Though many people followed Jesus,
as he moved closer to the end of his time on earth his teachings became more intense
and harder for people to accept.
The people who followed him
into the wilderness in chapter 15
know that there is something unusual about him, but they opt
to believe that he is just a normal human being.
This will become clear later.
For example when he heals the sick
and then feeds them in the wilderness
they want to proclaim him as their earthly King,
but he disappears
for he does not yet want
to confront the political and religious powers.
The disciples leave by boat to cross the lake
and the people walk around the shore
to get to where they are going,
they are aware that Jesus
was not with the disciples in the boat.
When they do find Jesus on the other side
they ask him not “How did you get here”
but instead “When did you arrive?”
which implies no understanding
that he is more than human.
Jesus doesn’t answer their question.
Instead he tells them that they are looking for him
not because of the signs he performed, demonstrating God’s life-giving power,
but because they got free food
that they didn’t have to work for.
Sure these people worked hard
to provide daily bread for themselves.
However, finding a miraculous source of food
that doesn’t require hard work is certainly amazing and they don’t want to turn loose
of the opportunity that presents:
Give us more of the same!
Jesus, though,
wants to redirect their attention to God.
He reminds them that the manna
that the Children of Israel
received in the wilderness
came not from the human Moses
but from the Divine God.
He reminds them that the manna spoiled quickly. So will this physical food that I have given to you. Instead you should desire something more lasting. Seek the Bread of Life,
food that will endure into the eternal life,
food that nourishes your spirit.
The people then ask him a question
that modern people like you and I often ask:
What must we do to do the work of God?
In other words, how can I make sure
by what I do that I will
inherit eternal life?
Jesus tells them that it isn’t about works,
It’s about belief. They need to believe
In the One that God has sent.
In other words, believe in Jesus!
You and I can be pretty stubborn
when we want to be, especially when it concerns our relationship with God.
How often have you pleaded with God
to show you a sign that what you want to do
is the right thing to do?
We’ve all done it.
Those following Jesus were no different
and they ask him to show them a sign
to prove that he is from God.
That in itself is pretty amazing,
given the fact that they have recently witnessed Jesus heal the sick and feed thousands of people
in the wilderness
but those miracles weren’t good enough for them. They want even more sensational miracles,
not to prove who Jesus is,
but because, they, like us enjoyed fireworks
and awe-inspiring acrobatic performances
for the sheer entertainment
that such things provide.
They are really saying: Entertain us, Jesus!
We want a supernatural performance!
Make sure it involves a miracle or two
and please don’t forget the snacks!
They demand more manna telling Jesus
that Moses gave the people bread from heaven.
They haven’t gotten the message yet,
so Jesus reminds them that it wasn’t Moses
who gave their ancestors bread in the wilderness,
but it was God.
He keeps trying to direct their attention
to the divine, but like you and me,
they insist on sticking to the concrete things of life.
He tells them that the Bread of Life from Heaven
will give them eternal life.
They ask for the bread to be given to them,
showing again that they are totally missing
what he is trying to tell them.
Jesus explains his relationship with God:
“I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. But as I told you, you have seen me and still you do not believe.37 All those the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away. 38 For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me. 39 And this is the will of him who sent me, that I shall lose none of all those he has given me, but raise them up at the last day. 40 For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.”
Their reaction is basically to ask,
“Who does this guy think that he is?
We know his father and mother.
We know where he comes from.
He isn’t anything special.
And since they know his family
they can’t believe he actually came from heaven.
Let me ask you a question this morning:
Who do you know that could be God in disguise?
Several movies and TV shows over the years
have cast normal human beings
in the role of God. I
t’s always interesting
to see who they give the role to:
an eight year old girl,
a 90 year old man with a cigar.
Let me ask you another question,
Who do you know that you believe
couldn’t possibly ever represent God?
Who would you have trouble accepting
if he or she was God in human form?
A Transperson? A gay guy? A lesbian?
A straight person? A child? A physically challenged person? Who would you reject? Who would you accept?
Jesus explains that he is the Bread of Life from God and that they must eat his flesh and drink his blood in order to have eternal life with God.
You have to understand that ancient people
often talked this way, especially politicians,
by saying such things as
‘eat my flesh and drink my blood’
meaning to agree with me
and join me in my effort.
However, what Jesus says is an affront to those
who eat Kosher food.
You don’t mix bread and blood.
This was extremely offensive talk.
Centuries of eucharistic theology
give us a way to understand these words,
but at the time they were more than puzzling -- they probably were downright offensive.
Rightly reading the mood,
Jesus says, "Does this offend you?"
The idea of eating human flesh
or drinking human blood
still offends us today.
Like us, they probably missed his real meaning
with their perceived offense
of his breaking dietary laws.
It was too much to take and
many walk away from Jesus.
Left alone with his most intimate disciples
and friends he asks them,
“Do you, too, want to leave me?”
