Matthew 26:14-16, 31-38, 45-50; Isaiah 50:4-9a
Throughout the dark night of his soul in the Gethsemane Garden, Jesus begged his disciples to stay up with him, comfort him, pray with him, support him. But they couldn’t do it. On the night that Jesus was arrested, all of his disciples abandoned him. And two of them actively betrayed him.
Judas, the one who betrayed Jesus only once, almost immediately regretted his action. He boldly marched back before the powerful, corrupt officials and proclaimed Jesus’ innocence to their faces, throwing their bribe money back at their feet for good measure. Peter, the other fallen disciple, betrayed Jesus on three separate occasions. He hid in abject fear of the officials and then ran off seeking anonymity and seclusion. Yet that first disciple, Judas, has been named throughout history as the prime example of all that is contemptible, corrupt and deceitful in human nature. (Do you know anyone named Judas?) That second disciple, Peter, is honored as the father of the church and is designated a “saint.” (I suspect you know several Peters. I do.)
How come we treat these two fallen, betraying disciples, so differently? Why is Judas’ betrayal of Jesus taken in such a different direction than Peter’s?
Any competent investigator will tell us that we have to begin with motive. Judas’ treachery seems to have been built on long running conflict of expectations. Jesus wasn’t the militant messiah that many, including Judas, expected. Perhaps Judas thought that if he backed Jesus into a corner with the authorities, Jesus would show the aggressive side of salvation. If Jesus didn’t come out fighting then he would be out of the way for someone else to be the hero people wanted. Judas' plan was premeditated, calculated, even paid for.
Peter’s act of betrayal, on the other hand, was a cowardly, spontaneous burst of emotion that profited him nothing. He was prone to rash actions without thinking which exhibited both a childlike naivete and a cluelessness.
But it isn’t all that simple. Matthew reports the theory breaking fact that Judas returned the blood money, defended Jesus’ innocence before the tribunal, and realized his mistake. All this occurred while Jesus was still alive. In contrast, Peter sneaked back to the disciple's fold as a mourner after the crucifixion frenzy had passed and the tomb was sealed.
The only real difference between these two betrayers – Judas and Peter – was their perception of how Jesus must see them. Judas was overcome with guilt. Although “he repented” (Matthew 27:3), Judas could only envision a wrathful, judgmental Jesus declaring him cursed according to Deuteronomic law (Mt. 26:23-24, Deuteronomy 27:25). In his despair, Judas blocked out Jesus’ forgiving gesture in the garden (Mt. 26:50). Judas could only hear condemnation ringing in his ears, so he cut himself off from the healing capabilities of God’s grace and, in an agonizing fit of self-judgment, hanged himself.
Peter heard other voices. He replayed his three pitiful denials of Jesus over and over again in his head. Matthew says that Peter “cried uncontrollably” after leaving the courtyard (Mt. 26:75). Peter recalled himself strongly promising Jesus that he would never deny him, even if it meant facing death (Mt. 26:35).
Those weren’t the only conversations Peter remembered. There were some stored in his memory that gave him hope on that dark night. Peter was the disciple who had asked Jesus specifically about forgiveness. How many times should we forgive? Peter asked. Jesus declared “Not just seven times, but rather as many as seventy-seven times” (Mt. 18:21-22).
Jesus had singled Peter, asking, “Who do you say that I am?” Peter could recall he had boldly confessed, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God” (Mt. 16:15-16). Of greater comfort to Peter was the memory of Jesus’ response to that confession: “Happy are you, Simon son of Jonah, because no human has shown this to you.” And then came Jesus’ playful pun, “I tell you that you are Peter. And I’ll build my church on this rock. The gates of the underworld won’t be able to stand against it” (Mt. 16:17-18). What a life-vest that must have been for Peter’s aching heart that night. Jesus had believed in him. Jesus had designated him to be something special in the life of the church. Whatever Peter had done in his past, Jesus had assured him he had a future.
