Sermon 2020.07.26 2nd Peter Week 2

I’m a bit of an aviation nut.  Airplanes fascinate me, they always have, and there’s a part of me that has always wished that I had been able to become a pilot.  My wife, Jackie has always been aware of this fascination of mine, and many, many years ago, she gave me a computer flight simulator for Christmas. And the flight simulator that she gave me is more than just a video game.  It’s an actual, in fact, flight simulator, one that’s used to train real pilots, and the program teaches you everything that you need to know to be able to fly a plane.  I had an absolute blast playing with this program, and I played with it off and on for years, but there was one problem that I had… navigation.  Navigation is accomplished through pairs of beacons on the ground sending out radio impulses, and you have to learn to read and interpret these impulses in order to know where you are and what direction in which you are headed.  In a car, most times, three rights make a left, and four rights will put you right back where you started.  In an airplane, without careful navigation, three rights could put you just about anywhere, and four rights could potentially put you into a completely different state (And sometimes did!).  Unfortunately, I was never very good at the navigation thing.  I was, on occasion able to find my destination airport, and I knew how to land because the flight sim had a part of the program that would start you off properly lined up to the runway so you could practice landings, but trying to navigate myself into position to land was another story entirely.  If your vector is off by even the tiniest little bit, and believe me, we’re talking just a few tenths of a degree here, you will not be landing straight relative to the runway, and as a result, you will end up driving right off of the runway, and planes do not steer well on the ground at all, so it’s not something that is easily corrected once you’ve landed!  The view on the computer screen for this flight simulator has you looking right out the front window of the plane, and when you run off of the runway, your front window breaks, a subtle reminder of the fact that you just crashed your plane.  I did that a lot, which is probably why God never allowed me to become a pilot.

In the 2^nd chapter of Peter’s 2^nd letter, Peter speaks of false teachers, and makes the point that in order to avoid falling prey to false teachers, one must be thoroughly familiar with the true Word.  Just as the pilot who is just not properly lined up with the runway is destined to fail, so it is that the believer, lacking true spiritual direction is at risk of failing as well; and the stakes are just too high to put ourselves at risk of failure.

Most of what we know about the fall of Satan, and the angels who followed him, is shrouded in mystery, but there are a few verses in the Bible that speak of Satan’s desire to be like the Most High, and speak of the subsequent fall of Satan and the angels who followed him.  Peter says that God did not spare these angels, but put them in chains of darkness to be held for judgment, and Peter makes the point that if God did not spare the angels who fell, the prospects for humans who fall are not really very good either.  We don’t like to talk about this much, because it doesn’t seem to us to fit with our concept of a God who personifies love, but we need to hold fast to God’s word and trust that ultimately God’s plan IS love, and that sometimes we are just incapable of seeing that from our perspective.  Perhaps the thousands of years that God has patiently waited for the fullness of His children to turn to him provides us a glimpse of the depth of His love and the expanse of His grace.

So how are we to know how to identify false teachers, and to avoid falling for their deception?  You know that straight and true line that allows you to land your plane safely without driving off of the runway?  That’s Jesus.  Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life.  When Jesus is teaching us to love others, the false teacher is saying “What’s in it for me?” When Jesus is telling us to be generous, the false teacher is saying “You earned that, it’s yours.” When Jesus is telling us to be humble, the false teacher is telling us to “Look out for number one.”

The message of the Gospel can be a difficult one, as we have seen.  Agape love requires sacrifice.  Time and time again believers are called to deny themselves; to take up their cross and to follow Jesus.  Believers are called to feed the hungry, to heal the sick, to clothe the naked, and to visit the lonely, and are called to do all of these things out of their own resources.  The believer is called to live lives of extravagant love and grace, attributes that make absolutely no sense to those who are of the world.  The call to the believer is such that, only one with a sincere heart, transformed by God’s love, would ever choose to follow that call.

The message of the false teacher is a lot easier, because it requires no sacrifice, except for maybe sending him lots of money.

When Jesus says that believers will be blessed, the blessing that He promises is one of being filled with the Holy Spirit, of being empowered to do God’s work and God’s will, and of being filled with a love that defies imagination.  When the false teacher says that believers will be blessed, the promised blessing is one of satisfying one’s greed.  The false teacher appeals to worldly desires, not to Godly desires, but the false teacher comes speaking words that sound right, and promising things that sound very appealing.

In his letter, Peter talks about Balaam when he speaks of false teachers, saying “They have wandered off the right road and followed the footsteps of Balaam son of Beor, who loved to earn money by doing wrong.  But Balaam was stopped from his mad course when his donkey rebuked him with a human voice.”

The story of Balaam spreads across three chapters of the Book of Numbers, and the first time I encountered this story as a very young Christian, I was deeply perplexed.

Balaam was a prophet.  He describes himself as one whose eyes see clearly, whose ears hear the Word of God, who sees a vision from the Almighty, and falls prostrate with his eyes open.  In the story of Balaam, a cursory reading makes it appear that Balaam does everything exactly the way God tells him to do it; and yet God is displeased at his actions.  Please allow me to summarize the story so that it makes sense.

Balak was the king of Moab.  As the Israelites entered the Promised Land, Balak had seen how easily Israel had defeated the Amorites and this caused the Moabites to be deeply fearful of the Israelites.  King Balak, realizing that God was on the side of the Israelites, decided that his best hope for defending his land was to hire a prophet to curse the Israelites.  He sent a delegation with expensive gifts to the prophet Balaam, asking him to come with them in order to pronounce a curse on the Israelites.  Balaam asked his guests to spend the night while he inquired of the Lord.  The next morning he informed the delegation that God had instructed him not to go with them, and he told them to leave.  King Balak, His delegation having failed, sent a larger and even more distinguished delegation with even more lavish gifts to try to persuade Balaam to come and curse the Israelites.  Once again Balaam asks the delegation to spend the night so he could inquire of the Lord.  Once again Balaam asked God and this time God said that he may go with them, but only to say what God tells him to say.  Balaam followed the delegation, and then we come to the famous story of Balaam and his donkey.  Three times God sends an angel with a sword to block Balaam’s path.  While Balaam doesn’t see the angel, the donkey does, and three times the donkey stops, and refuses to proceed.  This angers Balaam, and so three times he beats his donkey.  After the third beating, God allows the donkey to speak to Balaam in a human voice.  The donkey explains that he was protecting Balaam, and then God permits Balaam to see the angel who was blocking his path, and the angel tells Balaam that the donkey had saved his life.  The angel then gave Balaam a message that came directly from God.  “Your path is a reckless one before me”

Interrupting the story for a minute, when I was a young Christian, perplexed by this story, it was explained to me that God has an express will and God has a permissive will.  God lets us know that which is His express will, but God will not interfere with the exercise of our free will.  God’s initial “Do not go with these people” should have been enough of an answer when the second delegation came also, but Balaam, enticed by the prospect of being lavished with gifts for his cooperation, chose to disobey God’s express will, and accompany the delegation.  Even though he told the delegation that he could only say what God told him to say, Balaam had already proved to God that he wasn’t willing to follow God’s express will.  This is why his path was a reckless one.

Making a three chapter story short, Balak took Balaam to a high place where he could see the encamped Israelites.  Balaam made altars and offered sacrifices, inquired of the Lord, and then, instead of cursing the Israelites, Balaam blessed them.  King Balak was enraged, so Balaam suggested they go to a different high place and try again.  I guess Balaam thought that he may be able to curse them from a different angle?  Again, he blessed the Israelites, again Balak was angered, again, now a third time Balaam suggests another different high place, and a third time Balaam ended up blessing the Israelites.  This time Balak sent Balaam home without his reward.  So, Balaam essentially did what God told him to do, right?  Well, NO!  Peter tells us that Balaam “loved the wages of wickedness”.  Balaam was persistent in his pursuit of personal gain, and even though when push came to shove, he spoke only the words God gave him to speak, Balaam’s heart was not seeking to serve God, Balaam was seeking personal gain.  Peter tells us that this is one of the ways to spot the false teacher.  Is he seeking to do the Lord’s work or is he seeking personal gain?  As we learn the lesson of Balaam, let’s not forget that Balaam appeared to be doing exactly what God told him to do.  His error was not one of action, but one of the heart.  God said through Jeremiah “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked, who can know it?”  Only a heart transformed by the Holy Spirit is able to serve God in Spirit and in Truth.

Peter heard Jesus address this very issue in His Sermon on the Mount, when Jesus said “Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves.  By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thorn bushes, or figs from thistles?  Likewise, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit.  A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit.  Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.  Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them.”  In Galatians 5:22 Paul explains to us what fruit to look for: “But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.”

This hardly fits Peter’ description of the false teacher:  Peter says false teachers will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the sovereign Lord who bought them. In their greed these teachers will exploit you with fabricated stories.  They will follow the corrupt desire of the flesh, and despise authority. They are not afraid to heap abuse on celestial beings, and they blaspheme in matters that they don’t understand.  They mouth empty, boastful words and, by appealing to the lustful desires of the flesh, they entice people who are just escaping from those who live in error.  They promise them freedom, while they themselves are slaves of depravity—for “people are slaves to whatever has mastered them”.

Last week our Secret Service Agent taught us that being thoroughly familiar with the authentic makes it easy to spot the counterfeit.  For the believer, rich in experiences and grounded in the guidance of the Holy Spirit, spotting false teachers should be easy, but for the new Christians and the seekers, a false Gospel can be a compelling and attractive alternative; one that doesn’t require sacrifice, or study, or obedience.  It’s important for us as believers to call out false teaching, to provide a word of warning to those who might otherwise fall for teaching that scratches their itching ears.

Tony Campolo is a well-known pastor and educator.  Tony is active in missions, both in inner city Philadelphia, and in Haiti.  He has a heart for the least among us that is readily apparent in the many books he has written, in his sermons, and in his actions.  His dedication to the poor and the marginalized would lead some to believe that his politics lean to the left.  Once, Tony was questioned about what “kind” of Christian he was, with the question coming from some people for whom other theological priorities prevail and whose political bent takes another track.  Tony’s answer to them was that he is a “Red Letter Christian”.  The red letters, of course referring to the practice of printing Bibles with the words of Jesus printed in red, and indeed, Tony’s life has shown a consistent pattern of actions in keeping with the commands of Jesus to love unconditionally, to care for the poor, to advocate for justice, and to honor each and every person as a beloved child of God.

Is this what we are seeing from our teachers?  Do they exemplify the red letters?  Does their message align with the Gospel message of sacrificial love and extravagant grace?  Do our teachers live justly, love mercy, and walk humbly?

Learning to discern the authentic from the counterfeit is one of the most important skills a Christian will learn, and once learned, one of the most important skills that we can pass along to our brothers and sisters in Christ, who are still growing into their spiritual maturity.  It’s so important that Peter devotes almost his entire 2^nd letter to the subject, and indeed we will talk more about these things next week.

Dear Father, help us to learn to recognize the fruits of your Holy Spirit, and may we see those fruits exhibited in the lives of our teachers.  Help us to discern the authentic from the counterfeit.  Help the experienced believers among us to guide new believers and seekers faithfully, and may the new believers and seekers see the red letters abounding in the lives of their teachers.  Fill us with the knowledge of Jesus to the extent that doing your will is as natural to us as breathing, and fill us with your Holly Spirit that our lives may be filled with your love to overflowing, in order that we may reflect that love to a world in desperate need.   Amen!

Sermon 2020.07.12 2 Peter Week 1

In his first letter, Peter taught us that there is a way of living that is different from the earthly way.  Peter taught us that living a life that pleases God involves setting aside our self serving ways and actually loving people in a way that recognizes their value as beloved children of God.  In his second letter, Peter teaches us how to grow into Christ-likeness.  Peter also teaches us how to spot false teachers, and a good deal of his letter is about teaching us to discern between the real and the counterfeit.

Quite a few years ago, I read an article that was written by a US Secret Service Agent.  The Secret Service is responsible for fighting the use of counterfeit money, and the agent had to attend training classes in order to learn how to identify counterfeit money.  In the article, the agent said that, going into the class, he expected to see all kinds of counterfeit money, but the entire class was taught using only real money.  The agent said that, once you were thoroughly familiar with real money, the counterfeit became easy to spot.  So it is that a genuine and deeply rooted knowledge of Jesus and His teachings will make it easier for the believer to recognize counterfeit teachers.

Peter again begins his letter by identifying himself.  As with 1^st Peter, he asks us to keep in mind the fact that he speaks as an eyewitness to the life and teachings of Jesus.  He then identifies his audience as “those who through the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ have received a faith as precious as ours”.  Then he says something interesting.  “Grace and peace be yours in abundance through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus Christ our Lord.”  Instead of using the word xero which is the common Greek word meaning to know or to recognize something or someone, Peter instead chooses to use the word epignosis which means to know something thoroughly; or to have a precise and correct knowledge of something; what, in today’s language we might say was knowing something inside out and backwards.  And so here we are, not even out of the introduction to his letter, and Peter is already laying the foundation for one of the central themes of his letter; the importance of having an intimate and thorough knowledge of Jesus’ life and teaching.

