Freedom, Truth, and Luther

 Jeremiah 31:31-34; Romans 3:19-28; John 8:31-36

There is a television program called “This is Us” which has become quite popular in the past couple of years, but until recently I had never watched any of its episodes. Lately, however, curiosity has had me watching the first couple of seasons through a streaming app. This week I watched an episode in which one of the characters talks about the first time he got glasses with corrective lenses in them.

Before he could get the glasses of course, came the exam with what he calls the “Better Machine.”

Anyone who has had optical refraction is familiar with that machine. (Refraction is what they call it when they check to see how much – or how little correction your eyes might need to attain your best possible vision).

So, the “best machine” is the one where the doctor or optical technician flicks through combinations of varying strengths of lenses on a machine that you look through to read the chart on the wall. As lenses are changed, the patient is asked over and over, “Which is better, one or two?” click, click, “now which is better – one or two?” click, click, “two or one?”

The patient goes through a series of trial lenses in this way, while the world goes from blurry to clear and back to blurry again, until you finally arrive at the combination that provides the best correction you can attain to see the world.

I remember walking out of the optician’s office with my first pair of glasses when I was in fourth or fifth grade. I was amazed that the grassy lawn contained millions of individual blades of grass – and was not just the sea of green I had become accustomed to seeing. That’s what I remember most of that first step out into a vision-corrected world – individual blades of grass.

Today we commemorate Reformation Sunday, when we remember with gratitude the work of Martin Luther and the rest of the reformers, who gave us a clearer vision of God’s grace through their work with the Scriptures. We celebrate how, through the Reformation, our faith came to contain millions of beautiful blades of grass as we see God’s presence throughout our world, no longer a simple one-or-two-dimensional sea of green.

Luther and his friends never intended to split the church, or to create a new denomination in the Christian faith. They simply wished to share with the masses what they, through the power of the Holy Spirit, had come to understand more clearly; that what God has done in Jesus Christ, on the cross, is to pour our grace sufficient for new life for us all.

They wanted to devise better ways to teach the faithful that God’s unmerited, perfect grace is already accomplished for us all. They were, in a lot of ways, like the “better machine.”

They kept writing, studying, arguing and debating with each so that they could best understand and then convey the truth of Christ’s Word that is life-giving and not oppressive, as Jesus himself is life-giving and liberating.

In so doing, they looked through a variety of lenses and asked the question over and over, “which is clearer, one or two? two or one”? As they worked, their vision went from blurry to clear, back to blurry again, and then clearer than ever before, through reading Scriptures like those ones we just read.

Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, “If you keep on living in my truth, you are really, truly my disciples; and you will know the Truth, and the Truth will make you free.”

The disciples answered him, “We are descendants of Abraham and have never been slaves to anyone.”

Somehow, I don’t think the disciple are on the same page as Jesus.

·         Jesus is speaking of spiritual truth; of eternal truth; of divine truth. This is the truth that will outlive every human-constructed world or cultural reality. He is speaking of truth and freedom as infinite possibilities that are known only through him – through God’s almighty grace.

·         They are relying on the finite history and stories of the path trod by their ancestors.

·         Jesus is the embodiment of God’s love and mercy to all the fallen world, but despite having recently declared that they believe he is the Messiah, they still identify themselves through their traditional Jewish heritage, where their identity is found in Abraham, the father of the faith. The trouble is, in this way they give their association with Abraham priority over their relationship with Jesus.

·         Jesus challenges them to own their new identity as Christ-followers, saved now by God’s grace apart from any Law that has bound them in the past, but they worry that he is equating them with slaves.

·         They associate freedom with the physical removal of the shackles of enslavement in Egypt, while Jesus is talking about a much more profound and lasting liberation, where the heart itself is set free from that which binds it so that it can grow in the new, unalienable life that God gives us.

As Lutherans commemorate the Reformation, we remember that freedom was a crucial element in faith for Luther and the other Reformers. The big question they were driven to answer was, where and how are truth, freedom, and new life to be found? What is the truth about our salvation? What is necessary for eternal life?

Those questions burned for those who live in the Middle Ages of Luther’s world. There was an urgency to such understanding that is lost to those of us living in the 21^st century.

          Their world was dark and dangerous, with death from plague, starvation, disease and poverty literally just around the corner in a way that we comfortable Americans cannot fathom; life was beyond hard.

