Stewards

Stewards

Mark 12:28-34[1]

“Stewardship” is not a word we use much these days. When we do, it usually has something to do with money. Boards of foundations exercise “stewardship” with the money entrusted to them. That means they’re expected to be wise managers of those funds, both in terms of fulfilling the purpose of the organization and in terms of making sound decisions to ensure that the foundation continues to operate. We also talk about “stewardship” with reference to natural resources. For example, we expect the National Park Service to care for those public lands so that future generations may enjoy their beauty. Of course, the other arena in which we use the word “stewardship” is in the church. And to most of us, “stewardship” equals the church asking its members to donate money to support its ministry.

I would say that the biblical view of the Christian life views “stewardship” in a much broader way than that. The starting place for all of it is the conviction that all that we are and all that we have come to us as gifts from God. From our very existence, to our gifts and abilities, to the opportunities we’ve had to make use of those skills, it all falls under the category of “gift from God.” There’s no part of our lives that we can say “I did this myself.” Even our most individual achievements, when viewed from the biblical perspective, are made possible because of all that God has given us. Whether it’s the ability to make music, or shape students’ lives, or build a thriving business, or discover a new cure, or work for the health and wellbeing of others, it’s all a gift from God.

Beyond that, since God not only created us, but also gave us new life through Jesus Christ, from the biblical perspective, we “belong” to God. As the statement of faith put it earlier, we “belong” to him in that God has claimed us all as his children with his unconditional and unfailing love. More than that, Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection mean that we “belong” to God in that we have a hope and a future that comes from him and from him alone. Our very ability to get up in the morning and face a new day with the enthusiasm that comes from knowing that how we live and what we do in this world makes a difference, both now and eternally, is ours because God has given us new life through his son Jesus Christ.

All of that is necessary to understand our Gospel lesson for today. In this section of Mark’s Gospel, the religious leaders have been carrying on a debate with Jesus, hoping to make a fool out of him in front of the crowds who followed him. One of them asked him which of God’s commands was the “first,” or most important. It’s no coincidence that Jesus chose love for God and love for neighbor in reply. The “first” commandment came from the Shema, which was and still is the heart of the Jewish faith (Deut 6:4-5): “Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one; you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength” (Mk 12:29-30). And the “second” commandment (Lev 19:18), “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” is part of a summary of God’s intentions for the way he wanted his people to live their lives in the book of Leviticus.

These two “great” commands reflect a fundamental framework of faith that runs throughout the whole Bible. God created all that is, including us, out of his love. And God is in the process of restoring all that is, including us, through what Jesus Christ did for us in his death and resurrection. When we miss the fact that all that we are and all that we have come to us from God’s love, both in creation and in salvation, we can make the mistake of thinking that “stewardship” relates only to what we may do at church. But from the biblical perspective God’s love claims our whole lives.

So it is that we who are fortunate enough to live our whole lives knowing that God loves us unconditionally and irrevocably are called to love God in return with all that we are. That’s one way to summarize “love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.” God desires more than just our money or a token amount of our time. God’s love claims our whole lives, our very selves, everything we are and everything we have.

I think it’s natural to wonder what that’s supposed look like in real life. Are we all meant to go live in a monastery or a convent, devoting all our waking hours to worshiping and serving God? Are we all called to dedicate ourselves to serve as ministers or missionaries? I’ve been trying to learn what this means all my life, and I must confess, I’m not sure any of us really has the answer. We can’t even love another person with everything we are and everything we have. Not to the extent that the Bible calls us to love God. How are we expected to love God in that way, given the fact that we all fall short?

I think the best way we have to figure this out is to look to Jesus. Jesus loved God with all his life. And from that love for God flowed a way of living defined by the second “great” commandment: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Jesus demonstrated his love for God by treating all people with dignity, respect, fairness, compassion, and kindness, which is the practical definition of “loving your neighbor” (Lev 19:9-18, 33-36). We show our love for God when we follow his example and commit all that we are and all that we have to serving God’s purpose in this world.

I know that all sounds incredibly impractical, if not downright impossible. Who can live their whole life in service to God. There are bills to pay, and children to raise, and parents to care for, and homes to maintain. And more than that, we all have activities we do for “fun” to “re-create” the energy we need to take care of our responsibilities. How can we possibly devote more than an hour here or there on a Sunday morning or a Wednesday evening to God?

I believe it’s a matter of perspective. We can view everything we do—working at our jobs, raising our families, and more—as a way of living out our commitment to love God with all that we are and all that we have. What God wants from us, and what God has always wanted from those who love him, is nothing less than all our lives. That’s what stewardship means in the Bible. It means to love God with all our lives. It’s not primarily about money, it’s about our hearts. It’s not primarily about how we spend our time, it’s about making the choice again and again to turn the gift of God’s love into love for other people. When that perspective on all of life is the starting point for all that we do, then what we give, whether money or time or service, will flow naturally and joyfully from a heart that’s overwhelmed with gratitude for the love we’ve received.

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[1] © 2024 Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by Rev. Alan Brehm PhD on 11/3/2024 for Hickman Presbyterian Church, Hickman, NE.

(Not) All About Me

 (Not) All About Me

Luke 18:9-14[1]

We all search for meaning in life in a variety of ways. Many of us center our sense of meaning, purpose, and belonging in our hopes and dreams. Most of you know that I was never very close to my parents. Some of you know that life in my childhood home was more like “All in the Family” than “It’s a Wonderful Life.” Actually, that’s understating things, but I’m trying to be respectful toward my parents. As a result, from an early age a big part of my sense of meaning, purpose, and belonging focused on my “dream” that I would do things “right” with my family. Of course, in my child’s mind the “dream” I had for my family wasn’t quite realistic. But more to the point, my “dream” was really all about me.

I think all of us have some kind of “dream” for our lives. It may be about the “right” career and the rewards that will bring us. It may be about having a certain lifestyle. Living in the “right” house, driving the “right” car, having the “right” friends. “Success” for most of us has a very definite look to it. Often, our dream brings with it the underlying assumption that we’re going to make the “right” amount of money. Many of us have hopes and dreams about family, perhaps involving marriage and children. Of course, life rarely turns out just like we imagine it in our hopes and dreams. But if we’re completely honest, we’d all have to admit that the real problem with orienting our lives in this way is that it’s always all about ourselves.

For many, faith and church are a part of our “strategy” for achieving those hopes and dreams. We try to ensure that what we want will come true by saying all the right words and doing all the right things. That includes how we practice our faith. We go to church so that we can be confident of going to Heaven when we die. But we also do so because we hope it will give us some measure of control over the way our lives turn out. We think that if we go to church, our family will turn out “right,” our career will be a “success,” and life will go “according to plan.” But that’s taking faith and church and trying to make it into some kind of magic way to get all we want in life. And in the end, it’s still all about ourselves.

