The Waking Dreamer: Presence of Christ

Showing posts with label Presence of Christ. Show all posts

Thursday, June 11, 2026

The Power of God's Love

The Power of God’s Love

Psalm 8, Matthew 28:16-20[1]

We have a complicated relationship with power. On the one hand, we seem to be fascinated with those whom we consider to be the most “powerful” people. Even to the point that our admiration can at times approach a kind of “worship.” There are many powerful people in this world who have an almost “cult” like following among their fans. On the other hand, we seem to be inherently distrusting of power. Especially when we believe someone is abusing their power. Anytime someone in power “bullies” those who are more vulnerable, we think of it as an abuse of power. And in our world we may see that kind of thing so often that we become distrusting of all power, regardless of how it’s used.

Our Scripture lessons for today speak to us about God’s power. The creation story in Genesis portrays God’s power to simply “speak” all things into existence. That’s a kind of power that most of us may want, but I dare say none of us would use well. But God most certainly used it well. That’s the point of the refrain that occurs throughout the creation story: “and God saw that it was good.” God used his extraordinary power to create a world and all the living things in it that was not only “good,” but indeed “very good,” as God observes at the end of the process (Gen 1:31). It may be hard for some people to imagine even God using that magnitude of power for good, but that’s precisely what the Bible teaches us! God always uses his power for good!

In our reading from the Psalms, we find this perspective on God’s power confirmed. Like many of us, the Psalmsinger found himself confronted by the majestic power of the God who created all the heavens and the earth simply with a word. I would say that the more we understand about how vast this cosmos really is, the more we are confronted by God’s majesty and power in creation. Even in ancient times, a simple glance at the night sky led the Psalmsinger to wonder, “what are human beings that you are mindful of them, mortals that you care for them?” (Psalm 8:4). And yet, despite the fact that he frames his faith in the form of a question, we shouldn’t overlook the affirmation that lies behind it: God is mindful of us all; God does care for us, both deeply and continually. That is also the nature of God’s power!

The Psalmsinger had good reason to believe this. It’s the heart of what Hebrew Bible affirms about God: “I am the Lord God. I am merciful and very patient with my people. I show great love, and I can be trusted” (Exodus 34:6, CEV). It is the revelation God gave to Moses in the “cleft of the rock” when he asked to see God’s glory. And it echoes like a refrain throughout the Hebrew Scriptures, because it is the truth that serves as the foundation for biblical faith. The message of the Scriptures is that God’s power points us to the fact that God loves us with a love that will never let us go. It may be difficult for us to grasp, but the truth of our Scripture lesson is that we are constantly surrounded by the love of the God who is powerful enough to create all things simply by speaking the word. As one of our affirmations of faith puts it, the Bible leads us to believe in a God whose love for us is “powerful beyond measure.”

We see this theme of power reflected a little differently in our Gospel reading for today. It’s the story of Jesus’ final appearance to his disciples according to Matthew. When he appeared to them on a mountain in Galilee, he said something that would have been startling for them. And it should still catch our attention today: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me” (Mt 28:18). We’re used to hearing that language because it’s part of the “Great Commission.” But in that day, “all authority” belonged to God. Any human being claiming “all authority in heaven and on earth” would have been viewed as directly contradicting God’s authority. In fact, there are many in our world to this day who struggle with the image Jesus as having “all authority in heaven and on earth.”

I think what made the difference is that it was the risen and living Jesus who made this startling claim. They had seen him die, and they had seen him alive more than once after he rose from the dead. It was the resurrection that confirmed that this authority had come from God. I think we could say that Jesus received this authority in response to the fact that he had “fulfilled all righteousness” as Matthew’s Gospel puts it (Mt 3:15), or in other words that he had carried out God’s plan to “set right” all things and all people by his death and resurrection. Because of that, God himself gave this authority to Jesus. So it is that, in the New Testament, there is no contradiction whatsoever between the affirmation that all authority belongs to God, and that God has given that authority to Jesus Christ.

One reason for that is because Jesus uses that authority to carry out God’s purpose in the world. That’s not something we expect these days. It goes against the norm in our day. In our world, “power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”[2] That’s the way we view power. Many of those who have the most power in our day use it to benefit themselves. But Jesus used the authority given to him by God not for his own benefit, but to extend the peace, justice, and freedom of God’s kingdom to all people. And he continues to use that authority to fulfill God’s work of “making all things new” (Rev 21:5). And at the end of it all, Paul said that Jesus would surrender all authority back to God, so that God “will be utterly supreme over everything everywhere” (1 Cor 15:28, NLT), bringing the new life of God’s kingdom to everyone and everything!

