Showing posts with label Sermon. Show all posts

(And, before you even think it... no, they were not clapping because they wanted it the sermon to be over.)

As I had posted earlier this week, the sermon on Sunday was relatively dramatic, closing with the smashing of a golden calf (spray painted ceramic cow bank) on the altar.  Earlier in the worship, I had replaced the cross on the altar with that cow.  The point of the sermon was that, after crossing over to the promised land, the Hebrews forgot about the providence of God.  They forgot all that God had done for them.  They forgot to be thankful. And, when they forgot God, they looked for something more tangible, understandable that they could put their faith in.  So they built a statue of gold they could touch, and feel, and see, and put their trust in.  I argued that, if this was possible for the Hebrews, how much more possible is it for us who have far less dramatic and tangible experiences of God.  So, when we offer God our thanks, when we remember his care, for all things in life, we keep the sacred cows from taking he place reserved for God.

At that, I smashed the cow and put the cross back on the altar.  

And there was loud applause from the congregation.

And I wasn't sure what to do.

I was pretty vulnerable during this sermon.  This was a sermon where I truly felt carried along by God.  I was passionate.  I felt inspired.  It was a God-thing.  I know it doesn't happen near as often as I wish it would.  But, as I smashed that small statue, I felt pretty prophetic.  I hope that's not pride that has me writing it down here -- sometimes it can be hard to tell.  But, suffice it to say, I was emotionally spent as I got to the close of the sermon and wielded that hammer.

And, at that time, I truly did not know how to react to the applause.

See, for me, applause usually means that "I" have done a good job.  We applaud after a good performance in a play or a rousing song where we appreciate the singer.  We applaud after the game-winning hit or the great speech.  And, while I know that sometimes people clap after a particularly good music number in worship, I didn't know what to do when people clapped after my sermon.

For a little bit there--hammer in my hand, pieces of cow everywhere, people clapping--I was embarrassed. 

Let me be clear that his was not a standing ovation that went on for a while.   There were no shouts of "Encore!  Encore!"  The congregation did not ask for a curtain call. I went home to the same 6 groupies as I always do.

This was a short burst of hearty applause.  But it was enough to make me feel like the attention was all on ME when it had felt like--and was intended to be--all about God and what God has done for us. 

Over the years I've had many folks tell me that they thought a sermon was particularly good or that it spoke to them or things like that.  But I'd never had folks clap at the close of one.

And I was embarrassed.

Now, fortunately, I have a discipleship group that I'm meeting with for Sunday School.  And, in that safe environment I was able to share my embarrassment.  What those folks told me I probably already knew, but I needed to hear it.  The people in church weren't applauding for me.  They were applauding that God was given back his rightful spot…that the cross was going back on the altar.

It wasn't about me

I'm pretty sure I already knew that.

But I needed to hear it.

We continue our sermon series this week, looking at Jacob's parenting and "Playing Favorites."

photo © 2010 Joel Montes de Oca | more info (via: Wylio)
I feel like I've been on a roll lately with sermons.  Or, perhaps to say it more faithfully, God's been on a roll through my sermons.  I think there has been more dialogue about preaching with the congregation and I've been going out of my way to include more visual presentation material -- powerpoint slides, images, even movies.  It's been a challenge and the way our church is set up presently, it means that I'm manning the computer/projector along with the sermon.  But I've been getting good feedback and some constructive criticism.  It hasn't all been sugar-coated.


But yesterday was awesome.  I'm not sure the sermon text or my presentation was all that great, but the topic and the sermon as a whole seemed to really resonate with people.  It was on GRUDGES and was called "LIFE'S TOO SHORT TO HOLD A GRUDGE."  And so we talked about the fleeting nature of life and the abundant life that God intends for us.  Then we talked of how grudges keep us from being the people God wants us to be and how it accomplishes nothing but making us slaves to our past and how grudges keep us from any hope of reconciliation and, beyond that, even civility with those for whom we carry the grudge.

Three people told me that they thought I was preaching directly to them.  One person asked for a copy and proceeded to text portions of my sermon to their family members.  Another person emailed me and said that the sermon led them to have a heart to heart with someone who had wronged them and that they wanted further conversation about it.

I think I preach pretty well.  I think I've been blessed with a fairly good ability to communicate, although I would never classify myself as a "great preacher."  "Pretty good" seems fair.  But, I guess I wasn't prepared for God to work through today's sermon the way God did.  I'm humbled.  I'm awed.  I pray that God is able to work this way again...maybe next week.

I'm also kind of nervous that I might have "peaked."  What if next week is a dud and the pieces just don't come together?

I guess I better start praying now.

Sermon by S. M. Lockeridge set to images from The Passion.  This gave me chills today.

It's Friday....but Sunday's Coming.

Image via Wikipedia(Note: This is a sermon series focused on misconceptions of Jesus in our culture where Jesus is all around us.  I'm using Jared Wilson's book, Your Jesus is Too Safe as a springboard into the series and will follow along with some of his themes.  For those of you who haven't read Wilson's stuff, I encourage you to at least check out his blog, The Gospel-Driven Church.  And, I've really enjoyed the book.  It's challenged me.)


Text:  Psalm 24:1-6 & Romans 5:17-21
Title:  “Jesus: The Man”

We like our God tough.  We like our God OMNIPOTENT and OMNIPRESENT and OMNISCIENT  (all-powerful, all-present, all-knowing).  We like our God to be GODLY, with some holy muscle on him.  We can talk pretty openly about Jesus being with us wherever we go and how much he loves us and speaks to us through his Spirit.

Sometimes it’s harder for us to come to grips with the humanness of Jesus.  That’s why I stress at Christmastime that the great God of the universe has come to us as a helpless baby in the manger…who cried and got gas and spit up on Mary’s shoulder as she burped him. 

That’s some human stuff.

And there’s other parts with being human that we just don’t get into with Jesus.  As fully human I’m pretty sure he had to use the restroom.  I’m pretty sure he left toys on the floor and had acne.  I’m pretty sure he sometimes laughed so hard that he got the hiccups or did one of those SNORT noises that some people do when they laugh.  He was human.  He was a baby.  He was a boy.   He was a teenager.  He was a man.

But, if we’re honest with ourselves, we need to admit that there is a leap of faith that comes with this, for we say that Jesus was both fully God and fully man…not the typical, everyday experience.  And sometimes, trying to hold these together, persons have come down way on the side of one of the other.

Throughout this sermon series, we’ve been saying that there are certain MISCONCEPTIONS that people have of Jesus – like he’s angry and doesn’t forgive of that he has nothing to do with all that came before him in the Old Testament.  But, the MISCONCEPTION about Jesus being fully God and not human at all isn’t even a misconception.  The church, long ago—like, in the 3rd century—,called it a heresy. 

