Posts
It was once said that:
"This life therefore is not righteousness, but growth in righteousness,
not health, but healing, not being, but becoming, not rest, but exercise. We
are not yet what we shall be, but we are growing toward it. The process is not
yet finished, but it is going on. This is not the end, but it is the road. All
does not yet gleam in Glory, but all is being purified."
These words came from the lips of a
man, in the midst of a very divided church. You could say, at the time of the
Reformation, much like our current time, perhaps, the evil one is at work in
dividing us. This is in not only our priorities in serving the Gospel but
dividing us truly against one another and against the Holy Spirit and his work
within us.
The Gospel this week has a
disturbing conversation going on between Jesus and now the Scribes. The Scribes
were like the snobby cousin to the Pharisees, you could say. They were all
about scholarly transcribing and implementing Jewish law. Jesus already had
them all riled up last week if you recall, in pointing out their indifference
by healing the man with the withered hand. This week, there's two things going
on, another nasty confrontation with Jesus' new enemies and his family. Jesus'
family was embarrassed and worried about his safety and want to try to take him
out of the crowds, to bring the peace. It doesn't sound like Mary and Jesus' brothers
are being too supportive. And yes, if you caught that, Mary did have other
children after Jesus. But maybe like all mothers are, she was worried for His
safety and her heart was just thinking in terms of being a mother and not
concerned really with Jesus' mission at the moment.
I really wonder what His disciples
were thinking. We don't hear from them this week but perhaps they're standing
on the sidelines with their mouths dropped open at the bravery and power of
Jesus to play with the Scribes and Pharisees in parable. When the Scribes
accuse Jesus of speaking through the voice of Satan... it is a horrible sin.
This is beyond the fact of who Jesus is, but that they are trying to pin an
image upon him out of their own agenda to squelch anyone who goes against their
wants and needs of power and control. There's a similar power struggle
going on, unintended you could say, with our first lesson about Adam and Eve
their rebellion against God. Their rebellion was basically by their eating the
fruit of the tree of knowledge. They blame each other, almost in a comical
fashion, and then they blame the snake. The fact that they were trying to hide
in God's Garden and showed fear, was a movement away from God's original
purposes for creation.
Returning to that beginning quote: “This
life therefore is not righteousness, but growth in righteousness....” Let's
take a look at that. What do you think this person means? “This life therefore,
is not righteousness?” Is it an acknowledgement of the reality of sin in the
world, or is it this reformer's confession? Is this a confession stating that
we cannot escape the reality of sin; but we strive to grow in righteousness? Is
this being that we struggle to do the right thing? That sounds familiar doesn't
it? It seems to be a carryover theme from last week— “do the right thing.” As I
taught you last week the exercise of believe, receive, incorporate and share.
This week we are to learn about reflection, confession, repentance and renewal.
In giving credit, where credit is due, these were wonderful nuggets of learning
I received studying, in planting those churches with Pastor Dawson. It's a wonderful
summary of thinking of how we exercise daily and struggle daily in our
discipleship.
The remainder of that quote
continues to say: "This life is there for not concerning health, but
healing…” What exactly are we healing from? This is the problem of evil in the world.
The 19th Century's Enlightenment, painted with a broad brush, absolving us
prematurely from struggling with the depths of evil by saying: it's all about
us, and nothing more. I beg to differ though, I would say that the reality of
evil is very real, and it is including forces beyond our control. Don't get me
wrong I'm not saying there's a little man with a pitchfork out there… We don't
know. We've not seen the face of Satan, we've only seen the work of Satan in
the world with great acts of evil. Spiritual warfare is a very old term,
but it is a starting point for us to understand the reality, our dual reality
of being simultaneously both saint and sinner. Life is not to be seen
completely through "rose-colored-glasses," but lived with eyes wide
open. That's a curious verse that we see from our first lesson from Genesis,
here they open their eyes to the reality of discovering their nakedness. They
felt the first emotion of sin as being shame, and as being afraid.