          The desperate hope and desire of the people therefore, was that the life that awaited them when they departed this mortal coil would be better than the one they traveled in this life.  They were desperate to know that they and the loved ones who had passed on before them would not languish in a continual cycle of suffering, but that they had believed correctly or done enough or lived a sufficiently good life to be assured that they were heaven-bound. They desperately needed the assurance that God would judge them worthy of a sweet eternal life after this world of infernal suffering.

As the reformers studied and debated the Scriptures together, the core belief that God’s Word of forgiveness and grace won through the cross of Christ alone as the ultimate power to save us, became their battle cry against the forces of darkness.

They were convinced that this essential truth had been lost in the medieval pietistic teachings and indulgences of the church of their time. Determined to share the Word that only belief in Jesus Christ could save, that only God’s grace could save, and that on the cross, God’s determination of salvation was accomplished for the whole world, they turned to passage like the ones we read today.

This Word of God has the authority to grant perfect vision to all people by conveying to us the truth and light of God’s steadfast love and mercy for all God’s creation.

The world today may be different from that of the reformers of over 500 years ago. Faith is no longer deemed as essential to life as it used to be. The conviction that our salvation comes from God alone has been lost to the masses – even the need for salvation by Christ is questioned by so many people around us.

The thing that hasn’t changed is that there is still vast suffering in the world. The past week has exemplified this truth: children senselessly die and people are maimed in car accidents, bombs sent through mail terrorize us, faithful worshipers and first responders are gunned down in a worship place – a synagogue; millions of children suffer the evil and pain of starvation in a war-torn land, and gang violence drives thousands from their homes to seek the refuge which just a few of them will receive in time. There are times when the dimness of our vision may be fueled by our despair and hopelessness.

Yet, here we gather today, by the will of the Holy Spirit. Together we confess the faith of our baptism, the same faith that four young people will affirm during the Rite of Confirmation.

We are so much like the disciples – while we may not locate our identity in Abraham any longer, our faith and our trust in Jesus’ words still need to be clarified so that our vision of God’s grace might be renewed, and we might be freed to live in the light of Christ.

The lenses our world offers us can blur our vision. But God restores it. As Lutherans we confess that we are at the same time sinner (by our response to the temptations and pull of the world) and saint (by the sweet gift of God’s grace).

We are not saved by our own understanding but by the mercy of a God who loves us so much that despite our blurry understanding, despite our indistinct vision of grace, despite our frequent blindness, God forgives us and renews us over and over again for the sake of Jesus Christ.

Jesus makes it possible for us to grasp the new life we are given at baptism – the new life our confirmands claim as their own this day.

And so today and every day, let us offer our thanks and praise to God for the “better machine” of our faith – for the corrective lenses that give us not perfect faith or perfect life – only God can to that – but the best vision of which we are capable, until that day when God perfectly restores our vision and our understanding with the fine heavenly vision given all the saints in light. Amen.

Expectations be Damned

Christ the King Sunday 2016

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God the Father and from Jesus Christ our ever-living King. Amen.

            I haven’t written our family Christmas letter yet, nor even thought much about the Christmas cards we still send out each year. But Thanksgiving is coming this week. And that means that Christmas is coming, my friends! Have I gotten your attention yet? And I know without a doubt that at our house we will begin to receive Christmas cards on the day after Thanksgiving, or perhaps the day after that.

I predict that the first Christmas card to arrive as always, will be from a good friend who lives in South Carolina. Ginny is an artist, and over the years hers has always been the first to arrive. The cards we have received from her have evolved from hand-made works to commercially reproduced pieces of hers, usually detailing a scene from the story of Jesus’ birth.

Other cards we receive will include the ones beautifully illustrated with doves proclaiming peace on earth, and cute wild animals preparing to either cavort with snowmen or celebrate the newborn king. There will be peaceful snowy scenes of country churches shining with glittered snow and warmly lighted windows. We might receive a few greetings from Charlie Brown and the Peanuts or from other contemporary Christmas revelers. There will be cards that weigh in toward the more “politically correct” Happy Holidays greetings and those that stubbornly declare that Christ is the reason for the season.

We will receive plenty of cards bearing the traditional fairy-tale scenes of the nativity, with a gorgeous Mary and sweetly smiling and very cleaned-up newborn Jesus.

Then we will receive cards that boldly declare what Christians have always claimed about the divinity of the Christ-child, the Messiah, using descriptions from the Hebrew Scriptures about the expected nature and characteristics of the long-awaited anointed one. You see, these cards and the expectations they express contain the titles we wish to apply to the one we call our king.

It is these expectations that I would like to talk about today, on this Christ the King Sunday.