Jesus’ question echoes down the ages,
“What about you, do you, too want to leave me?” Are the teachings of Jesus too tough for us
to understand and follow in our personal lives?
Is it out of the question
for us to become the New Community of God?
Jesus was asking his followers
to make some very foundational changes
in their lives.
They wanted their lives to remain the same,
with just a few miracles included
every now and then to keep things exciting.
They wanted to experience the sensational things God could do for them
without experiencing the sensational changes
God wanted to make inside of them,
in their thinking and in their behaviors.
Basically they were saying,
“Jesus, as long as you make us feel good
and perform more miracles,
hey, we’re there with you.
But when you start meddling in our lives
and asking us to change how we relate to God
and others, that’s just too much to take.”
Where are you with Jesus today?
Are you praying for a miracle
to be worked in your life:
a job, winning the lottery,
physical healing, or something else?
What if God does work the miracle
and proves to your personal satisfaction
that God does care about you…
which is really something
that you don’t have to worry about…
because God has loved you
and cared for you from long before the moment that God created you inside your mother’s womb. If you do get your miracle
will you then try to really follow Christ?
What if Jesus asks you to do something
that is really tough?
Will you hang in there with Jesus
and do what it takes
to become the kind of person
that God wants you to be
or will you bail out on Jesus?
Or what if there is no miracle?
Will you follow God anyway?
Doing what God wants takes guts.
My family used to say,
“When the going gets tough,
the tough get going.”
It takes courage to become the person
or the church God desires us to become
especially in our relationships with others.
We seem to forget that Jesus’ ministry
was based on something
that is really very difficult
for most of us to do
…relationship building.
Jesus wants to connect us with God
and with others.
Most importantly Jesus wanted his followers
to expand their definition
of what community meant
and to include within their New Community
all the different varieties of humanity
that then existed.
Living up to the expectations of God
means that even when the going gets tough
and the rest of the world
doesn’t understand what we are doing
and chooses to not come along with us
that we have to keep on working
toward achieving Christ’s vision of the future,
of the full inclusion of all humanity.
We need to concentrate on who Jesus Christ is, what Jesus Christ did,
apply the lessons that he taught.
Jesus is our best textbook
for becoming the New Community of God.
When I don’t know what to do as a pastor
I ask myself, “What would Jesus do?”
And I often get a very different answer
than the one I had thought about
before I asked myself that question.
How can I break down the walls
that separate people from each other?
How can I cross the barriers
that society has erected to keep people apart?
How can I, through what I do and say,
build up hope for others,
for myself, for my church?
Emerald City MCC Seattle is on a journey
to tear down walls and build up hope.
We are searching for what we believe
God wants us to become.
Some have decided to abandon the journey
and have left us,
others, however, have renewed themselves
and joined in the effort with us.
God has blessed uswith a vision
of the future of our church that is incredible!
We can become the New Community of God
built upon faith and hope and caring
…a community that Jesus will be proud of
and says represents exactly
what he was talking about.
Yes, it will be tough.
Yes, it will not happen overnight,
but if we keep our eyes on that vision
of the future God has planted within us,
we will get there, together with God.
Stanley Jones tells of a missionary
who got lost in an African jungle,
nothing around him but bush
and a few cleared places.
He found a native hut and asked the native
if he could get him out.
The native said he could.
"All right," said the missionary,
"show me the way."
The native said, "Walk,"
so they walked and hacked their way
through unmarked jungle
for more than an hour.
The missionary got worried.
"Are you quite sure this is the way?
Where is the path?"
The native said, "Bwana, in this place
there is no path.
I am the path."
I think that it is here that Peter
has one of his more honest and real moments.
His guard was down
because so many people were leaving Jesus.
They were leaving because, quite frankly,
things were getting a little too tough.
So, Jesus asks the twelve,
are you going to leave me as well?
"Lord, to whom shall we go?" Peter replied,
"You have the words of eternal life.
You are the Holy One of God."
Peter speaks for us all.
Because in this world there is no path.
Peter, you are right.
Jesus is the Path!
What about you, will you desert Christ, too,
now that the going is tough?
Like Peter I pray and hope your answer is:
“Christ, to whom shall we go?
You have the words of eternal life. 69
We have come to believe
and to know that you
are the Holy One of God.”
Sunday, July 17, 2011
Sunday, July 10, 2011
Living Life on God's Terms Romans 8:1-5
Life has a way of changing, sometimes so rapidly that it’s hard for us to keep up. Did you ever wonder as society and culture bring enormous changes economically and socially change into our lives just what your faith response is supposed to be? Where is my place in all of this change? Where is God in all of this? How do we hang on to the important spiritual aspects of our faith but allow almost overwhelming changes to enter in our lives without destroying our faith? What can we do or not do to assure our relationship with God is a good one?