Judas was no different from any of the other disciples and no different from any of us. We have all done it – fallen away from Jesus at some time or another, not for money but for safety, security, or anonymity. But Judas forgot one thing, the thing that makes a huge difference between life and death. Judas forgot that he wasn’t alone. He forgot that he was one person in a long, established, and distinguished tradition of God’s failed faithful. Jacob, Moses, Aaron, David, Elijah, Mary, Thomas, Paul all committed grievous acts of betrayal against God. But each one found their way back to God’s side through the back door of grace.
Judas died believing in his own heart that he was a betrayer. Why? Because he never even tried the door. He hadn’t gotten the message that Jesus had spent three years proclaiming: grace. Judas didn't want a gift of grace. He wanted to be in control of his situation. With those 30 pieces of silver, Judas thought he could buy his way into God’s presence. Judas thought the messianic age could be hurried along by forcing Jesus’ hand by confronting him with the military.
Faced with the consequences of his catastrophic mistake, Judas then tried to buy his way out of his betrayal by throwing that same silver back at the feet of the chief priests. But Judas could not control the tidal wave of events his actions had unleashed. In panic, Judas’ final attempt to control things was to take his own life. He never dared to check that back door of grace that God always leaves unlocked – and even pushes open for us.
Every one of us has seen someone squirming on the viciously barbed hook of some life calamity. And we piously thought, “There but for the grace of God go I.” Would that we never say that. It’s okay to acknowledge the saving nature of grace in your own life, but to deny the possibility of its presence in the lives of others is a “Judas-ism.” It is not “There but for God’s grace go I." Rather we need the redemptive cry of “There am I... with God’s grace” and then the missional cry of “There go I ... for God’s grace.”
L. Alexander Harper makes a remarkable observation about Johann Sebastian Bach’s musical representation of the Passion story in the Saint Matthew Passion: “Judas’ question to Jesus had always been a solo in other cantatas, because Judas is an individual. Not so for Bach. Breaking all tradition, he has the whole chorus instead sing that guilty question, ‘Is it I, Lord?’ The chorus represents you, me, the whole world. Judas is within us all, not 'out there' or 'back in history' somewhere comfortably remote.”(1) Judas is our middle name.
The message of the gospel is that God’s grace is available to all, that the back door to God’s loving presence is always open. Judas is the middle name of each one of us. Judas does not become our first name when we betray and deny Christ himself, but it does when we deny the redemptive power of God’s grace that Christ offers every one of us.
As we move through Holy Week, as our voices one by one give up the “Hosannas” and take up the call to crucify, as the skies darken and the clang of the hammers against nails assault our ears, may we know that “Judas” is our middle name. And may we know that Christ gives us a new name: filled with grace.
General Resource: Homiletics, April 4, 1993.
(1) L. Alexander Harper, “Judas, Our Brother,” St. Luke's Journal of Theology 29 (1986),102.
Unless noted otherwise, all scripture references are from The Common English Bible, © 2011 www.commonenglishbible.com.
Copyright © 2017 First Presbyterian Church of Waverly, Ohio. Reprinted by permission.
Showing posts with label grace. Show all posts
Showing posts with label grace. Show all posts
Sunday, April 9, 2017
Sunday, March 26, 2017
God's Light Reveals and Renews
Romans 5:8-14; 1 Samuel 16:1-13; John 9:1-17, 35-41
A book entitled The Benedict Option was recently published. The author, Rod Dreher, is a blogger for the American Conservative. The assertion he makes in his book is that anti-Christian forces and values in America have become victorious to the point that many Christian institutions have ceased living by distinctively Christian values, and those which still do feel relegated to the social margins or even persecuted.