In our Gospel lesson for today, Jesus tells us a story about two men who went up to the Temple to pray. One man was a Pharisee, and he would have been a respected member of the community. Pharisees were known for their devotion to studying and obeying God’s word in all aspects of their lives. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with obeying God in all aspects of life. But the problem with this Pharisee was that he was living his life in a manner that was all about himself. If you pay close attention to his prayer, it’s hard not to think that he was bragging about himself to God!

The other man was a tax collector. As such he would have been despised by more than just the Pharisee. He would have been viewed as a thief and a traitor to his people. Now, some of us might still think that way about tax collectors, but the situation in that day and time was different. There were a variety of taxes, and some of them were collected by people who basically “bid” for the right to do so. Since it involved paying a fee up front, tax collectors like this man could keep whatever they could extract from people. It’s not hard to see why the tax collector would have been viewed as a thief and a traitor by the public.

Two very different men came to the temple to pray. Both had made their lives all about themselves. The Pharisee had set out to be seen by others as a respected leader of his community by following the letter of the law. And all indications are that he had succeeded in that. For the tax collector, it was about taking the “fast track” to getting rich. He had thrown honesty and decency to the wind, and was basically robbing his own people. But for both of these men, the fact that they were living all about themselves made their success hollow.

Two men came to the temple to pray. Two men not so different in their attempts to live their lives all about themselves, although the paths they took were on opposite ends of the religious and social scale. But I think the real difference was this: one of them was thoroughly satisfied with the way he lived his life. He was quite convinced that his life was right and even pleasing to God. The other one came to the temple not satisfied, or pleased, or confident, but broken. He was so broken that he wouldn’t even look up and he kept beating his chest in remorse. And that’s the whole point of the story according to Luke: Jesus “told this parable to some who trusted in themselves” (Lk 18:9).

That’s one of the most important choices we have to make in this life. It comes down to whether we put our trust in ourselves, in our hopes and dreams, and in our own efforts or we put our trust in God, in his faithfulness, mercy, and love. While the people to whom Jesus told this story would have expected him to say what a good man the Pharisee was and what a rotten scoundrel the tax collector was, he shocked them. Speaking about the tax collector, he said, “I tell you, this man went down to his home justified rather than the other” (Lk 18:14). Jesus said this because the tax collector had learned a lesson that’s important for us all. When we make our lives “all about me,” our hopes and dreams may thrive for a while, but they will eventually collapse. Only when we base our sense of meaning, purpose, and belonging on our trust in God do we really find the life we’re looking for.

That’s the message of a Bible verse that may be familiar to you: “Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and do not rely on your own insight. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths (Prov 3:6-7). I don’t think we set out to live our lives “all about ourselves.” It kind of sneaks up on us. For some of us, perhaps our families of origin were such that the only “safe” place we had was inside our own hearts and minds. And that’s where our hopes and dreams took root and grew so strong. And so we put our trust in those hopes and dreams because that’s all we had. For others, we may have noticed that our ideas differed from most of the ones we heard from other people. And so we began to trust primarily in our own viewpoints. This process becomes like second nature to us, and I would say it goes unnoticed. But that’s still a form of making life all about me. And that’s not what life is all about. It’s all about God, and what God wants to do in and through us in this world.

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[1] © 2022 Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by Rev. Alan Brehm PhD on 10/23/2022 for Hickman Presbyterian Church, Hickman, NE. For a video recording of this sermon, check out my Pastor Alan YouTube channel: https://youtu.be/kRzsxfzmyck .

How Will They Believe?

How Will They Believe?

John 17:20-26[1]

I think it’s hard for those of us who grew up in church to witness its diminishing influence in our society. To some extent, it’s the result of cultural changes that have been in the works since long before any of us were born! The history of American Christianity bears witness to the way the influence of the church has waxed and waned from the very beginning until now. Many of us grew up in the wake of the most recent of several “great awakenings” that renewed the importance of the church in people’s lives. But that renewal has been fading for decades now.

The declining interest in church participation is not only due to these broader changes, however. I would say that there is a very real sense in which the cause of this decline lies at our feet. People have lost interest in church in many cases not in spite of what we’ve done, but because of what we’ve done. There are churches in our circle of influence that still publicly “shun” those they deem to be “sinful.” And there are a lot of churches who practice something similar to shunning by denying the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper to those who aren’t “deserving.” But perhaps the worst black eye of all is the way in which we who call ourselves members of the Body of Christ treat one another, sometimes over the most insignificant differences of opinion.

In our Gospel lesson for today, I think Jesus calls us to a different way. Jesus called his disciples to a unity that is grounded in the unity he shared with the Father based on the love between them. Jesus prays, “Father, just as you are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us” (Jn. 17:21). He says it in several different ways, but essentially Jesus prayed for the disciples “that they may be one as we are one: I in them and you in me” (Jn. 17:22-23). I would say Jesus understood that his disciples would experience this unity as they were connected to him, and therefore as they were connected to the Father. What creates true unity in the church is the fact that we have been enfolded into the relationship of love that unites Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Jesus says that the purpose of this unity among his disciples is “so that the world may believe that you have sent me” (Jn 17:21). The idea of “believing that you have sent me” may seem like a strange way to describe faith. We’re familiar with “believing in” Jesus, but it’s not so common to hear about “believe that” Jesus was sent by God. In John’s Gospel, however, this is one of the questions associated with Jesus, his mission, and the faith he calls people to have in him. The Jewish leaders continually debated his identity based on the question where Jesus came from. He tried to tell them in many different ways that he had come from the Father, and he called them to believe this. This is one of the important ways that John’s Gospel frames faith.

In fact, this is so important in John’s Gospel that Jesus repeats here it a little differently. It is his desire “that the world may know that you have sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me” (Jn 17:23). Here the idea of “believing” is replaced with “knowing,” which is not unusual in John’s Gospel. Not only does Jesus ask that his disciples share the relationship of love that he had with the Father, but he also wants the world to know that his disciples shared that relationship. I think at least one way in which the world would know this is by the way in which his disciples live out their unity with one another.

I guess the real question, though, is how we promote this kind of unity among people like us, who hold very different ideas about what we consider important in life. We can get very attached to our opinions, and we can be stubborn at times about holding onto our viewpoints. I think it takes a unity that is deeper and stronger than anything we can create ourselves. What really makes the church one is the unity that God creates—the church is the one people of the one God. It’s the unity that Jesus Christ creates—the church is the one people of the one Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. It’s the unity that the Spirit of God creates—the church is the one people of the one Holy Spirit. This is the unity that enables the world to believe in Jesus through our witness.