I'm sure the First Century Christians in Rome had many of the same questions that you and I do today. Society was rapidly changing for them, too. Then they get a letter from Preacher Paul that tells them that we all, even Paul, are confused about what is God's will for our lives and that we often fall far short of achieving anything near our goal in faithful matters or actions.
"Good news," Paul says. We don't have to do anything to make sure that we are all right with God, because God has already done that for us through Jesus, God's Child, who came into the world to share with us God's incredible Love and Acceptance.
Listen carefully! Whenever you are down on yourself because you think you have failed God or family or friends or yourself, stop and read what Paul says in the first verse of chapter 8: "There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus!"
Get it? You don't have to feel guilty or depressed because you couldn't live up to the expectations you thought God, friends, family, or you had for yourself. God loves and accepts you exactly the way that you are...warts and all. God loves you and me so much that God forgives us, forgets what we've done to keep God away, embraces us and includes us in God's family giving us the same inheritance as our Big Brother Jesus.
The fact is that though we don’t want to sin, that is do those things that separate us from God, we still do them. We then feel guilty because we couldn’t stop ourselves. In chapter 8 of Romans Paul describes the Christian life as feeling stuck between knowing what to do and not being able to do it. Sometimes it is very difficult to choose the right thing to do, knowing that others will have very strong opinions about our choices and may in fact accuse us of sinning because we did in fact choose the right thing which in their opinion was the wrong thing. You ever ask yourself that question, “How can I be right and still be wrong?” Life is very confusing.
Then in the midst of our confusion along comes Preacher Paul and tells us: “There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus!” Did you hear that? No condemnation! None! Not now! Not in the future! Not ever! Why? Because God loves you enough to forgive you, to restore you to a full loving relationship with God just like the Father welcomed back the Prodigal Son when he came back home.
That, Paul says, is exactly why Jesus came into our world. Not to show us how we must live in order to receive God’s love. Not to satisfy some weird sense of ancient justice that makes it possible for God to love us only if Christ’s blood is shed. And most definitely not to demand that Jesus be tortured and brutalized so that you and I can feel both guilty and grateful for his sacrifice.
No Jesus came to show us through his life and love how much God already loves us. His example was so extremely out of step with what his ancient society thought was right that they killed him. But through his resurrection we found out that God’s love is more powerful than anything, more powerful than death, more powerful than our sin, more powerful than our confusion and guilt.
That last part is probably the toughest for us to understand and accept: No matter how many times we are told that we’re forgiven, no matter how bravely we act, I believe it’d be a good bet that we all live quiet lives of desperation. What is it about your own life that your regret? What happened to you that you can’t quiet seem to get over? What did you do years ago that you still kick yourself about? Are you and another person at odds with each other? Maybe it’s an old lover, a parent, a sibling, a co-worker?
When I talk with people as their pastor there always seems to be one thing in their life that they regret happening and can’t seem to bring themselves to forgive themselves for, or to move forward in their life because of that past. Even when I’ve worked with someone for months, sometimes years, and I think that they have made progress toward forgiving themselves and moving on, I discover that they are still hurting and haven’t yet found a way to forgive themselves or another.
You’ve got two blank pieces of paper in your bulletin this morning. I want you to use one of those papers to write down that one regret, that one bitter moment, that one broken relationship, that failed attempt in your life to get right with God or another. What is it that keeps you from claiming God’s promises in your life? Take just a moment and write something down.
Now I want you to hear Paul’s words one more time: “There is therefore now no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus.” Get it? No matter what you have done, no matter what others may have told you previously, no matter what you think you believed before today, GOD IS NOT ANGRY WITH YOU! God loves you, forgives you, accepts you just as you are and sets you free to live a life of meaning, purpose, grace and gratitude.
During communion this morning. I want you to take that piece of paper and toss it into this garbage pail. Throw away your regrets, toss out your failures, get rid of all the ancient history that keeps you from claiming God’s love and acceptance for you. I don’t care what it is, God doesn’t care what it is, just get rid of it. Stop letting it have control over your life. Stop wearing your shame and confusion like some snail shell you have to carry around with you everywhere you go. Take it off. Take it all off! Do your own strip-tease this morning and get rid of anything and everything that keeps you from having a real and right relationship with God. As you throw that piece of paper away this morning say to yourself: “There is therefore no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus.”
Let’s practice saying it together, There is therefore no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus.” Now you say it: “There is therefore no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus.”
When you have finished communion, go back to your seat and take out the second piece of paper and write down what it is that you are now free to do or become because you no longer have that threat of inadequacy and condemnation, of shame and regret hanging over you. What might you dare to do? What challenge will you accept? What act of courage or generosity might you attempt because you know that you are beloved by God whether you succeed or fail?
Then I want you to put that piece of paper in your wallet or your purse and take it with you this week as a living remembrance of God’s promise to be with you and to empower you with God’s Spirit to share God’s love with others you come into contact with at home, at work, at play.