I think the point of all this was to inspire confidence in those of us who follow Jesus in a world that is set against God’s authority and power, in a world that remains set against the peace, justice, and freedom of God’s kingdom to this day. We see that opposition almost daily. Part of the assurance that God’s love triumphs in this world through Jesus lies in the promise that “I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Mt 28:20). Yes, we live in a world where the work of God’s kingdom isn’t complete. Yes, we live in a world where people continue to abuse power for their own benefit, and they hurt innocent people in the process. But rather than letting that cause us to doubt God’s purpose, or cause us to question Jesus’ power and authority, we can be confident because Jesus Christ our Savior and Lord is the one to whom God has entrusted “authority, honor, and sovereignty over all the nations of the world” (Dan 7:13, NLT). And with that authority, Jesus Christ our Savior and Lord rules right now over “everything in heaven and on earth, everything seen and unseen” (Col 1:16, NLT). And the promise is that “His rule is eternal—it will never end” (Dan 7:14, NLT).

When we get caught up in what’s happening around us in this world, we can easily lose sight of all this. We can wonder where God’s rule, God’s power, and God’s authority are in this world. It’s still there! Jesus the Christ and our Savior and Lord is reigning with “all authority” at the right hand of God, right now! And he promised that he would be with us until the end of the age, continuing to fulfill the promise of God’s kingdom with the authority and power that God has given him. And part of the promise is that the power of God’s love will never fade. The promise is that the rule of love that Jesus carries out in our lives now will never end. One day, the power of God’s love, the rule of love that Jesus carries out in our lives now will extend to all people and encompass everything. On that day, then the whole creation will return to where it was in the beginning, when God “spoke” it into being, and everything was “very good.”

[2] Famously penned by Lord John Dalberg-Acton, Letter to Mandell Creighton (5 April 1887), referring to the declaration by Pope Pius IX of the Roman Catholic dogma of papal infallibility. He said, “I cannot accept your canon that we are to judge Pope and King unlike other men, with a favorable presumption that they did no wrong. If there is any presumption it is the other way against holders of power, increasing as the power increases. … Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely. … There is no worse heresy than that the office sanctifies the holder of it. That is the point at which … the end learns to justify the means.” Cf. Historical Essays and Studies, by John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton (1907), edited by John Neville Figgis and Reginald Vere Laurence, Appendix, p. 504. Accessed at http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Lord_Acton.

Wednesday, May 13, 2020

On This Day

On this Day

Psalm 118:24[1]

On this day we come together to celebrate the heart of our faith: that Jesus lives! It is something that may be difficult for us to wrap our heads around. We can understand sacrificing oneself for the sake of others. Most of us have been called upon to do just that for the sake of the people in our lives we love and care about. But none of us has any first-hand experience with resurrection—at least not literally. We may have known someone who has had a “near-death” experience. But there is simply nothing in our experience of this world that gives us a basis for grasping the idea that a person who was dead—not for minutes, but for over 36 hours—somehow came back to life.

That doesn’t bother me too much, though, because I know that there are some elements of our faith that we may never understand. But while I may never be able to explain the resurrection of Jesus from death to life, I can experience the risen Lord in and through my life. I can sense the presence of the Spirit, I can feel Jesus’ impulse to compassion, and I can enjoy the freedom of faith and hope in the God who is always here. At the end of the day, I think that’s what Easter is about. When we experience the presence and power of God in our lives, it is the same Spirit that the disciples encountered in Jesus of Nazareth. And the reason we celebrate the resurrection on Easter Sunday is because that same Spirit of the risen Christ lives in you and in me and in all who have the experience of his continuing presence.

The Psalmist celebrated a kind of death-to-life renewal. He spoke of being in distress, of being surrounded on every side (Ps. 118:5, 10-11). The Psalmist spoke of being “pushed hard” to the point of falling (Ps. 118:13). The language suggests the setting of battle, but I’m not sure we should take that literally. Whether he was at the crucial point of a battle, at the point where it could have gone either way, or simply at a critical turning point in his life, he felt as if he could have been defeated. It’s in that setting that the Psalmist affirms, “The LORD is my strength and my might; he has become my salvation” (Ps. 118:14). Like a piece of stone that had been cast aside as worthless, only to be retrieved later as the most important building block that holds the rest of the structure together, the Psalmist rejoices that he has been delivered from whatever it was that threatened him.