What were these expectations, and did Jesus fulfill them? The most familiar claims about the nature of the messiah come from Isaiah 9:2-7. This well-known oracle, made even more familiar through the works of Handel’s Messiah, performed by choirs the world over, reflect our expectations for a divine king: Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

This oracle, while well-known and claimed by Christians as a reference to Christ, did not actually anticipate or predict the person of Jesus. Written in the eighth century BCE, it was likely used to announce or celebrate the birth of a new royal prince in Jerusalem, perhaps Hezekiah, or even the coronation of the new king: Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of peace.

As in any transition in national rule or leadership from the beginning of kingly rule to present-day elections, there was great anticipation and hope for the well-being, peace and prosperity of a nation. Isaiah 9:2-7 anticipates such a change in fortune, a coming of “great light,” to dispel the “darkness” of the imperial exploitation and oppression known by the people of Judah under the governance of the empire of Assyria. Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

Early Christians transferred this focus on hope, power, might, victory over tyranny, and the coming of promised peace, to Jesus.  They saw verse 6 as containing exactly the kind of characteristics they needed from the Messiah, who they now identify as Jesus Christ, the Son of God: Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

In the readings of the scriptures this morning, however, we see a dichotomy form between expectations and reality.

The very first reading we heard reflects the ancient Near East metaphor of king as shepherd – and the promise that the Lord would provide a leader who would restore the justice and righteousness that have been all-but-destroyed by a series of bad kings and rulers who have scattered the flock of the Lord, sending many off into exile, and preventing the remnant from fulfilling their destiny as God’s people. There is a promise here of coming reconciliation, justice, righteousness and peace: Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

The reading from Paul to the Colossians raises up characteristics of Christ, who is Lord over all. The images are powerful: reflecting the glory of God, the firstborn of all creation through whom all things came into being, powerful enough to defeat even the death, the one through whom God fully dwells in, with, and among us, reconciling us forever to God.

Once again we see absolute conviction in one who is a wonderful counselor, fully divine, everlasting creator and savior, reconciler to and for all nations. On this Christ the King Sunday as we read these scriptures, we too apply these characteristics to Jesus. These two readings are consistent with our expectations. They fulfill for us our ideal for the kind of king we want, even today: Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

But – there always seems to be a “but”, doesn’t there? Then comes this morning’s gospel reading, the one seemingly belonging to Good Friday.  That’s when we expect to hear about Christ on the cross. Not on a Sunday when we proclaim his kingship and majesty.

We quickly go from images like this [Christmas cards] to this [paintings from the Stations of the Cross]. Something isn’t quite right. Something doesn’t fit. There is a huge contrast between the reading of Colossians or the prophecy of Jeremiah and this gospel.

Jeremiah assures us of a righteous Lord who will heal the brokenness of the nation.

This Gospel, however, is what we need to hear. While together these readings create a kind of balance, still, the vulnerability of Christ on the cross troubles us. Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace? How can Jesus be those things for us while hanging, powerless, from the cross? How can Jesus, hanging from the cross, vulnerable, his body broken and humiliated, be for us a King?

We live in a world where people claim for themselves greatness while demonstrating through their actions true poverty of character and justice. We claim that we are the most powerful and virtuous nation in the world, yet we read each day about the angry and desperate acts of so many who feel victimized, rejected, discriminated against, or threatened because of the color of their skin, their ethnicity, their sexual orientation, disability, their gender, age, or religion.

We as Christians frequently claim our own righteousness, and superiority, while at the same time forgetting Christ’s mandate to advocate for and love the weak, the marginalized, the prisoner, the poor, the hungry, and the vulnerable. We make ourselves judge and jury over our neighbors while we ourselves have trouble even seeing past that very large log in our eye.

Such paradox.

Today, however, we celebrate Christ the King who shows us the way to true greatness, who demonstrates his greatness in suffering and in great vulnerability. From the cross, Jesus demonstrates extraordinary power as he embraces our humanity through his suffering, and offers full reconciliation for all sinners. On the cross, Jesus is the fullest expression of human powerlessness while at the same time claims the divine power to forgive sin and bring hope and reconciliation to the powerless.

The power that Christ claims is not for himself. The first criminal derides him:  “save yourself” is a challenge to act in accordance with the world’s expectations – our expectations; it is a challenge to exercise the kind of power every political authority knows best and claims for himself or herself.

The good news for us is that Jesus refuses. The only power Jesus exercises in Luke’s crucifixion account is to forgive sin and invite sinners like the criminals beside him, sinners like us, to embrace the hope and new life of God’s reign. While fully identifying with all those so easily rejected by the world, Jesus embodies the life, hope, and reconciliation desired by God, to bring the whole world into the relationship God desires for all of creation, as only Jesus, the divine King can do.