One pastor reports that a neighbor has a sign on his front door that reads: “Tell me what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life.” My question to you today is this: “Tell me what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life now that there is no condemnation. What will you do now that you are free? What will you do with all the love and grace that God can give you? What will you do….?”
I'm sure the First Century Christians in Rome had many of the same questions that you and I do today. Society was rapidly changing for them, too. Then they get a letter from Preacher Paul that tells them that we all, even Paul, are confused about what is God's will for our lives and that we often fall far short of achieving anything near our goal in faithful matters or actions.
"Good news," Paul says. We don't have to do anything to make sure that we are all right with God, because God has already done that for us through Jesus, God's Child, who came into the world to share with us God's incredible Love and Acceptance.
Listen carefully! Whenever you are down on yourself because you think you have failed God or family or friends or yourself, stop and read what Paul says in the first verse of chapter 8: "There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus!"
Get it? You don't have to feel guilty or depressed because you couldn't live up to the expectations you thought God, friends, family, or you had for yourself. God loves and accepts you exactly the way that you are...warts and all. God loves you and me so much that God forgives us, forgets what we've done to keep God away, embraces us and includes us in God's family giving us the same inheritance as our Big Brother Jesus.
The fact is that though we don’t want to sin, that is do those things that separate us from God, we still do them. We then feel guilty because we couldn’t stop ourselves. In chapter 8 of Romans Paul describes the Christian life as feeling stuck between knowing what to do and not being able to do it. Sometimes it is very difficult to choose the right thing to do, knowing that others will have very strong opinions about our choices and may in fact accuse us of sinning because we did in fact choose the right thing which in their opinion was the wrong thing. You ever ask yourself that question, “How can I be right and still be wrong?” Life is very confusing.
Then in the midst of our confusion along comes Preacher Paul and tells us: “There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus!” Did you hear that? No condemnation! None! Not now! Not in the future! Not ever! Why? Because God loves you enough to forgive you, to restore you to a full loving relationship with God just like the Father welcomed back the Prodigal Son when he came back home.
That, Paul says, is exactly why Jesus came into our world. Not to show us how we must live in order to receive God’s love. Not to satisfy some weird sense of ancient justice that makes it possible for God to love us only if Christ’s blood is shed. And most definitely not to demand that Jesus be tortured and brutalized so that you and I can feel both guilty and grateful for his sacrifice.
No Jesus came to show us through his life and love how much God already loves us. His example was so extremely out of step with what his ancient society thought was right that they killed him. But through his resurrection we found out that God’s love is more powerful than anything, more powerful than death, more powerful than our sin, more powerful than our confusion and guilt.
That last part is probably the toughest for us to understand and accept: No matter how many times we are told that we’re forgiven, no matter how bravely we act, I believe it’d be a good bet that we all live quiet lives of desperation. What is it about your own life that your regret? What happened to you that you can’t quiet seem to get over? What did you do years ago that you still kick yourself about? Are you and another person at odds with each other? Maybe it’s an old lover, a parent, a sibling, a co-worker?
When I talk with people as their pastor there always seems to be one thing in their life that they regret happening and can’t seem to bring themselves to forgive themselves for, or to move forward in their life because of that past. Even when I’ve worked with someone for months, sometimes years, and I think that they have made progress toward forgiving themselves and moving on, I discover that they are still hurting and haven’t yet found a way to forgive themselves or another.
You’ve got two blank pieces of paper in your bulletin this morning. I want you to use one of those papers to write down that one regret, that one bitter moment, that one broken relationship, that failed attempt in your life to get right with God or another. What is it that keeps you from claiming God’s promises in your life? Take just a moment and write something down.
Now I want you to hear Paul’s words one more time: “There is therefore now no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus.” Get it? No matter what you have done, no matter what others may have told you previously, no matter what you think you believed before today, GOD IS NOT ANGRY WITH YOU! God loves you, forgives you, accepts you just as you are and sets you free to live a life of meaning, purpose, grace and gratitude.
During communion this morning. I want you to take that piece of paper and toss it into this garbage pail. Throw away your regrets, toss out your failures, get rid of all the ancient history that keeps you from claiming God’s love and acceptance for you. I don’t care what it is, God doesn’t care what it is, just get rid of it. Stop letting it have control over your life. Stop wearing your shame and confusion like some snail shell you have to carry around with you everywhere you go. Take it off. Take it all off! Do your own strip-tease this morning and get rid of anything and everything that keeps you from having a real and right relationship with God. As you throw that piece of paper away this morning say to yourself: “There is therefore no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus.”
Let’s practice saying it together, There is therefore no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus.” Now you say it: “There is therefore no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus.”
When you have finished communion, go back to your seat and take out the second piece of paper and write down what it is that you are now free to do or become because you no longer have that threat of inadequacy and condemnation, of shame and regret hanging over you. What might you dare to do? What challenge will you accept? What act of courage or generosity might you attempt because you know that you are beloved by God whether you succeed or fail?
