Beyond Death Denying
Lent 4b, March 18, 2012 (John 3:14-21 with Numbers 21:4-9 in the b.g.)
Death is all around us. Literal death – a soldier enters a village and indiscriminately shoots and kills 16 people- mostly women and children. But this – as horrific and tragic as it is, is only the tip of the iceberg of death in Afghanistan and Iraq, in the Sudan and the Congo. The cost of such death in terms of raging violence necessarily limits the possibility for giving and receiving of health care and education, of creating other possibilities for employment that could be life-bringing and not death dealing. The waging and raging of violence also limits the possibility of seeing each other as people. And the results are – horrific.
Do we see that death is all around us – in a bus crash in Switzerland, claiming the lives of children and teachers – devastating families and communities? Do we see the death around us, when people don't see the multitudinous gifts God places right in front of them.? God worked to free the people of Israel from slavery in Egypt. But even as they were going out from that imposed slavery of the Egyptians, with the hope of a promised land and new beginnings right in front of them, they were still choosing to be enslaved. They often refused to trust God. They did this by complaining - about the weather, about the food, about the leadership God was giving them in Moses. So, death was active among them, literally and figuratively. Only when they were fully embraced by death, do they cry out to God admitting their own role in that death.
Are we any different? I wonder.
Do we even see the death around us? I mean can we safely go out to a nice restaurant to eat, or drive our car down the road, or send our children off to school without concern? I know that some may say, oh, for the good old days? But let me tell you, as a Pastor I'm not sure that the good old days were that much different from these days. I have worked with people who were abused, beaten, bullied and excluded, harmed beyond belief then too. Oh, it didn't get the press then, it didn't get tweeted or face booked –but it happened. I remember the police coming to my high school in the 1960's. I remember the Vietnam War and the Mylai Massacre. I remember a woman coming to my parent's house at 3 in the morning because her husband had beaten her up when she was pregnant – he in a drunken rage. I was 4 years old. It was 1958.
It is tempting and easy to think and act as if the problem is out there – with those others – other people, other countries, other religions or no religion. And there are problems out there.
But what about in here? What about inside of our own beings, our own minds, our own families and congregation?
I am reminded of an old Peanuts cartoon. Lucy is speaking to Charlie Brown. And Lucy says, "Discouraged again, Charlie Brown? ... You know what your whole trouble is? The whole trouble with you is that you're you!" To which Charlie asks, "Well, what in the world can I do about that?" Lucy answers, "I don't pretend to be able to give advice... I merely point out the trouble!"
Later the conversation between the 2 continues. Lucy speaks, " You know what the whole trouble with you is, Charlie Brown?" Charlie answers, "No, and I don't want to know! Leave me alone!" He walks away. Lucy shouts after him, "The whole trouble with you is you won't listen to what the trouble with you is!"
Often in cartoons, we are confronted with profound truth. We are often discouraged for good reason. And often the reasons are found within us. Hatred, apathy, blame that excuses ourselves or chooses to blindly not see our responsibility in what is going on – lead to death in many ways. A desire to find ourselves in things – is like a mirage in a desert. We can run up there, crawl up there, work our way towards that mirage – but we are thirstier, hungrier, more empty when we arrive than when we first began the journey.
Those early Israelites need to realize that the serpents on the ground were of their own doing. They were still enslaved to thinking and relating to others, to God and to themselves in certain ways – ways that included blaming, not sharing, not trusting God or others – not being able to see the blessings that were given them each day by God. They wanted more – or the past, or the future – anything but the present. And then, they damage themselves and others by their refusal to actually trust God, by their ongoing complaining and by their attempts to try to secure some kind of limited future for themselves by hoarding.
They need deliverance! What a strange deliverance, God ordains. Moses is to lift the image of a serpent on a pole – so that they may be healed even as they look at the real results of their choices.
Do we realize that we need healing, wholeness, somehow a way through the death that is around us and most importantly within us? Do we need a way to deal with the ongoing voices that strive to enslave us – telling us that we are so good or so bad – or so helpless or so anxious? Do we not need to experience and share unconditional love – a love that does not seek to possess but to free, that does not seek to control but to give away? (Pause)
Can we hear John's gospel, John's good news in our ears, in our minds, in our hearts today? We know the words – or at least we have heard them before. But do we realize that these words, the person they point us to, are for us the difference between life and death?
God so loved the world, the cosmos. Wow! How will we be touched, shaped by God's love? Are we open to God's embrace in Jesus, to enfold us – to forgive us, to free us from our self loathing, from our blaming, from our fears to hear God's voice each day in our ears and hearts – to direct our days and our deeds in God's peace?
God so loved the world that He gave His only Son. Yes, God gave. God gives over God's Son to the powers of sin and death – the powers that rage around us and within us – that seek to blame everyone but ourselves or that sometimes blame ourselves but feel there is no way out, no way forward but to keep on keeping on, blaming, belittling, hating, worrying, dealing death's ways.
So, God's Son is lifted up – not on a throne but on a cross. He allows us to kill him, literally and figuratively, then and now. Do we see him on that cross? Do we see ourselves in that scene – even now?
For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.
"Believe" here is a verb – an action word – it's ongoing. In John's gospel believe means much more than to give mental assent to some things about God. For John believe is, believe is much more than doctrine. To Believe is to obey. In this case to believe God is to obey God.
Miraculously, God gives God's Son to free us, to free all people and all creation from the power of sin and death. Do we believe? That is, Are we willing to seek to obey Jesus in the here and now – to have all of our actions, and all of our thoughts brought to the light of Christ's love and sacrifice?
Remember – know - God loves even us. That's why God sends and gives His Son. We can, we must ask for God's help, certainly in believing, that is obeying God, truly in hoping and most actively in loving. And who knows, what will happen then? Dare to look to the cross and see ourselves as we are – but also see God as God is- God's incredible love for the whole world. On the cross we see that God chooses life even through the Son's death. By God's grace we can be embraced by such love and then embracing.
Lord, we believe, forgive our unbelief. For Christ's sake, Amen.