In regard to the next segment of the
initial thought— “…not being, but becoming, not rest, but exercise...” Welcome
to the journey of being a disciple. Being a disciple is being able to trudge up
the hill and hear that saying in your head: "no guts, no glory" or
"no cross, no crown." Tough stuff, do you have the right motivation
to persevere, to endure? Jesus is being pretty harsh here for He's not only
playing with them in speaking through parables, but He doesn't seem to care
about what people think about Him at all. He's focused on His mission to have
the truth heard. When they start accusing Him of being ruled by demons, to cast
out demons… Jesus doesn't hold back. Verse 29 is perhaps probably a very
serious warning: “whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit can never have forgiveness
but is guilty of an eternal sin.” The Holy Spirit, the Spirit aspect of the
Triune God, was not only understood then, as a revealer of Truth in the heart,
but also that great mirror of conviction to see the heart of where you really
are. We must never forget and be humble, that we are always in the process of
becoming. The reformer is right— “we are not yet what we shall be, but we are
growing towards it.”
Perhaps even the state of our
surroundings right now this "physical Church in progress," you should
see in a different light. It has been a difficult set of Sundays for us. We
either didn't have the air working, or had painted over light bulbs, wrapped-up
cabinets and dusty, dirty floors to deal with… but we gathered nonetheless. We
gathered nonetheless, because we are here for a greater purpose and mission.
Think about the state of your heart right now. It is a work in progress. The
Holy Spirit keeps us in line to see the folly of our ways. To help us realize, see
the good that we've accomplished, especially when we've struggled and climbed
up that mountain to finally see the light!
I've been doing a lot of reading
this past week in little crevices of time I have in between all the other tasks
I do weekly in serving here. I was reading a book about the “why” of worship.
It talked about our gathering as being the “gathered guests” of God in His home
away from home you could say. The simple things that we do together in the
small amount of time on this Sunday, God's day, is to motivate us to
scatter. To motivate and encourage us to take the time to reflect— past,
present and future. To reflect upon what we need to do and how we are, on this common
road together in our diversity of spirit and gifts. Being the Body of Christ is
being a part of that great kinship with Christ. This is especially when we
don't stray in keeping our promise to be children of Grace. This is believing,
receiving that Grace, incorporating it in all that we do and sharing it with
others. Now is the time for us to reflect and live into that confession of just
where we are and where we need to go. That's repentance who is opening the eyes
to something you can't hide from.
Adam and Eve tried to hide in God's
Garden. They tried to duck away from their rebellion of eating the fruit.
I think that's such an interesting image, eating the forbidden fruit of the “tree
of knowledge.” Perhaps it's like going from a to z and avoiding all the
consequences and accountability that come in between that help us to grow fully
as God's Children of Grace and Promise. The process is not yet finished. It
is ongoing, and it is not the end, but it is the road. “All does not yet gleam
in Glory, but all is being purified.”
That last sentence is just as
powerful and profound as Jesus last comment to the Scribes.... “All does not
yet gleam in Glory, but all is being purified.” Glory is one of those words
that has a Pandora's Box of meanings and misunderstandings. Glory here is not
the glory we think of as personal triumph and success. The glory of God is truly
something profoundly humbling and is spiritually washing us of the destructive
elements sin has given us. “No guts, no glory” or “no cross, no crown” is
certainly not to be heard in the wrong way. Perhaps now we should talk
about that snake. The snake encourages the pair that it's okay and that this
holds a special knowledge that they must partake in. The father of all lies
also known as Satan loves to paint the picture a different way in everything
that we choose to contemplate or consider doing. The consequences are seemingly
gone. The accountability is neatly whitewashed for our convenience. Our
convenience of doing things, the way we would like to do them.
“Doing the right thing,” becomes too
much work. We'd rather do things our own way, worry about the consequences, the
letters in between a to z, later. The inexorable truth of the matter is
that we can't avoid that there's always going to be a spiritual struggle
between “doing the do's of the Gospel,” that is doing the right thing or doing
whatever we feel like, also in a simplistic sense, “the don'ts of the Gospel.”
Can't there be something in between? That's where that middle road could be
misunderstood. God gave them a commandment not to eat the fruit of the tree,
but they thought perhaps blaming something else would free them from the
consequences of their rebellious thoughts.