I don’t believe this kind of unity is about the absence of difference. I believe that one of the signs of a healthy community is their ability to disagree. The bond created among us by the presence of God in Christ through the Spirit doesn’t eliminate the differences among us. It means that the differences don’t divide us, they make us stronger. That happens when we deal with differences by focusing on our agreements without engaging in “mud-slinging” or “name-calling” or in any other way tearing down brothers and sisters in Christ who hold different views about crucial issues. The ties that bind us together are stronger than our differences of opinion!

When I was serving in Houston, the PCUSA was dealing with some divisive issues. A friend of mine who was the pastor of a nearby church led an education session during a Presbytery meeting. In that meeting he shared that their church was not “of one mind, but we are not divided.” That has stuck with me for many years. Bearing witness to our unity in Christ doesn’t mean we have to agree on everything, but I think it does mean that our disagreements don’t divide us. When we can show our world this kind of unity, especially now, I think our witness can be a way for them to believe.

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[1] © 2022 Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by Rev. Alan Brehm Ph.D. on 5/29/2022 for Hickman Presbyterian Church, Hickman, NE.

Never Abandoned

Never Abandoned

John 14:15-29[1]

We live in a world that is more interconnected than ever before in history, and yet those who study our life in this world tell us that loneliness has become an epidemic. We can know what’s happening on the other side of the world instantly, and yet we have no idea what’s going on in the lives of our friends and neighbors. There is so much about the way our society functions that seems to isolate us from one another. Our superficial “connections” on social media only make matters worse. When we see the pictures our Facebook “friends” post of their “perfect” families, it can leave us feeling left out and abandoned.

One of the challenges we have with all this is that we all have expectations about how we thought our life was going to go. And when that doesn’t happen, we have a hard time letting those expectations go and finding the good things in our lives just the way they are here and now. Another challenge is that what we tell ourselves about our lives makes a huge difference in how we experience it. When we tell ourselves enough times that we’re a square peg trying to fit into a round hole and just never quite fitting in, we’re going to believe it. And what we believe about our lives tends to wind up being our “truth.” When we tell ourselves we’re left out and abandoned, we’re going to feel lonely.

This relates to our Gospel lesson for today because Jesus was preparing his disciples for the fact that very soon he was no longer going to be with them, at least in the physical sense of the word. He knew that his “hour” was at hand, and that he would be fulfilling the will of his Father that he “lay down his life” for his friends, and for us all. This whole section of John’s Gospel addresses that. From chapter to 13 to chapter 17, Jesus was preparing them for the crisis they would be facing as he went through the cross, the resurrection, and his ascension to the right hand of the Father.

Just a quick overview of their dialogues with Jesus in these chapters makes it clear that the disciples were confused by what Jesus was telling them. They expected the Messiah to come and take his place on David’s throne, not die on a cross and return to the Father who had sent him. More than that, his talk of “going” where they could not follow troubled them. We see that in Peter’s interaction with Jesus, asking why he couldn’t follow him (Jn 13:37). We see it in Thomas’ question, “Lord, we do not know where you are going, how can we know the way?” (Jn 14:5). And we see it when “some of his disciples” wondered among themselves, “What does he mean by saying to us, ‘A little while, and you will no longer see me,’ … and ‘I am going to the Father’?” (Jn 16:17).

In response to their uneasiness about all of this, Jesus sought to reassure them that they would not be left to carry on alone. In the first place, he told them that “Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them” (Jn 14:23). This probably sounds strange to our ears, because we’re used to St. Paul telling us that we’re saved by faith, not by what we do. But in John’s Gospel, true faith is defined as “loving” Jesus by “keeping his word.” It’s a matter of following Jesus’ example of loving the Father and fulfilling the Father’s will for his life. In John’s Gospel, those who respond to Jesus in faith will also follow his pattern of carrying out God’s purpose in their lives.

We shouldn’t get hung up on this and miss out on the promise here: Jesus promises his disciples that “my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them” (Jn 14:23). This is one of the major themes in John’s Gospel. Those who “love” Jesus will follow his example of loving obedience to the Father. They will “keep his word,” not in order to be loved, but because they have encountered the love of Christ. And Jesus promises that those who follow his example of loving God by obeying him will be enfolded into the relationship of love that Jesus and the Father share. Far from being abandoned, Jesus’ departure makes it possible for them to share the same relationship with God that Jesus did!

Jesus also promised his disciples that they would not be left abandoned because the Father would send them the Holy Spirit, who is called the “Advocate” here (Jn 14:26). I think perhaps a better translation would be “Helper” or “Encourager.” Jesus promises that the Spirit would “remind” them of all that he had taught them. Later, Jesus says that the Spirit would “guide” them into “all truth” (Jn 16:13). Again, I think the point of this is to assure the disciples that Jesus’ departure would not mean that they were abandoned and left on their own to carry on. Rather the Spirit would be right there with them, every step of the way, encouraging them and empowering them to remain faithful and true.

I believe these promises also hold a great deal of assurance for us. No matter how lonely we may feel, no matter how much we may think we are “misfits,” we are not left alone in our efforts to follow Christ and to carry out his work in our world. Just like Jesus’ first disciples, we too share in the relationship of love that Jesus and the Father have shared for all eternity. And no less than those first disciples, we too have the constant presence of the Spirit to guide us, to encourage us, and to empower us in our efforts to serve Christ. No matter how we may feel, we are never abandoned.

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[1] © 2022 Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by Rev. Alan Brehm Ph. D. on 5/22/2022 for Hickman Presbyterian Church, Hickman, NE.

At the Center

 At the Center

Mark 12:28-34[1]

It’s hard to avoid the truth that most of us live our lives with ourselves at the center. We may choke on the very words if we try to say it out loud. I think that’s one reason why we have always used the “younger generation” as the scapegoat for our selfishness. But the truth of the matter is that humanity has always lived with themselves at the center. Even when we do something to help someone else, we often do it for approval or simply to feel good about ourselves. Of course, there are those among us who rise above this and truly serve others. But if we’re honest we have to admit that they are the exception that proves the rule.

Although we prefer to locate “selfishness” in someone else, anyone else, it’s something we all have to deal with if we are going to try to follow Jesus as his disciples. That’s why week after week we gather here and confess to God, to one another, and to ourselves that we live with “self” at the center of our lives. That’s one of the basic definitions of the “sin” we try to confess together every week in worship. Our confession is not only an attempt to acknowledge that we all fall short. It’s also a way of trying to reorient our lives with God at the center.

