 Mark 10:17-31
What an idiotic thing for James and John to ask! Especially after the passage that is just before this one, which reads,
“ They were on the road, going up to Jerusalem, and Jesus was walking ahead of them; they were amazed, and those who followed were afraid. He took the twelve aside again and began to tell them what was to happen to him, saying, "See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be handed over to the chief priests and the scribes, and they will condemn him to death; then they will hand him over to the Gentiles; they will mock him, and spit upon him, and flog him, and kill him; and after three days he will rise again."”
And then, “James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came forward to him and said to him, "Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you." And he said to them, "What is it you want me to do for you?" And they said to him, "Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory."
They just don't get it, do they? Or maybe in horror they just glossed over all the mocking, spitting, flogging and killing, and just focused on the rising again. Maybe they thought they could just stand back and watch all the bad stuff, and get into the good stuff later. Obviously the glory part is what they wanted.
And are we all that much different? We want the glory and resurrection, certainly! And yes, they will be ours. But the way to all that glory is not so pleasant. We don't get to just sit back and watch.
Following Jesus means following Jesus, including going to the cross. And although nobody is threatening to execute us, what we are called to do can still be pretty painful. “Whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all.”
Now being a servant is often not very much fun. It means putting what you want to do aside, and doing what someone else wants you to do. People do this all the time, of course. Nowadays we call it having a job. And the reason “thank God it's Friday” is such a popular saying is because it is the time when you can stop doing what someone else wants, and do your own thing. And this is good, we all need a Sabbath, a day off.
Nothing wrong with that.
But Jesus wants James and John, and all of us, to pay more attention to our job as disciples. It is to be a servant of all. It is to do things that other people want done for them. We often like to do things for people, but it is usually the things that we think they should like. How many times have you had someone do something for you, and it was exactly the wrong thing? The person didn't really know what you wanted, and took a guess, and guessed wrong. My mother always used to give me money to buy Christmas gifts for my children from her, because she said she had no idea what they would want or like. Wise woman!
The thing is, being a servant means knowing what the person you are serving wants and needs. A waiter in a restaurant who gets the customers' orders all mixed up is not going to get very many tips. So the key to being a good servant is to pay close attention to what the other person really needs.
Jesus knew what we needed. It was not another King to lord it over us the way kings usually do. We needed to be shown that power-tripping is not the way to happiness. We needed to be shown that violence does not solve problems. We needed to be shown that peace lies in being forgiven and in forgiving others. We needed to be shown that God loves us so much that God would even die for us.
So Jesus went to the cross, willingly, to teach us all that. He came not to be served but to serve. And he still serves us, still teaches us, still calls us to be reconciled to God. And he still calls us to carry out his work of serving the world.
And of course the key to doing this successfully, is to pay close attention to what the world needs. We can't just assume that our neighbours need to come to church on Sundays. We have to find out from them, what their actual needs are. That means we have to talk to them. We have to be curious about their problems and their concerns. We have to learn to think about what God may have to offer them in the difficult paths of their lives. And then we have to learn how to offer God's help, in very real terms.
This may mean offering to pray for them or their loved ones – many people really appreciate this. Or it may mean offering some more concrete help. Even bothering to find out what's going on in their lives might in itself be a help, as they discover that someone really cares about them.
And this is the big payoff. As we get to know our neighbours better, we develop a relationship with them. And relationships of love enrich our lives in so many ways. What seemed a burden in the beginning can turn into a joy.
Our congregation has made some efforts in the last while to find out just what it is that the people around us want and need. We have been asking them just what their spiritual needs are and how we can help. We are not here to organize the kind of worship service that we like, just because we like it. We are here to serve our neighbours. And then God will have the glory. Thanks be to God. Amen.
Mark 3:20 – 35
I was watching the TV show Downton Abbey the other day with Lucy. It takes place in pre-World War 1 England. It seems quaint to us to see a society where everybody had his or her own station, and knew just what society expected of them, whether they were a housemaid or a duke. And when one of the housemaids dared to buy herself a typewriter because she wanted a career as a typist, consternation arose all around! She was not following the script, the plan for her life that society had decreed!
We feel our society is not so rigid, and indeed it is not. Yet there are still scripts that are given to us by society, by our families and our employers. And woe betide us if we fail to follow the script, if we write our own scripts, or follow a different script! Many families have been thrown into confusion when a daughter becomes pregnant without being married, or if a son declares that he is gay. They are not following the script. People become distressed and anxious, and even angry, when the approved script is not followed.
In our Gospel today, Jesus is not following the script. Different people had different expectations of him, and he wasn't following any of their scripts. He wasn't raising an army to become the kind of military king some people wanted. He certainly wasn't being a good Jewish boy and marrying a nice girl and settling down and building up his carpentry shop. He wasn't supporting his widowed mother the way the eldest son was supposed to. He wasn't following the right script.