And so he rejoices that “This is the day that the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it” (Ps. 118:24). That’s the way most translations put it. But if we pay attention to the sequence, it seems like there’s more to this verse than just celebrating God’s hand in each day. This is a special day. The rejected one has been raised to the place of highest honor. In response the Psalmist says, “This is the Lord's doing; it is marvelous in our eyes” (Ps. 118:23). One of the features of the Psalms is that verses are parallel with each other. Sometimes to point out a contrast. Here, I think it is for emphasis. And so that familiar verse probably shouldn’t be read as “this is the day the Lord has made,” but rather “on this day the Lord has done it; let us rejoice and be glad in what he has done.” It’s a celebration of an act so unexpected, so unique, and so “marvelous” that all we can do is to celebrate what God has done with joy and gladness.

I think that’s what Easter is about. It’s a celebration that on this day, all those years ago, God acted decisively to break the break the power of everything that threatens to enslave or oppress or distort or destroy our humanity. It’s a celebration that, on this day, God took all our pain and sorrow and suffering and sadness and loss and death and turned it all into new life. Easter is a celebration of the new life that came into being on this day and that it will one day transform everything and everyone. It is a celebration that, on this day, God acted in a decisive way to demonstrate that he is constantly working to restore the whole creation to the place where it is once again “very good.”

Simply put, because the Spirit of Easter is alive and well in this community of faith, I believe in a God who is working to bring grace and peace and mercy and love and joy and life into every life. And we experience that “marvelous” work of God in our own lives as we know the continuing presence of Jesus in all our lives. It means that for us, “Jesus is the light in our darkness, the bread that satisfies our hunger, the vine that is the source of our life, the healer who makes us whole … .”[2] Not “Jesus was,” but “Jesus is.” Easter is like a promise that points toward a future filled with hope and joy and love and life. But it is a promise that we can all begin to experience right here and right now because Jesus is alive and well in us all. Although we may never understand all that Easter means, because Jesus is alive and well in us, on this day, we can celebrate what God is doing in and through us.

[2] Borg, Heart of Christianity, 88.

Monday, June 10, 2019

The Spirit of Truth

John 14:8-17; Acts 2:16-21[1]

Given our sometimes maddeningly diverse world, I’m afraid people tend to fall into two camps when it comes to “Truth.” Some, like Pontius Pilate long ago, sagely ask, “What is truth?” (John 18:38). Others cling ever more tightly to that version of “Truth” they have embraced, insisting as the Roman Catholic Church did in the Middle Ages that it is “what has been believed everywhere, always, and by all.”^{^[2]} I’m afraid this kind of “all-or-nothing” thinking has plagued the church for centuries. Indeed, all organized religions are characterized by their ability to define and maintain their identity, even when the means they use to do so may seem to contradict the faith they profess.^{^[3]}

Unfortunately, that tension in the church originates in Scripture. It is a tension between what we might call “exclusion” and “embrace.”[4] There are many passages of scripture that emphasize “God’s people” as unique, distinct, set apart from other peoples. And, as we discussed not long ago, along with that goes “boundary markers” that are absolute in order to reinforce that identity. It is the language of “exclusion.” It says to those who are different, “You don’t belong.”

But then there are also many passages in Scripture that emphasize that God’s ultimate purpose in choosing a people for himself is to bring all peoples into the embrace of God’s love and God’s life. Along with that point of view go visions of a far-reaching and all-inclusive mission to carry the good news of God’s love to all nations. It is the language of “embrace.” It says, “Jesus loves the little children, all the children of the world.”

Our Scripture lessons for today highlight this problem. In our lesson from Acts, Peter uses verses from the book of the prophet Joel to explain what was happening on the Day of Pentecost. He boldly proclaims, “this is what was spoken through the prophet Joel: ‘In the last days it will be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh’” (Acts 2:16-17). Peter was quoting from Joel 2:28, which in its context was a part of God’s promise to restore his people and restore his life-giving presence among them. That might seem to limit the promise of the Spirit to Jewish people, but in Acts, the idea of the Spirit poured out on “all flesh,” as well as the promise that “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved” (Acts 2:21), clearly implies that the promise is opened to all people.