That’s what our Gospel lesson for today is about: the question of what it looks like to live with God at the center of our lives. The question comes at the end of a debate that the religious leaders had been carrying on with Jesus, hoping to make a fool out of him in front of the people who followed him. One torah scholar asks him which of God’s commands was the “first,” or most important. You may find it surprising that I don’t believe this scribe was trying to trip Jesus up. Mark says he asked this question when he saw that Jesus answered “well” those who were antagonizing him. I think the scribe noticed that he was “on the same page” with Jesus, and so he was genuinely curious about how Jesus understood the heart of what God wants from us.

It was no coincidence that Jesus chose love for God and love for neighbor in reply. The “first” commandment came from the Shema, which was and still is the heart of the Jewish faith (Deut 6:4-5): “Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one; you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength” (Mk 12:29-30). And the “second” commandment (Lev 19:18), “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” is part of a summary of God’s mandates in Leviticus called the “holiness code”. It’s called that because its theme is “you shall be holy for I the Lord your God am holy” (Lev. 19:2). While we assume these two commands go together, what we should understand is that it’s very likely Jesus was the first one to put them together like this.

But in one sense, Jesus wasn’t really breaking any new ground here. These two “great” commands reflect a fundamental framework of faith that runs throughout the whole Bible. It begins with the fact that God loved the family of Abraham and Sarah, and chose them to be a blessing to all the families of the earth. This is called the “covenant” in the Bible, and it speaks of a relationship that God established in his grace and mercy. When we miss the fact that everything else is based on God’s love, we can get on the wrong track about God and about what it means to live with God at the center of our lives.

The next part of that framework is that the Bible insists that those who have experienced God’s love, those who are fortunate enough to live in a relationship in which they know that God loves them unconditionally and irrevocably, will respond by loving God so much that we will put God at the center of life. That’s what it means to love God with all your heart. We may find it surprising that the way to do this is by following God’s ways, by putting God’s commands into practice in our everyday lives. We get confused about this because we think a life of obedience somehow earns for us the right to God’s love. But that’s not it at all. We live this way because we know God loves us, not to gain God’s love.

The next step is that we who love God in this way will demonstrate it by the love we show others. This way of loving God by loving others isn’t just about how we feel about people. It’s about what we do. And the Bible gets very practical, very specific, and very down to earth about what that looks like. We love others when we show them mercy and justice, when we treat them with dignity, respect, fairness, compassion, and kindness. We love others when we feed the hungry and welcome the stranger. That whole framework, responding to God’s love by loving God in such a way that we love others is what living with God at the center of our lives looks like.[2]

I’ll be the first to admit that living this way isn’t easy, and it isn’t something we learn quickly. I find that the farther I go in my journey toward discipleship, the more aware I am of how I fall short. The lure of trying to satisfy our own desires is one that can be incredibly difficult to recognize, and even more so to avoid. But I don’t think that God expects us to be perfect in this life. I think the point is that we take seriously the call live in a relationship with God, a relationship that is grounded in God’s love for us. The way we do that is by loving and serving God through loving and serving others. That’s what living with God at the center looks like, and it’s a challenge that takes a lifetime to master.

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[1] © 2021 Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by Rev. Alan Brehm, Ph. D. on 10/31/2021 for Hickman Presbyterian Church, Hickman, NE.

[2] Cf. Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics, 4.1:54-66, where he maintains that this has always been God’s intention against all efforts to “break up” this “one covenant” of grace into a series of different “covenants.”  He disputes the “federal theology” of Johannes Cocceius, whose ideas are probably best known today in the “Dispensationalism” of Tim LaHaye and Hal Lindsay.

God's Truth

 God’s Truth

John 17:1-24[1]

Long ago, the prophet who spoke in the book of Isaiah said, “Justice is turned back, and righteousness stands at a distance; for truth stumbles in the public square, and uprightness cannot enter” (Isa 59:14). Unfortunately, we are all too familiar with the fact that “truth stumbles in the public square.” The lines between facts and opinions have become so blurred in our day that many good people fall under the influence of all kinds of “conspiracy theories.” This plays out in politics, in religion, and in family life. It seems that there’s no aspect of our lives that hasn’t been affected by this problem. It shouldn’t come as a surprise that the falsehoods that prevail in our society lead to confusion and turmoil.

Part of the problem is that we all seem to have become much more rigid about what we call “Truth.” We hold fast to our own convictions, regardless of whether they may fly in the face of the facts. This can be a particular temptation for those of us in the church. We may assume not only that our understanding of “Truth” is correct, but also that we have God on our side. The problem with this approach is that when we’re not willing to admit that we may not know the “Truth,” we not only close ourselves off from any chance of learning, we also throw up walls that divide “us” from “them.”

Our lesson from John’s Gospel for today addresses some of these issues. In this section of the Gospel, Jesus is preparing his disciples for the fact that he would be leaving them soon. Not only is he “pulling out all the stops” in his effort to communicate his message to them. He’s also tying up all the previous hints and clues in John’s Gospel that he had been dropping all along about his purpose and his mission. In our lesson for today, Jesus uses the opportunity to pray for the disciples that they would indeed understand and follow the truth he had sought to teach them.

One of the most important themes in this Gospel is that the “Truth” Jesus taught his disciples is a unique kind of truth. It is not the truth of science or mathematics, where formulas and equations all add up. It is not the truth of philosophy seeking to come up with a rational answer to just about every question one could think. Nor is it the “truth” of of insisting that my opinion is “right” and if you disagree with me your opinion is “wrong.” Rather, the “Truth” that Jesus came to bring is the truth of a relationship with God whereby we experience God’s love and we embrace God’s ways and purposes in this world.

I think we see this reflected in our Gospel lesson today in several ways. First, the “Truth” that Jesus taught his disciples was something that Jesus had received from his Father. We see this in an interesting interplay between the “Name” and the “Word” and the “Truth” Jesus says that God had given him. The point of this is, as Jesus says, “Now they know that everything you have given me is from you” (Jn. 17:7). The fact that everything Jesus did and taught had come from his Father reflects the relationship between Jesus and the Father. It was such a close relationship that Jesus could say that he was doing only what the Father wanted him to do.

At the same time, the theme is expanded here to include the disciples in that relationship. Interestingly, just as the Father had given Jesus the “Name” and the “Word” and the “Truth, so Jesus says that the disciples were those whom the Father had given him. The reason why Jesus had taught them the “Truth” he had received from the Father was so that the disciples could share the joy of his relationship with God. Jesus said it this way: “I speak these things in the world so that they may have my joy made complete in themselves.” (Jn. 17:13). The truth Jesus spoke was the kind of truth that was intended to draw the disciples into the same relationship with the Father that he enjoyed.

