Four-Part Harmony

The Sermon Study Guide is here.

Colossians 2:20-3:5

April 21/22, 2012 • Portage First UMC

Christianity—and the church—has an image problem. That’s what researcher David Kinnaman discovered when his friend Gabe Lyons asked him to do a study to figure out why people—particularly younger people—are turning away from the church. What started as a 3-month project turned into a 3-year study for Kinnaman as he poured over data gained through surveys and conversations. The result was a book called unChristian: What a New Generation Really Thinks About Christianity. That’s how they discovered the church’s image problem—specifically, that nearly forty percent of “outsiders” (people who aren’t part of any church) have a bad impression of present-day Christianity. And that bad impression is rooted in real beliefs. For instance, 91% of outsiders see the church as antihomosexual, 87% see the church as judgmental, and 85% see it as hypocritical. After those top three, other images emerge as well: old-fashioned, too involved in politics, out of touch with reality, insensitive to others (particularly those of other faiths), boring and confusing (Kinnaman; Hamilton, When Christians Get It Wrong, pg. 3). The church has a problem, and much of it is our own fault. We’ve failed to be who God calls us to be.

Last week, we began a series of sermons called “The Good and Beautiful Community,” and for the next few weeks, we’re going to explore what the Bible has to say about what the church—the community of Christ—ought to be. Last week, Pastor Deb got us started thinking about the right way to be peculiar in the world, because Christians, as Peter described us, are a “peculiar people.” We’re a community of “odd ducks.” But we’re also a hopeful community. Here, in this season of Easter, that should be more obvious than at any other time of the year. We serve a risen savior, not a dead teacher. We live with hope for life beyond this one, and we also live with hope in this life. The church is a hopeful community, but somewhere along the way, that message has not gotten out. When many in the new generation see us as judgmental or hypocritical or out of touch or old-fashioned, it tells me that the real message of the Gospel has gotten lost. And the fault, if the message of hope has not gotten beyond the doors of this building, falls squarely on us who have failed to live as people of hope. In fact, in Kinnaman’s research, when asked if the Christian faith offered hope for the future, only 9% answered “a lot.” Nine percent! What we need is not more PR. What we need is to live this hope we have in the real world, in authentic ways, and to share the story that is full of hope. Peter put it this way: “Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect” (1 Peter 3:15). A hopeful community shares their hope with others. That’s what the church is.

We get this idea, though, that only certain people can share their faith. You know—the Billy Grahams, or the ones who have “the gift” of evangelism, ones who know their Bible well, or who speak well, or who are confident in their faith. Have you ever said or thought any of these things? “I’m afraid I would offend someone if I shared my faith.” “If I talk about my faith, they will reject me. They’ll think I’m odd.” Or peculiar? “I’m not educated enough to share my faith.” “I’m not a perfect Christian, so I’d feel like a hypocrite if I shared my faith.” These and many other statements are ways we convince ourselves that we don’t have to or we can’t be a witness for Jesus—even though being a witness is one of the things we agree to when we become part of the church. Only four percent of United Methodists ever share their faith with someone even once in their entire life. We convince ourselves we can’t. We’re not perfect—none of us are. We don’t know all the answers—none of us do. And even if we’re not good at sharing our faith, we can get better. We work at getting better at cooking or tennis or baseball or computers or learning a language—whatever it is we’re interested in. Why are we not willing to work at getting better at sharing our faith (Smith, The Good and Beautiful Community, pgs. 44-47)? Others are watching your life and listening to your words, and because some of us haven’t always lived our faith consistently or ever talked about God’s love, we end up with the sorts of images the world has now of the church, the images Kinnaman discovered. What does it take to be better at giving a reason for the hope we have?

Well, we have to be people of hope ourselves. Hope, defined, is “confidence in a good future” (Smith 47). And, as Christians, our hope comes from knowing and internalizing our story. Paul is helping the Colossians do just that in the passage we read this evening/morning. He’s writing to a church that is struggling to know who it is, what it believes, and how it should live that belief out. Sound familiar? He doesn’t want them to be deceived by “fine-sounding arguments” (2:4), but rather to be “strengthened in the faith” (2:7). To help them with this, he reminds them of four parts of their story. If it were a song, it would be four notes that, together, make a beautiful harmony. It’s the story of Jesus, which is our story as well, because our hope comes from him. So what I want to do with the remainder of our time today is to remind you of our story—Jesus’ story of hope—and then suggest a way we can share that story in our world, a way we can be ready to give a reason for our hope.

So what is our four-part harmony, our four-part story of hope? I’m going to give you four words to remember (you might even want to write them down) that is the outline of our hope-filled story, and the first one is this: death. Now, wait a minute, you say, I though this was a story of hope. Listen to how Paul describes it. He says this: “You died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God” (3:3). The Christian story of hope begins with death—certainly Paul is thinking of Jesus’ death on the cross, but he tells the Colossians that they have died as well. Well, they hadn’t died physically, or they wouldn’t be reading his letter. Paul is talking about sharing Jesus’ death on the cross, that when Jesus died and took all of our sins away, we died, too. Our old way of life died. The Colossians were struggling with whether to go back to certain old ways of thinking and living, and Paul says, “No!” Your life, as you knew it, is over. You died. Those old things that once controlled you—money, sex and power—they must no longer have control over you, Paul says, because you’ve died. And, as a side note, that also means we don’t have to really worry about what others think of us when we talk about our faith because we’ve died to all that. Our life, Paul says, is wrapped up in Jesus. If people mock your faith, they’re not mocking you, they’re mocking Jesus (cf. Wright, Paul for Everyone: The Prison Letters, pg. 175). Your life is hidden in him.

What’s more, Paul says, you have also died to all the old legalisms, the human-made rules that are supposed to make you more holy when, in reality, they have nothing to do with real holiness. Paul tells the Colossians to not worry about the “do not handle, taste, touch” rules some were trying to strap them to. Our modern versions say women can only wear certain things or Christians can only read a certain version of the Bible or be seen in certain places and so on. Those things, Paul says, will perish (2:20-23). In fact, the image he uses is that all that will end up on the dung heap (cf. Barclay, The Letters to the Philippians, Colossians and Thessalonians, pg. 145). The one who believes in Christ has died to all those things. We’re called not to live by mere rules and regulations, but to live in a way that we allow the evil desires in us to die and good desires to live (Barclay 146). We don’t belong to the old world anymore, that part of us must be allowed to die (Wright 175). So the first word of hope is “death.”

But that’s followed quickly by the next word of hope: resurrection. Paul has already described this in chapter 2 of his letter: “For you were buried with Christ when you were baptized. And with him you were raised to new life because you trusted the mighty power of God, who raised Christ from the dead” (2:12, NLT). Sometimes, I think, we forget that the same power which raised Jesus from the dead lives in us. We want to experience resurrection when we physically die, but the reality is that God begins working in us, filling us with his power, from the moment we trust Jesus for salvation. The same resurrection power lives in you. Again, we come back to that image of fear when we talk about sharing our faith. If the resurrection power lives in us, that means there is nothing the world can do to us that will ultimately destroy us. If even death has been overcome, what do we have left to fear? That’s why the second word of hope is “resurrection.”

Are you getting a picture of our story yet? It’s a story of allowing the old, rotten things in us to die and letting God bring about a new person. So that leads to the third word of hope: ascension. Paul begins chapter 3 this way: “Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God” (3:1). After forty days of appearances to the disciples, Jesus ascended to heaven, to the right hand of God. There are a couple of things for us in that statement. One, Jesus gives us a different focus, a higher focus. The things of this world are not as important as we think they are. There is a better life, a higher life, we’re called to live. So Paul calls the Colossians to look beyond the things that were causing them problems. Look to Jesus, look up. Now Paul is not saying that just looking up is going to solve everything. But when we include Jesus in the struggles of our life, we gain a different perspective. And that leads us to the second observation of this verse: Jesus is seated. In ancient imagery, that meant his work was done. You sat down when your work was complete. Jesus has done everything he needed to do in defeating death, sin and the grave. And because he has finished it, we can have hope. We can serve others with generosity and grace. We can forgive. We can extend hospitality. All because he’s finished the work and given us a new vision, a new hope, a new purpose. So the third word of hope is “ascension.”

And then there’s one more word: return. Paul says, “When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory” (3:4). He’s reminding the Colossians that Jesus has one more move in the story; this one hasn’t happened yet. But Jesus promised to return, to restore creation, to make all things new. And when he does, he will gather those who belong to him and we will share his glory, his home, all his goodness. Jesus promises the ultimate healing and the ultimate justice when he returns. Even though we don’t know when that will happen, it is the deepest hope of the Christian story. In the Revelation, you might remember, John saw it this way: “He [God] will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away” (21:3-4). And that, my friends, is a reason to be people of hope.