As he begins the body of his letter, Peter states that God’s divine power has given us everything that we need to live a godly life through our epignosis (There’s that word again) through our precise knowledge of “Him who called us by His own glory and goodness”.  Peter goes on to say “Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature, having escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.”  What does this mean?  It means that it is through our epignosis , our precise and correct knowledge of Jesus, that we are recipients of God’s promises and that through this precise and correct knowledge we find our path to participating in the divine nature, in other words, to become Christ Like.

Remember from 1^st Peter, that our goal is Christ Likeness.  Through our thorough and intimate knowledge of Jesus and His teachings, we have been given the necessary tools to grow into a person through whom the love of God can be reflected to the world.  It’s here that Peter begins to explain to his readers that, though the gift has already been given, the fact that we’ve been given this gift is not enough.  Once received, it becomes our responsibility to take that gift and to allow God’s Holy Spirit to shape us into Christ Likeness.

Peter wants his readers to understand that Christ Likeness is a two-way street.  While it’s impossible for us to develop Christ Likeness on our own because the transformation of our hearts and minds can only be done by God, through His Holy Spirit, this transformation still requires work on our part.  Peter spends the rest of the first chapter teaching us what we need to do in order to change our understanding from xero into epignosis . From knowing about, to knowing.

Peter gives us a roadmap for this journey.  “For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love.

Our life’s work is to make all of these things components of our character.

When Peter says goodness, he uses the Greek areth which speaks specifically of moral excellence.  It’s goodness of the sort that leads to virtuous behavior.  When he speaks of knowledge, he uses gnosis, the root of the word for precise knowledge that we learned earlier.  Self-control is directed inward, as egkrateia is a word which, according to Strong’s means “the virtue of one who masters his desires and passions”. And Perseverance is directed outwards as one’s patient bearing of life’s trials.   Godliness should be self-explanatory, but it’s kind of interesting to note the position of this word in Peter’s list.  Peter intended this list to be progressive, as character begets character, and Godliness is almost at the end of the list, followed only by two words that we have already learned.  Mutual affection is fileo, the word for love as you would love a brother or family member, and agape, which is the word that defines the sacrificial love of God.  As important as Godliness, or Christ Likeness is, even that attribute, is ranked behind love in its importance.  As we grow into Christ Likeness, Faith, Goodness, Knowledge, Self-Control, and Perseverance are all essential components of Godliness, and sincere love springs only from a heart that has been transformed by Godliness.  So as these virtues compound within us, Peter says that they will prevent us from being unproductive in our knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Peter knows that his time is short, and soon, according to tradition, Peter will be crucified upside down by the Romans.  And so, Peter’s message bears an urgency.

“So, I will always remind you of these things, even though you know them and are firmly established in the truth you now have.  I think it is right to refresh your memory as long as I live in the tent of this body, because I know that I will soon put it aside, as our Lord Jesus Christ has made clear to me.  And I will make every effort to see that after my departure you will always be able to remember these things.”

Peter reminds us that his teaching comes not from cleverly devised stories, but is rather the actual account of one who was an eyewitness to Jesus’ glory.  Peter himself saw the transfigured Jesus, and heard the voice from heaven proclaim “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.”  Peter declares his message to be “completely reliable” and says that we would do well to pay attention to it.  Ya’ think?

Our part in this journey towards Christ Likeness involves a few different things.  First is the study of the Word.  Peter makes the point that scripture came about not because of a prophet’s interpretation of things, because the origin of prophecy is never human will, but rather, a prophet’s words come from God as the prophets are moved to speak by the Holy Spirit.  The Bible was given to us that we might KNOW God.  Not know about Him, know him.  By immersing ourselves in the Word, and particularly by immersing ourselves in studying the life of Christ, we develop an intimate understanding of God.  Jesus is God in the flesh.  Isaiah called the Messiah “Emmanuel” which means God with us, or God among us.  To know Jesus is to know God.  To study the life and teachings of Jesus is to understand what God is all about.  What He likes and dislikes, what is important to Him and what is not important to Him, and what His priorities are not only in a heavenly sense, but also very much in the sense of what happens in this life, in the here and now.

More than study though, we need to learn to listen to the Holy Spirit, and I think this deserves an explanation.

The prophet Elijah had made an enemy of King Ahab and his wife Jezebel, who had promised to kill Elijah.  Elijah was on the run when God confronted him, and Elijah actually asked God to take his life.  Instead, God sent an angel who touched Elijah and gave him strength, and then prepared something for Elijah to eat.  After Elijah was refreshed, God told Elijah to “stand on the mountain in the presence of the Lord, for the Lord was about to pass by”.

In 1 Kings 19 we read: “Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake.  After the earthquake came a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper.  When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave.”

I would never be one to limit what I thought God could do, but I would say that it would be extraordinarily unusual for the Holy Spirit to speak to us in an audible voice.  The Holy Spirit speaks to us mostly in thoughts, ideas, and notions.  This is why it is so critical to know God, not to know about Him, but to know Him.

For one who is not intimately familiar with the life and teaching of Jesus, the ability to hear the voice of the Holy Spirit is severely impaired, and that person is susceptible to being misled by the voice of Satan, who also speaks in thoughts, ideas, and notions; just different ones.  And remember, Satan’s most effective tool is to impersonate God.  This is why learning to recognize the authentic Word of God is so incredibly important, and that ability to recognize the authentic Word of God comes only from intimate familiarity with the life and teaching of Jesus.

Remember our Secret Service agent?  The ability to recognize the counterfeit is a product of intimate familiarity with the real thing.  Peter will speak at length about counterfeit teachers in the coming chapters, so we will spend some time talking about that in the coming weeks.

In addition to our study of the Word, we also need to be spending time in prayer… regularly.  I don’t remember where, but I once read that prayer is not about us asking God to do our will, prayer is about asking God to incorporate us into His will.  As we read the Gospels, we find that Jesus regularly seeks solitude to pray, and if prayer was vitally important to Jesus, it must be to us as well.  Prayer is an indispensable component of the spiritual life, and something that we, as those aspiring to Christ Likeness, need to find time to make a regular part of our lives.

Lastly, our spiritual growth requires learning from our elders.  Again, the words presbuteros and presbutera indicate a man, or a woman (respectively), having seasoned judgment, and not necessarily meaning someone who is older than we are.   Peter understood his responsibility as a servant and apostle to share the insight that he had gleaned from his journey, and so it is that everyone who has progressed along their path to Christ Likeness has experiences to share that would teach or encourage others.  Part of your call is to share these experiences and not to worry about how you will go about sharing them, because God has promised us that the Holy Spirit will guide us.  Does anyone remember what God said to Isaiah? He said “I have put my words in your mouth”.  Like the song said this morning, Moses had stage fright and David brought a rock to a sword fight.  And God picked twelve outsiders nobody would have chosen and He changed the world.”  The one essential component in being able to be used by God, is a willingness to be used by God. When we are faithful to serve, He is faithful to provide for our needs in that service.

The evangelist Billy Sunday once said “Spend 15 minutes a day letting God talk to you through the Bible, 15 minutes a day talking to God in prayer, and 15 minutes a day talking to someone else about God.  As we seek to grow in Christ Likeness, this is great advice.  When the day comes that we stand before our Lord and Savior in person, NOTHING we do in this life will be more important than the time we invested in seeking to become like Jesus.

And now, I’d like to take a few minutes to talk about something that is somewhat obliquely related to the text today.  The beauty of God’s concept of becoming Christ Like has always fascinated me because as we grow in Christ, we come to the realization that God is not trying to turn all of us into clones of Jesus.  God created us with unique personalities for a reason.  Our personality is not something that He ever wants to take away from us.  He has always intended for us to be uniquely… us.  What the process of becoming Christ Like does, is it allows us to retain in our entirety who we are, but to have that person transformed into a person whose heart is filled with love and compassion and grace.  Our individuality is something to be celebrated, our diversity something to be enjoyed!  If God wanted robots, He would have made robots, but what he wants is for us to be us in all of our wonderful diversity. And that applies not only to us individually, but to believers universally as well.

This is something that I wrote a few years ago that I’d like to share, and hopefully something for us to keep in the front of our minds as every day we re-commit ourselves to this quest for Christ Likeness.

Try to imagine how awful life would be if every voice sounded alike and sang only one note; if every instrument sounded the same and played only one note.
Music is made possible by a wonderful diversity of pitches and timbres. Soprano, altos, tenors, and basses, strings, winds, brass, and percussion are all able to be combined is ways that can bring one to ecstasy, or bring one to tears.

God, in His wisdom created a wonderfully diverse planet; not only in order to create beautiful music, but to create beautiful art, wonderfully different foods, diverse literature, and a plethora of other things that have sprung from different cultures from across the globe. Different cultures cause people to think in different ways, with each culture making its own unique contribution to the whole; and every bit of this is God breathed.

There is no room in God’s Kingdom for those who would belittle cultures other than their own. In fact, to belittle other cultures is to question God’s wisdom in creating them in the first place.

Just as Jesus taught his contemporaries that loving your neighbor meant loving the despised Samaritans, so His command for us today is to love those who are different from us. Our world is wonderfully diverse by design, and that diversity is something to celebrate, not to deride. We need to learn to love without borders.

May God’s love fill your hearts and minds today to overflowing, that you may reflect His love to a world in desperate need.

Sermon 2020.06.14 1 Peter Week 6

So, for 2½ chapters Peter has been talking to us about the difference between the earthly way of doing things and the kingdom way of doing things.  He has taught us how the essence of the earthly life is selfishness and the essence of the kingdom life is a desire to be more like Jesus, and he’s tried to encourage his readers, in the face of persecutions, that the kingdom strategy is not just the right choice, but the only choice.  Now, Peter wants to expand on his teaching of what it means to live a life that is patterned after Jesus.

It’s critical for us to notice that right off the bat, Peter begins to describe the Christ–like life, talking not about what we do but talking about who we are.

Has anyone ever wondered about the meaning of this parable from Luke 11?

“When an evil spirit leaves a person, it goes into the desert, searching for rest. But when it finds none, it says, ‘I will return to the person I came from.’   So, it returns and finds that its former home is all swept and in order.   Then the spirit finds seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they all enter the person and live there. And so that person is worse off than before.”

This is what happens when a person tries to act holy.  Remember that we learned that our word “Hypocrite” in the original Greek was the word “actor”? Christ likeness is not about acting holy.  The actions of the followers of Jesus spring from a heart that has developed the attributes of sympathy, love, compassion, and humility.  Only when these things have taken root in the believer’s heart will the demons find the return to their original home impeded.

Peter next says that the believer is called not to return evil for evil and insult for insult, but to return evil with blessing.  Warren Wiersbe points out the fact that to return evil for good is Satan’s way, to return good for good and evil for evil is the earthly way, and to return good for evil is the Godly way.  For the believer who has developed a compassionate and loving heart, returning evil for anything is impossible, even when evil is what is tendered.  Peter then goes on to say that our refusal to return anything but good, is that to which we are called, in order that we may inherit a blessing.

When we think about why people do hurtful things, I think we all realize that, while sometimes it is done out of malice, more often than not, it’s done unconsciously.  It’s not that people intend to hurt others, but the earthly mind often lacks the sensitivity to realize the hurt that it causes.  The earthly mind allows selfishness and self-interest to dictate one’s actions, usually without regard for the impact that those actions have on others; and so often when we are hurt, the hurt is unintentional, but it is hurt, nevertheless.  The believer, seeking always to be a peace maker, may choose to act with a heart of humility, not taking offense, but rather responding with compassion and understanding.  This is the life that Jesus modeled for us.

In discussing this passage, Max Lucado said: “The Christian life is often counter to human instincts.  In our natural state, we humans want to return evil for evil and reviling for reviling.  We believe that what goes around comes around, and we want to give it an extra shove when it goes by us!  However, if we’re going to obey Jesus’ command to love others, we have to ignore our inclination to have things our way.  Jesus goes beyond His role as our example… He also empowers us to love beyond what we could ever do in our own strength.”

So, why was Jesus so good at loving the unlovable?  Why did He forgive those who mocked, beat, and crucified Him; and even prayed for them?  And how are we to become people who are able to exhibit this kind of love?  What Jesus knew is that everyone, absolutely everyone, is a precious and beloved child of God; and that understanding permeated His interactions with everyone.

It’s easy not to love someone when you don’t value them, but it’s a completely different story when you do.  Part of our job as Christians is to develop this same fundamental understanding of the immeasurable value of each and every one of God’s precious children; no matter who they are, no matter what they look like, no matter what they do, or what they believe, or who they love, they are all precious to God, and all loved by Him, and must all be loved by us as well.