But there was more to it than that. The truth that Jesus taught his disciples was the kind of truth that would not leave them where they were. It would change them, and it would change them through and through. Jesus said that the ultimate purpose of this truth was that they may be “sanctified in the truth” (Jn. 17:17, 19). In the Bible, sanctification is one of those theological words that means to set something or someone apart for God’s purposes. I like the way the CEV puts it: “let this truth make them completely yours” (John 17:17 CEV). The kind of truth Jesus brought was intended to make those who followed it into people who belong completely to God.

When we receive and embrace the truth Jesus taught, we are changed so that we become people who belong to God and to God’s truth through and through. We enter into a relationship with God, that both brings us joy and makes a claim on our lives. That may not answer the problem of “Truth” in our world at large. The turmoil in our society is due in part to the fact that the people who lead us are driven by their own egos. Even though that turmoil is frightening, we have the assurance that no matter what may happen in the world, our lives are always in God’s hands. “Truth” may “stumble” in the “public square” today, but we can trust that God’s truth will prevail—if not now, then finally. And God’s truth prevails now in our lives when we embrace it to such an extent that it defines how we live. God’s truth is about a relationship, and when we embrace that truth in Jesus Christ, we are changed into people who put God’s truth into practice. Perhaps that’s the place to begin trying to solve to the problem of “Truth” in our world.

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[1] © 2021 Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by Rev. Alan Brehm, Ph. D. on 5/16/2021 for Hickman Presbyterian Church, Hickman, NE.

Connected to Jesus

 Connected to Jesus

John 15:1-8[1]

One of the amazing facets of human language is the way we use metaphors. They help our feeble words reflect the richness of life. They add color to what could otherwise be a drab world. They use simple word pictures to express our sometimes-complicated experiences. Like “putting the cart before the horse.” All you have to do is say it and it speaks for itself. You get the point without anyone having to explain it. It is this simplicity of metaphors—the fact that they need no explanation—that makes them so useful in language. They not only give us a means to express our experiences in life, but they also help us make sense of them.

One of the challenges with metaphors is that their simplicity can keep us from seeing the subtle nuances and even the very real complexity of our experiences. A metaphor like “putting the cart before the horse” is meaningful to us because it clearly depicts one aspect of taking action: following steps in their proper order. Of course, there is more to taking action than this. And the temptation with a metaphor is to push it too far. We might turn the image into a discussion of choosing the right horse to pull the cart. Or we might get caught up in the details of what makes a cart suitable to be pulled by a horse. But when we do that, we’re missing the point of the metaphor.

There is something of this dynamic with language going on in our Gospel lesson for today. Jesus uses a beautiful image to describe what it means to follow him in discipleship. He says, “I am the vine, you are the branches” (Jn 15:5). Those of us who have experience with gardening understand the main point of the metaphor: branches “bear fruit” because they draw vital energy and nutrients from the vine. And so Jesus uses this metaphor to help his disciples understand something very important: it is their connection to him that enables them to live a life of faithful discipleship. That is the point of this metaphor.

But Jesus sort of “complicates” the metaphor by alluding to another aspect of tending a vine: “pruning.” In order for the branches to have the best possible yield, you have to “clean” the vine of the branches from last years’ crop. You strip off the old branches that have already borne fruit in order to make way for a new harvest in the coming year. In the case of some plants, you also have to keep an eye out for “sucker” branches that “waste” the vital energy needed for it to produce the best possible fruit. This kind of “pruning” is an important part of horticulture, whether you’re talking about tending vines or tending garden plants.

The problem comes up here with the fact that Jesus is talking not about plants, but about people! He said, “I am the vine, you are the branches”! And in the process of presenting this metaphor, he speaks about “pruning” the vine by removing branches that don’t bear fruit, gathering them up, and burning them in “the fire” (Jn 15:2, 6). I think we can miss the point here if we’re not careful. It’s very easy to read this passage and come away with questions or doubts about whether you’re a branch that bears fruit or a branch that gets lopped off and withers. Unfortunately, I think for many people who read this passage, that is what they come away with: worrying whether they are a “fruitful” branch or not.

But I don’t think that Jesus was using this metaphor of the vine and the branches to create doubt. In the original setting, Jesus was preparing his disciples for his imminent departure. He would be “lifted up” on the cross and as a result he would return to the Father. He spent a great deal of time in these chapters of John’s Gospel helping them understand how they were going to carry on after he was no longer physically present with them. And here he emphasizes that they will “bear fruit” as his disciples because they will remain connected to him through his words and through the Spirit whom he would give them. He says it this way: “Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit” (Jn 15:5). His point is that, even though he will not be present with them physically, they will be able to carry on in fruitful discipleship because they are still be connected to him.

But Jesus also says, “Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me” (Jn. 15:4). I think here Jesus is simply stating the other side of the same point. Just as branches that are no longer connected to the vine cannot bear fruit, so also we cannot be fruitful disciples if we are not connected to Jesus. But again, I would insist that Jesus’ point is not to impose the fear that we might not be connected to him. Rather, his point is to assure us that we will be able to do all that we are called to do precisely because we remain connected to him.

Part of the problem with this passage is that too often people turn it into a statement about salvation (or the lack thereof). That’s not the point. In the original setting, Jesus was encouraging disciples who were already concerned about his talk of returning to the Father. I believe he is assuring all of us that even though he may not be with us physically, we will have all the resources we need to carry on with the Father’s work. Like lush branches on a grapevine, we will “bear much fruit” because the life of Jesus, and the love of God, and the power of the Spirit will be working through us. And all of this happens because of the relationship we have with him; we bear fruit because we remain connected to Jesus.

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[1] ©2021 Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by Rev. Alan Brehm, Ph. D. on 5/2/2021 for Hickman Presbyterian Church, Hickman, NE.

Safe and Secure

Safe and Secure

John 10:1-18[1]

Much of what we do in this life is directed toward our sense of security. We choose the neighborhood in which we live based on whether it feels “safe.” We may install fencing or external lights or even an alarm system to enhance our feeling of security. We work to find a job that will provide us with the opportunity to work productively for as long as necessary to ensure that we will have a stable livelihood. We have insurance policies to enable us to meet our major medical needs and to protect us in case of unforeseen damage to our cars or our homes. And we save up a nest egg to try to make sure we can retire as comfortably as possible.

For all of our efforts at feeling “save and secure” in life, however, the hard truth is that none of them are foolproof. Career, home, and finances can be swept away in the blink of an eye. In a very real sense we are all like the rich farmer Jesus used to illustrate the fragility of our lives. He saved up so much grain that he had to tear down his old barns to build bigger ones. But Jesus pointed out that his life could be snatched away at any time. The things he had stored up for himself could not provide ultimate security. The same thing is true for us. We cannot know what today will bring, let alone tomorrow. Finding security in the things we have only serves to distract us from the vulnerability that we all face in this life. We have to find our security elsewhere.