Death, resurrection, ascension, return—this is our story of hope. This is our story. And while we often get hung up on smaller details or larger controversies within the Bible, ultimately all of those things boil down to four words, four simple words of hope: death, resurrection, ascension, return. It’s a four-part harmony we can remember. And once we know our story, it’s up to us to share it. Paul says, in another letter, that we are actually sharing our faith in one way or another. He describes us as an “aroma” of Christ (2 Corinthians 2:15). You know what that’s like. Maybe you come home and instantly you can smell what’s cooking, or if it’s particularly strong, you can smell what cooked a couple of days ago. Or you go into a coffee shop and as soon as you walk in, you’re taken in by the aroma. There’s no doubt where you are. An aroma sends a message—sometimes pleasing and sometimes not so much. You are an aroma of Christ. Are you a pleasing, hopeful aroma or do you just stink up the place? Do others “smell” hope in you or do they walk away with their noses covered determined never to be part of that group? If we’re going to turn the culture around, if we’re going to be able to help others see hope in the church, we’ve got a lot of work to do to become a hopeful community rather than a community that turns people away. We must be, as Peter told us, ready to share the hope that lives within us.

Now, as Pastor Deb told you last week, you’re going to get an assignment every week—a soul training assignment—and if you haven’t guessed it yet, this week’s assignment is to begin working toward sharing your faith without embarrassment or coercion. We’re following Peter’s guidelines, to give a reason for the hope that’s within us, but to do it with gentleness and respect. I think those elements are what have been missing, part of what has caused our “image problem” in the wider world. We’ve failed to show gentleness and respect. On the rare occasion that we do share our faith, often we rush in without doing the “prep work” that needs to come first. The very first thing to do is to pray. Pray that God will send us someone we can share our faith with, and pray that we would have eyes and ears to know it when they come. It might be someone you already know, someone you work with, someone who lives near you, the parent of a child who is on a team with your kids. Pray that God would send you someone, then watch. Ask God, “Help me see who you are bringing me.” This takes patience and perseverance. My wife, Cathy, spends a lot of time at McDonald’s, as some of you know, and she doesn’t just hide in the corner. She gets to know those who work there and asks God for ways to insert faith into their lives. It’s her McMinistry. So pray, and watch, and then reach out.

Now, by “reach out,” I don’t mean “beat them over the head with a Bible.” We reach out in nonthreatening ways, like inviting someone to have coffee with us, with no agenda other than to get to know each other. Or maybe you know a need they have. Maybe they’ve had a new baby in their family and need a meal dropped off. Or maybe they just need someone to talk to. Look for ways—practical, nonthreatening ways—to reach out, to make a difference in their lives. And then listen. “Simply by listening you are demonstrating love.” We rarely listen in our culture. We hurry here and there and, in clues both verbal and nonverbal, we let people know we really don’t care about their lives, and so we don’t listen. But is that the example of Jesus? Jesus always took the time to listen. He was never in a hurry. And he listened beyond the surface meanings of a person’s conversation. He listened to their hearts. As you listen to the other person, what is it that concerns them? What is on their heart? Pray, watch, reach out, listen, and then connect.

This is where it becomes important to know our story, because as we come to know the other person, we find ways to connect the gospel hope with their lives, with their story. Suppose the person you’re talking with is struggling in the aftermath of a divorce. The Gospel story, the Gospel hope is that Jesus brings life out of death, and in the midst of a divorce, it can be as painful if not more painful than a death. So how do you connect that story with their story? Of course, you have to be sensitive to the right time, but you can ask a question—questions are always better than statements—like, “What gives you hope right now? What keeps you going?” And again, you’re not using “religious language,” because hope is something we all need, we all want. But behind that question is your conviction that the only lasting hope comes from Jesus. And so, without preaching, you make connections between that person and the Gospel story.

And after you connect, you share. Now, I’m not talking about sharing a sermon or an outline of the Bible’s story. The very best witness is always your own story, because while someone may want to argue with you on the finer points of Biblical theology, they cannot argue with your story. Peter did not say, “You have to go to seminary and earn a degree in systematic theology before you can share the good news.” No, Peter only says, “Be ready to share the reason for your hope.” Death, resurrection, ascension, return. How has that story made a difference in your life? Several years ago, in the midst of finals in college, there was a person I had connected with and had prayed for, and one day over lunch she asked me, “How do you stay so peaceful with all the stress of finals week?” And I’ve thought back on that day many times since then, because I wasn’t ready to give a reason for the hope I have. I mumbled something, I can’t even tell you what, but how often I have wished I could go back and say, “Any peace you see in me comes from my faith in Jesus. It’s not something I can conjure up on my own.” The reason for our hope doesn’t have to be a long, eloquent statement. In fact, it’s better if it’s not. It’s better if we allow the other person to keep asking questions. Tell your story, simply and directly, because no one can argue with it. Share where your hope comes from, but do it with gentleness and respect.

And that leads us to the final piece of all this, which is to invite. If we do all the other things and never invite that person into a friendship with Jesus, we’ve left them hanging. It’s like watching a movie and walking out when there are ten minutes to go. You never find out how it all came out. Now, I’m not taking about, “If you died tonight, where would you spend eternity?” For some people, that works, but for most people today, it’s a matter of being loved into God’s kingdom, of being invited to come to church or to a small group or to Alpha. Bishop Robert Schnase says invitation is “an active love that steps toward people” (Five Practices of Fruitful Living, pg. 147). It takes patience, because today, the average time between when a person shows interest in the Christian faith and when they actually make a commitment to Jesus is 28 months. Patience pays off in seeing a person come to Jesus. So pray, watch, reach out, listen, connect, share and invite (Smith 59-63).

Now, things don’t always happen the way we think they should. Traditionally, we’ve thought of the path to faith as a baseball diamond. You start by seeking, then you accept Jesus and become part of a church, then you get involved in growing your faith (Bible studies and such), and then you’re sent out in mission and the process starts over. But increasingly today, we’re learning that the path to faith, particularly among young people, isn’t quite that clean. More often, it’s sort of the reverse of what we’ve been doing. People today are attracted by mission, by doing things that relieve the suffering of the world, then as they get to know people in the church, they might join a small group (entire churches have started out of small group ministries), and then, perhaps, out of their study, they come to know Jesus and join the church and then they invite others to get involved in mission. It’s a reverse baseball diamond. Bishop Schnase describes the church this way: “The church fulfills its mission at the margins of the congregation…In a healthy church, the boundary is wonderfully permeable, and members readily reach across the edge and new people easily enter the community. The margin is where the action is” (Schnase 152). Paul put it this way, just a little later in Colossians: “Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone” (4:5-6). So how do we do with that? How effective are we at reaching those in need and giving them a true picture of Jesus and of the Christian faith?

Almost a year ago, we began PF Hope, which was an intentional effort to reach the margins, to reach people who were either unchurched or dechurched. We wanted to reach people who, for whatever reason, had distanced themselves from the church. Maybe they’d had a bad experience, maybe they weren’t sure what they believed, maybe they didn’t want to come to a church building—the reason, to us, really didn’t matter. The only thing that matters is that Jesus loves them and we want to reach them in a way they appreciate, enjoy and understand. And so we’ve been at it for about a year, and lives have been changed. It hasn’t been a huge crowd yet, but there are many attending who weren’t going anywhere before, and so PF Hope is meeting its goal, reaching its intended audience. But for PF Hope to move forward, we’ve got to do better at getting behind it and supporting it. The most immediate need is for people who will help set up on Saturdays. It will probably take less than an hour of your time each week, but it will make a world of difference as we, as a church (remember, this is our mission), seek to share the hope of the Gospel. I have a friend who is an ordained deacon in our Conference, a retired seminary professor with (at last count) 5 college and seminary degrees. Ken is highly educated and has many skills. So I asked him what he’s doing at his current church. “My job,” he says, “is to set up the chairs. That’s what I do.” Now, as we talked further, I learned that’s not really what he does. Setting up the chairs is his way of being able to have conversations with people, conversations that lead, week after week, to talking about faith. Whose life might you impact for the sake of the Gospel because you agree to set up chairs, or microphones or whatever is needed at PF Hope? You might change a life by a simple act of kindness that won’t cost you that much at all. We are a hopeful community, called to share that hope with everyone. As we learn our story, as we are shaped by it and internalize it, our community can’t help but be changed for the sake of the Gospel.

In the early years of Coca-Cola, the company wanted to make sure that they had a distinctive bottle, one that would stand out from other soft drinks. Shape, color, label and logo were all important, and the designers were given this instruction: “Even if the bottle shatters into a million pieces, we want each piece to be identifiable and recognizable as being from a Coke bottle.” Out of that directive came the light green Coke bottle, and in the days of glass bottles, if you saw broken green glass on the pavement, you knew it was from a Coke bottle (Schnase 156). Here’s the question: as the church scatters throughout the world, throughout our community, do people recognize you as being part of a hopeful community? Are you as distinctive as a Coke bottle? Do people see Jesus in you, even if you don’t have a church t-shirt or nametag on? The church is a hopeful community, called to share a clear witness to the Gospel in everything we say and do. Is Jesus evident in you each and every day in good and beautiful ways? Let’s pray.