I don’t need to be the one to tell you that this isn’t easy!  But Peter also knew that it isn’t easy, and so he addresses this very issue as we continue.

Peter quotes from Psalm 34 “Whoever would love life and see good days must keep their tongue from evil and their lips from deceitful speech.  They must turn from evil and do good; they must seek peace and pursue it.  For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous and his ears are attentive to their prayer, but the face of the Lord is against those who do evil.”

In quoting this psalm, Peter is doing two things.  First, this psalm echoes Peter’s teaching from the beginning of chapter 2 where he spoke of avoiding malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy and slander all as part of the quest to be like Jesus.  Here, the psalmist is also telling us to avoid slander, malice, and deceit.  But, when the psalmist tells us to “turn from evil”, the psalmist did something really interesting.  The phrase which we have translated into “turn from”, in the original Greek, would ordinarily have used the word apofugei, which was the word that was most commonly used that meant to “avoid”.  But instead, the author chose to use the word ekklino which is a word that means to avoid something for reasons of piety. In other words, you are avoiding something because, to you, just the idea of doing it is repulsive. Once again, Peter is illustrating the need for our goodness to spring from the heart.

Second, when the psalmist says “For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous and his ears are attentive to their prayer, but the face of the Lord is against those who do evil.” The psalmist is illustrating a point that Peter made way back in the beginning of his letter.  Remember when we recalled Peter’s “Where shall we go” statement?  As we face difficulties and challenges and the temptation to respond to these difficulties and challenges in earthly ways, comes to us in a stronger voice than we might like to hear, we must remind ourselves that we, as believers, are called to remember that Jesus alone has the words of life, and that, just like Peter, we also have nowhere else to turn.

Throughout this letter, Peter is straightforward about the possibility of there being a personal cost to our faith.  “Who is going to harm you if you are eager to do good?”  Peter says, “But even if you should suffer for what is right, you are blessed.”

Even though, in this time and place, our lives may not be threatened by our witness, we still live in a world where the wisdom of God is considered foolishness.  What would ever make us think that living Godly lives would be something that would always be considered in a positive way?  People will be annoyed by behaviors that are gracious and forgiving.  People will be enraged when we dare speak for the poor and the marginalized.  People will berate us for being empathetic, and for treating people with kindness or compassion or respect.  Just as Peter is saying, those who are truly seeking to become like Jesus can expect to face opposition from the world, and not just the secular world.  Just as the first century Christians were persecuted by the religious establishment; the Pharisees and the Sadducees, we also will face opposition from segments of the church that have traded the power of the Gospel for a man-made religion centered not on grace, but on human morality, or at least the perception thereof.  In today’s society, we don’t need to look far to see the apostate church vehemently fighting against the very things that are essential components of the Christ like character; portions of the church are actually fighting against the very things that we are called to be fighting for.  And when we, as believers, stand up for these things for which we are called to stand, we can expect opposition and adversity.

In the face of opposition, name calling, others denouncing our faith, and personal attacks on our sincerity and our morality, Peter tells us not to fear threats and not to be frightened, but to continue to honor Christ with lives that continue to reflect Christ’s character.

And then, in one of the truly important passages in the New Testament, Peter tells us that we should “Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have.”

I love what Max Lucado had to say about this passage.  “To the watching world, the perseverance of a Christian in the face of persecution would have caused much curiosity.  Peter wanted believers to be prepared to ‘Give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have’ and in this way draw others into the family of God”.

Peter continues, saying that this should be done with “gentleness and respect”, and this is the second time that Peter has shown himself not to be a fan of spiritual “mugging”.  Peter knows that the most effective spreading of the gospel isn’t accomplished through clever words, or through carefully crafted apologetics, but simply through love.  When we show love in unexpected ways and in unexpected places, people will be curious, and some will ask us why.  When they do, please don’t be hesitant to tell them what God’s love in Jesus means to you.  In some instances, it’s possible that you may be their only opportunity ever to hear the Gospel; that your love, in that moment, is the only thing that will ever open their hearts wide enough to allow Jesus to come in.

Peter then reminds us that, if we do face persecution, we’re in good company, because Jesus suffered unjustly, the righteous for the unrighteous, in order to bring us to God.  In the original Greek, the phrase “Bring you” is the word prosagage which is a legal term which meant to summon to court, a word that we might translate today as “subpoena”.  What Peter is saying here is that through Jesus we have been called into direct access to God.

Peter would surely have known about the tearing of the veil in the temple and would have been fully aware of its significance.  I’ve probably explained this before, and if you already know the story please bear with me. Herod’s temple in Jerusalem was designed in a series of concentric rectangles. The outermost court of the temple was the Court of the Gentiles, and all were permitted there.  Inside that was the Court of the Women.  Only Jewish men and women were permitted in this area, and entrance by any non-Jewish person was a capital offense.  Next was the Court of the Israelites and only Jewish men were permitted in this area.  Inside that was the Court of the Priests, into which only priests, or those offering sacrifices were permitted, and in the center of it all was the Holy of Holies.  The Holy of Holies was separated from the rest of the temple by a huge veil that hung three stories from the ceiling to the floor, and surrounded the Holy of Holies.  The Holy of Holies was entered only one day a year, only by the High Priest, in order to make sacrifices for the entire nation of Israel on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement.  Legend has it that, when the priest entered the Holy of Holies, he did so with bells tied to the hem of his garment, and a rope tied around his ankle. So fearful was entrance into the Holy of Holies that the bells were used to let the other priests know that the High Priest was still moving around, and the rope would be used to pull the High Priest out should he be struck dead, as no one else would dare enter.  When Jesus died, the veil that separated this awesome and terrifying place from the rest of the temple is the veil to which the Bible refers as having been torn from top to bottom, revealing the Holy of Holies to everyone.  The sacrificial death of Jesus totally removed the barrier between God and man, and now, through Jesus, we all have direct access to the Father, with Jesus as our advocate before Him.  And Jesus, the only One in all of creation with the authority to judge us, acts not as prosecutor, but as defense attorney.  THIS is God’s grace at work.

Hebrews 10:14 says “For by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.”  How can the believer possibly respond to this in any way other than gratitude?  And how can that gratitude rightly manifest itself in any way other than for us to commit ourselves to becoming followers of Jesus, no matter what the cost?

Peter, after a cryptic comment about Jesus making a proclamation to imprisoned spirits, a discussion that we will save for another day (Sorry), Peter closes the chapter by speaking of our baptism.

Peter compares our baptism to the saving of Noah through the flood.  Just as faithful Noah emerged from the flood with his family to begin a new civilization, so it is that we emerge from the waters of baptism to become a new creation.

The human heart does not easily adopt Christ like qualities.  The heart that does develop the attributes of sympathy, love, compassion, and humility, must, of necessity, be a completely new creation within us; with a new life and a new outlook brought about by the Holy Spirit.

This is what Jesus was talking about when He told Nicodemus that “You must be born again”.  Becoming like Jesus requires a heart that is able to adopt Christ like qualities.  Any effort to become like Jesus will be fruitless until we allow God to fill us with His Holy Spirit, and to form within us this completely new creation.

And the very essence of the Gospel is the fact that this new creation within us is the free gift of a gracious and loving God, and is available to everyone who will seek Him with all of their hearts.

Please pray with me.

Gracious God, fill us with Your Spirit, that we may become a new creation in you; a creation filled with your love and compassion, a creation that recognizes the infinite value of every single one of your precious children, a creation that seeks to become a peace maker, and a creation that is willing to live a life of selfless, extravagant, love, for you, and for each and every one of your precious children.  Amen.

Sermon 2020.05.31 1st Peter Week 5

I have some explaining that I have to do before we step into today’s sermon.  Peter has been talking about love for four weeks now, and I need to talk a little bit about the concept of love among Peter’s first century audience.  Koine Greek, which is the original Greek of the New Testament, had seven different words that we translate into the English word “love”.  Four of these seven words appear in the Bible.

Filia is the love that you would have for a sibling or the closest of your friends.  Filia is often described as “brotherly love”, in fact filia is one half of the name Philadelphia. Filia is brotherly love, and adelfia is city, so Philadelphia is the city of brotherly love.  Filia is a love that can be rich in emotion and feelings; and is the strongest expression of non-physical human love.

Eros is romantic love, such as would be experienced between a husband and wife.  Eros is the source of our word “erotic”, but eros is not to be thought of in a negative way, because it is describing that wonderful, blessed, love both physical and emotional that is shared by couples who are devoted to one another, and as we learned a few weeks ago, there is a completely different Greek word for lust.

Storge is love as shared by families and also describes love of community. Storge can sometimes be an obligatory love, but more commonly it is as Strong’s defines it:  Storge is “cherishing one’s kindred, especially parents or children; loving affection; loving tenderly; but speaking chiefly of the reciprocal tenderness of parents and children.”

Agape is sacrificial love.  Agape sets aside pride, self-interest, personal comfort, and possessions, for the sake of the beloved.  Thayer, in his Greek Lexicon defines it as “to take pleasure in the thing, prize it above all other things, be unwilling to abandon it or do without it.”  This is the love with which God loves His children, this is the love that sent Jesus willingly to the cross to suffer and to die in our behalf, and this is the love with which we are called to love God, and to love others… ALL others.

So often I wish that the English language differentiated between these varied manifestations of love.  There are times when having separate words would make things a lot easier to understand.  But we are stuck with what we have, so throughout this series, when I need to differentiate between different meanings of the word “love”, I’ll use the Greek, and no, there won’t be a quiz.  The word agape was used only rarely in classical Greek writings, but it is a word that abounds in the New Testament, and when Peter speaks of love in this letter the word agape is the one that he uses.

I defined agape above, but there is a much better definition to be found in Paul’s first letter to the church at Corinth.  1^st Corinthians 13 is one of the most recognized passages in the Bible, a passage that is almost universally read at Christian weddings, and something believers recognize as the ideal love to which we all aspire, but I think rarely do we realize that this passage is actually describing the love that God has for us.  Let’s read these familiar words, bearing that in mind.

Love is patient, love is kind.  Love is never jealous, never boastful.  Love is never proud or rude, love is never selfish, not easily angered.  Love keeps no record of wrongs, love cries over evil, but always takes delight in what is true.  Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.  Love never ends.

Let’s hold this thought of God’s definition of agape love in our hearts as we continue.

Well, last week I promised you another loaded passage, and here it is.  As happens at times, this passage about wives submitting to their husbands is occasionally lifted out of context and used as a bludgeon.  My fun for the day is the fact that this misusage actually speaks directly to my analysis of the passage, so let’s talk about it.

My first observation with regard to people using this passage to imply that wives should be subservient, is simply to say “keep reading”.  I actually like the NLT translation of verse 7: “In the same way, you husbands must give honor to your wives. Treat your wife with understanding as you live together. She may be weaker than you are, but she is your equal partner in God’s gift of new life. Treat her as you should so your prayers will not be hindered.”

I’m not sure which part of “She is your equal partner” people aren’t understanding, but if there are any questions about the real meaning of this passage, one can always turn to Paul and compare what he wrote in his letter to the church at Galatia “There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”

Certainly the Bible has passages, especially in the Old Testament, that report on the subjugation of women throughout history, but if the subjugation of women was actually the Bibles intent then we would have seen it in the actions and teachings of the Living Word of God, Jesus, but we saw no such thing.  In fact, at a time when women did not have anything even remotely resembling equal status, Jesus did not discriminate between men and women, and several women were included in His inner circle.  We are familiar with Mary Magdalene’s status as a follower of Jesus and a member of His inner circle, but there are also Mary and Martha, the sisters of Lazarus, Joanna, who was healed by Jesus, traveled with Him and His disciples, and was present at His crucifixion, and Susana, who is mentioned in Luke as a follower of Jesus who provided for Him out of her resources.

When one looks at the book of Acts one finds women prominently named throughout the book.  From Acts 1 where the Bible lists the disciples who gathered in the upper room after the transfiguration, and then adds “They all met together and were constantly united in prayer, along with Mary the mother of Jesus, several other women, and the brothers of Jesus.  Women were present at Pentecost and were among those who were filled with the Holy Spirit, and women are mentioned as teachers, hosts of gatherings of believers, financial supporters, and Deaconesses of the church throughout the book of Acts.

In addition, please allow me to read what Paul wrote in the closing paragraph of his letter to the church at Rome, “Greet Andronicus and Junia, my fellow Jews, who were in prison with me. They are highly respected among the apostles and became followers of Christ before I did.”  Junia is a woman, and was identified as such by the early church fathers.  Unfortunately, several hundred years later, some translators of the Bible decided to change the name to the masculine Junias, (misogyny doesn’t give up easily) but in a simple linguistic analysis of the original Greek, were the name to be masculine, there would be an accent over the last syllable, and the fact that none of the earliest manuscripts contain that accent confirms the name to be feminine. Junia was female, and was named as an apostle of Jesus Christ, and according to Paul, a highly respected one at that.