Here’s a little history lesson for you.  In the 3rd century the church was dealing with a growing belief that JESUS FELT NO PAIN.  While there was a lot going on at the time that tried to deny the divinity of Christ, this is one that denied the humanity.  The name of this belief is DOCETISM.  Docetism comes from the Greek work which means “TO SEEM” or “TO APPEAR” and, in docetism, Jesus wasn’t really human although he SEEMED to be human.

There is a logic here.  Because we have an all-powerful, all present, totally transcendent God, it would be impossible for our God to experience any kind of human suffering.  It wouldn’t make sense.  And to embrace some sort of idea where the great ruler of the universe would have put on human flesh and moved into our neighborhoods was, well unthinkable.  Couldn’t have happened. 

The early church, however, fought back hard.  I know the name Irenaeus probably isn’t known to you, but it was Irenaeus who wrote from prison saying, essentially:  Hey, why am I in prison if the gospel is just some harmless lie, where no one really suffered and died?

His exact words were more pointed, even:

Turn a deaf ear therefore when any one speaks to you apart from Jesus Christ, who was of the family of David, the child of Mary, who was truly born, who ate and drank, who was truly persecuted under Pontius Pilate, was truly crucified and truly died….But if, as some godless men, that is, unbelievers, say, he suffered in mere appearance (being themselves being mere appearances), why am I in bonds?

[And another ancient saint in the fray is Polycarp who] “makes the strongest possible charge against the Docetists by saying that “everyone who does not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is an anti-Christ,” echoing 1 John 4:2-3.”

So, what’s the big deal here?  What’s the problem with having a view that our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ never touched the ground because he was so Godly and surely couldn’t have suffered and died?  Well, that’s what we need to get at.

It all kind of goes back to that Psalm passage we read, from Psalm 24 a bit earlier:

The earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it, the world, and those who live in it; for he has founded it on the seas, and established it on the rivers.  Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord? And who shall stand in his holy place?  Those who have clean hands and pure hearts, who do not lift up their souls to what is false, and do not swear deceitfully. They will receive blessing from the Lord, and vindication from the God of their salvation. Such is the company of those who seek him, who seek the face of the God of Jacob.

This is David, back in the Old Testament.  David…with all of his Bathsheba problem.  This is not someone with clean hands and a pure heart.  And yet, here he is, singing about the only one being able to ascend the hill of the Lord…the only one able to bridge the distance between God and humankind is the one who is clean and pure and doesn’t do what is false, and doesn’t swear…deceitfully.

Even in the Old Testament, there was a sense that what was needed, to really connect us with God was someone…some human…who was without sin.  We needed a human to make the sacrifice to restore the relationship between humans and God.

That’s where Jesus comes in.

The Bible is full of the humanness of Jesus.  We’ve already alluded to that birth in the manger that we celebrated about a month and a half ago.  (Really, it’s about a month and a half ago.  I swear!)  And we know this was a real birth, albeit a miraculous one with a virgin for a mother—and that’s “virgin” in the classic sense of the word and not “virgin” as in “a young girl” which is what the original word in Isaiah, that points to this might have meant.  The gospels are clear that Mary and Joseph had no marital relations before Jesus was born. 

And then we kind of enter a cloudy area in Jesus’ life, because there’s just not much there.  We might be fully interested in hearing about Jesus’ childhood friends, and whether he got picked first or last for the baseball team and whether or not he responded with some “and the first will be last” comment.  But we just don’t have that information.  We know that he got lost from his parents when he was just 12 years old and his parents found him in the temple.  But that’s about it.  And we have to deal with that.

Says Jared Wilson, whose book Your Jesus is Too Safe is serving as the background for this series says,

Though we’d love to know more about Jesus as a child, the gospel writers were more interested in telling us about the powerful and redemptive work of his adult ministry than in satisfying our curiosity about his childhood.  The modern imaginative insistence—that the church excised from the Gospels and then concealed whatever happened in Jesus’ adolescence—is not only fanciful, it is also anachronistic—it assumes the Gospels must adhere to the forms and conventions of modern biographies. (83)

In short, the gospel writers didn’t care to tell us what happened in Jesus’ teens and twenties…why…because that wasn’t really important to the salvation story at hand.

We can assume some things.

We might assume that Jesus was a carpenter because we know Joseph was.  But, Jesus is never called a carpenter in the Bible…only a carpenter’s son (Matthew 13:55).  He’s called “Rabbi” or “Teacher” a lot more frequently.  It could very well be that he studied as a Rabbi.  That would make some sense.

We can also assume that Joseph, Jesus’ dad died at some point.  That would explain why we don’t hear about Joseph at all after the “lost in the temple” experience.  And, it would also explain why, Jesus, at the cross, gives his friend John charge of his mother. 

There would have been no need to do this if Joseph were still living, and indeed, John takes Mary into his home to live thereafter.  Mary’s widowhood would partially explain Jesus’ close relationship with her throughout the gospel stories.  The other explanation for maintaining such a close, sweet relationship with his mother is just that he was the perfect son. (Wilson, 84)

Some have assumed that Jesus was married, even married and having kids.  Does Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code ring a bell to anyone?  There are some problems with this. 

First, it doesn’t make historical sense.  We know it’s not in the four gospels.  And, if he had gotten married, there’d be no reason not to include it. It wouldn’t be scandalous and therefore kept from the first century Christians.  Moreover, if he had been married with kids, it would have been a big part of his life and worthy of a mention.

Secondly, it doesn’t make logical sense.  We started this discussion of Jesus’ manhood by saying that he was the perfect man…the perfect human…and was therefore able to bridge the divide between God and humanity.  Well, what kind of perfect man would leave his wife and kids behind to go tour around the countryside with 12 guys for three year before dying for the sins of the world?  He’d be a horrible man.  It’s not logical.

All this is to say that, orthodox Christianity doesn’t believe that he was married.  If he had been, it wouldn’t make him any less the Son of God and Son of Man.  But, since he didn’t get married it’s kind of a moot point.

But, beyond assumptions, there are some things that we really can know about Jesus the Man from the three years of ministry that get recorded in the Gospels.

We can know the Jesus was a humble man.

This is, perhaps, a little odd considering here’s a guy who says, “I am the Way and the Truth, and the Life” and demanded that the lives of all his followers revolved around him.  But we know he was humble.

This is one who gave up the throne of heaven to come down to earth to redeem.  He gave.  He served.  He sought.  Think of how he lowered himself to move into our neighborhood, earth…the neighborhood on the other side of the tracks from heaven.