With his reign, Jesus brings about an entirely different way of being in relationship with one another and with God. It is a way of being that reveals complete vulnerability that breaks down barriers and gives life to those who are suffering and in pain.

Once again, Jesus proves to be not the kind of king we want but the kind of king we need. One born in the most humble of circumstances and settings, not in a glowing, air-brushed beautiful Christmas nativity scene; one not wielding the sword but instead hammering the sword into an instrument to bring food for the hungry; one not embraced by the masses but betrayed into the hands of tempters and torturers; one not sitting upon any earthly throne, but hanging from a cross.

Jesus is the kind of king we need, not feasting to excess while his people languish, but one who feeds us with his own body, given for us, and his own blood, shed for us, for the forgiveness of our sins, and for the promise of resurrected life with him for all of eternity.

Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace at the last – our hope, our joy, and the lifeblood of the world.

Let Go My Legos!

John 3:1-17 ~

My grandson Alex loves Legos. Who doesn’t, right? Back in November or December, when my husband and I asked our son Bill what he might suggest we get for Alex for Christmas, we were told that just about anything Legos would be great, that Alex was really into them.

Now, at the time Alex was not quite 4 – his birthday is in January. And as anyone familiar with Legos knows, the really good ones, the ones that make castles and planes and pirates ships and the really cool stuff that appeals to an almost any 4-year-old child, are recommended for children within certain age ranges – for instance, from 7 to 9 years old, or 8 to 12 years old, or something like that – and for good reason. A reason frequently overlooked when purchasing the Legos for that really bright child of yours. While you are sure this child has the ability to figure out how to build a master creation with these small blocks and all the teeny tiny pieces that come with them, they are not necessarily as easy to put together as they appear.

Finally, Christmas came and the family gathered at our house. Alex was uber-excited and happy with the Legos he received. And while the rest of us were all relaxing, preparing dinner and visiting with one another, our son Bill spent the rest of the day constructing Lego sets into the exact design required to replicate the castle, or the plane or the pirate ship pictured on each box, which was what was expected by little Alex.

Of course, by the time the blocks and the rest of Alex’s Christmas booty made it home, the pieces from the various sets were hopelessly dismantled and intermingled. And Alex was incapable of building the specified designs on his own, especially from the confusion of blocks in front of him now. So, a month later when it was time for Alex’s birthday celebration, the request came down from his parents – please – no more Legos!

There is something that often happens between the development of our expectations and how reality plays out. When we approach something with preconceived ideas thoroughly cemented by ironclad ideologies, it can be hard to comprehend and face the mental complexities that result when our ideas are challenged. Alex expected to be able to make those Legos into the desired designs easily, each and every time he brought them out (and the adults around him had no more realistic expectations, apparently). The Legos could, in fact, be built into other creations. They didn’t have to become a plane, a castle, or a pirate ship. They could probably also be made into a house, a sail boat or a train. They could come together to form a church or a school or a spaceship. However, Alex couldn’t comprehend those possibilities at first, couldn’t grasp that these blocks could come together in ways that he hadn’t even imagined.

In our gospel narrative, Nicodemus comes to Jesus under cover of darkness. He is a Pharisee – a leader within the Jewish holy establishment – a man of tradition, a man faithful to Jewish law. When Nicodemus came to visit Jesus he came with some preconceived ideas. He came with a firmly cemented ideology, with particular thoughts and philosophies and convictions about how things work – about how God, in particular, works. And he begins by saying to Jesus, “we know that you are a teacher who has come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do apart from the presence of God.” So far, so good, right? Rapidly, however, we begin to see that the darkness that shrouds Nicodemus also keeps him from comprehending the truth of Jesus’ radical, unexpected message.

Here in John’s gospel, where “signs” are not “miracles” but are actions and events that point to the presence and activity of God, and where the gospel repeatedly points to Jesus as the way that God is in the world and acts on behalf of the world, Nicodemus acknowledges that what Jesus is doing and saying points to God. But when Jesus answers Nicodemus with words about birth and water and Spirit, Nicodemus simply cannot understand what Jesus is saying.

The radical design and reality of God’s tremendous love and liberating Spirit don’t fit on or into the box of Nicodemus’s worldview. The deep darkness of his unbelief obscures his vision of God’s mysterious and redemptive work. The Lego pieces of his deeply-held convictions don’t fit into the radically creative and restorative design of God’s redeeming love for the whole world. Jesus changes the game. God is making a new creation in this kingdom of God, and all the old ideas and previous designs of our imagining are dismantled and redesigned through the cross of Christ.