The Words After That

The Sermon Study Guide is here.

Luke 24:13-25

April 7/8, 2012 (Easter) • Portage First UMC

INTRO VIDEO

It was about 10:30 a.m. Pacific time this past Monday when a 43-year-old former nursing student walked into the building of Oikos University in Oakland, California, took a receptionist hostage and walked into a classroom. “Oikos” means “family,” and One Goh had been expelled from the “family” earlier this year, due, some say, to behavioral issues. Apparently upset that his career plans had been derailed, Goh went looking for a particular female administrator at this small predominately Korean Christian college. When he learned that the administrator was not there, he went into a room and told former classmates to line up along the wall. “I’m going to kill you all,” he said, and began shooting. Seven people were killed and three were wounded before Goh left in a victim’s car, which he then drove to a grocery store in Alameda. There, he surrendered to police. In the midst of the usual statements from the neighbors about how he wasn’t a bad guy and he was good to his parents, and the usual statements about gun control and the senselessness of it all from politicians, we were again faced with a horrible tragedy, seven senseless deaths, and a reminder that despite appearances to the contrary, our world is in fact filled with dangerous and dark places. What do we say to situations like that? How do we respond when death seems to push in on us?

In many ways, that’s the question that the two disciples who were walking to Emmaus were dealing with. Death had surrounded them, and they were left confused, hurt, and hopeless. Their discouragement had really began three days ago, on Friday, when they watched one they had hoped was going to save their people die on a Roman cross. They had come to Jerusalem, most likely, to celebrate Passover, a normal part of their year, and yet this year, their celebration, their normalcy was interrupted by a brutal, senseless and tragic death. Jesus of Nazareth had died and been buried, and all those who thought he was the Savior had gone back and spent the last two nights mourning his death. What else was there to do? It was the Sabbath, the day of rest, so they couldn’t travel home. Walking the seven miles from Jerusalem to Emmaus was considered “work,” so they stayed in the city until Sunday.

On Sunday morning, some of the women had left very early, while it was still dark (John 20:1), to go anoint the body of Jesus. That was something that was usually done before burial, but the quick approach of the Sabbath had prevented them from finishing the job. So they went to the tomb, and I cannot emphasize enough that, despite what they had heard Jesus say repeatedly about him being raised, they did not go looking for a resurrection. They went to anoint the body. They went to take care of their dead friend. No one in the Gospels expects Jesus to be anything other than stone cold dead (Card, Luke: The Gospel of Amazement, pg. 260). So when these women come running back to the place where Jesus’ followers are staying, when they say the tomb is empty, and when they claim that an angel told them Jesus had been raised from the dead, it sounds like “nonsense” to everyone else (24:11). In fact, Luke, being a doctor, uses a medical term here; he actually says they think the women are “delirious” (Card 261). I imagine the women got all sorts of questions, centered around the fact that just because the tomb was empty didn’t mean he was raised. It just meant the body was missing. Even Peter, who Luke says goes to check it all out, doesn’t decide right away that Jesus was raised. He wonders to himself what happened (24:12). No one expected a resurrection.

And so these two disciples, who are probably husband and wife (Wright, Luke for Everyone, pg. 293), decided it really is over and begin the journey home. Seven miles from Jerusalem to Emmaus. Seven long, endless miles. What do you talk about on a journey like that? Well, Luke says they were discussing what had happened over the last few days, perhaps how disappointed, discouraged and depressed they had become. I mean, if Jesus really was the Messiah, the Savior, he should have been defeating the pagans, not dying at their hands (Wright 294)! Everything they had hoped for died on the cross. You know how discussions like that go, but in the midst of this one, a stranger approaches them and joins their journey. Actually, he’s not a stranger, but Luke says they were “kept” from recognizing him (23:16). That’s an important theme in this story: who and when and how do people recognize Jesus, the stranger? The word means to “know, to perceive, to understand.” Luke isn’t talking so much about physically recognizing this stranger as Jesus (though we have evidence in other Gospels that Jesus looked at least a little different from the way they remembered him, and yet he still retained the scars in his hands and side from the crucifixion). Instead, Luke is talking about seeing beyond the physical to the core of who a person is. They failed to realize this stranger is Jesus largely because they weren’t looking for him. As I said, they had zero expectations of ever seeing Jesus alive again (Card 262). They had stood near the cross. They had heard his final words. They listened as he cried out, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit” (23:46). And they watched as he died. So when this stranger comes up to them and asks what they are talking about, they are surprised he doesn’t know. How could he have been anywhere near Jerusalem in the last few days and not know what had happened there (24:17-18)?

So they tell him their perception of what happened, and how their hopes and dreams had been nailed to the cross with Jesus. Everything they had given their lives for and everything they had dreamed of was gone. “We had hoped,” they say (24:21). One time, so long ago, we had hoped. But now we’ve given up hope. He’s dead, and so are our dreams. Have you been there? Have you walked to the road of disappointment? David and Helen did. They had met in college and looked forward with excitement to being missionaries in India. David had been raised in India, his parents having served long terms there as United Methodist missionaries. They got to experience their dreams coming true when they arrived in India with their one-year-old daughter and began the work they had been preparing for so long. About a year later, David had passed his language exam and was scheduled to go on a preaching tour. This was shortly after their son, David Jr., had been born, and just as David Sr. was preparing to leave, Helen had a dream. She dreamed that they were burying their son, and she begged David not to go on the trip he had planned. But Davey was healthy, and so his father chalked it up to still adjusting to a new culture and nothing more. He kissed a healthy Davey goodbye and left on his trip. But the very next night he received a message that Davey was seriously ill with dysentery. By noon the following day, they were burying their son. The dreams they had for their family and their ministry came crashing down around them (Seamands, Living With Your Dreams, pgs. 39-41). We had hoped…but it was not to be. That’s what Cleopas and his wife are telling Jesus. We had hoped…we had hoped.

And we expect Jesus to respond compassionately, to say, “I understand how you feel. It’s okay to feel that way.” But that’s not what we get. Instead, Jesus turns to them and says, “How foolish you are!” (24:25). In essence, he says, you’ve got it all wrong. You’re looking at things through the wrong lens. And instead of comforting them like we think he ought to, he begins to explain the Scriptures to them. Luke says it this way: “Beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself” (24:27). Now, do you see the problem here? I get frustrated every time I read that verse. Here is the Son of God giving a Bible lesson, explaining the entire Old Testament, and Luke doesn’t think it’s important enough to record what he says! Not one word of Jesus’ teaching is captured here. The greatest Bible lesson of all time, and it’s not written down. Wasn’t someone taking notes?

No, because that’s not Luke’s point. Luke’s point is that the first glimmer of recognition, the first hint that this stranger is someone they might know is found as they begin to rightly understand the Scriptures. They first encounter the risen Jesus in the words of the Bible. And that’s even more true today. John says Jesus is “the word made flesh” (John 1:14) and the words of the Bible point to the one who is the Word. To truly encounter Jesus, to know who he is means we have to intentionally engage with the Scriptures. There are a lot of false assumptions and a lot of bad teachings roaming around out there. The real truth about Jesus is found in the Scriptures, and if we’re not studying this book, we’re only guessing. And it’s not enough to just rely on what you get on Sunday morning. We read a couple of passages here, but that’s only a glimpse of the whole story. And so around here, we have tried to make many opportunities available for you to study, to grow, to learn, to develop your faith and your picture of Jesus. This week, we launch a brand new one, an opportunity to deal with difficult questions in a safe place. That disappointment, that discouragement, those wonderings…on Wednesday evening at 6 p.m., we will launch Alpha, which is a place you can bring those things and know that they will be dealt with honestly, fairly and openly. Alpha is for everyone who struggles, whether you believe in Jesus at this point or not. Take a listen to this to get an idea of what Alpha will be like.

VIDEO: Alpha Questions

Alpha is fully and firmly based in the Scriptures, and it’s a place where thousands of people have first begun to recognize Jesus, because he’s found in the Scriptures.