Philippians says he “made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness.  And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death—even death on a cross.”

He was humble man.

We can also know he was a brilliant man.

This may be hard for us to grasp, as we see brilliance in the minds of Einstein or Plato, Augustine or Isaac Newton.  We don’t think of Jesus.

Yesterday I had a meeting for The Walk to Emmaus spiritual retreat.  And, on the retreat, the Walk to Emmaus story from Luke comes up where Jesus walks with persons after the resurrection and they are distraught at what’s taken place around his death.  But as they walked along Jesus opened up their hearts to all the scriptures about himself.

And we believe that Jesus was a brilliant guy and believe that his words are not just a quaint account of first century life, but are words of instruction and life across the miles and the ages.  We believe he was good, but that he was smart in the practical application.

But, says Wilson:

In one of the great ironies of our modern evangelical subculture, we are very big on “making” the Christian faith practical and “relevant,” yet by and large we go on living our lives as if Jesus had nothing relevant to say about what we do and say, who we date or marry, what sort of jobs we take, what sort of families we raise, where we spend our time with. (94-95)

We’ll take our Jesus as “good” but will we take him as smart enough to know what’s best for us.

We can know him as fully man. 

Because Jesus was fully man, he can reverse Adam’s fall.  Our Romans passage says this:

If, because of the one man’s trespass, death exercised dominion through that one, much more surely will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness exercise dominion in life through the one man, Jesus Christ.  Therefore just as one man’s trespass led to condemnation for all, so one man’s act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all.

Jesus was fully man…but a fully sinless man.  That makes our righteousness possible.  This is integral to a Christian understanding of salvation.

But he was fully man as well in that he experienced the highs, the lows, of human life.  He knew loss of family (Joseph and John the Baptist).  He knew the loss of a friend (Lazarus).  He knew temptation (remember that time in the desert).  He knew what it was like to be lost from him parent.

He might not have experienced exactly what you’re going through or you’ve been through but he knew what it was like to be rejected by friends and family.  He knew anxiety.  He knew physical abuse.  He even knew what it was like to die.

As human as we are, we may want a God who is totally other than us…divine.  That’s understandable.  And, in many ways, Jesus was and is that.  But as divine as our God is, he knew that the way to offer us a better way was to become one of us…fully.  Know that Jesus the man has accomplished all that his Father has set out to have him do.  And because of that we can ascend “the hill of the Lord.”

In the name of the Father and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

photo © 2010 R. M. Calamar | more info (via: Wylio)

She destroyed my picture.

He told her that I liked her.

They went into my room without asking first.

We have so sanitized forgiveness it’s all out of focus.  We idealize it as nice and virtuous, the dominion of children and their insignificant squabbles.  We forget, though, just how messy, how difficult, how scandalous forgiveness really is until were faced with the opportunity to experience it ourselves.  If you’ve ever cried out for a forgiveness withheld from you, or if you’ve ever had to face the sometimes excruciating process of forgiving someone who has really sinned against you, then you know what I’m talking about.  If you haven’t experienced either opportunity, just wait. (59)

"I will heal their waywardness.

   I will love them lavishly. My anger is played out.

I will make a fresh start with Israel.

   He'll burst into bloom like a crocus in the spring.

He'll put down deep oak tree roots,

   he'll become a forest of oaks!

He'll become splendid—like a giant sequoia,

   his fragrance like a grove of cedars!

Those who live near him will be blessed by him,

   be blessed and prosper like golden grain.

Everyone will be talking about them,

   spreading their fame as the vintage children of God. (Hosea 14:4-7)

The same week of the Amish schoolhouse murders, one of our church’s pastors told the story of a mother who’d forgiven the drunk driver who killed her teenage son.  Not only had she found her way past the anger and bitterness to forgive the driver, but she and her husband had also pursued the messy work of reconciling a relationship with the man, EVEN THOUGH THEY HAD NO PRIOR RELATIONSHIP WITH HIM.  Her husband, who was a pastor, even presided over the man’s marriage. (66)

Bear with one another and, if anyone has a complaint against another, forgive each other; just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.

[T]he moment you make your granting of forgiveness contingent on another persons’ attitude or worthiness, you’re slapping God in the face.  Again, this is why: you yourself are not WORTHY of God’s forgiveness.   You can never deserve it. You aren’t good enough or smart enough—doggone it, God didn’t grant you forgiveness because you’re likeable.  He did it because he loves you and because grace is the way he shows it. (72)

Image by _escalade328s_ via Flickr(Note: This is a sermon series focused on misconceptions of Jesus in our culture where Jesus is all around us.  I'm using Jared Wilson's book, Your Jesus is Too Safe as a springboard into the series and will follow along with some of his themes.  For those of you who haven't read Wilson's stuff, I encourage you to at least check out his blog, The Gospel-Driven Church.  This sermon functioned as the introduction to the series, trying to convey the notion that it can be hard to find who Jesus is in our culture.)


Text:  Malachi 4:1-6 & Matthew 24:37-42
Title:  “Jesus, The Prophet who Disturbs Us”

Our Old Testament comes to a close with those great words of Malachi that were just read.  I’m going to read it again, at least the first part.  And I want you to tell me what you think…what are your initial reactions?

See, the day is coming, burning like an oven, when all the arrogant and all evildoers will be stubble; the day that comes shall burn them up, says the Lord of hosts, so that it will leave them neither root nor branch. But for you who revere my name the sun of righteousness shall rise, with healing in its wings. You shall go out leaping like calves from the stall. And you shall tread down the wicked, for they will be ashes under the soles of your feet, on the day when I act, says the Lord of hosts.

So, what do you think?

See, I think these words…these words that point to the coming of Jesus and really serve as the prelude to all that follows in the New Testament…I think these words are hard for us to hear.  I think, we prefer our Jesus to be more warm and cuddly than this.  I think when we hear that his coming will be like the burning of an oven that will burn up everything so that there is nothing left…well, that this is hard for us to hear.  I think that, even if we can understand some measure of judgment and punishment we really would much rather hear about the little children coming to Jesus.  We’d rather hear about sight being restored.  We rather hear, “turn the other cheek” and “love your enemies” and BE NICE PEOPLE…which Jesus doesn’t really ever say but we often ascribe to him.

We want a NICE Jesus.  We want a SAFE Jesus.  We want our faith with an EASY BUTTON so we can, at times look for an EASY JESUS.  We want our Jesus to come to us like Stuart Smalley of Saturday Night Fame 20 years ago, telling us that we are GOOD ENOUGH, SMART ENOUGH, AND DOGGONE IT, PEOPLE LIKE US.

And so, we come to the BUDDY JESUS (show image) who is just happy to be around us, wants to hang out with us, enjoys the same things we do and likes us for who we are.