On the other hand, in our lesson from John’s Gospel, Jesus seems to speak about the gift of the Spirit in a very different way. The setting is that Jesus is preparing his disciples for his departure. But they are confused. They cannot fathom the idea that the Messiah would abandon them. In response, Jesus promises to send them “another Advocate” (John 14:16). The word “Advocate” here could also be translated “Comforter,” “Counselor,” “Helper,” or “Friend.” I think the main point is that the one Jesus was sending to them would be with them in the same way that he had been with them.

Jesus calls this helper, “the Spirit of Truth (John 14:17), because he’s talking about the Spirit of God, the one who makes God’s presence real in our lives, and the one who would continue to make Jesus’ presence real in their lives and ours. But the strange thing Jesus says about the “Spirit of Truth” is that while “he abides with you, and he will be in you,” “the world cannot receive [him]” (John 14:17). This seems to be a very different take on the outpouring of the Spirit at Pentecost. It seems to say that the Spirit is reserved only for a limited group, not poured out on “all flesh.”

What are we to make of this? Is the Spirit of God poured out on everyone, or just a particular group? Even within the Gospel of John, which affirms that “God so loved the world that he gave his only son” (John 3:16), the language of our Gospel reading seems strange. Part of the answer can be found in the fact that the community of believers John was addressing faced severe threats, like the loss of livelihood, or family and social ties, or possibly even loss of their lives. In the face of these kinds of threats our natural fears harden into isolation. Instead of embracing others, we see them as a threat from which we must protect ourselves. And we tend to restrict those who belong to our “group,” and limit the gifts that go with our faith, like the gift of the Spirit.

Beyond the context of our reading from John’s Gospel, I believe we have to think more clearly about what the gift of the Spirit represents. It represents God’s presence in this world, and I don’t see a whole lot of justification in Scripture for placing any limitations on that. The Spirit represents Jesus’ continuing presence in this world, and it doesn’t make sense to restrict the presence of the one who identifies with the poor and marginalized people in our world. If we see ourselves as those who are called by the “Spirit of Truth” to be the people of the God who embraces all people in his love, then we cannot isolate ourselves from “outsiders” whom we judge “different.”[5] If we are going to follow the “Spirit of Truth,” we will not only love God but also love our neighbors, all our neighbors.^{^[6]} And that means recognizing every human being as a beloved child of God. As Ray Stevens sang it, “Red and yellow, black and white, they are precious in his sight.” If they are precious in God’s sight, they must be precious in ours as well.

[2] This was Vincent of Lerin’s view of the faith that guided the Roman Catholic Church in the medieval ages. See The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, 1700, s. v. “Vincentian Canon.”

[3] John D. Caputo, On Religion, 32-33: “Institutionalized communities are defined by their identity and the power to maintain their identity, which includes the power to excommunicate the different.”

[4] See Miroslav Volf, Exclusion and Embrace, 22-31.

[5] Volf, Exclusion and Embrace, 69-79.

[6] Caputo, On Religion, 111: “Religious truth is tied up with being truly religious, truly loving God, loving God in spirit and in truth (John 4:24), and there are more ways to do that than are dreamt of by the faithful in the traditional confessions.”

Thursday, January 10, 2019

Living in the Light

Isaiah 60:1-6[1]

I find that, all too often, I suffer from a kind of spiritual “Attention Deficit.” I come to church and worship with great hymns and hear in the Scriptures the great truths and promises and hopes of our faith. Then I get distracted by matters that press upon me with their urgency and demand my attention. Before long, it seems as if I can completely forget it all. I don’t think I’m alone in that problem. I think one of the great challenges in our world so full of screens and lights and sounds and demands is to find a way to remain focused on our faith. It’s so very easy to let all the distractions of our lives cause us to forget the heart of our faith. At times, the light of the Gospel that shines at Christmas gets blurred by all that clamors for our attention.