And so his family comes to take him home, to put an end to the craziness, to get him back on track again. And the Jewish authorities speak against him, warning people that he can't be the Messiah, because he is not following the right Messiah script.
Whenever we deviate from the script other people think we should be following, strong negative feelings are thrown at us. I'm sure you have experienced this in your own life. Either other people criticized you harshly for your behaviour, or you have criticized others for their behaviour. Because we all do it. It's one way that society tries to make people conform to what is considered normal behaviour.
And sometimes it's good, maybe most of the time it's good. We frown on bullying. When someone is verbally or physically abusive, we bring the full force of law down on them. When someone is wasting their money on addictions or gambling , familes resort to interventions, to bring them to their senses and impress upon them the damage they are doing, not only to themselves, but to the ones they love. This is what Jesus' family thought they were doing.
But sometimes, the script needs changing. Sometimes the way it's always been done is not the right way for this time and this place and this person. Sometimes God has a different script.
In our first lesson we see a clear distinction between God's script and the people's script. God wants Israel to be a different kind of nation, a nation that does not depend on the leadership of a king, but the leadership of God. But the people want to follow the script that all the other nations are following; they want a king. And so they get a king.
And in our Gospel, Jesus is writing a different script, too. It is a script where God has power over the forces of evil. It is a script where people who do the will of God are bound together in a family that is even stronger than a family bound by blood. It is a script which in the end will result in his death. And in his resurrection.
We all have a choice as to what script we will follow. Will we follow the script our families and society have given us? Or will we follow God's script? They are not always the same. And especially when God changes the script on us, there is hell to pay. We will face a great deal of doubt and opposition. Tempers will flare and harsh words will be said. There may even be ruptures in family relations. Sometimes it may seem that it is just not worth it.
God is changing the script in the world right now. For 500 years the Lutheran church has followed a certain script, a certain way of being the church in the world. This is what we grew up in, this is what we are used to and what we want. But it's not working any more. God has changed the script. God is pushing us to become a different kind of church.
Now this leads to a lot of confusion, doubt, anger and dissension. Even last Sunday we witnessed this. And what makes it worse is that it is hard to agree on what the script should be, even if we agree that the old script is not working any more.
It is easy to look at the story of Jesus and his family and see so clearly that Jesus was right and Jesus was following God's script. And it is easy to look back at Samuel and his contemporaries and see that it might have gone a lot better for them if they had paid attention to Samuel and played it according to God's script. I'm sure a hundred years from now people will look back at our struggles and clearly see that what we have done is right, or that we really missed the boat. I wonder which!
But whatever happens, we have to remember that the script we are to follow, is the same script that Jesus followed. We follow the script of reaching out to the hurting and lost. We follow the script of giving of ourselves in the face of criticism and scorn. When we were baptized, we were baptized into Jesus' death so that we would also participate in his resurrection. As Paul puts it, “We know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus, and will bring us with you into his presence. Yes, everything is for your sake, so that grace, as it extends to more and more people, may increase thanksgiving, to the glory of God. So we do not lose heart.” Now that is a very important point, because it is all too easy to lose heart when we are faced with confusion and doubt.
Paul goes on: “Even though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed day by day.” You could also say that of our congregation. Our outer nature is surely wasting away: our finances are faltering, our average attendance is slipping; but our inner nature does not depend on these external signs. The life of this congregation is still strong, the love we have for each other sustains us, and the hope for the future which God is giving us is carrying us along.
God has a future planned for us; a future with hope. God is guiding us to discover how we can move into that future. Between us, we and God are writing a new script for Our Saviour's Lutheran Church, a script that is loving and welcoming and challenging and inspiring. Thanks be to God! Amen.
Luke 24:36b-48
We Christians are a strange lot, according to the world. We believe in things that many people find completely incredible. Angels and demons – and a dead man rising back to life! That makes a lot of people think only of zombies, to tell the truth. Or ghosts.
There are so many different ways of seeing things – so many different ways of understanding the world. I was reading something last week that stated that every religion answers two questions: What is real? And what is important? And it is these questions that sharply divide Christians from those who do not believe.
The disciples had a lesson in our Gospel today about what was real. They thought, as everyone else does, that once a person had died, they stayed dead. And so, when Jesus appeared to them, they at once jumped to the conclusion that he was a ghost. I think they had never heard of zombies in that culture!
Jesus had quite a time convincing them that he was not a ghost! He had to show them his wounds to prove that it was really him and not a look-alike. He even had to eat some fish to prove he was not a ghost. (Good thing they didn't have any brains lying around...)
That makes us ponder, what is it that has convinced US that Jesus is alive? How has God reached into our lives and changed our way of seeing? For all our texts make it quite clear that we cannot see the truth, we cannot know what is real, what is important, unless it is revealed to us by God's own self.