So now that we’ve established the fact that Peter isn’t referring to second class citizens here, what exactly is he saying?  Last week Peter used the government, and slave owners to illustrate two different aspects of his kingdom strategy.  I believe that, today, Peter is continuing his discussion of what it means to be Christ like.

“What does the Lord require of you”, Micah asks, “To live justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God”.  Love is humble, it places the needs of others before its own.  Jesus left His heavenly throne and all of His glory to become a baby in a manger.  Why?  Because of love.  To humble Himself was never a problem for Jesus because of His love for us.  And if we are to be Christ like, our love needs to be rooted in humility as well.

In the life laboratory that is marriage, both husband and wife need to learn that love is always giving and never taking; that learning to honor one another, to listen to, to understand, and to trust one another are all building blocks of a loving relationship.  And then there is one other thing that was really lost in the translation.  In verse 7 it says “As you live together”, and while it may seem that this is an unimportant phrase, the meaning of this isn’t simply about living arrangements, it actually means to be present with one another; not only to be physically together, but to be actively involved in one another’s lives.

Those who have used this passage to try to limit a woman’s place in God’s kingdom have totally missed Peter’s point.  The object for husband and wife alike is to be Christ like, the object is to love.

Most of you know what a big fan I am of Warren Wiersbe.  In discussing 1^st Peter, he made two comments that I find to be right on the mark.  The first is “As citizens of heaven, we must be united.  We must present to the world a united demonstration of what the grace and mercy of God can do.”  Last week I spoke about the ineffectiveness of an inconsistent witness.  For the believing couple, a strong and loving marriage is a powerful witness to the world.  Husbands and wives who honor and respect each other and who live with readily apparent affection for each other will find that their marriage will speak to the wonders of God’s love far more effectively than mere words.  In fact, Peter says in this passage “That they may be won over without words”.  Saint Francis of Assisi echoed this thought when he said “Spread the Gospel, use words if necessary”.  A loving marriage can be a great witness to an unbelieving world, and do so without a single word ever being spoken.  The same thing applies when one married partner is a believer and the other isn’t.  Showing a true agape love to your partner can be a powerful, wordless, witness to them as well.

Wiersbe’s 2^nd 1^st Peter observation is even better.  “After all, one day all of us will be together in heaven; so, it might be a good idea if we learned to love each other down here.”  Can you see why I love Warren Wiersbe?

As we’ve discussed for the last few weeks, Peter’s kingdom strategy revolves around the believer seeking to become like Christ.  Today Peter has given us one more example of what it means to be like Christ.  The more we study Peter, the more we come to realize that the very essence of Christ likeness is agape love.  There is no other way to put it.

Now, for those who noticed, I glossed over verses 3 through 6.  I did this on purpose, first because I wanted to comment on these verses separately, and second, because this is my very favorite verse in the Bible; and even though this appears in a section in which Peter is addressing the wives, I don’t for one second believe that this applies only to them.  In fact, if ever I were to make a list of words to live by, this verse would be at the top of my list.  “Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as elaborate hairstyles and the wearing of gold jewelry or fine clothes.  Rather, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God’s sight.”

This world is fixated on status.  So much of what is done, so much of what people wear, and what people drive, and where people live, is focused on impressing other people.  But just as Peter has contrasted the worldly strategy with the earthly strategy, we need to ask ourselves “Who are we trying to impress, and why?”  Those taking an earthly view understand that status is important.  Without status it’s almost impossible to land the right job or to fit in with the right people.  For those seeking to succeed in life, status is an integral component; status is what tells the world “I am somebody”.  But once again, the wisdom of the world is made foolishness by God.  The world doesn’t recognize the value of a “quiet and gentle spirit”.  On the contrary, one with that demeanor would be considered weak, and unworthy of a high position in society.  And yet, to God, the attributes of kindness and gentleness, the capacity for compassion and empathy, the heart inclined towards the needs of the poor and the marginalized, and the willingness to defer to others for the sake of love, are all giant steps in the right direction towards Christ likeness.

Please understand that I am not saying that there is anything wrong with trying to look our best.  There’s nothing wrong with wearing jewelry, or having nice clothes, or having a great haircut, and Jackie hates it when I go out with a stain on my shirt, but these things are not the priority.  Life is not about how we look, or who we impress, or what we acquire.  Life is about who we become.  Life is about making our hearts look like God’s heart.  To care about the things that God cares about.  To rejoice over that which God rejoices over, to despair at the things that trouble God’s heart, and to embrace the things that please Him.  And at the heart of all of this is agape love; a love that is willing to let go of self, and to love others with the same extravagant love that Jesus modeled for us.

I know some of you have already heard this story, but as Groucho Marx once said “If you’ve heard this already, don’t stop me because I want to hear it again.”

There was a pastor who was giving a children’s sermon when a young girl raised her hand.  Now, answering children’s questions during a children’s sermon can be an iffy proposition, so the pastor said with some trepidation “Yes?”  The young lady said “If God is everywhere, then He must be really big, right?”  “Yes” the pastor replied.  “And I’m really small, right?” the girls asked.  “Yes” the pastor replied again, not really sure where she was going with this.  Then the young lady said “Well if God is really big, and I’m really small, and God is supposed to live in me, then isn’t some of Him going to stick out?”

My prayer for today is that we all live our lives with God sticking out.

Sermon 2020.05.24 1st Peter Week 4

So far in our study of 1 Peter, we have found that Peter wrote this letter to encourage his readers in the face of a persecution that was just beginning to take root.  He’s contrasted an earthly strategy for living with a kingdom strategy for living, he’s described for us how the earthly strategy is rooted in epithmeeo, the desire for that which is not permitted, and he has called us to set aside those desires in favor of holy living.  He’s called us to rid ourselves of all malice and all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander of every kind, and to allow the love of God to so permeate our hearts that we become bearers of that love to a deeply hurting and needful world.

In today’s reading, Peter is calling his readers to submit to ruling authorities.  In verse 15 he says “It is God’s will that your honorable lives should silence those ignorant people who make foolish accusations against you.”

This verse could lead us to believe that we are being called to this behavior in order to protect ourselves, after all, the strategy of living exemplary lives in order to avoid trouble with the authorities might work well with a government that ruled justly, but Rome, under Nero, was hardly a government that sought to rule justly.  Even before Nero, the Roman government valued order over practically everything else, sometimes even including justice.  At the center of the Roman government’s philosophy was the Pax Romana, the Roman peace.  For a period of over 200 years the Roman Empire enjoyed a period of peace and prosperity that was unheard of in the ancient world.  This peace was critically important to Rome, because the maintaining of this peace and prosperity made it possible for Rome to control a vast empire that stretched from England in the north to Morocco in the south, and from Spain in the west to Iraq in the east.  This empire encompassed over 70 million people, many of whom appreciated the Roman protection and benefitted from the Roman infrastructure and the robust Roman economy, but not all of Rome’s conquered people were so easily satisfied.  Rome maintained the Pax Romana with an iron fist, retaliating swiftly and mercilessly against any revolt or political subterfuge, and Christians under Nero were not on the good side of that equation.

And so it was that good behavior was proving to be entirely ineffective at protecting believers from Roman harm; and I’m sure that Peter knew this well, because Peter  himself been imprisoned by the Romans, and shortly after the authoring of his 2^nd letter, tradition states that Peter was crucified by the Romans.

So, it’s highly unlikely that his aim here is to protect his readers from Roman persecution.  In fact, this passage looks a lot like a continuation of last week’s message where Peter had taken these principles that he had laid out, and had put them into action.  In short, I don’t think that Peter means here what we may think he means.  Peter is not advocating an earthly strategy of self-preservation.  His interest is not in coping with the world or in placating the Roman government to ensure safety.  Peter is still firmly rooted in his kingdom strategy.  Peter is still calling us to holy living.

Remember that last week we learned that among believers, there is to be no malice.  Well, even though Christians are facing increasing mistreatment, he is calling his readers to have hearts that are pure and devoid of spiteful or hurtful thoughts; even towards those who are persecuting them.

There is to be no deceit.  We are not to seek to use others to suit our own purposes, even if it keeps us out of trouble.

There is to be no hypocrisy, we aren’t to pretend to be something that we are not in order to manipulate people or situations, even if we are doing it to protect ourselves.

We aren’t to envy those who are free from persecutions, and we are not to slander others, even those who are persecuting us.

Peter almost certainly heard with his own ears the words Jesus spoke when He said “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do”.  What Peter is teaching, he learned from observing Jesus.  Peter is calling his readers to be genuine and transparent, just as he had experienced Jesus to be.  The submitting to authorities that Peter is calling for here, is not defense, it’s witness.

I’d like to take a moment here to expand on the “Submit to authority” passage, because it is the first of two loaded passages that we will encounter in this letter; passages that people often like to bend to suit their purposes, and I think it’s important to understand what Peter is actually saying here.

One of the best sermons I’ve ever heard was preached by my friend, David Ourisman.  David was preaching on Mark 12, the passage where Jesus was asked whether or not it was lawful to pay taxes to Rome, and Jesus answered by showing a coin with a picture of Caesar and saying “Render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s and unto God what is God’s”.

In his sermon, David posed three different questions, asking what do you render to Caesar if Caesar is Tiberius, if Caesar is Nero, or if Caesar is Constantine?

In Tiberius we have a leader who treated Israel reasonably well, and a Caesar whose efforts benefitted the people in the form of roads, running water, peaceful times, and a robust economy. A good citizen is obligated to contribute to those amenities, and the believer should delight in contributing their efforts and resources to programs that enhance the common good.

In Nero we have a tyrant, and while it was still entirely appropriate to pay taxes for the above-mentioned benefits, many of Nero’s policies were antithetical to the Christian way of life, and this is where rendering to God that which is God’s comes in to play.  We are never to submit to a government that asks us to violate the commandments to love God, or to love one another.   Resistance to an evil government is not just appropriate, it’s essential.  The believer’s call to faithfulness isn’t affected by circumstance, the call remains the same even in times of trial.  Peter knew that the believer’s witness to the world is dependent upon consistent behavior, and believe me, people will notice an inconsistent witness.

In Constantine we have the Caesar who made Christianity the official state religion of Rome. Many church historians and theologians consider this to be the worst thing ever to happen to the church.  Prior to this act, the church of Jesus Christ consisted entirely of deeply committed believers.  The persecution of the church and the dangers faced by individual Christians, difficult though those circumstances may have been, purified the church, discouraging those whose faith was not genuine.

Once Christianity became the official state religion, persecutions ended and people joined the church, not because of faith, but out of political expediency. The church became the happy recipients of political power and influence, but they did so at the expense of the true power that comes from dedicated disciples, empowered by the Holy Spirit, spreading a Gospel of love and forgiveness.

The blending of church and state can also be an act of failing to render to God that which is God’s.  Knowing how and when to interact with government requires discernment.  It is always appropriate for the church to speak for those who cannot speak for themselves. The church always needs to be about the business of ensuring justice for the poor and the marginalized.   The church must always be active in feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, visiting the isolated, and healing the sick.  The church can advocate, they can educate, and they can try to influence the political process, but the church must never align with the government, and the church can never allow the government to infiltrate or to pollute the church’s mission.   There are those who say that the separation of church and state is designed to protect the state, and that may be so, but it also protects the church.

When churches align with the government and Christians join in the worldly political mudslinging and angry responses to opposing points of view, that is malice.

When Christians use or manipulate the government or government personnel to achieve a purpose, even a holy purpose, that is deceit.

Governments are often all too willing to make moral compromises.  When Christians pretend that those compromises don’t matter as long as it helps the church to achieve a goal, that is hypocrisy.

When churches desire to have the power and influence that the government can offer to the acquiescent church, that is envy.

And for Christians to speak out against other churches or organizations that disagree with them or the policies that they advocate, that is slander.

Peter’s kingdom strategy precludes all of this.  We can never allow ourselves to believe that the ends justify the means, because it’s the means that matter the most. It’s the means that flow from the heart of the believer, and it’s the means that are our witness and our testimony.

Peter continues with a discussion of slaves and their responsibility to their masters.   “You who are slaves must submit to your masters with all respect.  Do what they tell you—not only if they are kind and reasonable, but even if they are cruel.”

In this passage, Peter offers a clarification of the previous passage because here, Peter is clearly not saying that better behavior will result in better treatment.   And it’s here that Peter offers the second argument for his kingdom strategy.  Speaking not only to the slaves, not only to his immediate audience, but to the church universal, Peter says “For God called you to do good, even if it means suffering, just as Christ suffered for you. He is your example, and you must follow in his steps.”