To some extent, we see this with the “rush” to get things “back to normal” around the house after Christmas. Even though the “Christmas season” lasts from December 25 to January 5, many of us have stripped our homes of all vestige of Christmas before the New Year rolls around. The practical person in me understands that. After all the “hustle and bustle” of Christmas preparations, we want things to “get back to normal.” But the pastor in me wonders if that’s precisely part of the problem. For many of us “normal” means going about our daily routines, doing business as usual, and not really paying much attention to the message of our faith that we have supposedly been “celebrating” at Christmas.

In fact, the season of Epiphany is meant to reinforce the faith that we intend to celebrate at Christmas. I think we don’t really know what to do with Epiphany. We don’t really know what “Epiphany” is about. Today is the “festival of Epiphany.” It’s the day that we commemorate the arrival of the magi. But the “season of Epiphany” lasts from now until Len. The word “epiphany” itself is not one we use much. “Epiphany” literally means “revealing,” or “unveiling.” In this case, it’s a time for us to focus on the ways Jesus revealed himself during his ministry. It’s a time to reinforce our faith that Jesus truly is the light that has come into the darkness.

In our lesson from Isaiah for today, the prophet calls the people of Israel to rejoice over the light that had come to brighten their prospects. In this section of Isaiah, the prophet is addressing a people who have come back from exile with the promise of restoration. But the reality of what they encountered fell far short of their expectations. Jerusalem lay in ruins. Much of the “infrastructure” that supported life had been destroyed. They were surrounded by enemies who were more established and more powerful. They struggled to keep those enemies at bay, let alone to rebuild their city, their homes, their crops, and their lives.

As is often the case in when we are in dire straits, the people turned to religion as a source of security. But there is a big difference between religion as a way of life and religion as a crutch. When you’re strong enough to walk on your own, you may keep the crutch around, but you don’t use it much. That was the case with the people of Israel. The prophet challenged them at many points with the hollow way in which they supposedly worshiped the Lord. They seemed to pay a great deal of attention to the external trappings of their religion, like observing the Sabbath. But all the while they ignored what God desired from them: showing mercy to those in need, practicing true justice in public life, and honoring God from the heart.

Since this was the case, the prophet declared in the name of the Lord that God would come to set things right. God would establish true justice in the land, justice that applied equally to the rich and the poor. God would intervene to halt the various forms of violence that were practiced by the powerful: cheating workers of their wages, stealing assets and resources from the most vulnerable, and all of it to support a lavish lifestyle they thought they deserved. And the prophet promised in the name of the Lord that when God restored the land by banishing violence and establishing true justice, his presence would be like a light that would drive out the darkness, and and they would find the truly “good life” that only God can give.

Although the people of Israel experienced God’s work in their lives in that they had been released from captivity, the circumstances seemed to distract them from the light that had dawned in their lives. They had forgotten the core of their relationship with God. If you’re like me, you may have to admit that we’re more like them than we would like to think. We need to be reminded continually of the promises that lie at the heart of our faith. That’s why we gather for worship: to remind ourselves of our faith and to refocus our lives toward practicing it. I don’t know about you, but if I don’t practice worship on a daily basis, I can easily lose myself and my faith.

Epiphany is about unveiling what Advent and Christmas promises: that “all flesh shall see the salvation of God” (Lk. 3:6); that “the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all people shall see it together” (Isaiah 40:5). That’s why we celebrate Epiphany. It’s a time to remind ourselves that in Jesus a light has dawned that will never go out. Although we may have taken down all the Christmas decorations, perhaps it’s fitting to select a candle to light during the season of Epiphany in order to help us remember our faith. However we accomplish it, this is a time for us to keep our attention on the light of Christ so that we can refocus our lives toward following him. As we do so, the hope is that we will find ourselves living in the light that has dawned for us all in Jesus.

Wednesday, June 21, 2017

Surrounded by Love

Psalm 8; Matthew 28:20[1]

One of the blessings of information technology is that the world has become a much smaller place. We can learn about what is going on in around the country and even around the world almost as soon as it happens. That can be a very good thing. It means that we get to see up close and personal how much of a resemblance we bear to our sisters and brothers in the human family. One of the curses of information technology is that the world has become a much smaller place. That means that we also get to see—up close and personal—all the cruelty and violence and hatred and injustice afflicting the human family. In the face of overwhelming cruelty and violence and injustice, it can seem incredibly naïve to believe that God surrounds us continually with love!