Then I want you to put that piece of paper in your wallet or your purse and take it with you this week as a living remembrance of God’s promise to be with you and to empower you with God’s Spirit to share God’s love with others you come into contact with at home, at work, at play.
One pastor reports that a neighbor has a sign on his front door that reads: “Tell me what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life.” My question to you today is this: “Tell me what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life now that there is no condemnation. What will you do now that you are free? What will you do with all the love and grace that God can give you? What will you do….?”
Sunday, July 3, 2011
Burning Out or Living Joyfully? Matthew 11:16-19, 28-30
Matthew 11:16-19, 28-30
16 “To what can I compare this generation? They are like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling out to others:
17 “‘We played the pipe for you,
and you did not dance;
we sang a dirge,
and you did not mourn.’
18 For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, ‘He has a demon.’ 19 The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.’ But wisdom is proved right by her deeds.”
28 “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
Matthew begins the story recorded in chapter 11 with John the Baptist in jail. John sends his disciples to ask Jesus if he really is the messiah: “Are you the one we’ve been waiting for or will another come?”
John is suffering. He’s been imprisoned for his confrontation with the king. He’s facing the death penalty. No doubt he’s depressed and dismayed, especially about Jesus, who he announced to all as the messiah they had been waiting for who would bring scorching justice to the world and turn the world upside down making things radically right. But Jesus has come with a different sense of justice and of what life means in the New Community of God that doesn’t include the blazing actions of justice that John expected.
What do you do when God doesn’t answer your prayers the way you think God should answer them? Do you despair and give up hope? That’s what’s happened to John, I think.
Jesus says to John’s disciples. Reassure John, God is at work just as you expected. "Go back and tell John what's going on: The blind see, The lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, the wretched of the earth learn that God is on their side. If that is what you were expecting? Then count yourselves most blessed!"
Jesus goes on to praise John as the prophet foretold in the scriptures who would blaze a pathway for the messiah. People followed John out into the desert to hear his preaching and to repent of their sins and turn their lives back toward God. John came with a message and a manner that caused many to think of him as simply a wild-man, a joke, someone who was too strict and too limited in his outlook on life. He called people to fast and to give up their wealth and ease and get serious about living life as God’s word ordered. Seemingly there is little joy in John’s outlook.
Then Jesus says that the people are being very childish as opposed to childlike. Yes, we all need to have faith like a child in God, but none of us need to act like a selfish child in carrying out our faithful words and actions. Both Jesus and John are criticized by the people and the religious leaders. John is said to be too restraining, Jesus too liberal.
So Jesus tells the parable of the children. Children in that society, like our own, would make the celebrative situations of their society into play-games, especially make-believe weddings and funerals. Some see here gender differences as well as children’s behavior. The boys would play the flute and dance as men were expected to do at weddings in their society. The girls would play at weeping and screaming in grief like women did at funerals. But when the boys wanted to play wedding the girls wanted to play funeral. When the girls wanted to play funeral, the boys refused and wanted to play wedding. Nobody could agree on what to play. And so there was little joy.
Jesus says that the people couldn’t accept his style of ministry anymore than they could accept John’s. They say that Jesus drank too much wine. He eats too much. He goes to too many parties. He hangs out with the wrong kind of people. He doesn’t break the rules, but he stretches those rules so near to the breaking point they might as well be broken. Such was the criticism of Jesus. John’s interpretation of scripture was too strict. Jesus too liberal. John wanted everyone to weep and repent and give up all the luxuries of life. Jesus wanted people to celebrate God with joy! Both Jesus and John were rejected by society. No one therefore gave either of them or their message the real consideration demanded.
Jesus identifies his ministry and message with John’s, but there are important differences. Where John’s restrictive style belongs to the waiting period before the messiah comes, Jesus’ celebrative style belongs to the time of fulfillment when the messiah has already arrived. The time for the funeral is over. It’s time to celebrate. Let’s have a wedding, a party of joy and hope! Enjoy the life that God has blessed you with! Enjoy God’s presence in your life! Celebrate God’s power and activity in your life! Look for the good. See the blessings! Take a new perspective on life!
Jesus isn’t just fond of dinner parties, he employs the concept of the final dinner party when all the world’s people come to celebrate with God in the great dinner party that will usher in God’s New Community. No one will be left out of that party. So, Jesus says, let’s begin the party now! Why? Because God is here now! Emmanuel. God with us! The Messiah has come to be with all people. Why weep any longer?
Jesus even employs the dinner party of joy and celebration when he institutes what we call the Eucharist, what we usually refer to as communion. The word Eucharist means “Thanksgiving” and needs to retain the grand sense of joy which then makes sense of Christ’s death and resurrection.