The book’s title comes from St. Benedict (active in the first half of the sixth century C.E.), and his invention of monastic communities, which were places where Christians could be more deliberately and deeply formed by their faith. He and his communities are credited with saving Western civilization during dark times. Dreher is calling for Christians to withdraw from political engagement with the world, become more internally focused on spiritual formation by creating deeply Christian institutions, and then re-engage the world through better and more sophisticated as well as more persuasive strategies.(1)
One of the philosophical points underlying Dreher’s thought process is a dualism that goes back to ancient Greek philosophical dialogues predating Christ, Paul, and the early church and which were prevalent in the century following the Pentecost birthing of the church: light and darkness, good and evil. This dualism is found in the apocalyptic – end times – writings of the inter-testamental period between the last written Old Testament writing (possibly Daniel) and the earliest Christian writing, mostly letters from Paul to the churches in Asia Minor.
This dualism of light and darkness was also prominent in the writings of the Essenes, a cloistered, eclectic sect active when the Ephesian letter author was active. The Essenes considered themselves the elite heirs of an advanced, esoteric knowledge that could flood our inner darkness with the light of awakened consciousness.
The Essenes’ way of engaging the forces of darkness consisted mainly in huddling in secluded safety to translate life’s mysteries into useful knowledge.(2) They pursued their calling far from the centers of public life, living in the wilderness wastelands around the Dead Sea. They are most noted for their preservation of canonical scriptural texts, such as Isaiah, and non-canonical texts such as “The Community Rule” and “The War Scroll.” Since the first discovery in 1946/47, fragments of nearly 1,000 manuscripts have been found hidden in 12 caves, with the most recent just this year.
The problem with the separation approach to faith, in the understanding of theologian Marcus Borg, is that small orthodox communities find it difficult to be faithful, since so many have a history of becoming preoccupied with tribal issues of us-versus-them while ignoring the very heart of Christianity, which is compassion for the least of the brothers and sisters.(3)
Separation from the world was the last thing the writer to the Ephesians was interested in. He calls for his followers to take to the streets in the fight with the minions of darkness. While there can be no doubt that the writer shares the Essenes’ call for separation from the “sons of darkness,” he charges his readers to storm the ramparts of darkness as moral agents in the world: “Don’t participate in the unfruitful actions of darkness. Instead you should reveal the truth about them.”
Revealing the truth about darkness is easier said than done. And it is a thankless task. Crucifixion comes to mind. This Lenten journey which we have been on since leaving the mountain of the transfiguration has descended from the realm of divine glory into the realm of where darkness increasingly smothers light. The omitted verses from the ninth chapter of John highlight the growing boldness and stubbornness of the religious leaders to the teaching and ministry of Jesus. The man healed of his blindness and his parents were subjected to terrorizing interrogation at the hands of the temple leaders.
That’s the reality which our Pauline author comes out swinging against. This passage is bookended with grace. Verse 8 opens the reading with a triumphal declaration: “You were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord.” The phrase, “in the Lord,” is an early church watchword for “in the risen Christ.” The author proclaims an awesome fact: in our mystic union with the living Christ we are aglow with Christ’s light. Such a glow is more than inspired intellectual keenness. This light also carries the spiritual energy that can empower us in our struggle with the forces of evil.
If the first half of verse 8 is the prelude of grace for our passage, then verses 13-14 similarly provide a triumphal postlude of God's favor:
The apostle writes, “Light produces fruit that consists of every sort of goodness, justice, and truth.” Since the passage has grace at its beginning and grace at its ending, this phrase tucked into the middle is a clarion call to live out the grace that has been bestowed on us. In the words of Don Wardlaw, emeritus professor of preaching at the Presbyterian McCormick Theological Seminary in Chicago, “Grace turns the imperative of what we ought to do into the indicative of what we may do.”(5)
Most of us are all too aware of the formidable powers of darkness. What you and I most need, as bearers of Christ's light, are glimpses of our possibilities for exposing the works of that darkness. We need broad brushstrokes of things that bring to life Christ’s aglow in each of us.
As Jesus said, our activities to feed the hungry, to shelter the homeless, to visit the sick and imprisoned, to care for widows and widowers, orphans and children in single-parent homes, and immigrants are done not just to and for them, the activities are done to and for Christ.