As we learned last week, Peter’s kingdom strategy revolves around the believer seeking to become like Jesus.  This exhortation to Christ likeness is a recurring theme throughout Peter’s letter.  Here again he is calling us to emulate Jesus, and good teacher that he is,  shares with us the benefit of his three years in a close, personal relationship with Jesus, using the examples of Jesus’ life and teaching, to guide us to an understanding of what it means to be Christ like.

And in that quest for Christ likeness, Peter gives us a close look at how Jesus handled the most difficult experience of His life.  Let’s look closely at Peter’s next verse and read between the lines.

Jesus never sinned, (There was no malice in His heart).

nor ever deceived anyone, (There was no deceit, or hypocrisy in His heart.)

He did not retaliate when he was insulted, (He didn’t envy those who’s circumstances were better than His.)

nor threaten revenge when he suffered. (There was no slander on His lips or in His mind.)

He left his case in the hands of God, who always judges fairly.

Jesus is our example, and if it is our choice to seek to become Christ like, then we need to listen to what Peter is telling us.  We need to go back and take another look at the first two chapters of this letter and meditate on his teachings, and we need to seek the Spirit’s guidance in making these teachings not just a part of what we believe, not just a part of  how we behave, but a part of who we are, because ultimately, faithfulness comes from within.

In closing this section, having again spoken about the possibility of suffering, Peter once more addresses the need to explain why we should choose the kingdom strategy when following that strategy may be hazardous to our health.

“[Jesus] personally carried our sins in his body on the cross so that we can be dead to sin and live for what is right.  By his wounds you are healed.
Once you were like sheep who wandered away.  But now you have turned to your Shepherd, the Guardian of your souls.”

The call to follow Jesus, is a call to follow Him in gratitude.  Peter calls his readers to consider the magnitude of what God had done for them in Christ.  He calls for them to reflect on the extravagant forgiveness that has been showered upon them by a loving and gracious God, and he calls them to respond in kind; showing God’s love to a world in desperate need.  God’s fondest hope is that His beloved children will turn to Him and allow Him to restore the right relationship that He intended for us to have with Him from the very beginning, and He promises blessings untold for those who choose the path of discipleship.

Sermon 2020.05.17 1 Peter Week 3

So last week, Peter was teaching us about epithemeo, a word described according to Peter as the desiring of things that are not holy.  Peter wants his readers to make a choice between living according to ways of this world, or living according to the example of his Lord, his teacher, and his friend, Jesus.  As we move into the 2^nd chapter, Peter continues his discussion about avoiding the ways of the world.

“Therefore, rid yourselves of all malice and all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander of every kind.”

As we discovered last week, words can sometimes be ugly, and sometimes these ugly words are not words that we would choose to use to describe nice people, and certainly not words that we would use to describe ourselves. And yet Peter IS speaking to us, and if we really want to dig deep to learn about who we are, and about how the ways of this world have affected our thoughts and our actions, we need to listen to Peter and to understand what it is that he is saying.  Last week I spoke of how words have meanings that change over time and can be interpreted differently in varying degrees from their original usage.  If we are to examine our lives honestly, we need to take a deeper look at what Peter is saying, so let’s examine these five words one by one.

The Greek word for “Malice” is kakian and this is a word that means to have a spiteful or hurtful disposition, regardless of whether or not your actions match your disposition.  In other words, malice is malice whether you act on it or whether you’re just thinking it.  As Jesus taught in the Sermon on the Mount, to think someone a fool, or to murder them, is the same sin of despising them in your heart, and Peter is calling for our hearts to be pure and devoid of spiteful or hurtful thoughts.

The Greek word for “Deceit” is dolios which literally means to bait.  According to Strong’s: dolios is “Deceit motivated by guile; using decoys to deceive people, which implies treachery to exploit the naive.”  Peter is talking about not using people to achieve your own purposes.

The Greek word for “Hypocrisy” is hupokrisein which according to context, may be translated into the English word “Actor”, because the word literally means someone playing a part.  Peter is making the point that we need to be genuine.  We can’t be pretending to be something that we’re not in order to manipulate people or situations.

The Greek word for “Envy” is fthonos. According to Trench fthonos is “Displeasure at another’s good, without longing to raise oneself to the level of him who he envies, but only to depress the envied to his own level.”  Peter is teaching us that just because someone has something that we don’t have, or something that we want, we can never allow our feelings or our desires to affect how we view or how we treat that individual.

The Greek word for “Slander” is katalalias which is a word that means… well… “Slander”. The meaning of this word apparently hasn’t changed much, but here Peter is reminding us that there is never a reason to speak ill of people.

One doesn’t have to spend too much time studying these words to realize that Peter is teaching us that, at the very core of the worldly way of life, is selfishness.  A 21^st century Peter might very well have said “Hey, it’s not all about you”.

As with all good teachers, Peter wants us to understand his teaching clearly, so he has provided us with multiple examples to illustrate his point, and his point is that once we have chosen to become a disciple of Jesus, these behaviors should no longer be a part of who we are.  Simply put, an individual with a heart filled with love is incapable of being selfish.  The needs and the good of others overwhelm the Christlike heart to the point where the old way of being is no longer possible.  A heart filled with love can’t speak or think ill of others; won’t use others for personal gain; and never acts hurtfully or callously.  The heart in which God’s love resides is completely unwilling to accept less for others than it is willing to accept for itself.

So how are we to go about this formidable task of setting aside the old?  There are two answers to this question and unfortunately, the first answer is that we won’t.  The old nature still resides in us, and will continue to do so until the day that our faith becomes sight.  In his letter to the church at Rome, Paul really captured the essence of the conflict between the Spirit and the flesh when he said “I don’t really understand myself, for I want to do what is right, but I don’t do it. Instead, I do what I hate.  But if I know that what I am doing is wrong, this shows that I agree that the law is good.  So, I am not the one doing wrong; it is sin living in me that does it.

And I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature.  I want to do what is right, but I can’t.  I want to do what is good, but I don’t. I don’t want to do what is wrong, but I do it anyway.  But if I do what I don’t want to do, I am not really the one doing wrong; it is sin living in me that does it.”

Every believer, without exception, faces this conundrum, so let’s not be thinking that we’re alone in this.  One of my favorite Christian authors, Warren Wiersbe, summarizes this beautifully when he says “The Spirit may use the body to glorify God, or the flesh may use the body to serve sin.  When a sinner yields to Christ, he receives a new nature, but the old nature is neither removed nor reformed.  For this reason, there is a battle within.”

The second answer, though, is the amazing good news that with Jesus, His forgiveness is every bit as extravagant as His love.  God’s grace covers the believer, not because our imperfections don’t matter, but because God’s love offers endless new chances to the repentant heart.

“Like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual milk,” Peter said, “so that by it you may grow up in your salvation, now that you have tasted that the Lord is good.”

For Peter, the pure, spiritual milk is the Word, and this is Peter’s way of calling us to become students of the Word.  And since the word “Disciple” is taken from the Greek word “mathetis” which means “Student”, This is really Peter calling us to discipleship.  As disciples we are to be always studying and learning the Word; but our learning is to be a learning that translates into action.  It’s not enough merely to have an intellectual grasp of the Word, our study must lead to learning that is reflected in our lifestyle and in our actions.  As we grow in grace and faithfulness, hopefully we will choose more and more often to use the body to glorify God.

Let’s not forget that Peter was there when Jesus spoke the parable that said “No one puts new wine into old wineskins.  Otherwise, the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine and the wineskins will be ruined. No, they pour new wine into new wineskins.”  Peter is teaching us that our new nature is like the new wine, and that our lives in Jesus are, as new wineskins, quite literally a brand-new creation.  And this new creation, by God’s love and grace, through the teaching of Jesus, and through the guidance of the Holy Spirit, has the capacity to set aside the old ways of doing things and to allow the love of God to so permeate our hearts that we become bearers of that love to a deeply hurting and needful world.

Peter closes this section with an explanation of why there are those who reject the message, but first, history nut that I am, I need to tell you a story.

When construction began on Solomon’s Temple, the stone masons were not permitted to cut stone at the site of the temple because the Temple Mount was holy ground and the continual racket of stone cutting would have disrupted worship, so the stone was cut at the quarry and shipped nearly a mile to the site of the new temple.  Because of the fact that the stone had to be cut away from the construction site, the cutting of the stones had to be meticulously planned and every single stone had a specific place for which it was cut.  Now the capstone is the stone at the top of the main arch that supports the building.  Prior to the capstone being set, the building is held up by scaffolding.  It’s not until the capstone is set that the scaffolding can come down and the building will stand on its own, so the capstone is the most important single stone of the building.

When the first stones for the temple arrived from the quarry, and the builders began to lay the foundation stones, the builders found that on that first shipment, among the beautiful, perfectly cut, and perfectly fitting rectangular stones, there was a stone of an odd shape.  It clearly didn’t fit anywhere in the foundation that was being laid so the builders assumed that it was a mistake and they set the stone aside with the construction debris to be stored until he temple was completed, and the debris could be hauled away.  It took twenty years to build the temple, so after nearly 20 years when the capstone was to be placed, the builders inquired of the stone cutters asking them “Where’s the capstone?”  The stone cutters informed the builders that the capstone had been sent to them on the first day of construction.  That oddly shaped stone that the builders had discarded, turned out to be the all-important capstone.  Now if the capstone had come on the last shipment from the quarry, there is no doubt that the builders would have instantly known what it was and it would not have been discarded, but because they weren’t expecting it on the first shipment, they didn’t recognize its importance and so they rejected it.

When Jesus comes to us as an itinerant preacher, born into poverty, fraternizing with prostitutes and tax collectors and sinners, when He shuns the religious leaders and breaks the religious rules, when he comes with zero political power and ends up being arrested, tried, and crucified, how are we to comprehend the fact that this man is the author of the universe?  How likely is Jesus to be just like that rejected stone, having shown up in the least possible expected way and not really meeting anyone’s expectations? Those who were looking for a military leader who would defeat the Romans and restore the Jewish kingship were looking in the wrong place.  Those who were looking for a religious leader who would assume the high priesthood and restore faithful worship were looking in the wrong place.  Those who were looking for one who would be a social justice warrior, ending poverty, hunger, and inequality and inaugurating an earthly kingdom of justice and righteousness were looking in the wrong place.

Just as Elijah expected God first in the tempest, then in the earthquake, and then in the fire, Elijah still had to be prepared to hear that still, small voice with which God spoke to him. So it is that we must be prepared to encounter God without the expectation that He’ll come to us with majesty or glory or power, though all these things He has ad infinitum.  But we need to be prepared for a God who has chosen to reach out to His beloved children with the tender touch of His love.

A king born into poverty?  A political leader with no political power?  A moral leader who kept company with sinners?  A religious leader who rejected religious tradition?  The One who created the entire universe simply by willing it into existence, tried and executed by common man?  Foolishness!  All foolishness!  According to the ways of this world, none of this makes any sense whatsoever.

In his first letter to the church at Corinth, Paul wrote “God chose things the world considers foolish in order to shame those who think they are wise. And he chose things that are powerless to shame those who are powerful.  God chose things despised by the world, things counted as nothing at all, and used them to bring to nothing what the world considers important.”

Our life in this world has been shaped by the ways in which the world operates.  We recognize the primacy of power and wealth, the importance of looking out for our own interests, and the occasional necessity of fighting for our survival, yet in God’s kingdom, these all amount to nothing.  In God’s kingdom we recognize the primacy of love, the importance of caring for one another, and the necessity of seeking the common good.  Things that the world considers to be a foolish waste of time, are actually the foundation upon which God’s kingdom is built.

Jesus came to Earth with three specific missions. The first was to be the spotless lamb who takes away the sin of the world through His sacrificial death and resurrection.  The second was to teach by example who God is; to show us through his teachings and actions the very nature of the God who created us.  And the third is to teach us what God expects of us; how He wants us to live.  Jesus’ life shows us how love is at the center of God’s relationship with us, and Jesus teaches us how God is calling us to love in kind.

Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, then I will come in to him, and will dine with him, and he with me.  God’s love is such that His fondest hope is that all will turn to Him and that none will be lost.  As such, God goes out of His way to reach His children, putting his Truth before us all in plain sight; easily found by those who ask.

Many will miss out on the message because God has come to us in a most unexpected way, and they have neither the time, nor the inclination to seek Him.  But for those who seek Him with all their hearts, God is 100% faithful to answer their prayers, to fill them with His Spirit, and to make His home their own.

Sermon 2020.05.10 1st Peter Week 2

What Endures?

 

Last week I spoke about strategies.  I spoke of an earthly strategy revolving around expedience and I spoke of Peter’s strategy revolving around kingdom priorities.  In today’s reading Peter begins to talk about the differences between the earthly strategy and the kingdom strategy.

“As obedient children, do not conform to the evil desires you had when you lived in ignorance.  But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; for it is written: “Be holy, because I am holy.”