And so we have our HIPPIE JESUS (show image) who doesn’t want to “harsh our vibe, man.”  He tells us that we’re cool with him.  He doesn’t want to talk about sin and judgment and stuff like that because what’s important to him is for us to feel the love.

This is all pretty simplistic.  And I want to be fair and say that this is a message that needs to be heard by persons.  We want to tell our children that “Jesus love me this I know, for the Bible tells me so.”  We want the person dealing with depression or self-worth issue or the youth who is struggling with self-image issue and is cutting themselves or suffering with anorexia that Jesus does love them just the way they are and that he is with them and cares for them and embraces them in his loving arms.  It’s a good message to hear.

But, I want to say, it’s incomplete.  It’s an incomplete, and therefore, inaccurate picture of Jesus.

Think of it this way…I love my children.  And I hope they know I love them very much and would do JUST ABOUT anything for them, particularly when they’re in trouble or when they’re hurt.  But I’m not OK with everything they do.  I get angry with them.  We have talks.  They get warnings.  There are “time-outs” and “groundings” and sometimes I know it hardly makes sense to them as hard as I try to be clear that my anger or their punishment is based on me, believe it or not, having some idea of what is best for them and wanting to pull them back into line with expectations.  That goes for my younger kids and the older ones as well.  And I know all of you who are parents know that this is the case.

I want to enjoy my time with my kids, but I don’t want to be their buddy.  I want to be their parent.  I give my kids a lot of freedom, much to their chagrin it’s a lot less than many other kids, but there are things I think ARE NOT OK…and I want to call them on it.  I will, on occasion, HARSH THEIR VIBE.  I will bother them.  I will get in their space.  I will disturb the world that they’ve set up around themselves.

And it doesn’t always go real smooth.  And there are times, I’m just trying to figure it out.  Sometimes, being good to them, caring for them, means seemingly harsh things.

C.S. Lewis addressed this very type of issue in THE LION, THE WITCH, AND THE WARDROBE  The Lion, of course, is Aslan.  He’s the Christ figure in the story who gives up his life for his people.  And isn’t it interesting, though, that it’s a LION who is the representation of Christ here.  Lions are big.  Lions can be vicious.  Lions are intimidating.  Here’s how the story plays out:

Says Mrs. Beaver; “I tell you he is the King of the wood and the son of the great Emperor-beyond-the-Sea.  Don’t you know who is the King of Beasts?  Aslan is a lion – the Lion, the great Lion.”

“Ooh!” said Susan. “I’d thought he was a man.  Is he – quite safe?  I shall feel rather nervous about meeting a lion.”

“That you will, dearie, and no mistake,” said Mrs. Beaver; “if there’s anyone who can appear before Aslan without their knees knocking, they’re either braver than most or else just silly.”

“Then he isn’t safe?” said Lucy.

“Safe?” said Mr. Beaver; “don’t you hear what Mrs. Beaver tells you?  Who said anything about safe?  Course he isn’t safe.  But he’s good.  He’s the King, I tell you.”

Imagine, if you will standing face to face with a full grown, real, untamed lion.   It would be terrible.  But what if the Lion were good.

C.S. Lewis writes as the children see the Lion for the first time:

People who have not been in Narnia sometimes think that a thing cannot be good and terrible at the same time.  If the children had ever thought so, they were cured of it now.  For when they tried to look at Aslan’s face they just caught a glimpse of the golden mane and the great, royal, solemn, overwhelming eyes; and then they found they couldn’t look at him and went all trembly.

The fact that we shudder a little, go “all trembly” when we read the words of Malachi, help us to see that, in many ways, we have tamed our God.  We’ve got a friend in Jesus.  He’s our brother.  But, in Scripture, our God isn’t a kitty cat.  Our God wants to disrupt us and disturb us an bother us and call us back into obedience.  Hebrews 10:31 kind of sums it up:  “It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God” (NLT).

So, to combat the BUDDY JESUS SYNDROME, we need to remember that Jesus comes to us as prophet, with all that this implies.

FIRST, JESUS DISTURBS THE NATION…HE PREACHES OUT AGAINST IT.  For instance, in Mark 11 Jesus curses a fig tree.   He sees a fig tree with no fruit.  He curses it, saying, “May no one ever eat off of you again.”  And the next morning the disciples see that it’s withered to the roots. 

You may think, “Well, la-di-da, a dead fig tree.”  But the fig tree was a symbol of Israel itself.   What if someone preached and destroyed a symbol for another country…like our own.  Burned a flag.  Would that be viewed as “figtin’ words”?  Of course.  He was proclaiming that there was no good fruit in their country and he showed it in a very vivid manner.

And that’s just one incident.  There are other places where Jesus preaches against the nation using the Temple and its future destruction as the illustration. 

This Jesus is disturbing.

SECOND, JESUS, LIKE THE PROPHETS OF OLD, PREACHED REPENTANCE.  Repentance means a TURNING AROUND in your life, a reorientation of the way you’ve been headed, to go in a new direction.  This ordinary carpenter’s son from the middle of nowhere started showing up and telling people…by the way, I’m speaking for God now and I gotta’ tell you things have got to change.  “GO AND SIN NO MORE!”

THIRD, JESUS THE PROPHET TELLS US TO BE PREPARED.  This is where that reading from Matthew 24 comes in:

For as the days of Noah were, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day Noah entered the ark, and they knew nothing until the flood came and swept them all away, so too will be the coming of the Son of Man. Then two will be in the field; one will be taken and one will be left. Two women will be grinding meal together; one will be taken and one will be left. Keep awake therefore, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming.

Look, one of the scary things about Jesus is that he tells us he’s coming back.  It’s scary.  But it’s awesome.  He doesn’t say when or where, but he says it’s going to be very good news for those he calls his own.  But...that means you gotta’ expect him any time.  Few people cheat when they know the teacher could walk in the door any moment.  We, too, need to act as if our Teacher’s coming in at any moment, too and that this is VERY GOOD NEWS FOR US.

This is a Jesus who should disturb us.

LASTLY, JESUS THE PROPHET COMES INTO OUR PERSONAL SPACE, OUR PERSONAL LIVES, TO CALL US INTO QUESTION.