After the Bible lesson, they arrive at Emmaus, the home for Cleopas and his wife, and Luke says Jesus pretends to be going further, even as they offer him a place to stay for the night. It was expected, in that culture, to offer hospitality to the stranger; Jesus himself had emphasized and endorsed that. It was also a custom, on the part of the stranger, to at first refuse such hospitality, to pretend to be going somewhere else. It was sort of a dance people did, knowing all the while that the stranger would accept the offer of hospitality (Liefeld, “Luke,” Expositor’s Bible Commentary, Vol. 8, pg. 1053-1054), which Jesus does. And yet, once inside the house, when the meal is prepared Jesus assumes the role of host. He takes the bread, he offers the prayer, he breaks the bread and gives it to them (24:30). Immediately, they know fully who he is, the recognize him, because when is the last time in the Gospel of Luke bread was broken and blessed and offered? It’s in the Upper Room, at the Last Supper. Jesus was the host, then, too, and he told them that bread would always remind them of his body, which was broken on the cross (22:19). And while what happens at Emmaus is not a communion celebration—it’s a normal table meal—in the breaking of the bread, they suddenly recognize Jesus for who he is. Was it because he lifted up the bread and they were able to see the wounds in his wrists? Was it in the way he said the prayer or the way he tore the bread? Was it his tone of voice, the spark in his eyes, or the burning in their own hearts (24:32)? Whatever it was, Jesus was known to them—recognized by them (24:35)—in the breaking of the bread. And though, as I said, this is not a communion celebration at Emmaus, I think Luke fully intends us to see in this breaking of the bread that earlier breaking, and he wants us to know that Jesus is known when we gather together, when we break the bread and drink the cup as he told us to do in remembrance of him (22:19).

Word and table. Scripture and sacrament. The reason these things are the shape of Christian worship is because it is here, in these things, that we encounter the risen Christ. Jesus’ final words from the cross were not really the last words at all. He spoke words after the cross because he was raised to life and in those words, he invites us to come close so that we, too, might share in his resurrection. If we learn nothing else from the cross and the resurrection, we have to learn this: the worst thing is never the last thing. The cross was not the end; the grave did not have the final word. Jesus did, because he was raised and lives forevermore. The worst thing is never the last thing. David and Helen learned that. Even in the midst of the devastation of losing their son, they found their bonds strengthened and their faith growing. They had a great impact on India, and when they returned home, David both pastored and grew churches while later teaching countless seminary students how to care for their congregations—students including me. Out of David’s broken dreams and seeming hopelessness came a ministry of grace and healing for countless people who were living with broken dreams of their own. The worst thing is never the last thing, even in Oakland, California. I love the way the churches responded there, allowing Jesus to shine through. The Korean Methodist Church in particular responded right away by providing space for mourning and praying. Even in the dark place where a student kills fellow students, the worst thing is never the last thing. Even in the darkness, Jesus still comes to us in bread and cup and word and worship.

We’ve spent the season of Lent studying the final words of Jesus, and this morning we’ve looked at some of his words after that, but the really final words of Jesus come at the end of the Gospel of Matthew, where he gathers his disciples together and gives them their mission. In Matthew 28, Jesus says, “Go and make disciples of all nations…and surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age” (28:19-20). Jesus’ final final words are both a challenge and a promise. The challenge? Share the love of Christ and the power of the resurrection through the whole earth. After 2,000 years, we’re still working on that one, and while the whole earth might be a bit intimidating for us sitting here this morning, what about your whole neighborhood or your whole family? Start there. Jesus calls us to share with everyone the good news that the worst thing is never the last thing and that there is hope and salvation found in him. It’s the sharing of that good news that compelled us to begin PF Hope just about a year ago, to share the good news with people who might not otherwise hear it. That’s our challenge, and it’s never enough just to say someone else will do it. If we call ourselves Christian, we’re all commissioned by Jesus. That’s the challenge. And the promise? He doesn’t promise us wealth or health or power. He promises us his presence. He will be with us. Because he is risen, he goes with us into the world so that we can share that good news. He will be with us, no matter what comes. He is present here, and he will be present with you at work tomorrow, and in the hospital waiting room, and at the graveside, and when you’re contemplating which decision to make, and when your child is born, and when that same child makes choices that unsettle you…he will be with you. He is with you, and his presence is always a reminder that the worst thing is never the last thing. That’s the good news and the hope of Easter.

Word and table. Scripture and Sacrament. Having heard the Scripture, this morning, we’re going to come to the table, and experience the presence of Jesus in the breaking of the bread. For some of you, perhaps it’s been a while since you’ve taken communion. Let me assure you that in the United Methodist Church, the communion table is open to all who love Jesus or who want to love him. It’s his table, he is the host, not myself or Pastor Deb or anyone else. Jesus is the host, and he invites us to come, to find him in the bread and in the cup and to allow being in his presence to make a lasting difference. For some of us, maybe coming to church on Easter is just an obligation, something we do to make someone else happy, or we come because we think we ought to. But Jesus calls us to more than just showing up for the music and the flowers. Jesus invites us to encounter him, and to allow him to change us, to make us new, to make us right with him. He wants his presence to be part of our lives. And so as you come to the table this morning, what will your response to him be? Will you walk out of here unchanged, essentially the same as when you came in? Or will time in his presence cause your heart to burn within you? Will you see the resurrected Lord in this place and allow him to live in your life every day from now on? He invites you—come to the table. He awaits you here.

One More Step

Mark 15:33-41

April 6, 2012 (Good Friday) • Portage First UMC

Several years ago, our family took a vacation to Stone Mountain, Georgia, which is just outside of Atlanta, and for some reason, we got it in our heads that a good way to start the day would be to walk up the mountain. There is a trail on one side of the mountain which is 1.3 miles long and ascends 786 feet before it reaches the top of the mountain. Well, that doesn’t sound so bad, and so, water bottles in hand, we started off. It was a beautiful, sunshiny day, and the first part of the hike was pleasant, almost easy. We smiled and talked to people as we passed them, feeling more confident with every step. And we kept going, until we came to a turn in the trail, maybe about two-thirds of the way up, where suddenly the path seemed to go straight up. Now, I know it didn’t really go straight up, but it sure seemed like it did. All of a sudden, the trail got very, very steep very, very quickly, and while the kids charged ahead (and made it to the top way ahead of me), I found myself slowed down, gasping for breath, and worrying my wife. I was winded, tired, hot, and not sure I was going to make it to the top of the mountain. Was there a helicopter anywhere nearby? We’d come too far to think about going back down; all I could think of was getting to the top and riding the cable car down. In retrospect, I don’t know why we didn’t think about riding the cable car up and walking down, but that wouldn’t have made as good a story. Instead, I just kept my eyes focused on the goal, on the top of the mountain, and concentrated on taking just one more step, and then one more, and then one more. That’s all I could do. And step by step by step, I made it to the top of the mountain.

I kind of feel like that’s where we are as we come to this Good Friday. We’ve been on a journey, a Lenten journey, and we’ve been gazing for the last six weeks at the top of a mountain, a hill called Calvary, at a cross planted there by some Roman soldiers. But more than that, we’ve been centered on the man on the middle cross, the one who made some outrageous claims about himself and why he was on that cross. The sign above his head reads, “King of the Jews,” but he’d claimed to be the Son of God. And so we’ve listened as he gasped out his final words, and we’ve watched as he died, as he gave up his spirit. At that moment, it feels like we’ve turned a corner and we’re facing a steep, uphill climb. What do we do now? Jesus is dead. Where do we go from here? Do we keep climbing, keep moving, or do we go back home, back down the mountain, untouched and unchanged by our time at Calvary? What do we do now?

There is one man at the cross we haven’t talked about yet. In the midst of disciples, family members and curious onlookers, there are also a whole bunch of Roman soldiers. Some of them have gambled for Jesus’ clothing. Some of them have mocked the men on the cross. And some of them haven’t cared what happens there on the hill; to them, it’s just another crucifixion, another in a long line of dirty jobs they are called on to do in this backwater province of Judea. But one of those soldiers—a centurion, we’re told (15:39)—sees what happens and reacts to it. A centurion would have been the equivalent of a sergeant-major (Barclay, The Gospel of Mark, pg. 365). He would have seen many men die, perhaps participated even in many crucifixions, and it’s likely he was in charge of this particular detachment of soldiers. He’s probably been with Jesus through the scourging, the mocking, the spitting and so on (Wessel, “Mark,” Expositor’s Bible Commentary, Vol. 8, pg. 783). He’s heard the seven cries from the cross, and he’s watched as Jesus gave up his spirit. Quietly, peacefully, not violently like the others. Mark says when he saw how Jesus died, he said, “Surely this man was the Son of God!” (15:39). Theologians debate what, exactly, the centurion meant by that statement. Did he come to faith in that moment? Was he simply acknowledging that Jesus died in a godly way? Was he simply impressed with the way Jesus gave up his spirit? I don’t know if Mark is all that worried about why the man said it. I think, instead, Mark wants us to see ourselves in this Gentile soldier, standing in front of the cross, having done our worst to Jesus. What do we say? How do we respond to this brutal, ugly, horrible, yet life-giving death?