In most English translations the phrase “Evil Desires” is translated “Lust”, and so often when we read this phrase, we interpret according to the classic English speaker’s way of thinking, where the tendency is to view it as meaning physical desire, but let’s take a look at that for a moment.  The Greek word epithimeo is a word which means to desire something that is not permitted.  In this passage, Peter contrasts for us what is permitted and what is not permitted.  Peter juxtaposes evil desires and being holy, so according to Peter, what is permitted is being holy and what is not permitted is not being holy.

Now in standard English usage, “Evil” is an ugly word.  It evokes images of wanton disregard for the lives or the safety, or the needs of others, and is surely not a word that we would ever use to describe any decent person, but in the biblical usage of epithimeo , we need to expand our horizons just a little.  Like the word “Evil”, the word “Sin” also has become an ugly word, and yet, as I’ve explained so often, the most common word in the Bible that is translated into the English word “Sin” is hamartia, which is a word that could appropriately be translated “Imperfection”, and imperfection isn’t quite as ugly a word as sin, now is it?  So it is that epithimeo carries the meaning of desiring literally anything that is not permitted. Should we be ignoring the needs of someone when we have the wherewithal to help them?  That’s epithimeo . Should we be speaking or thinking ill of someone that we don’t like?  That’s epithimeo . Should we be dismissing people because we find them too difficult to love?  That’s epithimeo . So we really need to adjust our understanding of this whole passage, because, Peter isn’t calling anyone a terrible person here, what he’s doing is, he’s teaching us that the scope of this phrase is much wider than it seems.

Let’s not forget that Peter was present when Jesus gave the Sermon on the Mount.  He was there!  And when Jesus taught that calling someone a fool the same as murdering them, or when He taught that simply desiring someone other than your spouse, of divorcing your spouse, was the same as committing adultery, Jesus was teaching us about epithimeo .  Jesus was helping us to expand our horizons, with regard to our understanding of what it means to be holy, and it is this exact line of thought to which Peter speaks.

For Peter, his kingdom strategy is all about putting into practice the things that Jesus taught him over the three years of his discipleship.  It’s a strategy that focuses squarely on Christ likeness.  To be holy, as God is holy, is to follow the example of the One who in every way exemplifies God.  To be holy is to be Christlike.  And it is to this Christlikeness that Peter calls us.

But Peter is still facing the difficulty of teaching his readers WHY they should be choosing a kingdom strategy over an earthly one.

“Since you call on a Father who judges each person’s work impartially, live out your time as foreigners here in reverent fear.  For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your ancestors, but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect.”

Peter identifies us as foreigners, a people living in a land that is not their own.  In his second letter to the church at Corinth, Paul expressed a very similar idea.  Paul called us “Ambassadors”, again conveying the idea that the citizenship of the believer is not earthly, but rather, heavenly.  Augustine, in his Confessions, addressed this so beautifully when he said “You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in You.”

“To whom shall we go?”  It is this for which we were made, and try as we might to convince ourselves otherwise, we never really know who we are until we find ourselves in Christ.

Peter tells us that this heavenly status is precious.  That is was bought for us not with silver and gold or things that eventually will have no value at all, but rather with the blood of Jesus, who was chosen before the creation of the world to be our redeemer.  Peter exhorts his readers to choose the kingdom strategy because the kingdom strategy is the one that will endure!  Peter punctuates his thought by closing this section with a quote from the 40^th chapter of Isaiah, “All people are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field; the grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of the Lord endures forever.”

We began this chapter thinking that we were being called to view our lives in what seemed to be such a cavalier manner as to scorn the threat of death, but Peter has turned this around into a question of whether we are willing to accept something transient; a wisp that is here today and then gone forever, or are we to choose something that endures; something that is literally from everlasting to everlasting?  Peter’s eyewitness accounts form a powerful foundation for his argument.  And though we ourselves don’t have the benefit of having personally witnessed the resurrection, or having sat at Jesus’ feet while he taught, we need to remember that Peter did, and his words should serve to encourage and sustain us, even through dark times.  Peter’s words give us a reason to be hopeful!

OK, so now that we understand that, where do we go from here?  Each of us faces a choice.  Do we continue to follow the ways of the world, or do we choose to seek the path of discipleship?

Let’s face it, choosing the path of discipleship isn’t exactly easy.

In his book “The Cost of Discipleship”, Dietrich Bonhoeffer speaks of the difference between “Cheap grace” and “Costly grace”.  According to Bonhoeffer, “Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance.  Baptism without church discipline.  Communion without confession.  Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate”

For Bonhoeffer, the message of cheap grace is “Of course you have sinned, but now you are forgiven so you can stay as you are and enjoy the consolations of forgiveness”.

Bonhoeffer then contrasts this cheap grace with costly grace explaining that “Such grace is COSTLY because it calls us to follow, and it is GRACE because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ.  It is COSTLY because it costs a man his life, and it is GRACE because it gives a man the only true life.  It is COSTLY because it condemns sin, and GRACE because it justifies the sinner……Costly grace confronts us as a gracious call to follow Jesus, it comes as a word of forgiveness to the broken spirit and the contrite heart.  Grace is costly because it compels a man to submit to the yoke of Christ and follow him; it is grace because Jesus says: ‘My yoke is easy and my burden is light.’”

Here, Bonhoeffer is doing exactly the same thing that Peter does in his letter.  Bonhoeffer is contrasting an earthly strategy with a kingdom strategy; and Bonhoeffer essentially ends up asking the same question “Lord, to whom shall we go?”

For those who are not familiar, Bonhoeffer was a key founding member of the Confessing Church in Nazi Germany.  While Germany attempted to unify all Christian denominations into a single, pro-Nazi church, the Confessing Church resisted both on moral grounds, opposing the strong nationalist nature and the overt Antisemitism of the German state church, and on theological grounds, declaring the Nazi demand of total control over the individual to be in opposition to the ultimate sovereignty of God, and opposing the re-writing of the Old Testament into the anti-Jewish “Message of God”.  Bonhoeffer continued to be a strident voice opposing Nazi policy until his arrest in April of 1943.  In February of 1945 he was transferred to the Flossenburg Concentration Camp, where on April 9th, just a few weeks before the liberation of the camp, at the age of 39, he was executed.

The prospect of denying oneself, taking up our cross and following Jesus is a daunting one. Though that choice carries higher costs for some than for others, even for those blessed to live in a time and place where our faith will not threaten our very lives, we are still making a choice that demands change, not only in our lifestyles, but also in our ways of thinking.

The really good news of this chapter though, Peter saves for last, because it is here that Peter, in one of my favorite verses in the Bible, begins to explain this new life to which we are being called.

“Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for each other, love one another deeply, from the heart.  For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God.”

This new life that the Spirit will awaken within us is a life of love!  As we turn from our old ways of expedience, our old ways of dealing with the world on the world’s terms, we find a capacity for love that we never imagined existed.  And as we begin to understand the wondrous depth of this love we will find this love creating these little pockets of heaven all over the world.

It was this extravagant, unmerited love that drew so many believers to the first century Christian Church.  It was this extravagant, unmerited love that Satan sought to silence.  But he couldn’t, and here it is; right in front of us for the taking.  If only we choose the kingdom strategy.

Sermon 2020.05.03 1st Peter Week 1

Who’s Agenda?

 

Be Hopeful!  This is the message of 1 Peter.

Simon Peter, the apostle, self identifies as the author of this letter and while he states that the letter was written from “Babylon”, it’s actually unlikely that the letter was written from the country Babylon.  The city of Babylon is used in the New Testament as a description of a world order based on violence and exploitation that is personified by Rome, and it’s highly likely that Babylon is used here in that context, as a code word for Rome.  It is presumed that Peter actually wrote the letter from Rome somewhere around the year 65.   Let me set the stage.

Israel had been under Roman occupation for nearly 100 years.  Israel proved to be a challenging people for the Romans to control, and in 40 BCE, presumably in order to try to keep the peace, Julius Caesar officially recognized Judaism as a legal religion and Israel was afforded concessions that Rome did not make for other conquered people.  The Israelites were permitted to practice their religion without interference from Rome (At least not official interference) and they were exempt from the regulations that required them to worship Caesar.  When Christianity came on the scene, it was first accepted by Rome as a sect of Judaism, and was therefore under the same relaxed regulations.  But when it became clear that Christianity wasn’t a sect of Judaism, and was, in fact, a new religion, the standard Roman regulations were imposed upon Christians, requiring them to worship Caesar and impinging on the practices of these new followers of what was called “The Way”.

1^st Century Christians were amazingly successful at reaching new believers with the Gospel.  They were open and welcoming to potential new believers, but potential new believers were subject to an extensive period of training before being admitted to the fellowship, and non-believers were strictly excluded from the fellowship.  Christians also often found themselves to be non-participants in community activities, due to the fact that these activities often revolved around the standard polytheistic themes of the Greco-Roman world, and so other citizens who didn’t know better, tended to view Christians as being unsociable.  As a result, 1^st century Christians faced increasing levels of distrust.  As persecution of Christians began to become increasingly more prevalent, Christians became increasingly more guarded about who was admitted into the fellowship of believers creating further distrust.  And exacerbating the problem of acceptance of the Christians even more were two highly unfortunate misunderstandings.

1^st Century Christians referred to the predecessor of the sacrament of communion as the Agape Feast; “Agape” being one of the three Greek words that we translate into the English word “Love”.  Now the word “Agape” carries with it the meaning of a love of a selfless and sacrificial character, and one would think that that might have been a hint to their Roman neighbors, but nevertheless, Christians were viewed as a peculiar people, who met in secret, and at each meeting the “Family” of believers had a “Love feast”.  To many Romans, the love feast was thought to be possibly incestual, or possibly an orgy, or possibly both.  Certainly, this was a misunderstanding capable of creating suspicion.  The second, and even more troubling reference was related to when Christians referred to the consuming of “The body and the blood”.  Romans, hearing this without appropriate context, assumed this to be cannibalism, (I mean, not knowing the context, what else would you think?) and so it’s not hard to understand why Christians faced a great deal of opposition based on some miscommunicated ideas.

Interestingly, in an extant letter that was written by the Roman Governor Pliny the Younger to the Emperor Trajan, asking about the official imperial policy regarding Christians, one can sense a tone of surprise in the letter when Pliny reports the simple and innocuous practices of Christian worship that he discovered when he investigated the issue, so clearly, these misunderstandings were prevalent.

As distrust grew from these misunderstandings, persecution of Christians became a very real and serious threat, and right around the year 64, Rome began executing Christians for their faith.  In the year 64, on July 19^th (My birthday !!) a fire broke out in Rome that burned for over a week and destroyed 2/3 of the city.  Historically, we don’t really know what started the fire, but in the ancient writings, there are five different theories that have been put forth about how the fire started, and four of those theories put the blame squarely on the Emperor Nero.  What we do know for sure is that Nero blamed the fire on the Christians.  This ignited (No pun intended) a deeper hatred of the Christians, and increased persecutions.

It is into this situation that we find Peter writing his first letter.  He begins his letter by identifying himself as the author, and he addresses the letter to believers in cities scattered throughout modern day Turkey, who he identifies as “Chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father”.  And while this is not at all the subject of my remarks today, as a good Presbyterian, I really can’t pass on the opportunity to comment on predestination.  (That sentence that should probably have a smiley face at the end of it).

There’s a whole school of debate about predestination, about whether humans actually have any choice whatsoever in the matter of their salvation, and about how could predestination possibly be fair if you are not one of the elect?  After all, how could you fairly be punished for something over which you ultimately have no control?

The pastor and theologian J. Allen Blair gave the best answer to this I’ve ever heard.  Blair said “Did God, before the foundation of the world, predestine persons, or a plan?  Did He decree that there should be certain individuals saved, or did He decree a plan of redemption in which His Son would die for all; that whoever should call upon Him would be saved?”  DL Moody said it a little more succinctly when he said “The whosoever wills are the elect.  The whosoever won’ts are the non-elect.

Anyway, back to my message.  After his introduction Peter offers a few words of Praise to God; and we’ll get back to those words in a moment.  After his short introduction, Peter gets right to the heart of his message.  Peter addresses directly the persecution of the church, saying “For a little while you may have to suffer grief in all kinds of trials”.  Peter is writing this letter to encourage believers who are facing persecution.

When difficulties come in this life, it’s awfully hard to see the silver lining in things.  Faced with persecution and even potentially death, Peter’s audience had little earthly reason for hope.  The earthly strategy for believers at this point would be to live inconspicuously enough not to attract the kind of attention that would bring trouble. But let’s take a look at that strategy for a moment.  Hypothetically, were Satan to try to interfere with the exponential growth of this new Christian movement, can you think of a better way to accomplish that than to silence believers?  The first century church grew exponentially because of the enthusiastic witness and the extravagant love of the first century church, and here, Peter wants to present his readers with an alternative strategy.  A strategy based not on earthly expedience, but rather based on God’s promises, of which Peter was intimately familiar.