In our Gospel lesson for today, Jesus declares that he is the “Good Shepherd” who cares for, protects, and even lays down his life for his flock. He is the one who “calls his own sheep by name and leads them out” (Jn 10:3). He is the one who enables them to “find pasture” and “abundant life” (Jn. 10:9-10). Unlike a “hired hand,” Jesus as the “Good Shepherd” protects the sheep from all dangers, even at the cost of “laying down his life” for them (Jn. 10:11-12). Jesus knows those who belong to him in the same way that Father knows him and he knows the Father (Jn. 10:14-15). And he not only “lays down his life” for the sheep, but he also “takes it up again” (Jn. 10:18). Thus he remains the “Good Shepherd” for all time.

Part of what’s going on in the background of all this is that Jesus is engaging in a not-so-subtle criticism of the Jewish leaders of his day. Like the prophets before him, he saw the people of Israel as God’s “flock,” and the leaders were intended to be “shepherds” who cared for them. Instead, as the OT prophets pointed out, these “shepherds” were often more concerned about their own welfare than the welfare of the people. In fact, in one place, God speaks through the prophet Ezekiel to say that he would rescue the “sheep” by sending his “servant David” to “feed them and be their shepherd” (Ezek. 34:23).

I don’t think anyone in Jesus’ day would have failed to hear the criticism of the Jewish leaders in what Jesus was saying. Time and again they demonstrated that they were more concerned with maintaining their own religious rules than they were with the welfare of people—especially those who were hurting. I also don’t think that anyone in Jesus’ day would have failed to hear in the statement “I am the good shepherd” an allusion to God’s promise to send one who would be a true shepherd for his people by caring for them. I think Jesus was saying that he had come to offer true and lasting care and protection to his people.

There are two aspects to that care in this passage. First, Jesus says, “I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father” (Jn. 10:14-15). We find our safety in Jesus because of the relationship he has with us. Part of what’s behind this is the idea that those who belong to him are “his own” because they have been “given” to him by the Father. But the other part is that Jesus says he knows those who are “his own” and they know him in the way that Jesus and the Father know each other! We are “safe and secure” in Jesus’ hands because we share the same relationship with Jesus that he shares with God!

 The second aspect of Jesus’ care in this passage is found in that he says, “The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep” (Jn 10:11). Now, at first glance, this makes perfect sense. But when you think about it, if the shepherd “lays down his life,” who will be there to protect the sheep? I think that’s why Jesus also says, “I lay down my life in order to take it up again” (Jn. 10:17). In fact, he says that he has received the “power” or perhaps better the “authority” to do so from the Father. In this respect, then, he can be the one who lays down his life us, and because he has “taken up his life again,” he can also still be the one who is there to protect us from any dangers.

The hard truth of life is that all our efforts to secure our lives will ultimately fail. No amount of protection can keep us from the fact that we will all have to face death someday. But because we have a “Good Shepherd” who has laid down his life for us and has taken it up again, we can trust him to keep us “safe and secure” even in the face of death. More than that, because we share the same relationship with Jesus that he shares with God, we can trust him to walk with us every step of the way, no matter what life may bring. That not only means that we have a constant companion and guide, but that “no one can snatch” us out of his hand. Because Jesus is our “Good Shepherd,” we can trust that we are safe and secure in his hands!

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[1] ©2021 Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by Rev. Alan Brehm, Ph. D. on 4/25/2021 for Hickman Presbyterian Church, Hickman, NE.

Getting Specific

 

Getting Specific

Matthew 22:34-46[1]

We have all kinds of images about what love is “supposed” to look like. If you’re in my generation, you will remember the line that “love means never having to say you’re sorry.” That “romanticized” view of love gets in the way of what I would say real love looks like. From the perspective of the Bible, love is about what we do. Love means caring enough about another person to set our wants and needs aside. Love means giving of ourselves without asking “what am I going to get out of this?” Whether it’s feeding the hungry, or clothing the poor, or comforting the sick and dying—or just listening enough to really hear someone—love is about what we do. And the Bible can get pretty specific about what that looks like.

In our Gospel lesson for today, when Jesus was asked about the “greatest commandment,” he answered with two well know passages from the Hebrew Bible: you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and you shall love your neighbor as yourself. This would have been nothing new to the people of the day. The first command to love God was something that pious Jewish people prayed on a daily basis. The fact that Jesus added a “second” command to love your neighbor would also have come as no surprise. These two commands were the foundation for all the teachings of Scripture.

Where I think we may get hung up is on what loving God and loving your neighbor looks like in daily life. I think a closer look at the Hebrew Bible may help us. The “first” command to love God comes from Deuteronomy 6:5. If we look at the book as a whole, we find that God was establishing a relationship with his people. And the commandments were meant to define what that relationship would look like. Deuteronomy says it this way: “loving God” means “obeying the commandments of the LORD your God … , walking in his ways, and observing his commandments” (Deut. 30:16). That’s right, we love God by keeping his commandments!

This perspective isn’t limited to the Hebrew Bible. Jesus also defined love for God in terms of keeping commandments (John 14:23-24). And he went on to spell out what that looks like in very specific terms in the Sermon on the Mount. For Jesus, loving God means we avoid hatred and anger and we find ways to make peace in our broken relationships. For Jesus, loving God means we keep our intentions toward others honest, in both our actions and our words. For Jesus, loving God means we proactively do good to all people, even those who may be “enemies.” In other words, for Jesus, loving God looks very specific.

The second “great” command, to love your neighbor as yourself, comes from Leviticus 19:18. Again, I think it will help us to take a closer look at the Hebrew Bible. In Leviticus, loving your neighbor means leaving the edges of the fields and the gleanings of the harvest “for the poor and the alien” (19:11). Rather than using all our material wealth for ourselves, we’re to reserve a portion to help those in need. Loving your neighbor means not mistreating the deaf or the blind, but rather giving respect to all people (19:14). Loving your neighbor means not talking about others in a manner that diminishes them (19:16). And it means not taking revenge or bearing a grudge (19:18). This Scripture gets quite specific when it defines what it means to love your neighbor as yourself!

I hope that you heard some echoes between what it means to love God and what it means to love your neighbor as yourself. Those two “great commands” are intertwined throughout the Bible. Loving God and loving others go hand-in-hand. It’s no coincidence that when the Bible gets specific about what it looks like to love God and love your neighbor, there’s quite a bit of overlap in what it has to say to us. We love God by the way in which we live our lives. And a big part of that is the way in which we treat others.