On the surface of things, it would seem that the reality of our world contradicts the message of our Scripture lessons for today. In our reading from the Psalms, we find ourselves confronted with the majesty of the God who created all the heavens and the earth. And the more we understand about just how vast this cosmos really is, the more God’s majesty and power in creation is magnified. Even in the Psalmist’s day, a simple glance at the night sky led him to wonder, “what are human beings that you are mindful of them, mortals that you care for them?” (Psalm 8:4). And yet, despite the fact that the Psalmist frames his faith in the form of a question, we shouldn’t overlook the affirmation that lies behind it: God is mindful of us all; God does care for us, both deeply and continually.

The Psalmist had good reason to believe this. It was the heart of the essential affirmation of the Hebrew Bible: “I am the Lord God. I am merciful and very patient with my people. I show great love, and I can be trusted” (Exodus 34:6, CEV). It is the revelation God gave to Moses when he asked to see God’s glory. And it echoes like a refrain throughout the Hebrew Scriptures, because it is the truth that serves as the foundation for the faith that God loves us with a love that will never let us go. It may be difficult for us to grasp, but the truth of our Scripture lesson is that we are constantly surrounded by the love of the God who created all things.

In our lesson from Matthew’s Gospel, we see this truth reflected in a little different light. The risen Christ is giving his final instructions to his disciples. And in the midst of it all, he gives them the promise “surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” (Mt. 28:20, Today’s NIV). Jesus promised his disciples that he would always be with them, no matter what. If you look at what happens to them in the course of their lives of service to Christ and his kingdom, we might wonder about that: imprisonments, beatings, shipwrecks, and even martyrdom. But Jesus didn’t promise them that his presence would spare them from opposition in this world. He promised them that he would always be with them.

I guess I would have to say that I would expect the world to look a lot different if we’re to believe that we are always surrounded by God’s love, and that Jesus is always with us. We might think that a world in which we are all constantly and continually surrounded by God’s loving presence should bear a whole lot more evidence of peace and compassion and love! This question has vexed the minds and hearts of believers throughout the centuries. If God is so good and loving, why is there so much evil in the world? And some of the best minds through the ages have diligently sought answers.

But I’m not so sure that the answer is all that complicated. It seems to me that God’s presence in this world is no more complicated than giving and receiving compassion. I would think it stands to reason that the way we experience God’s loving presence is in the small acts by which we share kindness and love with our fellow human beings. And I would say that when we open ourselves to our sisters and brothers all around us, we find that there is actually a great deal of love in the world—even in the midst of suffering and injustice. Precisely in the midst of suffering and injustice.

I heard an interview several years ago with Sarah Shourd, one of a group of American hikers who were arrested and imprisoned in Iran, accused of spying for the U. S.[2] At first, she was alone, and she didn’t have any contact with anyone outside her cell. During that time she said that all she did was cry and beat at the walls. What sustained her through her ordeal was the compassion of Iranian women who were her fellow prisoners. When they heard Sarah crying, they would sing songs to her in English to comfort her. In the depths of Sarah’s despair, they would cry out to her in English, “We love you Sarah!” There she was, surrounded by some of the worst human injustice and cruelty, and in the midst of all that suffering, the voice of compassion came to her, “we love you Sarah!”

I think for most of us, the reality of our world makes us tend to isolate ourselves from those around us. We stay safely detached from everything and everyone in our world, walking around with earbuds, comfortable in our cars, withdrawing to our homes to engage with virtual reality over one kind of screen or another. And it’s no wonder we look at our world and wonder, “Where is God?” On the other hand, when we open ourselves to those who are around us and allow ourselves to experience their suffering and share compassion and kindness with them, then we experience God’s loving presence in our own lives. That’s when we discover the truth of the promise that, no matter what may come, we are always surrounded by God’s love.

[2] Sarah Montague, Interview with Sarah Shourd, “Hardtalk,” June 10, 2011; accessed at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/hardtalk/9508967.stm

Sunday, June 11, 2017

I Have Seen The Lord

I Have Seen the Lord

John 20:1-18[1]

One of the key principles of our faith is that we “live by faith and not by sight.” None of us has ever seen Jesus in person. None of us has seen anyone who has seen Jesus. We are centuries removed from those who actually heard him teach and saw him after he rose from the dead. That may pose a challenge for some of us. After all, we do tend to live by the mind-set that “seeing is believing.” Since we don’t have the privilege of seeing the events that serve as the basis for our faith it can be difficult at times to maintain it. I think in those times we may wish we could have been there and seen and heard Jesus. We tell ourselves that it would have made it easier to for us to have faith.