In the introduction to his letter in chapter one, Peter reveals three great promises:

1. In Verse 2C, Peter says “Grace and Peace be yours in abundance”.

Remember, Peter was with Jesus when Jesus said “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you.  I do not give to you as the world gives.  Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not be afraid”.

After Peter’s greatest failure when he denied Jesus three times, Jesus lovingly restored Peter, letting Peter know that he had been fully forgiven.  What peace this must have brought to Peter, knowing that Jesus had restored their relationship, and feeling the confidence that Jesus had in him to continue His work. Following his reinstatement, Peter became a tireless and effective witness for Christ.  Peter knew in a deeply personal way of the peace that Jesus gives, and now he wanted to pass that peace along to his brothers and sisters who were facing difficult times.

2. In Verse 3B he says “In [God’s] great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead”.

Peter personally witnessed the crucifixion of Jesus and was one of the first to enter the empty tomb.  Peter encountered the risen Jesus, was a witness of the post resurrection teachings of Jesus, and had proof of his own new birth through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit who had worked so powerfully in his life.

In Paul’s letter to the church at Corinth, which would most likely have been familiar to Christians at the time Peter wrote this letter, Paul said “If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised.   And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith.”

Peter knew as an eyewitness that Jesus had indeed been raised from the dead and he wanted to pass along to his brothers and sisters his knowledge of the absolute fact of Jesus’ resurrection, and the promise that that resurrection holds for all believers.

3. In Verse 5A Peter says “You,who through faith are shielded by God’s power”.

Shortly after James, the brother of Jesus was executed by King Herod Agrippa II Peter was arrested and thrown into prison.  He was guarded by 4 squads of 4 soldiers each, and slept, bound by chains, between two soldiers, with two other soldiers guarding the locked door.  The night before he was to be brought to trial (And certainly executed) an angel appeared next to him.  The chains just fell off of Peter, the door opened by itself, and the angel led Peter out of the prison to safety.  Peter knew in a deeply personal way how God had protected and shielded him, and he wanted to pass along to his brothers and sisters how he personally had experienced God’s protection.

So the promises that Peter lists are for peace, salvation, and security.  Peter wants his readers to understand the absolute faithfulness of God, and the absolute confidence in which Peter holds these promises.  Peter reminds his readers that they are awaiting “An inheritance that can never perish”, that we experience an “Inexpressible and glorious joy for… receiving the goal of [our] faith, which is the salvation of [our] souls. Peter even tells his readers that “Even the angels long to look into these things.”

In the face of terrifying times, Peter has given his readers a challenge to view their lives and their mission from a kingdom perspective rather than an earthy perspective.  During Jesus’ earthly ministry, there came a time when He was teaching and many disciples turned away because of the difficulty of that teaching, Jesus asked the twelve “You do not want to leave me too, do you?”  Peter answered Jesus, saying “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.  We have come to believe and to know that you are the Holy One of God.”  Peter had a kingdom perspective and he wanted his fellow believers to share that same mind.

It’s just about impossibly difficult to view our lives in what seems to be such a cavalier manner as to scorn the threat of death, but having personally encountered the resurrected Jesus, Peter had irrefutable knowledge that Jesus had indeed conquered death.  Peter’s answer “Lord, to whom shall we go?” is the solid foundation upon which Peter builds his kingdom strategy, and the most powerful argument to those he calls to follow it.

“Therefore, prepare your minds for action”, Peter said.  “Be self-controlled and set your hope fully on the grace to be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed.”

We are blessed to live in a time and place where our lives are not threatened by our faith, but difficulties do abound, and it’s all too easy to become wrapped up in the things of this world.  Peter speaks to us also, encouraging us to be hopeful, and calling us to choose the kingdom strategy of living.

Peter’s kingdom strategy is a strategy of following the example of Jesus, a strategy of caring and compassion; a strategy of empathy and love; a strategy that refuses to accept less for others than you are willing to accept for yourself.  Loving others isn’t easy.  Loving the unlovable, the arrogant, the rude, and the thoughtless is nearly impossible.  We could take the easy route, distance ourselves from the unlovable, and make our lives a whole lot easier, but Peter continues to ask us “Lord, to whom should we go?”

 

 

Sermon 2/16/2020

For quite a while I’ve been wanting to do a study on Jesus and His interaction with people.  I’ve been curious about how He related to people, how He impacted people’s lives, and how He instructed people.  And so now finally, this opportunity to bring the message today has given me an opportunity to do that study, and I’m grateful for the opportunity to share what I’ve learned and grateful that you all are willing to put up with yet another week of amateur hour.

I did my study in the book of Matthew.  Now according to Matthew, Jesus’ first interactions with individual people were when He called His disciples and Matthew really elaborates very little on how Jesus interacted with the disciples beyond saying that Jesus simply said “Follow Me”.  I’ve always found it fascinating that these people dropped everything to follow Jesus, but the Bible really doesn’t shed a whole lot of light on what caused the disciples to leave their lives behind in the way that they did, but suffice it to say that Jesus must have been quite persuasive.

It’s really not until the eighth chapter of Matthew that we begin to find the first interactions between Jesus and individual people.  In the eighth chapter Matthew begins with the story of a leper approaching Jesus and saying “Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean”.  According to Matthew, Jesus puts out His hand, touches the man, and says “I am willing, be cleansed”, and the man was immediately healed.  In this first healing we already see something remarkable, even beyond the miraculous healing.  As is so often the case, there are layers to this story, and without our knowing the background information it’s easy to miss the deeper meaning.

Let me read a little passage from Leviticus 13:45-46: “Now the leper on whom the sore is, his clothes shall be torn and his head bare; and he shall cover his mustache, and cry, ‘Unclean! Unclean!’ He shall be unclean. All the days he has the sore he shall be unclean. He is unclean, and he shall dwell alone; his dwelling shall be outside the camp.

A person with leprosy was expelled from the community.  Lepers had to live by themselves, and when they encountered other people they were required to yell loudly “Unclean, unclean” so that people would know to stay away.  It was strictly forbidden for a leper to touch anyone and people would always give lepers a very wide berth.  And so, as if it wasn’t bad enough for them to be afflicted with an awful disease, they became social outcasts as well.  It is understandable that people would avoid lepers though, leprosy is contagious, and just as we sometimes, during passing of the peace, refuse to allow people to shake our hand when we have a cold, so it was that people sought to protect themselves when they were around someone who had a contagious and debilitating skin condition.  Add to all of that the fact that if you did touch a leper, it made you ritually unclean yourself; unable to attend worship for a specified period of time, and in some instances even preventing you from interacting with your own spouse or your own family.  And then all of that is followed by an elaborate cleansing ritual.  And so, it’s no wonder that people stayed far away.

So, looking at this story, what is the first thing that Jesus did, even before He declared Himself willing to heal this man?  He reached out and He touched him.  This man may conceivably have gone for months or even years without human touch, and Jesus compassion was such that His first instinct was to touch the man.  The leper was instantly healed, but understanding this underlying story we see that the physical malady was only a part of what Jesus healed.  In touching this man, Jesus was restoring him to his place in the community.  The love and compassion that Jesus exhibited in the act of touching him would have carried a deep meaning to this man, and to anyone else who witnessed the event.

The next person Jesus healed was a centurion’s servant. The centurion asked Jesus to heal his servant, who was paralyzed, but he told Jesus that he was unworthy to have Jesus come to His house.  The centurion explained that, as a man both under authority and with authority over others, he knew that when he commanded something be done that it would be done.  He told Jesus that he knew that Jesus was able to heal his servant without Him actually having to be there.  Jesus commended the man’s faith and healed his servant right then and there.

The Bible doesn’t tell us if the centurion was Jewish or not, though the text implies he was not “I have not found such great faith, not even in Israel!” Jesus said.  The Jews of Jesus’ day despised the Romans and resented the occupation.  The centurion, Jewish or not, would have been viewed by the general public with great disdain, but Jesus didn’t hesitate to heal his servant; or to commend the man for his faith.  It didn’t matter to Jesus whether this man was Jewish or not, and since centurions were conscripted from all over the Roman Empire, it’s entirely possible that the centurion wasn’t even middle eastern, and the centurion’s race didn’t matter to Jesus either.  The only thing that mattered to Jesus was the compassion and love that He had for this man, and for his servant.

Next Matthew tells us that Jesus visited Peter.  Noticing that Peter’s wife’s mother was sick, Jesus took her hand and healed her.  Peter’s mother in law immediately got up and began attending to Jesus and his disciples.  That evening many sick people were brought to Jesus and Matthew tells us that He healed them all.

Now, tell me something…  What DIDN’T happen here?  What does the Bible tell us Jesus said to these people?  Except for commending the centurion; nothing.  Jesus wasn’t evangelizing, He was responding to the needs of people with compassion and love.

In the next two chapters of Matthew, Jesus heals a demon possessed man and a paralytic.  He raised a girl from the dead, restored the sight of two blind men and then Matthew tells the story of the woman who had suffered with a bleeding issue for years who touched Jesus’ cloak thinking that if only she was able to touch His cloak that she would be healed.  Again, we need to understand the underlying story. Her bleeding made her unclean, and being unclean, it was strictly forbidden for her to touch anyone, due to the fact that touching them would have made them unclean as well.  Jesus immediately realized what had happened, but Jesus had no trouble with her touching Him.  Instead, He commended her faith and healed her.  It didn’t matter to Jesus that she was “unclean”, it didn’t matter to Jesus that she was a woman.  Jesus simply saw someone in need, and in keeping with the love and compassion that are at the core of His being, He healed her.

Matthew then tells us that “Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people. But when He saw the multitudes, He was moved with compassion for them, because they were weary and scattered, like sheep having no shepherd.”  Matthew never once focuses on who ended up following Jesus; that just wasn’t the point.  Matthew focused on the compassion and love that Jesus exhibited.

As we get deeper into the study, we find a pattern to these interactions.  The healing of people, more often than not results in deep feelings of gratitude among the healed, who either end up following Jesus, or going home and telling absolutely everyone they meet what Jesus had done for them.

As we reach the twelfth chapter of Matthew, we begin to find a different type of interaction.  Matthew tells the story that Jesus and His disciples were walking through a grain field, and his disciples, hungry from their journey, began to pick some of the heads of grain and eat them. Unfortunately, they were doing this on the Sabbath, and picking the heads of grain was considered work, and was therefore prohibited on the Sabbath.  The Pharisees confronted Jesus about this, and Jesus responded that He was Lord of the Sabbath, and that if the Pharisees truly understood God’s Word, that they wouldn’t be accusing the innocent.  It was just the beginning of the problems that Jesus had with the religious establishment.  Not too long after Jesus went into a synagogue where the Pharisees intended to trap Him.  A man with a withered hand ais in the synagogue, and the Pharisees asked Jesus if I was lawful to heal on the Sabbath.  Again, Jesus corrected their misunderstanding of the Law before going ahead and healing the man’s hand in the presence of the entire assembly.

The Pharisees and teachers of the Law ended up receiving the brunt of most of the harsh words that Jesus spoke in the Bible, and it may be fair to ask where was the love and compassion of Jesus as he dealt with these particular children of God?  I believe that when we ask ourselves this question that there are two things at which we need to look.

First, Jesus made it clear that the Pharisees were turning people away from God’s love.  The Pharisees demanded adherence to a multitude of interpretations of the Law. This demand to adhere to all of these regulations, ended up creating a religion of merit.  Those who followed the minutia of the Law were, as a result, right with God, and those who didn’t follow the minutia of the Law were considered to be sinners, and were assumed to be outside of the umbrella of God’s love; and this was just wrong.  Jesus needed to make the point that God’s love is not conditional on human goodness.  God’s love is given out of the depth of God’s grace as He seeks to call as many of His beloved children to Himself as He possibly can.  The Pharisees were interfering with that process and Jesus reacted forcefully in defense of those who were being incorrectly taught that they weren’t worthy of God’s love.

Second, when humans are stubbornly sure of themselves, and convinced of the rightness of their beliefs, it’s nearly impossible for them to be convinced that they may possibly be wrong.  I believe that Jesus WAS acting in love and compassion as he sought to break through their wall of certainty and teach them that their faith is actually designed to be centered not on following rules and regulations, but rather to be centered on living lives of love, compassion, and justice.  This is the very heart of God’s law, as exemplified in the life of Jesus.

And so, we see in the interactions that Jesus had with these people, a depth of compassion and love that flowed from His very core.  And here is the truly revolutionary thought:  Jesus didn’t have any ulterior motives when He healed these people.  Jesus had no expectation that He would be compensated in any way for healing them, and Jesus never actually asked for anything in return, except that they responded to Jesus’ love and compassion by living lives of love and compassion themselves.  This is what Jesus asks when He says “Follow me”.