Some of us may be experiencing a “disconnect” with this sermon. We’re used to thinking that the “Old Testament” has been replaced and we really don’t need to pay serious attention to it. We’re used to thinking of the commands as “law,” which we associate with “enforcement.” But the Hebrew word for “law” is Torah. And it’s fundamental meaning is “instruction.” That’s the point of the very specific commands of the Bible. They are instructing us about what it looks like to live our lives based on love for God and love for others. That’s right—all the “thou shalt not’s” and “thou shalt’s” are meant to lead you and me into a relationship with God. In that relationship we love God and love our neighbors by putting into practice in our daily living what we learn when the Bible gets specific with us.

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[1] © Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by Rev. Alan Brehm, Ph. D. on 10/25/2020 for Hickman Presbyterian Church, Hickman, NE.

Made for Relationships

Made for Relationships

Genesis 1:26; Deuteronomy 6:5; Leviticus 19:18[1]

One of the challenges of this time of separation from others is that we don’t have nearly as many face-to-face contacts with people. Of course, we do get to see each other on the screen with our Zoom gatherings, but it’s just not the same as being together. Believe it or not, I’m actually an introvert. I love being around people, but I need “alone” time to re-charge. Even those of us who are introverts need to see the people in our lives. I think part of the stress we’re all feeling is that we don’t have the same level of personal interaction with co-workers, friends, family, and the church family.

One of the main motivations for being a part of a church like ours is the relationships we form. As we heard earlier in our service, many times the church becomes an extended family for those whose are away from their family members. I don’t know about you, but that’s one of the things I miss most about being able to gather together in person. At the same time, I have a deep concern for your safety, and I don’t want to leave anybody out of our worship. For now, it seems that the best course is to continue to gather on Zoom, and to have regular opportunities for us to “meet and greet” one another in safe ways.

The fact that relationships are so important to us is, I think, something that is true by design. In the creation story in Genesis, God says, “Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness” (Gen. 1:26). This passage is the basis for the idea that we as human beings are created in the image of God. Throughout the ages, theologians and scholars have debated precisely what that means. Some have said that it is our capacity for reason, others that it is our ability to “have dominion” over the rest of creation, and others have even said it is the fact that we walk upright!

I would say that the Scriptures point us in a different direction. Understanding God is in some ways straightforward, and in other ways it is complicated. Especially in the New Testament, as in our Gospel reading, the language for God is the language of “Trinity.” This is one of the most complicated aspects of our faith. As I understand it, Trinity means that God does not exist in a solitary condition. Rather, God is “God in three persons” who are bound together by love. God is “God in relationship,” “God in community.” The very statement that “God is love” implies that at the heart of who God is, there is relationship. For there to be love, there has to be an “other” to love. That love starts with the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, who are bound together by the love they share for one another. And so it is that I think we are meant to read the creation of humankind in the image of God in part as a statement about who God is: God is “love overflowing” to all of us, and the whole creation.  

“God’s love overflowing”[2] reaches out to all created things, and especially to the human family. As I mentioned, that we are created in God’s image means that we are made for relationships. We are designed to respond to the love that God has poured out in our hearts. The primary way in which we do this is in our relationship with God our Creator. We are to “love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might” (Deut. 6:5). That means seeking God, following God’s ways, honoring God with our lives, and serving God by serving others.

That last part points us to the other essential way in which we respond to the love God has poured into our lives. Just as God exists in the community of love between Father, Son and Holy Spirit, so we are made to love others. We are created to “love your neighbor as yourself” (Lev. 19:18). We love God by loving others through the relationships we build with them. Just as God exists in a fellowship of love, so also we who are created in his image are made for relationships.

We’ve been given an amazing gift: we’ve been designed to relate to God and one another with love. And we’ve been given an amazing task: we’ve been created to share God’s love with one another and with those around us. To be this kind of people, people who are fundamentally shaped by God's love, people who share God’s love with all those we encounter, is more than we can do by ourselves. Fortunately, we have an example of what that looks like in human terms in the person of Jesus Christ. And we have a “helper” to guide us and empower us in the person of the Holy Spirit. We who are made for relationships can look to God our Creator, our Redeemer, and our Sustainer to live out the love we have been given by sharing it with all our fellow members of the human family.

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[1] © Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by Rev. Alan Brehm, Ph. D., on 6/7/2020 at Hickman Presbyterian Church, Hickman, NE.

[2] See the PCUSA statement on the Trinity entitled “The Trinity: God’s Love Overflowing” at https://www.presbyterianmission.org/resource/trinity-gods-love-overflowing/.

Looking for Love

Looking for Love

Psalm 80:1-7; Luke 1:46-55[1]

In my experience, most people spend their whole lives looking for love. I know it may be a cliché, but we really do have a way of “looking for love in all the wrong places.” We look to a significant other to fill our longing for love. Many of us are lucky enough to spend our whole lives with that person. But if we’re honest, we have to admit that no human being can truly fill our deep longing for love. Others of us may turn to our families to find the love we’re looking for. While families are wonderful, they are just people. While we may derive great joy from our families, they cannot fill our deepest longings for love. The truth of the matter is that even the good things in this world leave us at time still looking for love.

St. Augustine recognized this centuries ago, when at the very beginning of his Confessions, he said, “you have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in you.” ^[2] It’s a lesson that is difficult to learn. In order to truly grasp the message that only God can fill the longing in our hearts, I think we have to have our hearts broken, maybe more than once. We have to come to the place where we recognize that those we look to in this life to fill our longing for love simply cannot do so. We have to learn the truth that we are made to find our longing for love filled by God, and God alone.

The message of our Psalm for today resonates with this theme. Although there is no specific confession of their sin, the people have strayed from God once again and have experienced the consequences of turning away. They have eaten “the bread of tears” and they have had to endure the scorn of neighbors and the laughter of enemies (Ps. 80:5-6). The Psalm proceeds to speak of Israel as a vineyard whose wall has been broken down and left to be ravaged by the wild animals (Ps. 80:13). For those who considered themselves to be the people of God, God’s chosen ones, experiencing such devastation had to have shaken their faith.

And yet, the very fact that they turn to God and cry out for him to save them implies quite a lot, in my opinion. I think it implies that they realize that they have strayed from God. More than that, they are making the attempt to repent and return to God. The central refrain of the Psalm is, “Restore us, O God of hosts; let your face shine, that we may be saved” (Ps. 80:3, 7, 19). The request for God to “restore” the people could be translated “cause us to return.” That suggests to me that there is at least an awareness that they have strayed. They are seeking to return and are asking God to help them do so.

This prayer acknowledges that God is the one on whom their restoration depends. It is only as God comes among them and “lets his face shine” that they will know his salvation. The prayer recognizes that God alone is the source of their life and their well-being. The presupposition to this prayer is that they are addressing the one who has promised to love them with a love that will never let them go. They recognize that the love they need to be “restored” is the love that comes from the God of “steadfast” love: a love that is unconditional and irrevocable. That is the only love that can truly satisfy them.