“You mortals, how long will you dishonor my glory? How long will you love illusions and seek after lies?” says our Psalm today. “Many are saying, “Who will show us any good?” Let the light of your face shine upon us, O Lord.”
And this is indeed what many are saying. They want to be shown something good, they want to know what is real and what is important, but they just can't see it. This world is a mirrored fun-house, where illusion is just as convincing as the truth. How can any of us know the truth?
There is only one way, and Jesus brings that way to his disciples. “He opened their minds to understand the scriptures.” God is the one who brings understanding to our minds. God is the one who enables us to understand what is real and what is important.
The people that Peter was preaching to had seriously misunderstood the situation when Jesus had been killed. “You rejected the Holy and Righteous One and asked to have a murderer given to you, and you killed the author of life, whom God raised from the dead.” Can't get more misunderstood than that, can you? And now, is God furious with them? Has God rejected them?
No! Peter tells them, “I know that you acted in ignorance, as did also your rulers.” They couldn't help it, God had not revealed the truth to them, so that God's plan of redemption could be carried out. So Peter goes on and offers them the way out: “Repent therefore, and turn to God so that your sins may be wiped out.” This is always the way God works; God offers us forgiveness and a chance at a new beginning. Even when we have acted in ignorance, even when we knew perfectly well what we were doing was wrong, God offers us forgiveness and and new start.
And then a miracle happens. We see the truth. We see the truth about ourselves, we see the truth about God, and we see the way forward, the way to God. A few steps, anyway. Enough to be going on with. Steps in the right direction. Steps out of the fun house, the house of mirrors, the world of illusion.
God speaks to us through the words of scripture. God speaks to us through the words of preachers. God speaks to us through the wonder of nature. God speaks to us through the love of the community. God speaks to us in the silence of the dark of the night. God never stops speaking to us, calling us, revealing God's own self, God's own love to us.
This is what is real. This is what is important. God's love shown to us in the old stories about Jesus rising from the tomb. God's love shown to us in the healing done in Jesus' name. God's love shown to us in the forgiveness of sins.
“See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called the children of God; and that is what we are. The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Beloved, we are God's children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed.” Thanks be to God. Amen.
John 20:19-31
“These are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.” This is the big SO THAT, the chief motivation for John to write his gospel, and for that matter, for all the gospel writers. So that you may come to believe.
Now, we tend to use the word believe as if it means to have an opinion. “I believe it is going to rain today.” The word has a much deeper meaning as it is used in the Bible. There is intellectual content of course, but there is also an element of trust and confidence, and even loyalty, to the word believe.
Now, how does this belief happen? What causes it?
The kind of proof we need to believe in Jesus is not the kind of proof that we need if we are, say, developing a cure for cancer. It is not scientific, experimental, verifiable proof that we need. It is more like the kind of proof we need for falling in love. Ian and I know about this. We had only known each other 3 months when we decided to get married. And then we were only engaged for 5 weeks! 4 months from start to, well, not to finish, because that was only the start after all, and we're still going, after 38 years. We didn't need a lot of proof that we were a good match – and we were right.
Thomas thought that he needed tangible proof. “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.” He wanted proof that he could touch. But in the end, he didn't need that much proof. There is no indication that he actually did touch Jesus. When he saw Jesus and heard his voice, that was enough – he fell to his knees: “My Lord and my God!”
And there are many who don't even have this amount of proof – who just hear the story, and believe. And they are blessed.
Now I think there are 3 stages to coming to belief in Jesus. 1. We are attracted by the story, we want to believe it is true. 2. We decide to believe it is true, and start to behave as if it is true. 3. We get affirmation of the truth of our belief by what we experience.
This is also true in the process of falling in love: I first met Ian and just knew that we would be good friends. I decided that he was worth getting to know better. Then as we spent time together, we found more and more reasons to keep spending time together.
So the process of coming to belief in Jesus is much like falling in love with someone: You hear the story of Jesus; you decide that it would be worthwhile to be one of his followers; and as you act like his follower, you have experiences that convince you that you were right; everything about him is true.
What is the proof for you? Some people have had supernatural experiences. One man I know was baptized in a river as an adult. He says that while he was under the water, he could feel the pastor holding his hand, but he could feel another hand in his other hand, and he knew that it was God's. Some people have dreams or visions. Some people just have a sense of a comforting presence. All these are valid signs of the presence of God, proofs that the Jesus story is true.
But there is another affirmation that the gospel is true: the love and fellowship that is found in the church. It is significant that Thomas, after he was not present at the first appearance of Jesus, did give up. He was still with the community when Jesus appeared again. He didn't abandon his friends because he thought they were deluded. He still hung around with them.
The kind of love that the early church had for one another is so beautifully described in our first lesson from Acts: “Now the whole group of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and... everything they owned was held in common.” And in the second lesson: “If we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another.”