Your imagination, your relationships, your contexts will help describe and prescribe what it looks and feels like to live in the chemistry of God’s transforming light. That light in us who are in the risen Lord can and will reveal and renew.
(1) Michael Maudlin, senior vice-president and executive editor, HarperOne, “News and Pews,” March 20, 2017; http://www.newsandpews.com/the-borg-option-v-the-benedict-option/
(2) Don Wardlaw, "Ephesians 5:8-14: Homileticial Perspective,” Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010), Year A, vol. 2, 111-115.
(3) Maudlin, op.cit.
(4) Ibid.
(5) Ibid.
Unless noted otherwise, all scripture references are from The Common English Bible, © 2011 www.commonenglishbible.com.
Copyright © 2017 First Presbyterian Church of Waverly, Ohio. Reprinted by permission.
A book entitled The Benedict Option was recently published. The author, Rod Dreher, is a blogger for the American Conservative. The assertion he makes in his book is that anti-Christian forces and values in America have become victorious to the point that many Christian institutions have ceased living by distinctively Christian values, and those which still do feel relegated to the social margins or even persecuted.
The book’s title comes from St. Benedict (active in the first half of the sixth century C.E.), and his invention of monastic communities, which were places where Christians could be more deliberately and deeply formed by their faith. He and his communities are credited with saving Western civilization during dark times. Dreher is calling for Christians to withdraw from political engagement with the world, become more internally focused on spiritual formation by creating deeply Christian institutions, and then re-engage the world through better and more sophisticated as well as more persuasive strategies.(1)
One of the philosophical points underlying Dreher’s thought process is a dualism that goes back to ancient Greek philosophical dialogues predating Christ, Paul, and the early church and which were prevalent in the century following the Pentecost birthing of the church: light and darkness, good and evil. This dualism is found in the apocalyptic – end times – writings of the inter-testamental period between the last written Old Testament writing (possibly Daniel) and the earliest Christian writing, mostly letters from Paul to the churches in Asia Minor.
This dualism of light and darkness was also prominent in the writings of the Essenes, a cloistered, eclectic sect active when the Ephesian letter author was active. The Essenes considered themselves the elite heirs of an advanced, esoteric knowledge that could flood our inner darkness with the light of awakened consciousness.
The Essenes’ way of engaging the forces of darkness consisted mainly in huddling in secluded safety to translate life’s mysteries into useful knowledge.(2) They pursued their calling far from the centers of public life, living in the wilderness wastelands around the Dead Sea. They are most noted for their preservation of canonical scriptural texts, such as Isaiah, and non-canonical texts such as “The Community Rule” and “The War Scroll.” Since the first discovery in 1946/47, fragments of nearly 1,000 manuscripts have been found hidden in 12 caves, with the most recent just this year.
The problem with the separation approach to faith, in the understanding of theologian Marcus Borg, is that small orthodox communities find it difficult to be faithful, since so many have a history of becoming preoccupied with tribal issues of us-versus-them while ignoring the very heart of Christianity, which is compassion for the least of the brothers and sisters.(3)
Separation from the world was the last thing the writer to the Ephesians was interested in. He calls for his followers to take to the streets in the fight with the minions of darkness. While there can be no doubt that the writer shares the Essenes’ call for separation from the “sons of darkness,” he charges his readers to storm the ramparts of darkness as moral agents in the world: “Don’t participate in the unfruitful actions of darkness. Instead you should reveal the truth about them.”
Revealing the truth about darkness is easier said than done. And it is a thankless task. Crucifixion comes to mind. This Lenten journey which we have been on since leaving the mountain of the transfiguration has descended from the realm of divine glory into the realm of where darkness increasingly smothers light. The omitted verses from the ninth chapter of John highlight the growing boldness and stubbornness of the religious leaders to the teaching and ministry of Jesus. The man healed of his blindness and his parents were subjected to terrorizing interrogation at the hands of the temple leaders.
They insulted him: “You are his disciple, but we are Moses’ disciples. We know that God spoke to Moses, but we don’t know where this man is from.”
