Priority 1

 

Mark 6:14-29 with Ephesians 1:3-14 in the b.g.

Pentecost 6b, July 12, 2009 (following on the heels of VBS, Discovery Canyon)

 

It's absolutely amazing the way we human beings give our allegiances to others, even to things. I know this from personal experience. I have purchased jerseys, banners and tee shirts that signify my allegiance to my favorite football team, my favorite hockey team and my favorite baseball team. Most people that know me even a little bit know my allegiances. Nor I am alone in any of this. I observe many others, millions even that have similar allegiances – even if they don't agree with the particularity of mine.

 

I remember when Martha and I were first married. She had a number of her belongings in storage in Minneapolis Minnesota. We then lived in southern Saskatchewan. It was a 13-14 hour drive one way from our home to the storage unit. I thought about that and then told her that we would get her things in the summer while we were on vacation. How thoughtful of me! That was February. But then in early April my hockey team managed to squeak into the playoffs drawing the Minnesota North Stars as their first round opponent. Miraculously we procured tickets for two days hence, borrowed a truck, rented a u-haul trailer and managed to be there in time for the hockey game while also gathering up Martha's belongings. Suddenly because of my allegiance to my hockey team we could drop everything and oh, yes by the way get Martha's belongings.

 

I am also amazed how people will give unquestioned allegiance to any number of organizations or even their job despite the fact that such allegiance may literally consume them. I have seen this with parents and children. Nor have I been exempt in this regard. I remember a young man, only 13 years of age. He was big for 13. And he wanted to play football. So, his parents registered him. His new football coach demanded that every player come to practice every evening Monday to Friday for 2 hours from mid August through November. If a player missed a practice they didn't play that next Saturday. And this young man wanted to play. So from Monday to Friday for 3 ½ months everything else: family suppers, confirmation, friendships with any boys who weren't on his team, all were put on hold. This is now over 30 and hasn't played football for more than12 years. He may watch it occasionally. But in those days football occupied such a central place in both his life and the life of his family. Of course, many of us could fill in the blanks in this story if we just changed the subject to whatever we give our time and money (our priority) to at different times in our lives..

 

This is true with many adults in carrying out our work. The higher we climb in our profession, our trade – the more demands there are. For many people – 50, 60 or 70 hour work weeks are the norm. When you divide that by 6 or 7 days we realize that  8 or more hours per day for 6 or 7 days a week and throw in commuting times – one is not surprised by the reality that there is a subsequent cost to both personal well being, family well being and communal well being. Whom, what and how we give our allegiance matters greatly!

 

The earliest Christian confession involved merely 3 words. Yet it is incredibly profound: JESUS IS LORD! Though in many ways the word "Lord" is archaic, if we scratch the surface, probe the meaning we begin to see truth. Lord meant, the one in charge, the person to whom ultimate allegiance is owed and paid. Is Jesus this person for us? What a question! For we who claim to be followers of Jesus, this is THE QUESTION.

 

Before answering this question definitively with our time, talents and possessions we do well to actually, think, wrestle, pray. Surely we would desire that the one we pay allegiance to with our lives is worthy of such trust. The Biblical witness points beyond the shadow of a doubt to the reality that Jesus loves us and the world. His life attests to this reality. His death is offered to point to this reality. And His resurrection gives us hope that death and evil, hatred and apathy, deceit and fear will not carry the day.

 

This claim is amazing. For many it seems absolutely ludicrous. After all Herod kills John the Baptist. Pilate in conjunction with the religious leaders of that day and with little or no opposition from Jesus' own followers, condemns Jesus. Then Jesus dies a painfully slow and from the perspective of all onlookers a horribly shameful death. In some ways Jesus is not alone in this. Millions have died and continue to die slow, painful deaths. Such death is often extracted at the hands of others who cared little, or who took the easy way out while benefiting from these others' deaths. 

 

There is so much pain, so much suffering, so much inequitable and unjust death and loss – that all of the other allegiances increasingly seek to have their way with us. Their voices may be loud or soft, their accompanying music causing us to dance, sing or dream. I could have that. I could do that! All that's required is that I give myself over to them. It's similar to the temptation of a pyramid scheme. You put in a little. And for giving over your "friends" you are promised wealth. What will we do? Be careful!

 

For powers need to be examined. As Jesus is reported to have said, what do we gain if having gained the whole world we lose our life, the essence of who we are - some translations have it, "our soul"? Nor is this true only personally, but also corporately and  communally as well. This is multilayered truth!