Because when we believe, we have no need anymore to SEE the body of the risen Christ. We ARE the body of the risen Christ. WE are the proof that Jesus is alive.
Now, walking in the light, as John says, means being honest with one another. It means being honest with ourselves about our faults and our shortcomings. It means forgiving one another. We cut each other some slack because we are all struggling with some sin or other, if we are honest about it. And Jesus tells us to forgive one another in the power of the Holy Spirit. If we retain the sins of any, they are retained. We have to let go of them, let go of all our grudges and hard feelings from the past, and forgive one another freely, in order to set each other free.
In a world where everybody seems to be promoting their own agendas and putting up a perfect front for the world to see, covering up their inadequacies, it can be refreshing to be among a people who are humble and honest and forgiving. And this is the final proof that Jesus is alive.
People will fall in love with Jesus when they not only hear his story but see him in the flesh. And that's us, folks. We are the body of Christ. A bit broken, but filled with new life, the life of the Spirit, eternal life. Thanks be to God! Amen.
Just when you think you know how the world works, God comes and turns everything upside down.
On Maundy Thursday Jesus taught his disciples that bosses are now servants, and servants are bosses, in fact, there are no more bosses and servants in the Kingdom of God, but all are servants of each other, bound together in love.
On Good Friday Jesus taught his disciples that vulnerability is victory, that defeat is glory, that failure is success, that the only way that violence and hatred can be overcome is with love and forgiveness.
And now on Easter Sunday, Jesus is teaching us that death is life, and that humanity is now divine, as the divine is human.
Last Sunday we contemplated God in Jesus, hanging on the cross out of love for God's fallen creation, taking responsibility for all the sin and suffering of the world. God had to become human for God to know the full extent of our fallenness. And so God did the unthinkable thing – God did not hold us to account for our sins. God took those sins upon God's own self, and paid a terrible price of abandonment, suffering and death.
Some would say, “Well, if God takes responsibility for all my sins, then doesn't that allow me to just do whatever I want and keep on sinning?” Well, yes and no. If you are some kind of sociopath, who is not moved by suffering, who doesn't have any compassion, yes, I suppose so. But then you would keep on sinning anyway.
But when we see the suffering of Jesus, we are deeply moved. It is always moving to see the victim of an injustice. And seeing this suffering arouses compassion. Compassion is made of two latin words: con, meaning with, and passion, meaning suffering. We suffer with Christ. That's what it means to be baptized into the death of Christ. This is what it means to eat his body and drink his blood at communion. We are joined to him, we have communion with him in his death. We take his death into our bodies, just as he took our body to his death. We think about his suffering, we have compassion with him, we are grateful to him, and so we participate in his death.
And then we are transformed. Because when Christ participated in every single aspect of human life – including death – human life was taken up into the life of God. And was transformed. Now all human life is caught up in the life of the divine. As Peter said, there is no distinction based on ethnicity or culture. “Everyone who fears God and does what is right is acceptable to him.” God and humans are joined together on the most basic level – right down to the DNA.
And this is activated in our baptism. As we participate in the death of Jesus, we also participate in the resurrection of Christ. Christ's life is in us. We are in Christ as Christ is in us. And new life begins.
John is pointing to that new life in the way he writes his account of the resurrection. You notice, that Mary comes to the tomb “while it was still dark”. This may remind us of the darkness and chaos before the creation of the universe, while “the earth was formless and empty, and darkness was over the surface of the deep.” That is certainly how Mary must have felt in her grief. Life had no shape now, no content – her life was in darkness.
And of course, where does this story take place? In a garden. Just like the first garden, the garden of Eden. In the garden of Eden, God had grieved because the first humans were lost to him; now Mary is grieving because she thinks that God is lost to her. No wonder Mary thinks that Jesus is the gardener; he IS the gardener of the new Eden. And the fruits that this garden produces are love and joy and peace.
This is no longer the first day of the week, the first day of creation. Sunday has now become the eighth day of creation, the day of new creation. Eight has always symbolized the resurrection; when you come up for communion, take a look at the font and see how many sides it has!
Everything is different now – the very rules of the universe have changed. Death no more has dominion over the universe. God is changing things, slowly but surely, and you are a part of that change.
For this God-life that has become a part of you in your baptism will not be denied. It will grow in you, Christ will grow in you, and you will find yourself less and less attracted to sin. You will find yourself more interested in caring for your neighbour. You will become more and more the person God wants you to be.
And in the end, even death itself has lost its sting. The psalm that we read earlier is the one that I read at a burial, standing beside the open grave: “This is the gate of the Lord; here the righteous may enter.” Or, as the choir sang last week: “Here, O Lord, the very death I fear is that which draws me near, Lord, to Thee.”
Death has become life. Sorrow has become joy. Guilt has become forgiveness. God has turned everything upside down. Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia!
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