Jared Wilson, who’s book YOUR JESUS IS TOO SMALL is serving as the background for this series talks of how Jesus interfered in the life of the woman at the well, calling her relationships into question.  Jesus should and does make us uncomfortable when confronted with what's wrong in our lives.  Jared then shares the following story about how Jesus disturbed a Bible Study he was leading:

The Christian community I pastor was meeting one night for Bible study. In the sharing time, several of us spoke of difficulties at work or relatives undergoing surgery.  Then one new attendee, an Iranian immigrant who had been a Christian only a few months, said, “If I go back home they will kill me.”  Long awestruck silence followed.  And then she added, “But it’s okay.” (57)

Puts my complaints about having to go to San Francisco this afternoon or my complaints about picking up this kid or that kid from wherever or not having any skim milk at the Merc or losing power for 30 minutes or long lines on Chair 6 or whatever into question.  My life is lived so far removed from those who rely…really rely on Christ.  The mere fact that I know that there are people in this world for being a Christian makes me realize how EASY it is for me to stand up and say I believe in this place.  My faith is less challenging but God wants us to be challenged by his words and have our lives changed.

This should disturb each and every one of us.

One of the problems about our BUDDY JESUS, is that he’s entered our churches too, where we encourage folks to be nicer, or smarter, or more healthy, or richer.  We forget his challenges as we leave the buildings because we’re never challenged when we’re in.  We’re never called to a RADICAL change in the way we think and act and talk.  It seems, sometimes, all we’re asking is for people to be well-adjusted.  And we need more than this.

I want to close with a quote from a blog I read a lot.  It’s called The Internet Monk.  And it’s a couple of pastors carrying on the legacy of Michael Spencer, who died a year ago.  They right about how "BUDDY JESUS" has moved beyond a personal faith buddy to a programatic experience in churches. I don't know if it entirely meshes with what has come before, but I think it's important for us to hear as we look towards having more and more activities in our facility.  What is said here is disturbing:

Let me just say this straight out. If all you are interested in is becoming is a better person, then Jesus is not your best avenue to get there. You can find lots of self-help books—and in Christian bookstores without embarrassing references to Jesus to worry about—that deal with marriage, health, finances and life-issues you find yourself dealing with. They are piled high on tables leading into the temple. As a matter of fact, you can buy them in many temples every Sunday, credit cards accepted.

Jesus is not a self-help guru. He is not interested in you becoming a better person. He could not care less with you improving in any area of your life. Because in the end that is your life. Yours. And he demands you give it to him. All of it. An unconditional surrender. He did not come to improve you, or encourage you, or spur you on to bigger and better things. He came to raise the dead.

Do you have a Jesus who wants to be your BUDDY?  Or do you have a Prophetic Jesus who wants to bring you life?

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

(Note: This is a sermon series focused on misconceptions of Jesus in our culture where Jesus is all around us.  I'm using Jared Wilson's book, Your Jesus is Too Safe as a springboard into the series and will follow along with some of his themes.  For those of you who haven't read Wilson's stuff, I encourage you to at least check out his blog, The Gospel-Driven Church.  This sermon functioned as the introduction to the series, trying to convey the notion that it can be hard to find who Jesus is in our culture.)

Text:  Isaiah 40:3-5, 9 & Matthew 5:17-20
Title:  “Jesus the Promise”

How many people here today golf?  I know there are some who still find time to golf pretty regularly during the summer months up here even though Alaska isn’t perceived as a golfing destination for many. 

I golfed once, back in college, with a buddy of mine.  I remember on the first hole, missing the first shot completely…you know after a swing that I was sure was going to hit the ball a country mile.  So, that was a “mulligan” a “do-over.”  We pretended it just didn’t happen.  I was warming up.  It didn’t count.  And, with three more swings I managed to get the ball into the whole.  It was a par 3.  I thought I was God’s gift to golf.  I was on a roll.

It went downhill from there.  It wasn’t pretty.  I think when all was said and done, even with some mulligans thrown in, I shot a 72 for the first 9 holes. That, was my golfing experience.  I haven’t tried it again.

Now, I don’t think Jesus was much of a golfer, but I do think, as we talk about the misconceptions and incomplete pictures of Jesus that many of us have…I do think that some persons have an image of a “Mulligan Jesus” a “DO-OVER Jesus.”  That God had given the law and the prophets and a couple thousand years of history to his chosen people and they still weren’t getting it.  It was just one big swing and a miss.  And so, God, looking down from heaven says to his angels, “I think I’ll take a mulligan.”  Let’s have a whole do-over here.  I’m going to send them JESUS.

And, as if all that other stuff never happened, in comes Jesus, to save the day and it’s a HOLE IN ONE.

While it is true that, as Christians, we read the Old Testament through the lens of Jesus…meaning, we can’t help but use the words in red, what Jesus said, and what Jesus did as the tool for interpreting the Old Testament passage.  While that’s true, Jesus is not a whole new story in the salvation story of our God, but a continuation of the story that’s been told throughout eternity.  It’s not like, since Jesus came along that the whole Old Testament doesn’t matter.  That’s part of the reason why there’s been a movement to call the Old Testament “The First Testament” or “The Hebrew Bible.”  The Old Testament matters, and, when we pay attention we can see that it’s full of testimony about and for Jesus.

Take, for instance, the passage that we read from Isaiah 40 just a bit ago:

A voice of one calling: “In the desert prepare the way for the Lord; make straight in the wilderness a highway for our God.  Every valley shall be raised up, every mountain and hill be made low; the rough ground shall become level, the rugged places a plain.  And the glory of the Lord will be revealed, and all mankind together will see it. For the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”

You who bring good tidings to Zion, go up on a high mountain.  You who bring good tidings to Jerusalem, lift up your voice with a shout, lift it up, do not be afraid; say to the towns of Judah, “Here is your God!”

The people of Israel had passed through the waters during the Exile from Egypt a long time before Isaiah.  But still, at this point, there was the understanding that God had something more in store for them…that God had promised to come back and make things right…all things right with his people. 

It had been a long time.  But a promise is a promise is a promise and the people of Israel waited.

This is where I think the illustration from the Children's Time comes in handy…that of a child being tucked in and the parent promising to come and check on them.  In our household, it's in "eight minutes…with the kids not having much understanding of just how long that is.  But they know that we've promised to check on them and they can go to sleep safe in the knowledge that we'll come back.

Israel, though its history, knows that God will come.  He promised.  And they waited.

During this waiting period a lot of folks came out of the desert claiming to be the promised Messiah.  And many of them came with similar credentials.  They hoped that God would intervene and make things right. They were upset at the oppression of present overlords, the Romans.  They’d go out to the wilderness, get a bunch of followers, and then hatch a scheme to overthrow the government by might.

It didn’t work out too well for most of them.  Mostly death.