 

Am I saying that we shouldn't give allegiance or commitment to anything else other than God? Of course not! In fact in obeying God as revealed in Christ – we will love and serve others for their well-being. This will involve us in various commitments, allegiances if you will. Jesus also calls us to love ourselves. But in all of this we need to remember, we need to be aware that our actions and commitments need to be continually evaluated under the question: who and what is most important in my life in the decisions I am making. If any of our commitments and allegiances are superceding our response to Jesus as Lord they are misplaced. Then they will lead us beyond what we can immediately see – to great disappointment and ultimately to loss of the life that God intends for us,  for all people and all creation.

 

But, as we see with John the Baptist, allegiance to God does not always mean that  everything is rosy or easy. At times huge loss is involved directly as a result of our allegiance and commitment to God. What then?

 

I would be less than truthful if I didn't tell you that there is a huge cost to following Jesus as our Lord. But at the same time life is ever present and yes even eternal, that is of the highest quality. In following Jesus we are being freed from the power of fear and death, from the power of hatred and apathy – from the insecurity of worrying always about what others may think. We know the motivation of God in God's relationship to us. God loves us. Out of that love God calls us to so love and care for others that they too in experiencing love, may discover God as it's eternal source.

 

Moreover God/ Jesus has an incredible dream. Part of that dream is fleshed out in the letter to the Ephesians. God wills to gather all things up to him. This is new life, new hope a new creation. This is far different from any other "gods" that we are tempted to give our ultimate allegiance to. Truly these "gods" may seemingly offer us pleasure, happiness, even the adulation and respect of others. But these things when trusted as "god" will leave us ultimately empty, disappointed, heart broken – even lost.

 

Jesus is the one who gives his all for us, for the world. Jesus is the One who in acknowledging the power of death and evil, gives himself over to them as God's own Son, letting them do their worst to him, having their way with him. AND THE DARKNESS THEN IS SO GREAT.

 

But Jesus is also the light of the world. The darkness even at its darkest moment cannot forever quench his light. Jesus is risen! We can by the grace of God through the work of the Holy Spirit trust and obey Him. Jesus is LORD! Everything and everyone else is far less than that.

 

So, whom are we trusting? Where are our ultimate investments being made? Whom are they, whom will they benefit?

 

Lord we believe, help our unbelief. Amen.

CAUTION? WORKING GOD HERE AND NOW!

 

Mark 6:1-13, with II Corinthians 12:2-10 in the b.g.

Pentecost 5b, July 5, 2009

 

Life is amazing. Reflect on this truth for a moment (Pause). Today we come to celebrate the life that God gives Rylan Whitfield and Henry Bassman. They are young. They haven't been recorded much in the annals of history, at least yet. Nevertheless if you were to speak to their parents or to their grandparents asking if their lives matter you would discover that in many ways their young lives have already brought new life, new ways of being, thinking and loving to many around them. Today, thanks be to God, Henry and Rylan are being baptized.

 

Life is amazing in so many ways. I remember first seeing Michael Jackson perform with 4 of his brothers when he was only 12 years old. He was the star of that show not just because he was cute or the youngest. Michael Jackson was the star because he was gifted! Even as a 12 year old he could sing. And man could he dance. On stage he had a presence and poise that exceeded many, regardless of age. As Michael's voice matured, the exposure to his talent increased and his fame began to explode exponentially. He became known as the king of pop. I don't think this was an exaggeration. Wherever I went this last week and a half Michael Jackson's music filled the air.

 

But life is also difficult. Michael Jackson died at the age of 50 in many ways a tormented human being. I do not know the details. I suspect few do. But all of Michael's gifts, and they were considerable, all of his wealth and it was substantial – and his millions of fans especially those closest to him who truly loved him, did not, perhaps could not prevent him from self destructing. Again, there may have been many reasons for this. Whatever they are, Michael Jackson's early death is incredibly sad.

 

At times life is incredibly difficult. We all have desires and dreams. Many of them are important, pushing us to work, to develop, to experience others. Yet even as our dreams or desires are fulfilled, perhaps especially then, they can consume us.

 

Years ago when our own children were very young, I had this burning desire to protect them. I wanted to shield them from anyone or anything that might harm them, from the many dangers that just are: speeding drivers, others who would take advantage of them to further their own desires; even from a culture that says that one must be thin or successful or popular to have any "worth". Often such efforts bordered on the desperate. Regardless of all my efforts, of all your efforts, many things wash over our lives that are beyond our control. We cannot protect our children from all such dangers – perhaps even ultimately from any.