Or would it? As a matter of fact, the Gospels remind us many times that the disciples struggled to understand and believe in Jesus. Yes, even the ones who were with him day and night, who heard his teaching, who saw the amazing things he did, struggled to believe what they were seeing and hearing. How often in the Gospels does Jesus say to them “O you of little faith!” Even after that first Easter morning, their faith was a work in progress. Peter and the others had to develop their faith through their life experiences, just as anyone does. Even Paul didn’t emerge from the Damascus road with a fully formed faith. He had to live out his faith in order to grow strong enough to serve as he did.

Our Gospel lesson provides an illustration of how difficult it was for Jesus’ original disciples to understand and believe what was going on. The Scripture tells us about three people at Jesus’ tomb: Peter, John, and Mary Magdalene. The first person is Peter, the one whose confession of faith in Jesus as the Messiah Jesus said would be the foundation stone upon which he would build his church. But on that first Easter Peter’s faith was anything but rock solid. The story tells us that Peter rushed into the tomb, even though it was taboo. He saw the burial shroud, but didn’t understand. In John’s Gospel there were no angels telling Peter that Jesus had risen.

We presume the second person was John, although he’s not named anywhere in this Gospel other than “the disciple whom Jesus loved.” He is the one on the basis of whose testimony the Gospel was written (John 21:24). Since he was younger than Peter, he arrived at the tomb first. But he hesitated to enter out of proper religious scruples. After Peter rushed in he also entered. And the Scripture tells us that John saw and believed. In this Gospel that is attributed to his testimony, he was the first to believe that Jesus had been raised from the dead. That makes sense. But all of the Gospels tell us that, despite whatever budding faith they had, the disciples were all hiding in the upper room behind locked doors that night!

The third person was Mary Magdalene. She’s at the tomb even though she was overcome with grief. It was she who saw the two angels at the tomb, but instead of joy I would say she was probably shocked at that sight. Even to her the angels said nothing about resurrection. In her grief and shock, when she saw Jesus, she didn’t even recognize him. Thinking he was the gardener, she asked him if he knew where they had taken the body. Jesus simply speaks her name, and Mary realizes it is he. In this Gospel, it is Jesus himself who directly communicates the good news of his resurrection—not to Peter or John, but to Mary! More than that, he commissions her to go to the others and tell them what has happened. And so she does: she returns and tells them “I have seen the Lord.”

I think many of us could wish we had been in her shoes. We may think how easy it would be for us to maintain our faith on difficult days if we had actually seen the risen Christ as she did. And yet, I would say that there are indications in Scripture that we do indeed see the Lord all the time. In one of the judgment scenes in Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus says, “anything you did for even the least of my people here, you also did for me” (Matt. 25:40, NCV). Wherever we see people suffering poverty, homelessness, abandonment, injustice, Jesus said we are seeing him. And more than that, our response to them is our response to him. We can ignore Jesus in the face of those who suffer, or we can serve him.

Which brings me to another way in which we see the Lord. The New Testament describes “spiritual gifts” of teaching, service, generosity, and hospitality as something that comes from the Spirit and embodies the risen Lord Jesus working through us.

In a similar way, the “fruit of the Spirit” represent the character of Jesus reproduced in the lives of ordinary believers like us. And so wherever we see these qualities put into practice, we are seeing the risen Lord Jesus carrying out his work through us.

These kinds of things aren’t spectacular. We might not think they would constitute something as lofty as seeing the risen Lord. But whenever we see people in need and respond by serving them in love, we have seen the Lord. Whenever we see ordinary believers like you and me putting compassion, kindness, generosity, and love into practice, we have seen the Lord. We might wish that we could have been there to experience that first Easter. But the truth of the matter is that those who are suffering among us represent no less real an experience of the risen Lord. And along with that, our service to anyone in any way is just as important a demonstration of Jesus’ continuing presence. In light of this, we need not think of our faith as less than that of the original disciples. Because, like Mary, all of us can say “I have seen the Lord.”