But things changed when this one man, John, the cousin of Jesus came along.  We just heard some of his story leading up to Christmas.  This is how Jared Wilson, whose book Your Jesus is Too Safe, which I’m using as a springboard for this sermon series describes him:

Cousin John ventured into the Jordan River Valley, but instead of starting a commune, instead of seeking out angry dudes with swords, who wanted to conspire and bust some Roman heads, he put on his camel-fur galoshes, stood in the river and began receiving people who shared his expectation.  Cousin John was the perfect man for this perfect time, because he was a guy who really got into the wilderness.  This is a guy wearing animal skins and eating crickets and wild honey, who made the Crocodile Hunter look like Mister Rogers. (20-21)

And, with his baptizing of people, it was kind of like the Exodus was being reenacted all over again.  The stories of the prophets said that God would come…he PROMISED.  With John, he said the PROMISE WAS COMING NOW.

You'll remember John's words from the gospel of Matthew -- “The kingdom of heaven is at hand”  (Matthew 3:2).  That's pretty clear, isn't it?

And so, the Promise comes.  The long-awaited Promise, the Messiah, comes and breaks into the world.  The story of God continues.

But as we think about the promise of God coming to us in Jesus, we need to be very aware of why everyone didn’t just jump on Jesus’ bandwagon.  See, as I had stated, there had been a lot of anticipation for a military uprising that would come with God’s Messiah.  As we read a lot of the prophets, there was an understanding that not only had God promised to come and make things right but that he’d flex some divine muscle as he did this.  Swords.  Clubs. Armies.  Tactical plans.  That was part of the package.

But we know that wasn’t the case with Jesus.  Our Gospels go out of their way to show his humble and peaceful side.  He comes as a baby in a manger.  He preaches about turning the other cheek.  His triumphal entry into Jerusalem involves a donkey ride and not a big white stallion. 

And if the Jews had assumed they would gather with their Messiah and take over the land and the rivers and the trade and the government and the banks and sit all high and mighty in places of power…it had to be more than a little disheartening to find out that ALL they were getting out of the deal was Jesus. 

But the Promise wasn’t going to be fulfilled with the empty things of this world, but with God himself.  It’s not what people wanted.

Wilson writes:

Jesus showed up and said that the kingdom of God was here now, coming and breaking into history.  And he said the kingdom was coming by, in, and through him.  This was a hard pill to swallow—then and now.  Let’s be frank: if you find the message of Jesus easy to digest, you’d better check the label on the box.  You may be consuming a diluted version of Christianity.  The message of Jesus—that he himself is life and you can’t get it anywhere else, least of all in yourself—is the hardest message we could ever hear, because it goes completely against our perceptions and conceptions, our prejudices and our opinions.  It goes radically against the bent of our souls.

You know that we are a people who like our stuff…we like our things…we like our privilege…we like our power.  If you had hoped, like Israel, for hundreds of years for stuff and things and privilege and power and then found out you were getting a poor Carpenter from a nondescript Judean town, what would you think?

But as different as this Promise was, we need to remember that it’s not a do-over, a mulligan…that Jesus is very closely connected to what came before.

Many persons, as they look at Jesus will say, in the Old Testament we had the Law and that’s how God tried to shape and be in relation to his people.  But in the New Testament we have Jesus who comes and offers grace.  Law/Old Testament/Bad.  Grace/New Testament/Good.

But that misses the fact that the Law was, all along pointing to Jesus.  It was all about being in relationship with our God.  And to claim “Law/Bad…Grace/Good” misses even what Jesus says about the law:

“Do not think I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished.  Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven.  (Matthew 5:17-20).

As Christians, we look back at the Law and we can say that they definitely show us that we are a sinful people…we mess up…we’re broken…we have some trouble with obedience…ad probably with authority.  And we look to Jesus as the one who fixes that…fixes us.

And again, it doesn’t happen the way we might like it to…at least not if we were writing the story.  There is sin and disobedience.  And it involves the spilling of some blood, which is very much in line with the understanding of the Hebrew people.  And, if we’re going to follow him it even involves taking up our own crosses to follow him, some self-sacrifice.  Sacrifice…again…very much in line with the Hebrew people.

So, we can’t look at Jesus as some great “PLAN B” from God because “PLAN A” was an utter failure.  Jesus comes to us as the fulfillment of the promises of God…in person and he connects us with all that has come before.  He connects us to those stories.   He connects us to the love of God and the call to faithfulness of the prophets and even to the hope that God will create for us a world that is free from pain and abuse and hunger and awkwardness and cranky kids and depression and flat feet and everything. 

The story continues.

The Promise is ours.

He has come.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

(Note: This is a sermon series focused on misconceptions of Jesus in our culture where Jesus is all around us.  I'm using Jared Wilson's book, Your Jesus is Too Safe as a springboard into the series and will follow along with some of his themes.  For those of you who haven't read Wilson's stuff, I encourage you to at least check out his blog, The Gospel-Driven Church.  This sermon functioned as the introduction to the series, trying to convey the notion that it can be hard to find who Jesus is in our culture.)


Text:  Matthew 16:13-20
Title:  “Our Quest To Find Jesus:  Introduction”

Betty Stephens was the pastor’s wife at First United Methodist Church in Marion, Indiana when I was in High School.  She was a neat lady.  Thin as a rail.  Full of life.  We were in the Midwest, home of lots of Wesleyan Churches and in at town with Indiana Wesleyan University—“IWU” as we called it.  Our church was the big, downtown church.  It was country-clubbish and in it’s heyday it might have been the biggest church in the town.  Betty, as I said, was full of life and I’ve shared here that, as the conversation around her turned to salvation and whether or not she or someone else had “found” Jesus, she would say, “I didn’t know he was lost.”

And while her response, I’m sure, rubbed some persons the wrong way, there’s some good theology rooted there.  It’s not a matter about US FINDING JESUS but us BEING FOUND BY HIM.   The old hymn says, if I remember, “I once was lost, but now am found.”

And I think Betty saw the face of Christ all around her.  She saw Jesus on the children and in the other members.  She saw Christ in the community.  I don’t think, theologically, she could imagine not finding Jesus.   I don’t know that for sure, but I believe it’s the case, and it’s partly how I see Christ in this world of ours.  How could I not see him?

And, as we look at this world of ours…particularly the American culture in the latter part of the 20th Century, leading to the 21st Century, we can find a whole lot of Jesus around us.  We are a Jesus-fixated culture.  You hear his name used in vain.  You hear him mentioned from the stages of the Oscars and Grammys and when championship rings are placed on fingers.  And the cross on which he suffered and died had been reduced to a popular piece of fashion jewelry.

And just as we can take a few magnetic pieces and dress Jesus up to make him look like whatever we want, we can also morph our understanding of Jesus to speak to us as different time and place and so he comes to us in different guises.

The following are all found in brief searches on the internet.  Take a look at all of these Jesuses.  (I had lots of pictures of Jesus to show on the screen.)


