepherd. 17For
this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life in order
to take it up again. 18No
one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have
power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again. I have
received this command from my Father.”
19Again
the Jews were divided because of these words. 20Many
of them were saying, “He has a demon and is out of his mind. Why
listen to him?”
Easter: day of
Resurrection…
(for Xns) This is
the ultimate scene and scenario of Salvation!
As we have for so
many years…we immediately we think of empty tomb…
Visualize encounters
with angels, with the risen Jesus, near the tomb, on the road to
Emmaus, at breakfast on the beach…
Today let us “see”
in our hearts and minds, the risen One approaching us…
Today let us claim
our encounter with the Living Jesus, God’s presence still, as it
was in the beginning…as it will be forever… alpha/and
omega…Alleluia!
But today let us
consider our POV:
post--resurrection
is our default position!
It is hard for us
NOT to see a resurrected Jesus…
for that is the
Jesus we know…
That is the Jesus
that John writes about…
When John wrote his
gospel he was looking back through the event of Resurrection and then
proclaims
IT was there, what
happened then is what I now understand as God/presence moving to the
moment of resurrection mystery in which the eternity of God’s
presence and reign is revealed…
The resurrection is
an experience…
Critical/basic to
Xnty
It anchors our
Doctrinal, theological and experiential understanding
…from some
Evangelical and Reformed positions…it focuses on a personal
encounter…
in which the ancient
faith is affirmed
In which the
personal experience is proclaimed …I have seen the risen Lord
And so the Easter
faith spread
First as personal
witness, face to face, hand to hand, home to home…
Then it was
collected in shared memory, transmitted orally
Then Written in
various forms
Discussed, and
canonized
Reviewed reformed
and received…
…by many (us!) in
our collection of scriptures: the Bible
and then shared and
shared some more
until history was
changed...
I want to say that
the faith we have is accepted when shared because of the intuitive
understanding of stories like the Good Shepherd
...and the abundant
life...
told to us by the
evangelist John in a way that helps us see the eternity, the divine
presence through the story to Jesus himself
I want to think that
a part of our present experience of resurrection...(within history,
is like a bomb that keeps on exploding)
We must continue to
experience the resurrection...
Not just
liturgically...
For that is expected
of us when we gather on Easter…
to say together :
He is risen…
But for us to say
“he is risen” on Monday”.....
or to see him risen
in August, March, May or July…
requires more of the
story in us….
So we have to see
him more clearly…
And so we take
John’s story of the Good Shepherd and read it in our post
resurrection mode!
Our theological
theme for Lent: salvation… Scenarios of Salvation
Images, moments, in
which salvation breaks in and scoops us up!
In one mode or
another every religious system offers “salvation”
There are secular
“salvations”
Every approach to
life seeks something that in the broadest sense is “salvation”
Might be called The
Good Life/=Abundant life=/Eternal life?
Simple life but not
simplistic
Focused on right
relationships
Practicing justice
and kindness and wisdom
Bringing learning
and healing toward health and wholeness
Not only at the
point of death but Now & in every moment
Here John reports
that Jesus came to bring: Abundant life:
one of those
scriptures which inspired my career and my religious curiosity
That sounds good...
Realized after 30 or
40 years...it wasn't about material things (not that they hurt!!)
but the realities of
things: justice, etc, healthy people, healthy communities, healthy
nations...
key to ultimate
healthiness is faith...trust in God...especially as Jesus invited us
Under stood in
John’s meaningful metaphor: good shepherd….
Jesus taught in
images that people could understand
Not like the scribes
(scholars...? crusty, dour theologians
with their long
words and convoluted concepts!)
John transmits to us
that tradition in the rural vernacular!
A sophisticated
telling of the resurrection presence before its revealing…
Telling the stories
that Jesus told, understanding Jesus, his life and death, through the
experience of the resurrection.
Here is his image:
the sheep fold...
Where does salvation
happen?
In a place of
safety and security
In a place
guaranteed by Shepherd Security
First audience knew
sheep!
Economy included
large investment in wooly creatures...
The knew intuitively
what a good shepherd was!
Good Shepherd
Immediately
accessible image for 1st century
Culturally
meaningful
Religiously
associated with Ruler/leader
So at every level it
was Existentially comforting!
This was the World
of the pasture: (23rd Psalm!)
Verdant meadows
Still waters
Security and
leisure, abundance
a few Caveats
Don’t get lost:
(Shepherd will have to come and find you!)
And there are both
thieves those who
would rob the sheep, take them out of the fold
and wolves! Who
would destroy them in a moment, devouring their very existence.
Hear the voice! The
authoritative voice…
Calling our names,
so that we enter
with sense of trust
I guess the question
this morning does this still hold for us...
Can the
image...metaphor...of sheep fold still call for us a sense of safety
and security
Who's our shepherd
these days...
The economy run by
wall street?
…is it our
government run by political process...?
Maybe it is our
...teachers...pastors...counselors....psychiatrists...social workers,
nurses aids...
I'm afraid that all
too often we are driven by the materialistic values of the
world...and not the spiritual values of our faith
Would indicate to
me....that sheep pens are not big sellers
401k? Democrats? Tea
Party? A big insurance policy?
If we were to go to
the Swansea Mall today (open?) or tomorrow and ask folks... What is
going to save this country?... what would they say?
The church in our
time faces more critical challenges than at any time in our life
times….maybe even more challenges than at any point in history
My professor in the
early 70’s told us…the church will go through more changes now,
than even in the reformation
How those changes
occur
How the church forms
itself
How the church
proclaims its faith
….are all in flux
So it behooves us,
on Easter 2011, to see that the church becomes INTUITIVELY a place
for security, safety, compassionate care
…there are still
“hired hands” who think that the church is job and an abundant
life
…because there are
still those who would steal our minds and hearts and destroy our
faith
…because there are
“wolves” of disaster and temptation that would devour our hope
Jesus came for us…to
save us… to call us into the fold
but to save us…we
must heed his voice…and enter
Salvation is
offered, but we must all like sheep who have gone astray…need to
realize that to be found, we should probably be found in church or in
some spiritual journey
The power and
process of Salvation continues to change our world, to change the
church and open a new way of seeing that when Jesus was with us…and
when he was taken from us… that God never left, but has always been
with us….
As we embrace his
leadership and rule…as we gather in the fold…
…then we will be a
part of the scenario of salvation…
Which we continue as
we go forth saying, yea proclaiming joyfully…
he is risen… our
lives are redeemed, our lives are filled with abundance of love and
compassion, of right relationship and good practice
So it becomes easy
for us to say, I have seen the Lord…
he is risen, indeed
he continues to be raised at every moment into our lives!
Allelulia!