I like to think of myself as a “rebel
with a cause.” I am one of many Christian Pastors in the world trying to be
faithful to teach and spread God's Word. I am being faithful to encouraging
others to be enlightened, inspired and renewed by the Holy Spirit's work. To
get to that point of seeing enlightenment, being inspired and finally feeling
renewed, is by acknowledging the Holy Spirit's lessons and efforts in your own
life. I am simply here holding up the mirror through God’s Word. Your life
comes together, is revealed to you, by God's work within you.
Being a rebel with a cause is being
an activist wearing different hats. This past week one of the things that I saw
that wrenched my heart to tears, was the plight of this one mobile park,
Sunrise Mountain, that has chosen to evict all of its senior, disabled veterans
from their homes in 30 days or less. It was just a little blip on Channel 5
News and I have not heard or seen any other coverage after that. The managers
of that park don't want to deal with fixing the water. The water has lead, arsenic
and other toxins in it, that they don't want to spend the money or time fixing…
so why not just throw out all of the people, sell the land, and money makes the
world go around! How profoundly evil and heartless could you be?!
I've already begun to see who I
could find to reach out and help those people. The wheels of justice, as they
say are running perhaps too slowly, which is a sad reality for these people.
There was a similar mobile park case, a number of years ago in Illinois. The
managers there refused to spend the money and fix the horrible problems they
had with their water as well. One of the activists within this park finally did
reach out to the district attorney of the state to see what she could do. Apparently,
the attorney didn't have enough “clout” to see Justice through. Many of the
homes were vacated and sold. Where when you look through applications such as
Google Earth, it looks like a wasteland of concrete beds no longer hosting a
home on top. That was something like 10 years ago and still nothing has really
changed at all.
I wonder what's going to happen with
the people at Sunrise Mountain trailer park? There's a great irony in the words:
Sunrise Mountain.... for those veterans and disabled elderly are going to be
climbing a very hard mountain to keep the faith and hope that Justice will be
served on their behalf. That they will be helped to find new homes and not be
thrown into homelessness. The reality of wages versus the reality of even
securing a small domicile to rent are cruel and somewhat indifferent.
This is even more so, for the plight of homelessness in our neighboring state
of California. Why aren't those in charge ashamed of themselves for allowing
this to happen? Pointing fingers threatening to “succeed…” is their only
efforts in dealing with their many problems of failed policies, greed and
indifference.
I have already begun praying and
hoping for the people at Sunrise Mountain mobile park, and in other areas of
America where they fall between the cracks, because of our failure to be
accountable to care for others. The hateful words from the mouths of the Scribes
and Pharisees probably did test the human and divine side of Jesus. Jesus
seemingly harsh words to the crowd in regard to his mother's and brothers’ fears,
was to make a point. How can life be worth living, if we are not able to
give? How can we say we are children of Grace and especially of promise,
if we can't even forgive and grow from our own experiences in life? We are
becoming a divided house. Our hearts are divided from our actions. We just do
and justify things for our own agendas and purposes. We are no longer “gathered
guests” within the house of God, but strangers alienated by our own internal rebellion.
We have allowed the evil one to claim victory and lay stakes within our hearts.
Our earthiness becomes like those “flimsy
tents” that Paul talks about in Corinthians. We're hiding in the wilderness of
our sin. We're covering ourselves up with our own justification. We've had our
cake, and we've been eating it too… at what cost I ask? The house of God will
always have its doors open to us. We just need to be opening our lives to the
truth the Holy Spirit reveals to us.
Let us pray,
Loving and Gracious God,
Help us to see the truth of the Holy
Spirit’s work in our lives
Help our hearts and our minds to be
open to doing, choosing the do’s of the Gospel over the don'ts.
Help us to be reflecting upon
ourselves and our actions.
Help us to confess the truth of what
we believe and what we must do.
Help us repent of our poor choices
and forgive, love our neighbors
As we grow in renewal through the New
life you have given us to reap in Grace.
Amen
June
10th, 2018; Third Sunday after Pentecost; Proper 5; Green; SOLA Lectionary
Sermon
By: Reverend Nicole A.M. Collins
Psalm
130; Genesis 3:8-15; 2 Corinthians 4:13—5:1; Mark 3:20-35
The link below is to this sermon's delivery at First Congregational Church at 10am:
No comments:
Post a Comment