Too often we approach communion as if we are at a funeral remembering the life and death of a dear beloved family member who will no longer be with us. We like playing funeral. We think it should be quiet and reflective and we frown at those who make unnecessary noise and talk during communion. But is that what Jesus really wanted us to do? Wasn’t it supposed to be more like a celebration of the resurrection, of the return to life of the beloved child of God? “Remember me” he said to them. But are we to remember him dead and gone, or alive and present with us now? Crucified or resurrected? I submit to you that for far too many years most of us have concentrated on the death and we have forgotten the resurrection. We remember Jesus dead and on the cross instead of alive and living, present with us even today as the living spirit of God among us. It’s time to stop playing funeral and start the celebration! Emmanuel! God is with us!
Jesus is a realist. He understands that it is hard for us to live the life of God’s New Community with the kind of joy we should when we face so much that brings us down in life. He criticizes the Pharisees and religious lawyers for making the law too oppressive and restrictive. They think he is abusing the law because he doesn’t approach it with the same so-called honor and respect that they believe they give it. Instead Jesus is saying the evidence of God’s law is not seen in the keeping of the rules, but is seen in the compassion and mercy that one practices which results in life improvements for all people and not just a few. When he condemns the cities he has visited in his ministry in this passage, Jesus cannot believe that people are missing the significance of the miracles of life that are happening all around them and are instead concentrating on the strict interpretation of the law. Open your eyes and see. Open your ears and hear! You are missing what God is doing!
Remember that the Pharisees and Sadducees and religious lawyers have come up with 613 separate rules that everyone has to keep in order to prove that he or she is really a child of God. If you don’t keep all 613 rules exactly as they say you should keep them, then they believe you are not accepted by God. It’s an oppressive viewpoint and totally misses the point of why God instituted such laws to start with. The law was to be a guide to life, not an end unto itself.
Jesus says that they have made the law so oppressive that it has become an unbearable weight dragging people down to death instead of helping them live life with joy. Jesus then tells us that his burden is light and his yoke is easy.
Most of us don’t know what a yoke is. It was a neck piece made of wood hung around the neck of a animal or slave to which cords or rope were strung allowing one to pull a load more easily. It was an instrument of work, that could become oppressive if the load you had to pull was too heavy.
However, Jesus invites us to share his yoke. What does that mean? When you had a new young ox it didn’t know how to pull a load automatically. You had to train it. One of the best ways to train a young ox was to yoke it with a double yoke next to an experienced and older oxen. The yoke would look real funny, one side enormous for the older ox, the other side small for the younger ox. The older ox would do most of the work, the younger ox would help pull the load, and while pulling alongside the older ox would learn when to move and how to move to make the best use of the yoke and their combined strength. Jesus is saying, come alongside of me, wear the training yoke, learn how I move as I move, learn how I talk as I talk, learn how I walk through life as you walk with me. Do it with me. You are not alone. I will share my strength and my wisdom with you and you will find the burden to not be so terrible, but to be one we can share together and celebrate the accomplishments we achieve together.
If you study the scriptures you will realize that this portion of Matthew is actually a discourse on wisdom. Jesus is contrasting the viewpoint that keeping the law is not all demand and restriction, but a lightness of being, like the wise woman in Proverbs 8 and 9 who invites people to come to her free feast, or Isaiah 55 with its call to share free food. It’s a call to learn a new way of relating to God and applying what you learn to living life as it should be. God’s law was seen as peacemaking, as relieving the thirst and feeding hungry souls.
In the following passages from Matthew we see Jesus confronting the issue of how to keep the Sabbath. Can you heal a person on the Sabbath? Can you pick a handful of wheat and eat it on the Sabbath as you walk through a wheat field? Jesus tells us that the Sabbath, like the law, was made for people, and not the other way around. It is the person who is most important, and not the law. The law is to help us live faithfully, not to cause us to stumble and fall.
Jesus always interprets the law by focusing on compassion and mercy. Hosea 6:6 says, “I desire mercy and not sacrifice.” The promise is not heaven some day, but real joy today, real rest and assurance today, not in the time to come. With such a sense of rest we can turn our attention toward that which really matters: people.
Listen to me. It's summer time! We've had a whirlwind time at PRIDE! Some of us are exhausted and worn out. We've kept ourselves so busy getting ready for PRIDE and doing PRIDE that some of us forgot to have fun at PRIDE! Too many of us are on the verge of 'burn-out.' We've given and given and given until we have little left to give. That makes us critical about others who we think should be more involved than they are and who we believe should be willing to give more time and effort than they do. "Why can't they be more like us," we wonder. But do we really want them to feel the same way that we do? Burned out and negative?
As your pastor, I want you to get some rest, to enjoy some time-off from church responsibilities for the next few weeks. Take a walk in the park, smell the roses. Oh, I still want to see you in worship, of course! I want us to keep up our friendships and community going full-speed with each other. But most importantly, I want you to enjoy just being you and doing the things that give you refreshment and renewal in your life. I want you to get all charged up and energized for the exciting future that God has placed ahead of us as a community of faith.