Jesus says, “Very truly, I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above.” The Greek word ἄνωθεν (anothen) can be translated “again”, “anew”, or “from above” – and here, it seems that Nicodemus assumes the first meaning – “again” - and is confused, because how can anyone be, literally born - again?

I don’t think that we can really blame poor Nicodemus for his inability to imagine new lives and a new world transformed by God in the radical nature of Jesus Christ. And, beyond this exchange, we don’t really know what the impact of this conversation with Jesus had on him. We do see him later in the gospel, as he half-heartedly speaks on behalf of Jesus to the temple elite, and then again, when he again comes under cover of darkness, this time to aid Joseph of Arimathea in preparing Jesus’ body for entombment following his crucifixion. The fact that he seemingly stuck around and continued in some way to grow into a follower of Christ would suggest that although he may have lacked belief in Christ during this visit, some kernel of faith was planted and slowly grew. And he was changed.

The thing is, that is the way of faith. In his gospel, John never uses the word “faith” as a noun. It is not something you “get” or something that belongs to you; it isn’t something that you possess or manipulate. Rather, in John’s gospel we see faith as a verb. It is an action word. It is continuously working, continuously growing, and continuously changing everything around it. Faith comes through the Spirit, which, as Jesus points out, blows where it will. It never rests. It never sits still. It cannot be fit into a box, be built into a cookie-cutter design, or be pinned down by expectations and pre-formed convictions. Rather, through the Spirit of God, given at our baptism, faith challenges our assumptions, and opens the door to living, breathing union with God that impacts and guides our actions and our lives, forever changing them. Faith confounds us.  

But it is not always easy. We’re not talking about a magic elixir that solves all of our problems and puts an end to the current pain and suffering of the world. Living on this side of the cross as we do, we are vulnerable, we remain broken, we are mortal, imperfect creatures who all too frequently behave as Nicodemus, and demand that our blocks fit together to meet our expectations to construct that picture on the box. We are often crushed by disappointment, devastation and despair when they do not.

The reality of living in this complex world means that we stand in the shadow of the cross of Christ, where dreams are sometimes shattered and suffering not only exists but seems to thrive. Planes fall inexplicably out of the sky and vanish without a trace. Buildings that have stood strong and firm for over one hundred years disappear in a flash, taking the lives of ordinary people going about their ordinary business. Young parents learn that their small child has terminal cancer, and there is nothing they can do about it. Unexpected phone calls forever change lives. Civil wars drive millions of innocent people into exile. Addictions steal dreams and destroy families. Bodies, minds and spirits are laid waste by failing health and aging. We could go on and on listing all the kinds of losses we endure, and all of the ways that the reality of the world confounds our expectations of justice, and of life as it should be.

And into that reality comes Jesus, rearranging our blocks and building something new, something beyond our imagining. God enters our fragile, hurting, suffering humanity in the Word made flesh, and joins us in our suffering. God chooses not to be aloof from us, God chooses to be in the trenches with us. God accompanies us through every triumph and every challenge of life. God lifts up those who suffer. God sends loving hands and spirits to aid those who are stricken.

The cross of Christ stands as witness to these facts, offering us a place where the suffering of the whole world is connected, and embraced in God’s loving care. “For God so loved the world that God gave God’s only son…God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the whole world may be saved through him”. The cross—and all the suffering, sadness, and sorrow it bears—stands as witness to God’s presence and power and embrace…promising that even in the abrupt changes, God is present, and somehow holding it all together: connecting us with one another, embracing us fully in His arms. And into this same world, God’s Spirit continually blows freely, bringing us comfort, strengthening us in every adversity, empowering us in Jesus’ name, and sending us into places we’d never imagined, to build up blocks of resiliency and love. As the darkness gives way to Jesus’ eternally penetrating light, may God grant us new life in this endless baptism of God’s grace.

         

The Heart Condition

Ash Wednesday, March 5, 2014

Readings: Joel 2:1-2,12-17; 2 Corinthians 5:20b-6:10; Matthew 6:1-6,16-21 

You may not be able to tell this by looking at me, but the truth of the matter is, I have a heart condition. It’s a serious condition, though there is not cardiologist in the world who can do a whit about it. There is no surgeon who has the skill to open up my heart and fix what is broken.