Standing here at the cross can leave us breathless, much like I was at the top of Stone Mountain. We stare up at the horribly disfigured man hanging there, lifeless, breathless himself, and we can’t help but wonder: what now? What difference does his death make? How does what he did save me in any way? How does it draw me closer to God? Sometimes, when we stand in the shadow of the cross on this day, we’re like another man who once came to Jesus. The story is told in Mark 9, right after Jesus has been on another mountain, where his disciples saw a glimpse of his glory. Actually, the man had come to the disciples and asked them to heal his son. The boy seems to have had some sort of epilepsy, so severe that he couldn’t speak and would often have seizures that left him incapacitated (Barclay 215). “I asked your disciples to drive out the spirit,” the father says, “but they could not” (9:18). So Jesus calls the boy to himself, and the boy has another seizure which causes the father to beg Jesus, “If you can do anything, take pity on us and help us.” “‘If you can’?” Jesus asks. “Everything is possible for one who believes.” And so immediately, the father cries out, “I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!” And right then, Jesus heals the boy (9:21-29) and restores him to his father.

You see, sometimes I find myself like that father, only instead of asking for the healing of a family member, I’m standing in front of the cross, wondering if what he did there really makes a difference in my life. “I believe,” I cry out. “Help my unbelief!” All of us, much of the time, are a mixture of belief and unbelief, of hope and despair, of sorrow and joy. We know who we are, and how unworthy we often feel that someone would dare to die for us. We know the truth of what Paul said: “Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person” (Romans 5:7). Why would Jesus die for me, being so far from righteous? I believe…help my unbelief. Help me be like the centurion, who could recognize something powerful and unique in Jesus’ death, even if he didn’t understand everything it meant. He was willing to put words to his faith even though, being a Gentile and unschooled in the teachings of the Scriptures, he couldn’t possibly have known everything he was saying in that moment. Instead of being like him, sometimes we stand off to the side, we say we want to wait until we know more, until we understand more about what was happening at the cross, until we can intellectually categorize how Jesus saves us by his death on the cross, until we have all our questions answered. And while there is a time for learning and growing and studying, that time is not today. Questions can be debated another day. Today we stand at the cross, and we gaze up at the one who loves us. He is the one who asked forgiveness for the people who murdered him, the one who cared for his mother, the one who paid attention to a dying criminal, the one who felt forsaken, who knew thirst, who accomplished his mission and gave up his spirit. His life and death call us to faith. It calls for a decision on our part. I believe—help my unbelief.

In the late 1940’s, two men who were close friends were both preaching the Gospel with Youth for Christ, traveling around the nation and the world proclaiming the good news about Jesus. At one point, Charles began to develop physical illnesses the doctors couldn’t explain—at least there was no medical reason for his sickness. One doctor told him the problem wasn’t in his heart. It was in his head. Charles knew what the doctor was talking about, because he was finding himself struggling more and more to believe what he was preaching. World War II and the growing intellectual challenges to Christianity had sapped his faith. He had taken his eyes off the cross and put his focus on his doubts, so eventually Charles had to walk away from his preaching because he couldn’t explain every piece of it. His friend, however, listened to his struggles and doubts. William faced the same difficult questions. Particularly challenging were the accusations starting to make the rounds that the Bible wasn’t God’s word. Rather, some said, it was just a collection of ancient stories and writings. If that were so, William knew it would have no authority in his life, nor could he ask anyone else to accept its authority. Unlike Charles, however, William spent much time in prayer over the matter, continued to focus on the cross, and finally decided he could not settle all the questions by just thinking them through. He had to come to a point where he either believed or he didn’t. He said, “The finest minds in the world have looked and come down on both sides of these questions…and I am not going to wrestle with these questions any longer…I accept this book by faith as the Word of God.” In the midst of a forest at a conference center, Billy Graham cried out to God, in essence, “I believe; help my unbelief.” And for the last sixty years, Graham has touched untold numbers of people by calling them to look toward this crucified savior. Charles Templeton, on the other hand, never looked back to the faith of his early life and died an agnostic.

It’s not that questions are unimportant; it’s not that doubts shouldn’t be faced. Questions and doubts are part of faith; they are not evidence of faithlessness. It’s just that faith requires more than simply having all the answers to the questions or doubts. Faith requires us to step out. “Faith,” the book of Hebrews says, “is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. This is what the ancients were commended for” (Hebrews 11:1-2). And sometimes faith comes from a most unlikely source. “The Roman centurion becomes the first sane human being in Mark’s Gospel to call Jesus God’s son and mean it” (Wright, Mark for Everyone, pg. 216). We don’t know what happened to him after this moment. I wish we did. I wish we had scenes of him telling others about this man on the cross, scenes of him sharing his faith and his doubt with the other soldiers. We don’t know what happened to him. We only know about this moment in his life, when he saw in Jesus something that stirred at least the beginnings of faith within him. “This man was God’s Son. I believe—help my unbelief.” He stood before the cross, he took one step down the path of faith, and I believe his life was changed from that moment forward.

John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, found himself struggling, much like Charles Templeton, with preaching a Gospel he wasn’t always sure he believed wholeheartedly. He asked a friend of his, Peter Bohler, if he should quit preaching. “By no means,” Bohler said. “But what can I preach?” Wesley asked, to which Bohler responded, “Preach faith till you have it; and then, because you have it, you will preach faith” (Journal, March 4, 1738). There comes a point in our life when we have to choose, where we have to decide if we’re going to trust Jesus’ death on the cross for our salvation or not. There is a point where we have to decide we’re either going to keep going up the mountain one step at a time or we’re going to turn around, go home and give up. The journey of faith, the walk with Jesus, is not an easy one. It’s not meant to be. He said whoever would follow him would have to take up their own cross (8:34), and a cross is an instrument of death. Following Jesus means dying to ourselves so that we can live for him. Are we willing to make that journey this Good Friday?

When we got to the top of Stone Mountain, the view was incredible. You could see the lush Georgian countryside for miles around, and you could see quite a ways toward downtown Atlanta. I never would have seen that had I quit, had I turned around and gone back, had I not taken one step more, and then one more, and then one more. Sometimes that’s all we can do: one more step. I believe—help my unbelief. As we stand here at the cross on this Good Friday, as we once again hear the words of the passion of Jesus Christ, of his great love for us, how will you respond? With you stand with the skeptics, questioning the day? Will you stand with the onlookers, interested but not really committed? Or will you stand with the centurion, declaring faith when it seems hopeless? This day, this Good Friday, may we resolve to move ahead, to take one more step toward Jesus this day, to stay focused on him, for he is truly God’s Son and he is our only hope. Amen.

In The Garden

Genesis 3:1-9; John 18:1-9

April 5, 2012 (Maundy Thursday) • Portage First UMC

“Where are you?”

It’s a question that has echoed down through history, from the very beginning of time to this very night. It’s a question asked by every person who has ever lost something—or someone—and tonight, standing here in the garden alone, after all that’s happened in the last few hours, I hear echoes of it everywhere. The soldiers have left. The followers are gone. My fellow disciples have fled. Jesus has been taken. “Where are you?” It was first asked in the original garden at the very beginning of time. I have known the story from childhood; it was one of the first stories my mother told me, how Adam and Eve, the first man and first woman, had enjoyed unlimited fellowship with God, how they had walked with God in the cool of the day for who knows how many days or months or years. Time really wasn’t being measured then like we do now, because every day was a new day spent in God’s presence, experiencing God’s goodness. I can see why it was called a paradise—God was always there. When my mother told me the story, I learned how God took care of Adam and Eve, how he planted the garden, tended it, and gave them fruit from the trees to eat. And they could eat anything, except from the one tree. There was a tree, right in the center of the garden, that they weren’t allowed to eat from. It was the “Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil,” and God told the man and the woman if they ate from it, they would certainly die (Genesis 2:15-17). And my mother always used that story to say, “John, that’s why you should always do exactly what you’re told!”

Our rabbis debate what God meant by “you will certainly die,” but the point is that the woman and man were tempted by a serpent, ate from the tree, and the rest, as they say, is history. That was when the question was first asked. God came looking for Adam and Eve in the cool of the day, and he couldn’t find them. Well, actually, I imagine he knew where they were; after all, he’s God! But God wanted Adam and Eve to come and walk with him willingly, so when they weren’t there waiting for the evening walk as they always had been before, God called out, “Where are you?” (3:9).

Not long ago, Jesus was here. Standing right here. We all were here. We’d come here from the city. It has been a long week. Jesus seemed to want to challenge everyone and everything about our faith, our traditions, our leadership. He held nothing back, and he made almost everyone angry at him. That was nothing new. Jesus was always making people angry at him, and they’d usually put up with him while we were here for Passover, and then we’d go back to Galilee and things here in Jerusalem would quiet down. But this year, something was different. Jesus was different. He was harder, more pointed, almost like he wanted the religious leaders to get angry with him, like he was intentionally provoking them. Maybe that’s reading too much into what he said and did. I just know that when we left Bethany this morning, he told Mary, Martha and Lazarus he would be spending the night in the city, and not to expect him back for a while, maybe even a few days.