BLOND HAIR ED BLUE-EYED JESUS
BLACK JESUS
ASIAN JESUS
BUDDY JESUS
ANGRY JESUS
HIPSTER JESUS
FAT JESUS
PSYCHADELIC JESUS
HIPPIE JESUS
PUNK JESUS
ROCK N ROLL JESUS
HIDDEN JESUS
JESUS IN A LATTE
JESUS THE REPUBLICAN
JESUS THE DEMOCRAT
JESUS THE AMERICAN

And, to show just how far this can go…

ZOMBIE-KILLING JESUS.

Why do we have to go on a quest to find Jesus?  Because he is lost in the confusion of our culture.

Starting in the 1950’s there was a television show on called, “To Tell the Truth.”  On this show, three persons appeared before a panel of judges.  And each person claimed to be, for instance, Rosie Fletcher (an Olympic snowboarder in our community).  Two were imposters who were up there trying to convince the judges that they were Rosie Fletcher while one was the real Rosie Fletcher, who, as the name of the show implied, had “To Tell the Truth.”   After as series of questions and answers given by each of the contestants, the host would say… “Would the real Rosie Fletcher please stand up?” 

Well, that’s the kind of problem we have in our world when it comes to Jesus.  But, instead of just two imposters…we have hundreds of them, thousands up them and they come to us every day.

Jared Wilson, co-founder and pastor at Element, a Christian Community in Nashville, addresses this very issue in his book, Your Jesus is Too Small, which serves as the springboard into the Jesus discussions we’re going to have over the next eight weeks or so:

The man known as Jesus of Nazareth—Jesus the Christ, or Messiah, to Christians—is undoubtedly the most popular, the most recognizable, the most cited, the most admired, and the most controversial figure in all of history.  No other person has been more scrutinized, studied, or cited—ever.  Entire philosophies and religions have been founded on his teachings.  More books have been written about him than about any other person who ever lived.  Every day, his name is spoken more than any other name, whether in affectionate admiration by his followers and fans, or in absentminded curses or denouncements by those ambivalent or antagonistic toward his fame…

No message has been more used and exploited and appropriated than Jesus Christ’s.  It happens whenever a politician co-opts one of Jesus’ quotable quotes to promote his own platform.  As a result, every careerist soul climbing the ladder of American political engagement—in either major party or neither—and every one of their constituents believe that Jesus is on their side.  Every religion in the world, too, Christian or not, has to factor in some appraisal of Jesus himself, whether it’s to honor him as one of God’s prophets or as an enlightened man, to reject him as a false prophet, or hail him as king of the universe.  Indeed, a handful of religious leaders today cannot even avoid claiming to be him (12-13).

Is it any wonder, in our culture that Jesus is LOST and we need to go on a quest to find him?

And it’s not just the culture.  It’s the church as well.  We, too, want a Jesus that looks and acts and talks like us.  If our theology seems to focus on the primacy of sin, then it’s hard for us to avoid an angry Jesus who’s here to give us a stern talkin’ to.  If we love the environment, it’s hard for us not to have a Jesus who looks to the lilies of the field and caries sheep around his neck.  If, like the Doobie Brothers sang, “Jesus is Just All Right With Me,” we have a Jesus who’s cool with us and loves us man and “would never harsh our vibe because he like[s] rock music and [wears] blue jeans” (13).  If, we look at Jesus and we see America and we look at America and we see Jesus, God and country kind of morph into one thing, indistinguishable from each other.  Or, perhaps, like in the current “prosperity gospel” we avoid all that sacrificial language and know that Jesus Christ just wants us to be rich.

I know that at this point in my life and ministry, I resonate with the language of Jesus reaching out to the least, the last, and the lost…the hurting.  The Scriptures are full of that language and that that’s the side of Jesus that I think comes through in how I conduct myself as Pastor in this place.  The Jesus who turns over tables in the temple?  The Jesus who curses fig trees?  Not so much. 

So, how do we find the real Jesus here? 

A.W. Tozer, an evangelical preacher and author in the middle part of the last century said, “What comes to our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us” (The Knowledge of the Holy).

Fine tuning that a little bit… “What comes to our minds when we think about Jesus is the most important thing about our Christian faith.”

It is for this reason that Jesus asks the question in today’s Scripture reading:

When Jesus came to the region of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?”   “Well,” they replied, “some say John the Baptist, some say Elijah, and others say Jeremiah or one of the other prophets.”  Then he asked them, “But who do you say I am?”  Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”

It’s interesting here that Jesus starts off by asking the disciples “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?”  That easier.  That’s safer.  The answer they give here requires very little of them.

“Well, Jesus, some say you might be John the Baptist.  We can kinda see that.  There are others that have thrown out the names of our prophets…you know, Elijah, and Jeremiah or a couple other ones.  Yeah, that would be cool.” 

It’s always easier when it’s not your faith that’s on the line. 

Perhaps their answers are good.  Perhaps not.  But the real question comes next.  “But who do you say I am?”  And we get Peter’s answer, “You are the Messiah, Son of the Living God.”

This question from Jesus is a call to the disciples to step up to the plate and not rely on the perspectives of others but claim him as our own.  This, as you might guess, is no small issue for those of us who say we’re believers and followers of Jesus of Nazareth.

Present day scholar N.T. Wright pointed out, “What you say about Jesus affects your entire worldview. If you see Jesus differently, everything changes.”

We are going to try to see Jesus differently over the next 8 weeks.  We’re going to look at some of what he means to us and for us as we embark on this quest to find Jesus. 

For a culture that lives and breathes as much religious language as ours does, it’s amazing how lost Jesus can be. 

Over the next several weeks we’re going to find him.

As a prophet, and the forgiver, as a Man, as the Shepherd, as the Judge, as the Promise, as the King and as Savior.

Who do you say that he is?

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

Image via WikipediaText:  Matthew 2:1-12
Title:  “New King.  New Year.  New Directions.”

Welcome to the 9th of the 12 days of Christmas.  If you have not yet received your “Nine Ladies Dancing” I’m sure they’re arriving later.

And while it may just be the 9th day of the 12, it’s amazing how fast things change.

I dropped Samuel off at the Ice Cream Shop yesterday for work and Bud and Carol were there early, taking down the ornaments that had hung from the ceiling since about Thanksgiving.  They were putting away their Christmas music for the year, which means that those who work there revert back to their old playlist for the hours they’re serving customers.

At a New Years Eve party we stopped at the night before, a Christmas tree made it onto the bonfire.  It’s amazing how fast those things burn.  But the smell of burning spruce was a nice change from the smell of all of those fireworks going off all around us that night.