The fact of the matter is, I’ve never even seen a doctor about my heart condition. I know that there is nothing that any one of them can do despite all the medical knowledge amassed over the centuries; there is no research that has come up with a cure, nor could there ever be; and the development of ever-more delicate and intricate procedures, medications and treatments to correct the imperfections of our bodies fail to produce an answer to what ails me.

In a sense, my condition is hereditary and here’s the clincher – I’m afraid that I share this condition with all of you. We’ve all inherited the same heart condition, along with our DNA and all that goes into making us who we are. It is congenital; we were each born with it. As members of a fallen race, there is nothing that our mothers could have done to have prevented it. Here we are, each one of us suffering from the same condition, each with our own set of symptoms and maladies that go along with it. And as I’m sure you’ve surmised by now, this condition is closely related to, in fact is caused by that thing that is undeniably a part of who we are - sin.

Here at the beginning of this season of Lent, it occurs to me that much of the work of Lent is truly about the heart. Our lessons today would certainly lead us to believe that this is true. In them we read words like, “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me,” and, “Yet even now, says the LORD, return to me with all your heart,” and, “rend your hearts not your clothing,” then finally, in the gospel text from Matthew, we are left with these final words, “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

So if Lent is a lot about heart, what do we do about this heart condition of ours?

We often talk about Lent being a journey; after all, we are describing something that isn’t over in a flash but takes more than forty long days to unfold. Yet for most of us, it’s not really our journey, but Christ’s journey that we are after. After all it is Jesus who is on his way to Jerusalem. It is Jesus who is literally and figuratively following a road that will lead him to his passion and his death. We are less travelers along this journey with Jesus than we are spectators, bystanders lined up along the roadside, observing the events taking place and marking the signposts along the way.

Those signposts include the gospel images of Jesus’ temptation in the desert, and his encounter with Nicodemus and later, with the Samaritan woman at the well. During Lent we hear from our gospel texts about the man who was born blind and was healed by Christ, and about Lazarus being raised from the dead. Then, finally we arrive at the gates of Jerusalem where Jesus is met by a jubilant crowd bearing royal banners in his honor and waving palm branches in exultation, followed in short order by Jesus’ last supper with his disciples, his being handed over to the authorities under whose watch he will suffer his passion and death.

So, with all of this happening to Jesus, how do we enter this Lenten journey? And why would we even want to? What might we hope to take away from this holy season? How does Jesus’ journey become our journey?

I think the answers to all of these questions lead us back to our heart condition and to these impossibly broken hearts and the sin that we cling to. I think we come looking for a cure. We look for the reassurance that our heart condition will not be fatal. We seek ways to closer union with God, so that our hearts might be created anew and strengthened. My friends, we come to this journey because we desperately need our hearts to be healed and we know deep down inside that our only hope for these diseased, corrupted, and faulty hearts of ours is to be found through Jesus, most powerfully at the foot of his cross.

In Paul’s letter to the church at Corinth, a church in conflict with itself, suffering divisions and distractions to the mission of the church, with many of the members at odds with each other and many under the influence of false apostles, Paul talks about the reconciliation of relationships.  Paul makes it clear that it is through the cross, that God’s reconciling sacrifice and God’s love bring a cross-shaped reality to the disciples of Christ. It is God’s healing work on the cross that makes it possible for us to be reconciled and healed in two directions – healed in relationship with God, and healed in relationship with one another. It is through this reconciliation with God that God is able to take our hearts that have been torn apart by sin and brokenness, and create them anew…making possible reconciliation with others and restoring the relationships that reflect the love of God and the mercy and grace of Jesus Christ.

Disciples of Christ, living out the reality of the cross in daily life and ministry, live with a new reality – that God’s reconciling, loving embrace of us, with all of our raw edges and imperfections, with these heart conditions that rule our lives and our interactions, is not only able to change us but save us and bring us to new life. And God uses the cross to do it. Christ invites us into ministry and life shaped by that very same cross.

Our Lenten journey, not surprisingly is also shaped by the cross of Christ, not only on Good Friday but every day; … it’s why the ashes we mark today are in the sign of a cross. While Paul describes reconciliation that is cruciform – it will include the work of opening our hearts to and for God, and opening our lives and hearts to and for one another. It is only through Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection that this kind of reconciliation and new life is possible. 

Opening hearts to God comes in many different forms – Lenten practices like fasting, praying, exercising patience and compassion and generosity through almsgiving all draw us into the Lenten journey, drawing us closer to God. The reality is that although spiritual practices are needed in order for us to distance ourselves from all that distracts and divides us, it is God who makes all this possible.