So we gathered tonight for the Passover meal, that great celebration that’s so central to who we are as God’s people. It reminds us, every year, of the lengths God went to in order to free us a people from slavery in Egypt so many centuries ago. We got all settled in the room, and Jesus surprised us all when he washed our feet; that wasn’t the role of a master or a teacher. It’s the role of a slave. And yet, Peter was the only one to protest. The rest of us just sort of sat there in shock as Jesus told us we should do the same thing to one another. Then, back at the table, he told us, “One of you is going to betray me” (John 13:21). Betray him? It was unthinkable! We’d all been with him for nearly three years. We’d shared life together, all of us. We knew each other inside and out. Better friends I had never had than these twelve men. One of us would betray Jesus? Why? How? When? As all those thoughts were going through my head, Peter leaned over and said, “Ask him which one he means” (13:24). I was sitting next to Jesus, so I leaned back and did just that. “Lord,” I said, “who is it?” Very quietly, Jesus said to me, “It is the one to whom I will give this piece of bread when I have dipped it in the dish” (13:25-26). And then he dipped the bread and gave it to Judas, who was sitting on the other side of Jesus. He looked at Judas and said, “What you are about to do, do quickly” (13:27). And then Judas got up and left. Peter looked over at me and mouthed the word, “Well?” I shook my head and shrugged my shoulders, because I couldn’t imagine that Judas would betray Jesus. He had kept our money all of this time; he was our treasurer. He had laughed with us, cried with us, done ministry with us. No, it couldn’t be. He must have left to go buy something else for the dinner, or maybe to make a donation to the poor in our names (13:29). It couldn’t be Judas, could it?

After the dinner, we walked the length of the Kidron Valley; Jesus talked and prayed the whole way. He offered us words of comfort, of promise, of encouragement. And he prayed for us. He prayed that we would be one, that God would protect us from the evil one, and that none of us would be lost. Those are words and prayers that will stick in my memory, that will always be in my heart. And then we arrived at the garden—Gethsemane, they call it. “Oil Press,” is what it means. It’s an olive grove, and just over there is the actual press where they make the olive oil. Of course, it was quiet at night, and Jesus liked to come here. We’d been here many times before. Most of us, Jesus left at the gate, but he asked me, Peter and James to come with him a bit further. He pointed to a spot on the ground and told us to stay there while he went even further into the garden to pray. The moon was full, so we could see him and hear a bit. He was only about a stone’s throw away, but it had been a long week and an even longer day. We were tired, and before I knew it, I heard Jesus saying, “Where are you?” Well, not in those exact words, but he had come looking for us, and all three of us were asleep. “Couldn’t you keep watch for one hour?” he asked (Mark 14:37). He directed the words at Peter, but we knew he was really talking to all of us. “Watch and pray,” he said, “so that you will not fall into temptation.” Temptation…in a garden. Then he went away and prayed again. And a third time. And every time, we fell asleep. “Where are you?” he asked. We’re asleep, Jesus. We can’t even stay with you when you need us most.

When he had to wake us up the third time, he said, “Here comes my betrayer!” Instantly, we were awake, and I turned around, and sure enough, here came Judas (I still can’t believe it was Judas!), leading the chief priests, teachers of the law, the elders and some soldiers. He came up to Jesus, kissed him on the cheek, and called him “Rabbi.” I wanted to smack that smirk off of Judas’ face so bad, but Jesus stepped forward. “Who is it you want?” he asked, and when they said they were looking for Jesus of Nazareth, he told them, “I am he.” Now, see, I would have run away at that point. I would have used the garden and all the bushes and trees to hide behind. They would have had to search hard if they were going to take me. But not Jesus. He gave himself to them. “Let these men go,” he said, pointing to us. And we watched silently as they led Jesus away. He let them take him! We were left here, in the garden, alone, wondering what to do next (18:4-9).

The rabbis have always talked about what happened in the Garden of Eden as “the fall,” the time when we human beings fell away from God—or ran away, or walked away, or however you want to put it. We fell. We stumbled over our own pride and we were no longer who God intended us to be. And as I’ve stood here for the last—how long have I been here? I guess it doesn’t really matter, but I’ve been thinking about that garden and this one. In that garden, Adam and Eve hid from God when they shouldn’t have. They made a mistake, they did what they had been told not to do, and so they hid from the only one who could make it right, from the only one who would still love them in spite of their mistakes. Tonight, when Jesus should have hid from evil men, he didn’t. He put himself right out there. He wanted to be found. Even this place—we’ve come here before. Judas knew right where to find him. If Jesus had an inclination that someone was going to betray him, turn him in, why didn’t we go somewhere else? Why didn’t we go somewhere and hide until the storm blew over? I think the answer is found in Jesus’ time of prayer. In the garden here, he put himself in the hands of the only one who could make it right—his heavenly father. It’s almost like—well, it’s almost like Jesus came to this garden to reverse the fall, to set right what had happened in that other garden, so long ago (cf. Hamilton, 24 Hours That Changed the World, pg. 35). Jesus fell here, too, you know. He fell into the hands of evil men, who will now do with him what they want. And somehow, in that fall, it seems there just might be hope for undoing the other fall.

You know, right before we headed here to the garden, and right after Judas left, Jesus did something that left us all scratching our heads. He changed the Passover liturgy. That isn’t something you do normally, or lightly. The readings and the meanings for the Passover meal have stood the test of time; they’ve been around for a long, long time, and even when, as a people, we failed to celebrate the Passover, these ancient words were still part of who we are. And Jesus, for the last couple of years, has followed the liturgy to the letter. Always. He was faithful to the traditions. But not tonight. Tonight, when he picked up the loaf of bread, he broke it, said the usual blessing over it (“Blessed art thou, O Lord, king of the universe, who brings forth bread from the earth”), then stopped and looked closely at it. Two pieces of bread, broken in his hands. Then he looked at us and said, “Take and eat; this is my body.” What? That wasn’t in the liturgy. But none of us dared to speak up; we could still feel the dampness on our feet from when he had washed them. We took the bread, and we ate it like he told us to. Then, a little while later, Jesus took one of the cups of wine that was part of the ritual, and he blessed it like normal, too (“Blessed art thou, O Lord, king of the universe, who brings forth the fruit of the vine”), and I thought we were back on track. But he paused again, stared into the cup, and then said, “Drink from it, all of you. This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins” (Matthew 26:26-28).

“The blood of the covenant”—all of us knew what that meant. In our history, covenants or agreements between people had been ratified by the shedding of blood. You gave up something precious in order to solidify or guarantee the relationship. At the first Passover, a lamb had died so the people would be protected when the angel of death passed through Egypt (Keener, Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, pg. 120). The lamb had provided safety, salvation (Barclay, The Gospel of Matthew, Volume 2, pg. 341). We knew the stories, and we knew how, through the years, that had come to be the symbol of a solid or good relationship with God. When we gave up something precious, the life of a perfect animal, a sacrifice, our sins were forgiven by the shedding of that creature’s blood. The blood of the covenant provided forgiveness for the sin that had followed us, haunted us since that first garden. Forgiveness is tied to the blood, and God’s promise was that when the blood was shed, forgiveness would be given. Now Jesus was saying his blood was where forgiveness was found? And worse yet, he told us to drink the wine because it was his blood? I’m sorry, we also all knew that our faith found drinking blood revolting. Jesus was doing something very new here, something I don’t quite understand yet, but somehow, the best I can figure is he wanted us to think of forgiveness whenever we saw bread or wine, and that forgiveness would have something to do with his blood. So he gave us this meal, this bread and cup, to remind us that forgiveness is possible. Maybe it has something to do with what happened (or what began to happen) in this garden. Jesus fell here so we wouldn’t have to fall anymore. Somehow, what he’s doing is bringing forgiveness to us.

Yeah, it’s a lot to think about. I know I don’t have it all figured out yet. I just know that Jesus is up to something tonight—and that it has to do with that meal, and this garden, and wherever he’s headed next. Which reminds me—I’m not sure where everyone else went, but I’m going to go see if I can find out what’s going on with Jesus. I failed him here in the garden by falling asleep; I don’t want to leave him alone now. He’s been deserted enough tonight. And I don’t want to have to answer “Where are you?” with “I was hiding.” So I think I’ll see where they went with him; I know when they left here they went in the direction of the house of the high priest, back along the Kidron Valley. Luckily the moon’s out, so I should be able to follow them hopefully without being noticed. Hey, Peter, do you want to go with me? I think I can get us into the courtyard. I used to know some people there (John 18:15-16). Let’s go find out what’s going on with Jesus.

More Than You Can Imagine

The Sermon Study Guide is here.