Even today after worship we’ll have folks stay and help pack up our Christmas items for the year and start figuring out what this place looks like and feels like when it’s decorated for our weekly worship.

It can seem like Christ has come…and gone.  The decorations change.  The stories change.  The calendar changes.  People come up with lists of things they want to accomplish in the new year…resolutions, if you will.  And we reflect on what has happened over the past year…the joys…the pain…the things we learned…the things we experienced.  The things that shaped us and moved us and defined us.

But when we have moved on from that sweet little baby Jesus, we may have an empty manger, but we have an occupied throne.  We have looked forward to his coming to save us from our sins and now we settle into the reality that we have a new king to not only rule the world but rule the hearts of those of us in this world of ours. 

Part of the message of Christmas is there’s a new ruler in town, a new sheriff, one who seeks a response of faith and faithfulness from those who celebrate his coming.

Our magi give testimony to this.  The Common English Bible, a new translation, puts it this way:

After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in the territory of Judea during the reign of King Herod, magi came from the east to Jerusalem.  They asked, “Where is the newborn king of the Jews?  We’ve seen his star in the east, and we’ve come to honor him.”

When King Herod heard this, he was troubled, and everyone in Jerusalem was troubled with him.  He gathered all the chief priests and the legal experts and asked them where the Christ was to be born.  They said, “In Bethlehem of Judea, for this is what the prophet wrote:

You, Bethlehem, land of Judah, by no means are you least among the rulers of Judah, because from you will come one who governs, who will shepherd my people Israel.”

There is a new king in town, say these magi.  The stars have revealed that to them.

Now, it is important to remember a couple of things about these magi.  First, Christmas may have been 8 days ago in our calendar, but it’s been a couple of years in the Biblical story.  We may bring wise men in with shepherds and angels and manger, but they’ve all moved on since then.  Second, they aren’t kings.  They are magi, or astrologers or court priests.  “Kings” is a mis-translation.  Third, there aren’t three of them.  That’s in the song, but not in the Bible.  There could have been many more.

The arrival of these travelers from afar is the root story of Ephiphany, which is officially celebrated on January 6th, commemorating the magi.  Ephiphany means “manifestation” and it’s in this story that the Son of God, the King of Kings, and Lord of Lords is manifested, made known, revealed to the rest of the world.

This is what Isaiah foretold from of old:

Arise, shine; for your light has come,
    and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you.
For darkness shall cover the earth, and thick darkness the peoples;
    but the Lord will arise upon you, and his glory will appear over you.
Nations shall come to your light,
    and kings to the brightness of your dawn. (60:1-3)

And so it happens.  These rich wise guys from the east know this prophecy from Isaiah and come to Jerusalem knowing that THERE they will find the new king of the world ready to usher in an era of peace and tranquility and love enough to go around.

Someone who really doesn’t like the prospects of a new king coming to town are the old kings.  New kings are threats to existing powers.  And Herod wants to destroy his new rival.  So, he tells these magi to come back to him and tell him exactly where the child is, not so he can pay him homage but so that he can destroy him. 

The wise men find Jesus, they worship him, they give him their gifts, and, famously, “having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another road.”

There is a spirituality of Epiphany that comes out of this story to us.   Epiphany is about meeting Jesus in a new way.  It’s about the unexpected.  And all of what we talked about leading up to Christmas and even on Christmas day was about trying to push our way through the commercialism and the sentimentality and the busyness of the Christmas season so that through it, we might see the Christ child in a way that was deep for us.  We are surprised by so much in this life, why not be surprised by a God who pursues us so much that he’s willing to leave the side of his Father in Heaven to come down to earth.

And the hope and the prayer is that, after meeting Jesus in a new way, after being challenged, after being surprised, and excited, and moved…we will follow the magi and go home by another way…that we will turn our life in a new direction.

There is a spirituality associated with Epiphany that answers the practical, everyday, “so what” of Christmas.  It says, the Light of God has come, and I…we…will go home by another road…we’ll take a new path…preferably one that is shaped by and towards that new king we just welcomed in diapers.  It’s a prayer that maybe, THIS YEAR, Christ will make a difference in how I live my life, in what our family looks like, in how I do my job, in what responsibilities I take on or let go of.  Maybe I can go in a NEW DIRECTION this year.

In the secular world, it’s funny how this Epiphany time corresponds to the changing of our calendar.  We shoot off fireworks.  We parade down the mountain with torches.  We wear goofy hats and pop poppers. We toast.  We reflect on what the previous year held.  And we look ahead…many persons making resolutions.

• This year I’ll finally lose 20 pounds.
• This year I’ll get out of debt.
• This year I’ll spend more time with my kids.
• This year I’ll exercise every day.
• This year I’ll read more books.

And it is true that there are many Christians who use this time of year to seek a new direction in their spiritual lives…

• This year I’ll read through the Bible.
• This year I’ll get up every morning and pray.
• This year I’ll go on a mission trip.
• This year I’ll have devotions with my family.
• This year I’ll write every day about where I’ve seen God.

And, it true, that most of these spiritual resolutions go the same way as our less spiritual resolutions.  We may start strong…and with the best of intentions…but then slip and slide and let it go and forget about it all together.

As we, as a congregation, cross into the new year, we have a whole new space.  And it’s going to take some time to figure out how we LIVE in it and what MINISTRY looks like in this place.  “We’ve come a long way, baby”…but we still have a long way to go.  When we were sitting over there in our 30’ x 30’ building with a port-a-potty outside, it was pretty easy to let things revolve around the pastor…and let’s face it, I eat it up when it revolves around me.  I like being the center of attention.  When we tell folks we don’t have running water, we don’t have space, we have a leaky roof, there’s so much we can’t do, it’s easy to not do much and kind of justify it.

But not any more.  We may have some financial realities we’ll be working with for a long time, but we now have a lot of space.  And we have a lot of heat.  And we can dream. 

This past week I met via phone with a ministry coach down in Washington to help me pastor this place as we find our new directions together.  This coming week Sheila and I will meet with someone at our Conference office to think about how we start getting policies and practices REALLY into place to take protect our children, to work on managing our debt, to thinking about building use procedures.  And, even here on January 2nd we know that we need persons to offer their time to provide an activity during our sermons and persons to help count offering and persons to teach Sunday school and persons to finish off rooms and figure out how much it will cost, in each room to move in this direction.

There is a spirituality of Epiphany which calls us to enter this season of our life with some changes about who we are, what we do, and what’s important to us.

We have a new king.  Christ has come.

We have a new year.  We can lay aside the bad habits of last year.

And we’re called to travel in a new direction.

Will you follow the wise men and live your life and your life of faith by another road?

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.