Like the people in the encounters with Jesus that we will witness through the biblical texts in the coming weeks, our own encounters with Jesus will be transformative.  God’s heart-work of changing lives, forgiving sins, healing broken bodies and souls and raising the dead to new life, calls us to engage in this journey called Lent that we might experience God’s reconciling reality for all. Therefore, as we begin this season of Lent, let us rend our hearts to the great physician, engaging in those tried and true Christian practices that engage our body, mind, and spirit. And may the peace, love and reconciling grace of God be with you throughout these forty days.

Let us pray. O Lord our God, we come to you with hearts broken by sin. Have mercy on us O Lord, and through our journey with Christ this Lent bring us the healing and wholeness we so desperately need. Make our hearts clean and our spirits, focused on the cross, that our relationships with you and our neighbor might be restored for the sake of your kingdom. In Jesus’ name we pray.

Amen.

Whose Transfiguration is It, Anyway?

Matthew 17:1-9 Transfiguration Sunday

I love mountains. If I had the opportunity to build my dream home and had to choose between a site on the top of a mountain or a place at the beach, the choice would be tough. However, although I find the beauty and power displayed in the ocean to be supremely alluring, I think I would go with the top of a mountain. There is just something so beautiful, so mysterious and so awe-inspiring about mountains. Being so high up, able to look down upon a panorama of God’s beautiful creation, full of diversity and life and light is simply amazing. And so, as I read this text, my first reaction to this story is, “I want to be there. It must have been spectacular.”

Whether you are a mountain-lover like me or would in fact prefer the beach home, I wonder how the setting for this scene strikes you. I mean, wouldn’t you have just loved to have been on the mountaintop that day with Peter, James and John, as they accompanied Jesus, and then to have witnessed this wonderful event? What must it have been like for the disciples, to have this spectacular sight unfold before them on the top of that high mountain that day? To see Jesus joined by Moses and Elijah, those two cornerstones of the story of the faith of Israel and her relationship with God; then, to witness the glorious transfiguration of Jesus; to see his face, shining like the sun; to witness the brilliance of his clothes, now dazzling white.

Only, I don’t think that these three disciples would have described the scene as “spectacular.” At least, not at first, and especially not right after they heard “the voice”. The text tells us their first reaction upon hearing God’s voice was to do a simultaneous face-plant. That’s right, in this holy moment, upon this glorious mountaintop, we are told that they fell to the ground, face first. They were not just afraid, they were terrified. While that is actually not an unusual first reaction to the presence of the divine in the bible, I wonder - would we, with our 20-20 hindsight have reacted any differently?

Here at the end of the Epiphany season, on the last Sunday before Ash Wednesday each year, in order to participate in this mountaintop experience and to remind ourselves that this experience is part of our experience too. Here in the church we pull out the white paraments; we sing songs evoking the glorious transfiguration of our Lord. We share in the blessed meal of our Lord’s bidding. We might remember that it wasn’t all that long ago that we heard echoes of the same voice as it spoke the nearly the same words at the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry, because the truth is that Epiphany both begins and ends with God’s voice making Jesus known to the world.

Do you remember it? Where have we heard these words before?

As Jesus was being baptized in the River Jordan, the clouds parted and a voice declared, “This is my Son, the Beloved, in whom I am well pleased.” In today’s gospel text, we have yet another sacred scene. Once again from the cloud comes the voice. It actually interrupts Peter saying, “This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased;” but this time, the voice adds these words: “listen to him!”

The repetition of these words declaring the true identity of Jesus, confirm what was revealed at his baptism and has also been confessed by Peter and the disciples. Jesus is the Son of God, the Messiah. But in the verses just before these, when Jesus reveals a new word to the disciples - that their journey to Jerusalem would end in his passion, death and resurrection, they had vehemently protested. These poor disciples, who constantly swing between faith and doubt, understanding and misunderstanding, cannot grasp this truth that confuses their worldview.

The Son of God, the Messiah, is supposed to be the victorious Lord of all, who rescues God’s beloved people of Israel, who vanquishes the foe. If Jesus is truly the Messiah, how can what Jesus said be true – that he would suffer and die? I doubt that they even heard the part about his being raised from the dead. They were afraid. They were confused. So by nature, they had begun to doubt. God then adds these words to the declaration on the mountain as an exhortation that they should listen to what Jesus has to say, and obey him. God’s words affirm that what Jesus has revealed has been ordained by God. In obedience to the will of God, Jesus will go to Jerusalem, submit to suffering and die. And there, God will have the last word, from the cross. There, the love of God and Jesus Christ’s solidarity with all those who suffer will be revealed - and with this Transfiguration on the mountain, there should be no doubt of the source of this revelation.