John 19:28-30; Luke 23:44-49

March 31/April 1, 2012 (Palm Sunday) • Portage First UMC

INTRO VIDEO WEEK 6

When all is said and done, when the rest of the crowd has walked back down the hill, a group of women remain standing near the cross (Luke 23:49). It has been quite a week for them, as many of them had come with Jesus and his disciples to Jerusalem for the Passover, and just five days ago, they had taken part in a parade down the side of the Mount of Olives they thought was Jesus’ inauguration parade. They thought he was coming to Jerusalem to become a king, and so they had made quite a fuss over him, waving palm branches and singing and laying down their cloaks for his donkey to walk on. On that day, they never imagined this day would come…certainly not so quickly. They knew he had upset many different people and groups throughout the week, but they couldn’t imagine he had made them mad enough they would want to kill him. And, of course, they knew it wasn’t just the events of this week that had led to this awful, brutal death. It was the whole of his preaching, teaching, and healing that had led to this moment. Yet, in that moment, they couldn’t begin to understand all he was doing on that cross.

Nor can we, fully, even all these centuries later. We have been looking closely at the final words Jesus uttered from the cross during this Lenten season, trying not only to understand how they relate to his purpose on the cross but also what they can mean in our lives today. Today, we come to the final two words from the cross, two words we’re going to take together because it’s likely they were spoken rather closely together. These last two final words come at the very end of Jesus’ life, after he has spent a brutal six hours hanging between heaven and earth (and even though six hours in such a state seems unimaginable to you and me, many crucified men lasted much longer, more hours, sometimes days. The reason the break the legs of the other two is to speed their death, to make it so they can’t breathe anymore —John 19:31-33.). At the end of that time of darkness, Jesus, John says, knew that every Scripture promise had been fulfilled, and that’s when, with a loud cry, he called out, “It is finished” (John 19:28).

Now, there are a lot of ways that cry can be understood. Some hear it as a cry of relief, the sigh of a man whose suffering is almost over. “Thankfully, it is finished.” Others hear it as a cry of defeat, as if Jesus has given up and realizes that what he’s done has been a waste of time. I think most of us know that cry from time to time. Bishop Will Willmon tells about a study he did on clergy burnout some years ago, and how the number one aspect of church ministry that caused clergy to quit was the fact that it was never finished. There was always one more sermon, one more hospital visit, one more meeting that needed to be taken care of, and it sometimes begins to feel fruitless. “I envy housepainters,” one person told him. “They can actually see the results of their work” (Willimon, Thank God It’s Friday, pg. 62). And so people give up because they feel useless. Is that the way Jesus felt on the cross? It could be heard that way—as a surrender, as “I give up.” Maybe some who were on the ground that day chose to hear it that way. But I don’t think that’s what Jesus meant. John alone records the words Jesus said at this point; the other three Gospels simply tell us Jesus let out a loud shout (Barclay, The Gospel of John Volume 2, pg. 258). In Greek (the language the Gospel was written in) and in Aramaic (the language Jesus spoke), the phrase “It is finished” is one word (Hamilton, Final Words, pg. 104). Remember how I’ve been saying the words from the cross get shorter as we go along because it gets harder to breathe? Jesus summons up all of his energy and he shouts one word: “Finished!” Finished! The word he used means everything has been accomplished; it was actually the same word you would write on a bill when everything had been settled up (Wright, John for Everyone, Part Two, pg. 131). The work was done, the payment was made and everything was completed. It’s not a defeated cry; it’s a cry of victory. All is accomplished, completed, fulfilled (cf. Hauerwas). Finished!

What, then, did Jesus “finish” on the cross? One of the themes we’ve repeated through this series is that Jesus’ life mission was summed up in Luke 19:10: “The Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.” All through his ministry—his preaching, his teaching, his healing—he’s been seeking the lost, especially the ones no one else wanted anything to do with. Now, on the cross, he’s doing the work needed to save the lost, to save us from our sins. You’ve probably heard that before, that Jesus died to save us from our sins, but how does that work? How does his suffering and death save us from our sins? It’s not an easy question to answer, and it’s not one I feel like I have all figured out. There are a lot of theories as to how, exactly, Jesus’ death on the cross accomplishes or finishes our salvation. You gather ten theologians together and you’ll probably get fifteen answers as to how that happens. Sometimes we talk about Jesus being a substitute for us—he died our death. Other times we talk about him being an offering—that he gave his life to make things right with God the Father, to “atone” for our sins. Or we talk about how, since he was raised, he is the final victory over death, or an example of self-sacrifice for us, or a demonstration of God’s love for humanity. And some pastors and Bible teachers and theologians will go to the wall and even write you off as unChristian if you don’t agree with their particular theory of the cross, but every one of those theories has Biblical support. I don’t think there’s any one theory that fully describes what Jesus is doing on the cross, and if God were to explain it to us in depth, I think it would be more than we could understand. There is more than we can imagine happening on that cross in those six hours, but one thing is for sure: when Jesus says, “It is finished,” whatever it was he needed to do to be able to save us from our sins, he has done. That’s why he came. That’s why he went to the cross. Adam Hamilton describes what happens there as “poetry lived out in human flesh” (107). Just like every time we read a poem, we see things differently—every time we look at the cross, we see perhaps something new, something different, usually exactly what we need at that point in our life. Because, as Richard Neuhaus points out, Jesus said “It is finished,” but it was not over (qtd. in Hauerwas). God is still at work, saving the world.

Luke tells us, then, that the “curtain of the temple was torn in two” (23:45). It’s an odd detail, but one that would have made perfect sense to those first-century readers. The curtain he’s talking about is the one that marked off the Holy of Holies in the Temple in Jerusalem. The Holy of Holies was said to be the place where God himself dwelt, and no one was allowed in that space except the High Priest, and him only once a year on the Day of Atonement, the day he came to offer sacrifice for all the people’s sins (Barclay, The Gospel of Luke, pg. 288). In fact, if you go up on the Temple Mount today, where the Muslim Dome of the Rock sits, there is a small area marked off that is the archaeologists’ best guess as to where the Holy of Holies was. It’s marked off so no one accidentally steps in that place—because no one was allowed into God’s holy presence without extensive preparation. In Jesus’ day, the Holy of Holies was marked off by a curtain that may have been as much as foot thick and sixty feet tall. It was made of blue, purple and red yarn and would have been raised by other priests when it was time for the High Priest to enter. Then they would raise it again when he was ready to come out. No one else was allowed inside the most holy place (Hamilton 110; Card, Luke: The Gospel of Amazement, pg. 257). But Luke says, just before Jesus died, the curtain was torn in two. Mark includes the detail that it was torn from top to bottom (15:38). This thick, heavy, tall curtain was torn, starting at the top—sixty feet in the air! Mark wants us to know it wasn’t a human hand that tore the curtain. When Jesus finished his work, sins were forgiven and direct access to God was granted. The curtain was no longer needed. We can now come directly to God and ask for forgiveness; we no longer need a priest to intercede for us. Pastors are not priests; in fact, the New Testament refers to all of us as priests (1 Peter 2:9), lifting each other up in prayer (James 5:16). The curtain is torn; the way is open for everyone.

And now, since it was finished, Jesus has one last word. You may remember two weeks ago we talked about how, during that darkness and the silence, Jesus was praying the psalms. We heard him pray Psalm 22: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” But we know that wasn’t the only psalm he was praying, because at the very end, Jesus prays another psalm—Psalm 31. Out loud, he prays verse 5: “Into your hands I commit my spirit.” Except Jesus adds one word to his prayer: “Father—into your hands I commit my spirit” (23:46). There is a tradition that says this verse was the one taught by Jewish mothers to their children to pray just before going to sleep every night. It was sort of the first century Jewish version of, “Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep.” Picture Mary, every night, sitting with Jesus by his bedside, praying Psalm 31:5: “Into your hands I commit my spirit; deliver me, Lord, my faithful God” (cf. Barclay Luke 288; Hamilton 113). Couple that with the word John uses to describe Jesus’ death. John says, “With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit” (19:30). The word translated “bowed his head” is a sleep word. It refers to settling your head back on a pillow, ready for rest (Barclay John 258). This was no violent death at the end, no gasping for a final rush of air. This is the picture of a child, giving in to sleep, trusting his Father that everything would be okay on the other side. “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit” (23:46). After the brutality and the ugliness of the last six hours, Jesus quietly entrusts everything he is to his heavenly Father.