Remember today’s scripture. Let me read it to you from The Message: "Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you'll recover your life. I'll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won't lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you'll learn to live freely and lightly." (Matthew 11:28-30)
It's good advice from Jesus. Let's all try to follow it! I suggest you try following it this week.
16 “To what can I compare this generation? They are like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling out to others:
17 “‘We played the pipe for you,
and you did not dance;
we sang a dirge,
and you did not mourn.’
18 For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, ‘He has a demon.’ 19 The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.’ But wisdom is proved right by her deeds.”
28 “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
Matthew begins the story recorded in chapter 11 with John the Baptist in jail. John sends his disciples to ask Jesus if he really is the messiah: “Are you the one we’ve been waiting for or will another come?”
John is suffering. He’s been imprisoned for his confrontation with the king. He’s facing the death penalty. No doubt he’s depressed and dismayed, especially about Jesus, who he announced to all as the messiah they had been waiting for who would bring scorching justice to the world and turn the world upside down making things radically right. But Jesus has come with a different sense of justice and of what life means in the New Community of God that doesn’t include the blazing actions of justice that John expected.
What do you do when God doesn’t answer your prayers the way you think God should answer them? Do you despair and give up hope? That’s what’s happened to John, I think.
Jesus says to John’s disciples. Reassure John, God is at work just as you expected. "Go back and tell John what's going on: The blind see, The lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, the wretched of the earth learn that God is on their side. If that is what you were expecting? Then count yourselves most blessed!"
Jesus goes on to praise John as the prophet foretold in the scriptures who would blaze a pathway for the messiah. People followed John out into the desert to hear his preaching and to repent of their sins and turn their lives back toward God. John came with a message and a manner that caused many to think of him as simply a wild-man, a joke, someone who was too strict and too limited in his outlook on life. He called people to fast and to give up their wealth and ease and get serious about living life as God’s word ordered. Seemingly there is little joy in John’s outlook.
Then Jesus says that the people are being very childish as opposed to childlike. Yes, we all need to have faith like a child in God, but none of us need to act like a selfish child in carrying out our faithful words and actions. Both Jesus and John are criticized by the people and the religious leaders. John is said to be too restraining, Jesus too liberal.
So Jesus tells the parable of the children. Children in that society, like our own, would make the celebrative situations of their society into play-games, especially make-believe weddings and funerals. Some see here gender differences as well as children’s behavior. The boys would play the flute and dance as men were expected to do at weddings in their society. The girls would play at weeping and screaming in grief like women did at funerals. But when the boys wanted to play wedding the girls wanted to play funeral. When the girls wanted to play funeral, the boys refused and wanted to play wedding. Nobody could agree on what to play. And so there was little joy.
Jesus says that the people couldn’t accept his style of ministry anymore than they could accept John’s. They say that Jesus drank too much wine. He eats too much. He goes to too many parties. He hangs out with the wrong kind of people. He doesn’t break the rules, but he stretches those rules so near to the breaking point they might as well be broken. Such was the criticism of Jesus. John’s interpretation of scripture was too strict. Jesus too liberal. John wanted everyone to weep and repent and give up all the luxuries of life. Jesus wanted people to celebrate God with joy! Both Jesus and John were rejected by society. No one therefore gave either of them or their message the real consideration demanded.
Jesus identifies his ministry and message with John’s, but there are important differences. Where John’s restrictive style belongs to the waiting period before the messiah comes, Jesus’ celebrative style belongs to the time of fulfillment when the messiah has already arrived. The time for the funeral is over. It’s time to celebrate. Let’s have a wedding, a party of joy and hope! Enjoy the life that God has blessed you with! Enjoy God’s presence in your life! Celebrate God’s power and activity in your life! Look for the good. See the blessings! Take a new perspective on life!
Jesus isn’t just fond of dinner parties, he employs the concept of the final dinner party when all the world’s people come to celebrate with God in the great dinner party that will usher in God’s New Community. No one will be left out of that party. So, Jesus says, let’s begin the party now! Why? Because God is here now! Emmanuel. God with us! The Messiah has come to be with all people. Why weep any longer?
Jesus even employs the dinner party of joy and celebration when he institutes what we call the Eucharist, what we usually refer to as communion. The word Eucharist means “Thanksgiving” and needs to retain the grand sense of joy which then makes sense of Christ’s death and resurrection.
Too often we approach communion as if we are at a funeral remembering the life and death of a dear beloved family member who will no longer be with us. We like playing funeral. We think it should be quiet and reflective and we frown at those who make unnecessary noise and talk during communion. But is that what Jesus really wanted us to do? Wasn’t it supposed to be more like a celebration of the resurrection, of the return to life of the beloved child of God? “Remember me” he said to them. But are we to remember him dead and gone, or alive and present with us now? Crucified or resurrected? I submit to you that for far too many years most of us have concentrated on the death and we have forgotten the resurrection. We remember Jesus dead and on the cross instead of alive and living, present with us even today as the living spirit of God among us. It’s time to stop playing funeral and start the celebration! Emmanuel! God is with us!