 

Having just spent time with two close friends who are critically ill and still in what most of us would call early middle age, two people who have worked in disciplined ways at maintaining both physical and emotional health – and one of whom has striven to obey God in all the aspects of his life, I can attest from heart felt experience that life is difficult. One moment everything seems stable. Then, almost in the next instant everything changes.

 

Jesus had been spending time with many who were sick, even dying. He entered into their lives by touching them physically, emotionally and spiritually. He refused to keep his distance but cared about them by investing himself in them. Now he comes to his hometown. He goes to worship at the local synagogue – a place where he had probably spent time every week for much of his life. The people there knew him. They knew his mother, his siblings. They knew that Jesus came from lower-class folk. Those people who knew him also were convinced like so many people today that there is only so much to go around. So they believed that lower class people were lower class for a reason. They believed that lower class people were only capable of so much. Often these people themselves were part of the so-called lower class.

 

So they asked, "How can Jesus teach like that? How can Jesus quote scripture giving such an incredible interpretation? Today we are not at all sure that Jesus was literate. Having all of this in their experience, embedded in their minds, these local people took offense at Jesus. They do not trust what he says, or what he does. They are not open to the gifts that he brought to so many others just a few days earlier: a freedom from what had held them captive before - mentally, emotionally, spiritually. These local people didn't see God working in Jesus right there in their synagogue that day. They thought they knew Jesus because they were familiar with his siblings and his mother. But their familiarity and their accompanying preconceptions of limits impeded their perception of God working right there and right then. 

 

What are your preconceptions of God? High and lifted up? Absent? Only interested in spiritual things? Not concerned with peoples' food and drink, income or expenses, or the environment, politics or our sexuality? Oh, really!

 

Have we not heard, do we not know that God is the Creator of the universe: all creatures, all things, all people, including you and me, Rylan and Henry? Have we not heard, do we not the incredible claim that is at the very center of all who have been marked with the cross of Christ? We are children of God. This same God, the creator of the universe, chooses to take on flesh, to become a human being in Jesus of Nazareth. In our baptism, through that seemingly simple even foolish thing – of some water being poured or dabbed on us, or immersing us, accompanied by some words, "I baptize you in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit", we are joined to Jesus Christ's life, death and resurrection. Yes, in our baptism we are joined with all others who have gone before us and been so marked, so washed, so immersed in Him. We dare to claim that through this seemingly simple act, often carried out before any conscious understanding on our part, we are chosen by God as God's own sons and daughters. And we further claim that through the action of God that which is self centered, insecure, apathetic, hateful, filled or controlled by fear is being drowned in an ongoing way. In all of this we believe that God is birthing within us and through us a new person again and again and again. Make no mistake, this new emerging person is the result of God's Spirit's work. This is the Spirit that came upon those early disciples after Jesus had died and been raised. This Spirit works to give us love, trust of God, openness to new possibilities. This Spirit works to open our eyes to see as Paul did that even in the midst of our mortality, our own destructive desires, that the love of God in Christ still comes through. Or as Abraham Lincoln once supposedly said, " I am often driven to my knees by the realization that I have nowhere else to go".

 

Life is amazing. It is a gift from God. Life is also more than difficult. We human beings are mortals. We suffer, often as a result of our own doing but sometimes also as a result of being part of the human fabric that is broken. In that fabric we are bandied about by the realities of good and evil engaging in a cosmic battle. At such times all of our feelings, hopes and dreams are seemingly dashed. We may feel and even think that thee is no hope. But then we are profoundly mistaken.

 

For Christ Jesus has come. He has come historically. And He continues to come through the work of His Spirit reminding us, pointing us to His life, His suffering and death, His resurrection. Will we trust Him? Will we trust that His love, his death and resurrection are for us, for all people, for all creation? Will we trust that God's reign is being worked out even in the midst of our weakness and our pain? Do we see that even now God calls us to be open to parts of ourselves dying, so that new parts of us can be born anew in Him?

 

You see something amazing is happening right here and now. God promises this. Will we see it? Will we be open to God? Will we go out with Christ's love, Christ's courage to speak truth in hope – to serve – yes, to be weak and vulnerable, trusting that even through whatever happens God is doing something amazing. God is ushering in new life, now and forever through Jesus Christ, who suffers, dies and is raised! Lord, we believe. Help our unbelief to see you working right here, right now! Amen.