And so the Son of God dies. Inexplicable, unexplainable, incomprehensible—the author of life is killed on a cross made by his own creation. Having done what he came to do, Jesus entrusts his spirit to the Father. So what do we do with that? Of all the final words, these are perhaps the most perplexing, because there is deep mystery here, which is why our inclination is to hurry on to Easter and not linger at the cross. But we need to stay here. We need this Holy Week to be able to absorb all that has happened. When we jump from the celebration of the palm parade to the celebration of the empty tomb, we miss something—something significant, because what Jesus did on the cross is the culmination of everything he came to do. Jesus came to seek and save us, and on that cross, somehow mysteriously, wondrously, beautifully, he did exactly that. When Jesus says, “It is finished,” he reminds us that he is the one who does all the work in our salvation. There is nothing we can do to save ourselves. At that moment, “God has finished what only God could finish” (Hauerwas). There is nothing we can do, which is hard for we purpose-driven, vision-oriented, task-centered people. We believe you decide on an outcome, draw up a list of things to do to accomplish that outcome, make sure it lines up with your vision, and then do everything you can to finish the task. That’s why it’s so easy for us to think we can work our way to heaven, to earn our salvation. I’ve heard people say they just hope they do enough good deeds, that in the end their good outweighs the bad. And these aren’t necessarily worldly people. A lot of them are church people. But, folks, it doesn’t work that way. If it did, that would mean Jesus only did part of the work on the cross and God the Father expects us to get the rest of the way on our own. Jesus didn’t say, “It’s almost finished.” He didn’t say, “Well, I did as much as I could.” From the top of the cross, in the midst of incredible pain and suffering, he shouted, “Finished!” And so Bishop Willimon issues this call: “Listen to this, oh ye purpose-driven, upwardly mobile, goal-setting high achievers. He has done what we could not do. Because we could not get up to God, God climbed down to us, got down on our level, and here, in the bloody, unjust crucifixion, we have at last descended to our level. God has finished what God began. It is finished. What now is to be done by us? Nothing” (65).

Now, we set goals and we live out of a purpose statement here at the church, but that’s not so we can earn our salvation. What we do in our Christian life is a response to God’s great gift, a “working out” of our salvation (cf. Philippians 2:12), a living out of our faith. We feed the hungry, visit the sick, heal the lame, take care of the children, sit with the dying—not to earn God’s love but to respond to it. Everything that needed to be done was done on the cross. Finished. We only have to accept it, and let him do the work in us.

Thirteen years ago, as some of you know, I had heart surgery to repair a malformed aortic valve. It was a birth defect that the doctors had been monitoring since I was in high school, and the time finally came to have it fixed. So I went to Methodist Hospital in Indianapolis and I allowed a doctor to put me under anesthesia, open my chest, and do what he knew how to do—repair my heart. I could not do it myself. No amount of exercise, right diet or any other kind of activity would have fixed my heart. Even if I had the skills, even if I were a surgeon, I couldn’t open my own heart and fix it. I had to place myself in the hands of another person who would do what was needed to be done, and then after a time, declare that the surgery was finished. The defect had been repaired. Now, after the surgery, there were things I had to do to work out my healing. I had to walk for so many minutes a day. I had to take medication. I had to make sure I didn’t do certain things, like pick up anything heavier than a gallon of milk. That was hard. Christopher was just 3½ and he still liked to be held at that point. But if I was serious about my healing, I had to do certain things and not do others. And yet, there was still really nothing I could do to accomplish my own healing. What needed to be done, the surgeon had done. It was finished. What I did was a response to that work. The same is true of our salvation. Everything we need was accomplished on the cross. What we do is our way of working out our salvation, responding in gratitude to what Jesus has done.

And so, like Jesus, all we can do, ultimately, is trust. When it was finished, Jesus trusted. He gave up his spirit. He gave himself into the hands of the only one who is ultimately trustworthy. People will disappoint us. People will hurt us. People will use us for their own purposes, sometimes even if they don’t intend to. The only one who will never leave us nor forsake us (cf. Hebrews 13:5) is the one to whom Jesus entrusted his spirit. His final word from the cross is a challenge to us. Dr. Stanley Hauerwas puts it this way: “By giving himself up and commending his spirit to the Father, Jesus invites and enables us to give ourselves up and become ‘united with him in a death like his’ (Romans 6:5)” (Hauerwas). Or, perhaps put more simply, can we trust Jesus the way he trusted his Father?

The letter to the Hebrews says, “It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God” (Hebrews 10:31). Actually, the King James Version is a better translation here, because instead of the word “dreadful,” the KJV uses the word “fearful.” The Greek word is phoberos, which you can hear is the basis of our word “phobia,” fear. But the writer doesn’t imply an irrational fear, like we think of when we hear “phobia.” Rather, the author says it’s a logical, rational reaction to putting ourselves in God’s hands. Nearly three centuries ago, a New England preacher named Jonathan Edwards set off a revival by preaching on that text, reminding his hearers that the only thing separating us from hell is the hand of God, and while you can certainly hear that message in that verse, I think there’s another way to see it as well. It’s a fearful thing to fall into God’s hands simply because you never know what he might do with us (Willimon 72). When we choose to trust God, we’re never quite sure where he’s going to lead us or what he might ask us to give up. Can we trust that what God will do and the places he will lead us are good, or for our benefit? Perhaps, if we’re going to be able to trust God, we need a reminder of just who he is, and I know of no better reminder or celebration of who Jesus, our Lord and Savior, is, than this clip from a sermon by an African-American pastor, Dr. S. M. Lockridge. Take a listen.

Video - “That’s My King!”

Jesus is more than we can imagine, and what he’s done for us on the cross is also more than we can imagine. And because of that, we can choose to trust him. We can trust that God is good and will sustain us through everything the world throws at us. Moses reminded the people long ago, “The eternal God is your refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms” (Deuteronomy 33:27). I love that image! Even in the darkness, God can be trusted because Jesus already took the worst the world can give and he entrusted himself to his heavenly Father even then.

So I visit in the hospital, and there have been times when several of you are facing serious illnesses. And I dare to ask God for healing, but we also pray, “Into your hands, we commit our spirits.” We trust God whether he chooses to heal the way we want him to or not. And I talk with people whose marriages are struggling. One night, a couple came to the parsonage at the church we were serving at the time, and their marriage was in trouble. He had been abusive, and he knew he had hurt her in so many ways. And while we hoped for healing in the relationship, we also prayed that night, “Into your hands, Father.” We trust you. I sat with Joan, whose oldest daughter was a prodigal, far from the faith, and whose second daughter had physical and mental challenges. Joan and her husband had sought to serve God in another culture, and things had not worked out, so they came home, broken, beaten up and wondering what was next. As Joan faced the challenges of two of her daughters and her own broken dreams, she came to a point where she was at the end of her own resources. And we prayed, “Father, into your hands we commit Joan and her family.” We believed God for healing, even if it didn’t come the way we wanted. Can we trust God in the dark places? Can we trust him when everything around us lies shattered, broken, in pieces? Jesus did. “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.” What he prayed at bedtime as a child, he now prayed at the end of his life, and it had never meant more to him that it did on the top of that cross as he bowed his head and died.

Because, ultimately, that prayer is a call to trust God even in death. John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, talked about the ways God’s grace works in our lives. We most often talk about prevenient grace (the grace that works in our life even before we’re aware of God), justifying grace or saving grace, and sanctifying grace (the power we’re given to live the Christian life). But Wesley also talked about glorifying grace, the strength God gives us to face, as he said it, a “happy death.” It was said, in early days, that “Methodists die well,” and that was because of the peace and joy with which those early Methodists faced their homegoing (Willimon 75-76). It’s said that the truest test of what a person believes is whether or not it can sustain you in the face of death. And that’s true not only for the person facing eternity but for those who surround him or her. On a few occasions, I have been privileged to be invited into that holy place where a person is moving from this world to the next. On one occasion, I sat with a family late into the night as their father and husband struggled to breathe. People drifted in and out, and somewhere around 1 a.m., I watched as he took a last, peaceful breath and did not move again. His wife was sitting right by him, and while there were tears, the first thing she did was look into my eyes and say, “Shouldn’t we pray now?” Indeed, we should. He was home. He had committed his spirit to God, to his heavenly father, and all was well. Can we trust God like that?

And so, we enter this final week, this Holy Week. As I said a bit ago, if you jump from today’s celebration to next weekend’s celebration, you will miss something. I’m not just talking about the wonderful services we have planned. There is something profoundly spiritual that comes from walking with Jesus to the cross this week. We’ve spent the last six weeks gazing up at the cross, and we’ve seen in many ways how these final words continue to intersect with our own lives. “Father, forgive them, for they don’t know what they are doing.” Where are you in your journey of forgiveness? “Today you will be with me in paradise.” Who are the least of these you’ve been called to love? “Behold your son!” How are you honoring your family? “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Are you continuing to pray, even in the darkness? “I thirst.” What are you thirsty for? “It is finished.” Can you trust Jesus to do all the work in saving you? “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.” And we end where we began—in prayer to the heavenly Father. This is a good week to ponder those words again, and to spend time hearing from Jesus. Walking with him to the cross is a good way to do that. One of the things I noticed while reading the Steve Jobs biography is how, when something important needed to be discussed or communicated, Jobs would take people on a walk. Jesus often does the same thing, and this week he calls us to walk with him, to learn from him, to go to the Upper Room and eat with him, to go to the cross and stand by him. I invite you, brothers and sisters, into a holy week as we hear again the greatest news in all of history. Will you stand with Jesus at the cross this week? Next to the cross, after all, there is more than you can imagine—he has finished the work, and it’s all for you. You can trust him. Let’s pray.