Jesus is a realist. He understands that it is hard for us to live the life of God’s New Community with the kind of joy we should when we face so much that brings us down in life. He criticizes the Pharisees and religious lawyers for making the law too oppressive and restrictive. They think he is abusing the law because he doesn’t approach it with the same so-called honor and respect that they believe they give it. Instead Jesus is saying the evidence of God’s law is not seen in the keeping of the rules, but is seen in the compassion and mercy that one practices which results in life improvements for all people and not just a few. When he condemns the cities he has visited in his ministry in this passage, Jesus cannot believe that people are missing the significance of the miracles of life that are happening all around them and are instead concentrating on the strict interpretation of the law. Open your eyes and see. Open your ears and hear! You are missing what God is doing!
Remember that the Pharisees and Sadducees and religious lawyers have come up with 613 separate rules that everyone has to keep in order to prove that he or she is really a child of God. If you don’t keep all 613 rules exactly as they say you should keep them, then they believe you are not accepted by God. It’s an oppressive viewpoint and totally misses the point of why God instituted such laws to start with. The law was to be a guide to life, not an end unto itself.
Jesus says that they have made the law so oppressive that it has become an unbearable weight dragging people down to death instead of helping them live life with joy. Jesus then tells us that his burden is light and his yoke is easy.
Most of us don’t know what a yoke is. It was a neck piece made of wood hung around the neck of a animal or slave to which cords or rope were strung allowing one to pull a load more easily. It was an instrument of work, that could become oppressive if the load you had to pull was too heavy.
However, Jesus invites us to share his yoke. What does that mean? When you had a new young ox it didn’t know how to pull a load automatically. You had to train it. One of the best ways to train a young ox was to yoke it with a double yoke next to an experienced and older oxen. The yoke would look real funny, one side enormous for the older ox, the other side small for the younger ox. The older ox would do most of the work, the younger ox would help pull the load, and while pulling alongside the older ox would learn when to move and how to move to make the best use of the yoke and their combined strength. Jesus is saying, come alongside of me, wear the training yoke, learn how I move as I move, learn how I talk as I talk, learn how I walk through life as you walk with me. Do it with me. You are not alone. I will share my strength and my wisdom with you and you will find the burden to not be so terrible, but to be one we can share together and celebrate the accomplishments we achieve together.
If you study the scriptures you will realize that this portion of Matthew is actually a discourse on wisdom. Jesus is contrasting the viewpoint that keeping the law is not all demand and restriction, but a lightness of being, like the wise woman in Proverbs 8 and 9 who invites people to come to her free feast, or Isaiah 55 with its call to share free food. It’s a call to learn a new way of relating to God and applying what you learn to living life as it should be. God’s law was seen as peacemaking, as relieving the thirst and feeding hungry souls.
In the following passages from Matthew we see Jesus confronting the issue of how to keep the Sabbath. Can you heal a person on the Sabbath? Can you pick a handful of wheat and eat it on the Sabbath as you walk through a wheat field? Jesus tells us that the Sabbath, like the law, was made for people, and not the other way around. It is the person who is most important, and not the law. The law is to help us live faithfully, not to cause us to stumble and fall.
Jesus always interprets the law by focusing on compassion and mercy. Hosea 6:6 says, “I desire mercy and not sacrifice.” The promise is not heaven some day, but real joy today, real rest and assurance today, not in the time to come. With such a sense of rest we can turn our attention toward that which really matters: people.
Listen to me. It's summer time! We've had a whirlwind time at PRIDE! Some of us are exhausted and worn out. We've kept ourselves so busy getting ready for PRIDE and doing PRIDE that some of us forgot to have fun at PRIDE! Too many of us are on the verge of 'burn-out.' We've given and given and given until we have little left to give. That makes us critical about others who we think should be more involved than they are and who we believe should be willing to give more time and effort than they do. "Why can't they be more like us," we wonder. But do we really want them to feel the same way that we do? Burned out and negative?
As your pastor, I want you to get some rest, to enjoy some time-off from church responsibilities for the next few weeks. Take a walk in the park, smell the roses. Oh, I still want to see you in worship, of course! I want us to keep up our friendships and community going full-speed with each other. But most importantly, I want you to enjoy just being you and doing the things that give you refreshment and renewal in your life. I want you to get all charged up and energized for the exciting future that God has placed ahead of us as a community of faith.
Remember today’s scripture. Let me read it to you from The Message: "Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you'll recover your life. I'll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won't lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you'll learn to live freely and lightly." (Matthew 11:28-30)
It's good advice from Jesus. Let's all try to follow it! I suggest you try following it this week.
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