Throughout the story of the bible, mountaintop events are transformational. They are pivotal. On the top of mountains, perspective is changed. Relationship with God is clarified and even changed.

Back a few years ago, there was a series of TV commercials for a financial holding company, EF Hutton. Do you remember them? There would be a gathering of people at a party, or a large group of people working together in an office, or perhaps a couple of people having dinner in a crowded restaurant, when one person says to another, “EF Hutton said,…..” and immediately, the scene freezes; all chatter ceases; even the music and everyday sounds in each of the settings are silenced, and suddenly everyone is focused on listening to what it is that EF Hutton has to say. The tag line then was, “When EF Hutton talks, people listen.” And not only were these people listening, they were listening with intent. They want to know what EF Hutton, the voice of authority, reveals about what they should do with their money.

I think of those scenes when I read this text, because I think that while God wants to reiterate that indeed Jesus is God’s beloved, and is supremely pleasing to God, there is something important about the additional words of God here, and they draw us into the scene as well. The tense of these words in the Greek is more like, “keep on listening to him”. These words are for Jesus’ disciples of every time and place. These are words meant to carry the disciples all the way to Jerusalem with Jesus and beyond.

Many translations render God’s command here as “listen to him” but I think that it could just as easily and perhaps even more accurately be translated as “hear him.” In fact, it could be argued that whichever way the Greek word is translated, both listening and hearing are important to the life of the disciple.

Our world is filled with words, sounds, music, conversation, myths, monologues, dialogues, instructions, announcements, and these days, weather reports – words, words, words. There are conflicting sounds, words and voices. Like the disciples of Jesus’ time, some of what we hear confuses our worldview and we struggle with doubt. While many of the everyday words and sounds of our lives go in one ear and out the other, here in this biblical text, God commands us, “listen to Jesus….hear him, and keep on hearing him.”

Yet hearing and understanding are not automatic. Listening that does not lead to action has severe consequences in the life of faith and discipleship.

On that mountaintop, Jesus encountered God and was transformed. The scene harkens back to another mountaintop scene when Moses encountered God and was likewise transformed – his face shone like the sun. While we might not physically travel to the mountaintop, while we may be afraid of heights, would rather be at the beach, prefer our feet to be planted firmly on the ground, and are filled at times with doubt or fear, God’s word comes to all who follow Jesus – to all who follow the one whom God declares is God’s Beloved, the one in whom God is well-pleased. God calls disciples to listen to – to hear and to follow in Jesus’ ways. God’s word comes to us – listen to Jesus. Keep on listening to him.

While the disciples were still lying down, on their faces, filled with fear, Jesus came to them. Jesus touched them. What tender action, filled with love. Despite the failure of the disciples to understand, even to believe, first, Jesus loved them. Then he said to them, “Be raised up, and do not be afraid.” In that moment the disciples were pulled from their fear and failure and blessed with new life and courage.

God meets us in Jesus the same way. What is it in your life that instills falling-down-on-your-face fear? Jesus’ response is, “be raised up.” What is it that keeps you from hearing God’s word and plan for you? Jesus’ answer is “I love you – be raised up.” The cross of Christ and the resurrection are the antidotes to all that stands in the way between you and discipleship.

The good news for us this day, is that God doesn’t leave us on our own to figure these things out. God doesn’t leave us on our own to believe, to act or to pray. The Spirit draws us to the written word and there we meet God. God’s grace is poured out upon us in the holy meal, where we share in the Word made flesh. There, Jesus feeds us with his own body and reminds us, “this is for you.” Jesus meets us in the wine, and reminds us once again, “this is the new covenant in my blood, shed for you.” And even if we have fallen on our faces in failure, fear or doubt in the moment we receive this precious means of grace, are fed and forgiven, we are transfigured too. Each and every time.

As we enter the season of Lent this week, my prayer for each of us, is that we might commit to listening to and hearing God’s voice; that wherever our Lenten disciplines take us, as we encounter God’s voice in the scriptures, we might witness to the transfigured Lord of all; as we contemplate God’s transformational activity in our lives, in and through the world, that we might learn to love as Christ loves.

Let us pray; Lord God, as we journey toward the cross, grant that we may learn to listen and to hear well the transforming word of grace and love and might be so inspired in our discipleship, that in the new life of Christ is evident in our engagement in the world. Grant that we might become the instruments of your mercy and grace Jesus showed us to be. And unite us in spirit and love. In the name of Jesus we pray.

Amen.