The other side of this restoration is found in Mary’s “Magnificat.” Mary’s song is called the Magnificat because that is the first word in the Latin version. In her song she sings with joy over God’s work of restoration. But the way she describes that restoration might sound strange to our ears. God’s work of restoration would come about through what some have called “The Great Reversal”: the proud humbled, the powerful pulled down from their thrones, those who are stuffed sent away empty-handed, while those who are disempowered are lifted up and those who are hungry are filled with good things (Luke 1:51-53).  Mary describes the overturning of the current system of destruction and oppression and violence by the ways of God’s kingdom: mercy, justice, and love.

How we respond to Mary’s song of restoration depends on where we find ourselves. The only way for those of us who are “full” and “rich” here and now to sing Mary’s song with the same kind of joy—the joy of the “lowly” being lifted up—is if we actually join with God in his work of restoration. As one contemporary prophet puts it: “There are only two ways you can enter the kingdom and experience its joy. One is to be among the poor, oppressed, bruised, blind, and brokenhearted; those to whom God comes as healing, comfort, justice, and freedom. The other way is to be among God’s people who are going to the poor, oppressed, bruised, blind, and brokenhearted and bringing God’s healing, comfort, justice, and freedom.” ^[3]

What may not be readily apparent is the fact that both of these expressions of restoration reveal God’s unfailing love. Both the prayer that looks to God to restore a wayward people and the song that rejoices in God’s “great reversal” reveal a God who will not leave us to our own devices when we have strayed from him. Whatever alternate sources of love we look to in this life instead of God, God remains the one source of love that will never fail us. While it is true that our hearts are restless until we find our rest in God, I think it’s also true that God does not rest until he wins our hearts over with his love. In this season of looking for God’s salvation in Jesus, it is a time to be reminded that all the substitutes we use to satisfy our longing for love will never fully satisfy us. We have been created in such a way that we will only find our life fulfilled as we look to him to fill our longing for love.

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[1] ©2018 Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by Rev. Dr. Alan Brehm on 12/23/2018 at Hickman Presbyterian Church, Hickman, NE.

[2] Augustine of Hippo, Confessions, I.1.

[3] Cf. Stephen Shoemaker, GodStories, 217-18

Energy, Intelligence, Imagination, and Love

Energy, Intelligence, Imagination, and Love

Mark 12:28-34[1]

It seems to me that we live in an age when it’s hard to focus on anything for very long. It seems that we always have something clamoring for our attention. Those of us who have “smartphones” may have “dings” or a “beeps” coming at us on a regular basis all day long. When I got my first “smartphone,” it was set to sound off at me for just about everything: email, text messages, calendar reminders, Facebook notifications, and more. It didn’t take too long for me to decide I needed to find out how to turn off most of that noise! Even without the “dings” and “beeps,” we seem to be tethered to a whole web of electronic connections.

But more than that, we all have a wide variety of involvements that constantly claim our focus. Between work, family, social life, civic organizations, exercise routines, financial obligations, church commitments, and others, it can feel like we hardly have a moment in the day when we can catch our breath. So much for the promise that advances in technology would give us more leisure time!^[2] I would say that technology has actually expanded the work week rather than shortening it, as some predicted in the 1960’s and 70’s. We’re accessible 24/7. It can make it difficult to focus on anything spiritual.

In our Gospel lesson, Jesus answers a question that was much debated in his day: “which commandment is the first of all?” The question of the “first commandment” was, of course, the question about which one was the most important. The answer Jesus gave would have been considered fairly conventional: “Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one; you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength” (Mk. 12:29-31) That was the shema (Deut. 6:4-5), which devout Jewish people recited every day. That he combined it with a “second” command, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” would not have come as a surprise either.

There was widespread agreement that these two commands constituted the essence of what God wanted from his people. But I think then as well as now, the real problem is how to fulfill these two great commandments. I’m not the first person to wonder how we finite human beings can “love” God, the one who is both far beyond all that we can understand and also who is as close to us as the very air we’re breathing. It’s a question that St. Augustine framed over 1600 years ago: “What do I love when I love my God?”^[3] It’s a question that continues to be asked by many who are willing to face the difficulty of living in relationship with the God who made the heavens and the earth. Just how do you have a relationship with a God you can’t see, you can’t touch, with whom you can’t have a regular conversation?

Some insist that we love God by maintaining spiritual practices like prayer, Bible reading, and worship—both publicly and privately. I would agree that maintaining our personal and public spiritual lives is an important component of what it means to love God. But those who have explored this question throughout the ages developed other disciplines as well: welcoming strangers, sharing what we have, helping others, and giving care wherever it’s needed. This echoes a theme that is biblical: we love God when we walk in his ways. I would say that we “walk in God’s ways” when we seek to live out God’s grace, mercy, and love in our own lives. And if we want an example to follow, I think we need look no farther than Jesus. He constantly and consistently lived out God’s grace, mercy and love. He devoted his whole life to loving God and loving others.

Loving God leads us naturally to the “second” commandment: loving others. Scripture says that we cannot love God without loving others (1 John 4:11-12, 19-21). What we may not know is that this “second” command comes from Leviticus 19. In that chapter, the Bible is actually very specific about what it looks like to “love your neighbor as yourself.” It means to refrain from oppressing your workers, cursing the deaf or trying to trip up a blind person; it means that we’re not to show partiality to the rich over the poor, slander anyone, hate another person, take vengeance, or bear a grudge (Lev. 19:13-18)! Of course, there are other Bible passages that spell this out with different specifics, but I think you get the idea. Loving God leads to loving your neighbor in the real ways in which we treat other people on a daily basis.

In these distracted times, it can be difficult to keep our focus on these matters. The push and pull of life constantly drags us away from our primary calling: to love God and to love our neighbors. It’s not always easy to determine what that kind of love looks like in practice. I will say this: if we take it seriously, it will claim all that we are, and call forth the best we can give. Those of us who are ordained officers in the Presbyterian Church take an oath to serve others with “energy, intelligence, imagination, and love.” That’s not a bad way to approach trying to fulfill the two great commands. As we offer all that and more to God, I think we are setting out on a journey of discipleship in which we are constantly learning what it means to love God with all that we are and to love our neighbors as ourselves.

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[1] ©2018 Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by Rev. Dr. Alan Brehm on 11/4/2018 at Hickman Presbyterian Church, Hickman, NE.

[2] First introduced by Manfred Clynes and Nathan Kline, “Cyborgs and Space,” Astronautics (September 1960): 26-27, 74-76.

[3] Augustine of Hippo, Confessions, 10.6.8.