It’s not a matter of “I’ll heal you if you follow me” or “I’ll heal you if you love me”, or “I’ll heal you if you tell everyone about me”.  No!  In fact, Jesus usually admonished people NOT to tell anyone about what happened.  For Jesus, kindness and compassion was all the reason He needed to step in and help those who were in need; and when Jesus calls us, it is this to which we are called.

And there was something else that I learned in this study as well.  Most of you have heard me speak of sin before, maybe many times before, but I’d like to take a moment to remind you that there are several root words in the Greek that are all translated into the English word “Sin”, and all but one of these words have some variation of meaning related to the performing of an evil act, permitting an evil act, having the propensity to commit evil acts, or failing to prevent an evil act, and these words pretty much sum up the modern conception of the meaning of the word “sin”, and yet all of these words combined are used only a handful of times in the Bible. The remaining word, ‘amartia. appears 151 times in the Bible.  Now ‘amartia is a word that an archer would use if he shot his arrow and hit the target, but missed the bullseye.  It is a word that literally means to miss the mark, or to fail to meet a set standard, and it is a word that could appropriately be translated “Imperfection”.

I’ve always held the theologically conservative view that forgiveness of our imperfections is necessary in order to restore a right relationship with a holy God who cannot look upon sin, so to me, the forgiveness of sin has always been something that was God centered; we need His forgiveness so that we may have communion with Him.  And while that is true, my study of how Jesus interacted with people has led me to a discovery that forgiveness of our imperfections is actually US centered, because the forgiveness of our imperfections removes the barriers in our own lives that prevent us from becoming the loving, caring, compassionate, people that God designed us to be. It removes the barriers that prevent us from understanding the depth of love that God has for us, the esteem in which He holds us as His beloved children, and the unshakable faith that He has in us to be His messengers carrying His message of love and compassion to a world that is desperately in need of hearing it.  He’s not forgiving our imperfections in anticipation of some future event when our faith becomes sight.  He’s forgiving our imperfections in order that we may set aside the things that stand in the way of our loving the world with an extravagant love and with unmerited grace that emulates the love and the grace that God has for us; and in so doing, become citizens of heaven in the here and now, helping the rest of the word to see God’s love through us.

The author Madeleine L’Engle Camp once said “We draw people to Christ not by loudly discrediting what they believe, by telling them how wrong they are and how right we are, but by showing them a light that is so lovely that they want with all their hearts to know the source of it.”

This is how Jesus interacted with people, He loved them, pure and simple.  Out of the depth of love and compassion that is the very core of who Jesus is, he loved them, sensing and filling their deepest needs, and sending them on their way, whole, forgiven, and joyfully proclaiming the grace that had touched their lives.  Let us seek to become people for whom love and compassion are the very core of our being as well, and let’s love those who cross our paths in this life in such a way that they may see the light of God’s love shining in us.

Amen.

 

 

Two Half Sermons

When God created the universe, and when He created this world, he had a very specific plan in place for how things would work. He created the earth, filled it with plants, and animals, and eventually people, and He declared it to be “Very good”. When He placed humankind on this planet, God’s plan would have allowed a few billion people to live together in this paradise He had just created, and to do so peacefully, and even joyfully. And at the core of this plan was love. God, in His wisdom, knew that the only way that a world full of people would be able to live together and to maintain this paradise that He had created, would be if people loved each other; but humankind fell into sin; or more accurately, humankind chose to fall into sin. We sinned when we decided to love ourselves more than we loved others. When we believe in the necessity of “Looking out for number one” we lose sight of the necessity of loving others equally, and in the process of this failing to love others, we find that we lose out on the opportunity to get to know them, and in the process of not getting to know them, we find that misunderstanding and distrust abound, and we lose the capacity to care about the welfare of others. We fail to care about whether or not they are fed, whether or not they are well, and even whether or not they are happy. None of these things affect us, so none of these things concern us.
It’s not like God didn’t know this was going to happen.
Fortunately for us, God also already had the plan in place for leading humankind back to the paradise for which we were originally created. This plan was revealed to us over the span of a few thousand years, beginning with the giving of the 10 commandments, then through the work and writings of a number of prophets and authors who, inspired by God, expanded and clarified the law, and finally through the example of God Himself, who lived among us in the fully human, yet fully divine person of Jesus.
Our Jewish brothers and sisters were the ones through whom God chose to reveal Himself, and the Jewish people were known throughout the ancient world as a peculiar people who followed the law of their God down to the minutest detail. So meticulous were they that the ancient Hebrew men used to wear a box bound to their forehead; a box… on their forehead. The box would contain a Bible verse, or verses. Why? (Have someone read Deuteronomy 6:6-9). Well son of a gun, the Bible DOES say to take God’s commandments and bind them on our forehead, doesn’t it? In fact, the Rabbis wrote commentary after commentary explaining exactly how a faithful Jew should follow the commandments and laws precisely.
This is something that I’ve confessed in this pulpit before and will now do it again. I am a Facebook addict. I spend WAY too much time reading Facebook and WAY too much more time commenting and responding. A while back I was involved in a discussion and I was accused of being un-Christian. Hey, it happens. In this instance however, the person accusing me quoted a passage that I really didn’t think applied to my situation, and I really didn’t think the person had a theological basis for their complaint. I no longer remember the specific infraction, nor do I remember the passage quoted, but I know well what my response was. Believing that the passage had been misapplied I replied from the heart, and ended up saying something that I’ve known for a long time, but had never really put into words. I said “God’s Law is not a list of rules and regulations to be followed blindly. God’s Law is a description of what the human heart is supposed to look like”.
Our purpose is not to go through life following an exhaustive list of rules and regulations. Our purpose in life is to learn to love others at least as much as we love ourselves. We don’t follow God’s Law in order to gain something in this life (Not that there aren’t benefits to following God’s Law in this life). But we follow God’s Law because we are in training. (I was going to have Daniel cue the theme from Rocky here but I suppose we will skip that part). The lesson that we learn from the life that Jesus lived is that loving God and loving others is the very essence of our faith, and indeed the very reason for our existence.
Now, I don’t have to tell you that this is an extraordinarily difficult thing. Loving others more than we love ourselves would be difficult even if everyone else was loving us more than they loved themselves, but when the majority of the people in this world are definitely in that “Looking out for number one” mode, loving others sacrificially is nearly impossible. And yet it is that to which we are called.
Over the last few weeks Rev. Rack has been speaking of some of the difficult sayings of Jesus and how those sayings caused many of His followers to turn away from Him. When God asks the seemingly impossible of us we need a pretty darn good reason to follow Him and it’s not exactly like He’s meeting us on the street corner giving us instruction and encouragement. There is a lot that we are asked to accept on faith, and the simple truth is, faith is hard. Does anyone remember the words of the father who brought his child to Jesus to be cleansed of an evil spirit? (Have someone read Mark 9:23-24). Even when we do believe, faith can be hard. But faith may not be exactly what we think it is either. (Have someone read Hebrews 1:11). Faith is more than wishful thinking or hoping against hope. Faith is a real, tangible thing that springs from evidence. And so, instead of getting one whole sermon today, you’re going to get two half sermons, because in addition to talking about the necessity of love today, I’d also like to talk about the reasons why we should love. I hear a lot of arguments about there being no proof for God’s existence. If I hear the phrase “The invisible man in the sky” or hear God referred to as my “Imaginary Friend” I think I will lose it! It’s like these folks expect that the evidence for God’s existence or for the veracity of the claims of the disciples will fall down from the sky and smack them in the head. Like pretty much anything else in life, if you want to discover the evidence for God’s claims, you have to look for it. If you need a reason to love, it takes a little work to find one. Today’s good news is though, that I’ve done some of the work for you.
You all know that I am a history nut, and an archaeology nut, and there is an archaeological find that is so new that it hasn’t been published yet, but it has been leaked, and it is exciting. But first, a little background.
At the turn of the 20th century, when the 1800’s turned into the 1900’s there was a group of scholars who began to study the earliest Bible manuscripts in a new way. They called their new method of study “Form Criticism”. And to explain Form Criticism, I need to ask a question. By a show of hands, how many have actually read Shakespeare? For those who have, how many wished that there was an English translation available? Yes, Shakespeare wrote in English, but the English of his day is archaic compared to the English of today. Many word meanings and word forms have changed, many words are no longer used or have been replaced with different words and different syntax. 2000 years from now an archaeologist studying our society and finding a book of Shakespeare with a copyright date of 2018 will likely know that the book wasn’t actually authored in 2018 because they will recognize the fact that the usage of the language doesn’t at all fit our time period. It is these linguistic differences that the Form Critics studied. They tried to use linguistic cues to determine periods of authorship for the books of the New Testament. Unfortunately, the Form Critics approached their research with what appear to be some preconceived notions and they came to a conclusion that the earliest New Testament books were not authored until the mid-300’s of the common era. Though few people know about this group of scholars, or the name they gave themselves, the results of their research and their opinions about dates of authorship have come to be incredibly pervasive. I can’t tell you how many discussions in which I have participated (Yes, on Facebook) where people state with conviction the fact that the New Testament is unreliable because the books were authored 300 or more years after the fact and are full of exaggeration and legend as a result. The discovery of the John Ryland’s Manuscript in the 1930’s has done little to change this prevailing opinion. The Ryland’s Manuscript contains a fragment of the Gospel of John that most scholars believe is dated no later than the year 130. Unfortunately, this date is derived from evidence and not from verifiable fact, and skeptics have proposed a date for the manuscript well into the 300’s and so, even though the best guesses lean towards the earlier date, there is no general consensus, and no real hard and fast proof.
Why does this matter? The claims of the disciples are pretty hard to take at face value. Turning water into wine, healing the sick, restoring sight to the blind, walking on water… these are all hard to accept, but raising people from the dead, and eventually being crucified and then coming back to life? These things strain the bounds of reason pretty much to the limit. And yet how important is the resurrection to our faith? (Have someone read 1 Corinthians 15:13-14). Our preaching is useless, and so is your faith! The Bible claims that the resurrection was central to the teachings of the apostles, and that the apostles preached this message to literally hundred of eyewitnesses to the events. If it can be shown that the Gospels were in fact written by eyewitnesses and presented to an audience of eyewitnesses, it becomes much more likely that the text is reliable, because a document that is written and in circulation at a time when eyewitnesses of the events portrayed are plentiful will not be accepted unless it is factually accurate, which brings us to our exciting new discovery.
Most of us have seen pictures of the elaborate sarcophagus of King Tutankhamun (King Tut for short). Some of us may even have seen it in person since it toured the US many years ago. We are accustomed to seeing the jewel encrusted gold death masks of the Egyptian Pharaohs, but what we may not know is that death masks were extremely popular in ancient Egypt. Now most Egyptians couldn’t afford the fancy gold masks, and so for the common folk the masks were made of paper mache, or more accurately, papyrus mache, and for many people even the papyrus to make the mask was prohibitively expensive, so they made their masks from used papyrus. Recently, scientists have devised a way to dissolve the glue in these masks without damaging the papyrus or the ink that is written on them. In one of these disassembled masks, reliably dated to the 80’s through a combination of radio carbon dating and evidence from other documents recovered from the mask, one of the pieces of papyrus contained a fragment of the Gospel of Mark. For hundreds of years conservative scholars have dated the authorship of Mark in the early 60’s. The dating of this fragment makes that date highly likely; and since the letters of Paul preceded the synoptic Gospels by at least 10-15 years, this places the New Testament into a time when eyewitnesses would have indeed been plentiful. The testimony for which 7 of the 11 remaining disciples gave their lives, along with Stephen, James, and Paul can no longer be written off as legend or embellishment. These were words that were preached to people who would have known instantly whether they were true or not. We read in 1 Corinthians that after appearing to the 12, Jesus appeared to over 500 believers. Paul later encourages people to ask the living eyewitnesses to corroborate his message.
My friends, Jesus is a real person who lived in first century Palestine, a man whose name was mentioned by 21 separate, non-Biblical, late first or early second century sources. The story of His life has been revealed in four separate Gospels, written by men who it is becoming increasingly more apparent were actual eyewitnesses and followers of Jesus, many of whom were executed by the Romans for their testimony. Let’s stop to think about that for a moment. The world has never been at a loss for people willing to die for their beliefs, but there is a world of difference between giving your life for something you believe, but have no proof of, and giving your life for something of which you were an eyewitness.
We read in 2nd Peter: “6 For we did not follow cleverly devised stories when we told you about the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ in power, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. 17 He received honor and glory from God the Father when the voice came to him from the Majestic Glory, saying, “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.”[b] 18 We ourselves heard this voice that came from heaven when we were with him on the sacred mountain.”
If the resurrection of Jesus is real, then we can trust His words when He says that He will come again and receive us that where He is, we will be also. If our resurrection is real, then we are indeed in training; preparing for that glorious day when His love is made complete in us.
Amen.