Wednesday, May 10, 2017

More Than A Memory

More than a Memory

1 Corinthians 11:23-26[1]

It seems that a lot of what we call religion involves remembering. We rehearse events that took place long ago. In fact, all of the major religions of the world look to the distant past. They recall founding events that took place centuries ago. There’s nothing inherently wrong with that. But I think when our faith is built entirely on the memory of times past, I think it can lead many to think of religion as something that is at best old-fashioned and at worst irrelevant. It certainly doesn’t hold any meaning or value for their lives right here and right now. They may have the attitude of “that’s nice, but what have you done for me lately?”

The fact of the matter is that our worship this evening is precisely about something that took place long ago. One of the founding events of our faith is the “Last Supper” Jesus shared with his disciples just before dying on the cross. And it’s true that Jesus commanded us to repeat that meal “in remembrance of me.” The purpose of the meal was to turn the bread and the wine into a very tangible way for us to remember his death on the cross for us all. And so it is appropriate that we recall that original meal this evening in our worship.

In our lesson from the Apostle Paul, we see how important it is to observe the Lord’s Supper “in remembrance” of what Jesus did. Paul recounts the words of Jesus at the Last Supper as something that had “received from the Lord” and was therefore “handing on” to others. St. Paul can use this language when he’s referring to some kind of direct revelation. But I don’t think that’s what he’s talking about here. In this context, Paul is saying that he “received” this from the Lord because it was Jesus who spoke these words in the first place. As we think about our sharing of the Lord’s Supper, we’re talking about an event that actually happened.

But what we do tonight is about more than just a memory of what happened at the original Last Supper Jesus shared with his disciples. Paul points to this elsewhere in the letter to the Corinthians when he asks them “The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a sharing in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a sharing in the body of Christ?” (1 Cor. 10:16). I think that’s why he calls it the “Lord’s Supper,” not the “Last Supper” (1 Cor. 11:21). For him, there was more going on than simply remembering when they celebrated the Lord’s Supper. Christ was with them in a special way. And so we believe that every time we share the Lord’s Supper, Christ is present with us as well.

Unfortunately, Christ’s presence with us in the Lord’s Supper been a point of disagreement and division in the church. One of the most significant differences between the Christian churches around the world who are sharing this supper tonight has to do with how they understand the faith that Christ is present with us. Some insist that the bread and the wine are actually transformed into the body and blood of Christ. From that point of view, Christ is literally present in the bread and the cup. On the other side of the spectrum, some believe that the bread and the cup are “mere” symbols that represent Jesus’ death on the cross. Otherwise, they are just bread and juice. As with many theological disputes, it can seem like they’re straining a gnat and swallowing a camel, as Jesus once said.

Importance of the Lord’s Supper is that Christ is truly present with us. We may not be able to explain how that happens to everyone’s satisfaction. There is a sense in which it is a mystery. In the original understanding of the sacraments, there was a significant sense in which they were viewed as mysteries. If you think about it, it’s reasonable to hold onto this idea whenever we talk about the sacraments. After all, we believe they are visible means by which we experience God’s grace in our lives. Why would we think that we could ever fully understand or explain how that happens?

This mystery of God working in our lives right here and right now is an important part of the way the Lord’s Supper serves as more than a memory for us. As Christ is truly present with us in this celebration, God is working to continually renew and sustain us in our faith and service. For that reason, the Lord’s Supper is all about what God has “done for us lately.” Because God in Christ is present with us, right here and right now, our sharing of this meal is more than a memory.

Remembering is an important aspect of our faith. We remember events that took place long ago because we believe that God was acting in history to redeem the human family. We all have our own memories of faith experiences that we cherish as well—Christmas eve services, Thanksgiving meals, Baptisms, Confirmations. Those memories are a big part of what it means for us to continue to believe. But our faith has to be more than a memory if it’s going to make a difference in our lives today. We need a sense that God is working in our lives right here and right now—whether we understand it or not, whether we are even fully aware of it or not! That’s why we celebrate the sacrament of “Communion.” By sharing the Lord’s Supper we are sharing an experience of “communion” or fellowship with the living Lord Jesus Christ, who is truly present with us. Of course Christ is present with us always. But in our observance of the Lord’s Supper, he is present with us in a special way: to renew and sustain our faith here and now. While our sharing of the Lord’s Supper is certainly not less than a memory, because we look back on an actual meal that took place long ago, because Christ is with us here and now, it is also more than a memory.

The Waking Dreamer