The man answered, “This is incredible! You don’t know where he is from, yet he healed my eyes! We know that God doesn’t listen to sinners. God listens to anyone who is devout and does God’s will. No one has ever heard of a healing of the eyes of someone born blind. If this man wasn’t from God, he couldn’t do this.”
They responded, “You were born completely in sin! How is it that you dare to teach us?” Then they expelled him. (John 9:28-34)With that exchange another nail was crafted for the waiting cross. None of us has the strength of will-power or the gumption to risk everything to halt the smithy crafting those nails. In the midst of our personal struggles and the daily reports of global terrorism, mounting drug deaths, the growing gap between the have-nots and the haves, the resurgence of economic jingoism, racism, and sectarian hatred, and the existence of outright political intransigence, there is nothing to contradict the reality that we humans, in spite of our professed ethics and ideals, consistently lack the moral muscle to hold back, much less overcome, the forces of evil.
That’s the reality which our Pauline author comes out swinging against. This passage is bookended with grace. Verse 8 opens the reading with a triumphal declaration: “You were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord.” The phrase, “in the Lord,” is an early church watchword for “in the risen Christ.” The author proclaims an awesome fact: in our mystic union with the living Christ we are aglow with Christ’s light. Such a glow is more than inspired intellectual keenness. This light also carries the spiritual energy that can empower us in our struggle with the forces of evil.
If the first half of verse 8 is the prelude of grace for our passage, then verses 13-14 similarly provide a triumphal postlude of God's favor:
Everything exposed to the light is revealed by the light. Everything that is revealed by the light is light. Therefore it says, ‘Wake up, sleeper! Get up from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.'Here the writer gives a trumpet fanfare to the fact that God’s light both reveals and renews, exposing what is in the dark, while also changing into light what it exposes. The “Wake up, sleeper” citation is very likely part of a hymn from an early church baptismal ritual. It caps the passage with a celebratory declaration that locates the light in Christ. This light, which both reveals and renews, is in fact the risen Christ. We awake and rise up from spiritual death, as if emerging from baptismal waters, to stand renewed by and pervaded with Christ’s light.(4)
The apostle writes, “Light produces fruit that consists of every sort of goodness, justice, and truth.” Since the passage has grace at its beginning and grace at its ending, this phrase tucked into the middle is a clarion call to live out the grace that has been bestowed on us. In the words of Don Wardlaw, emeritus professor of preaching at the Presbyterian McCormick Theological Seminary in Chicago, “Grace turns the imperative of what we ought to do into the indicative of what we may do.”(5)
Most of us are all too aware of the formidable powers of darkness. What you and I most need, as bearers of Christ's light, are glimpses of our possibilities for exposing the works of that darkness. We need broad brushstrokes of things that bring to life Christ’s aglow in each of us.
- Perhaps that is writing letters to our senators and congressman by hand (the staff actually has to read them) about issues where light is being obscured by darkness, where human dignity is abused rather than uplifted.
- Perhaps we can shine Christ’s light by calling out a person for a racial or ethnic slur.
- Another possible revealing and renewing light is shed when we write letters to the editors of newspapers pointing out inaccuracies in public perceptions of individuals or groups of people tossed to the margins or about mistaken understandings of faith.
- We can also shine Christ’s light by standing with and for people caught in the cogs of dehumanizing social systems by being advocates or sponsors or simply friends.
As Jesus said, our activities to feed the hungry, to shelter the homeless, to visit the sick and imprisoned, to care for widows and widowers, orphans and children in single-parent homes, and immigrants are done not just to and for them, the activities are done to and for Christ.
Your imagination, your relationships, your contexts will help describe and prescribe what it looks and feels like to live in the chemistry of God’s transforming light. That light in us who are in the risen Lord can and will reveal and renew.
(1) Michael Maudlin, senior vice-president and executive editor, HarperOne, “News and Pews,” March 20, 2017; http://www.newsandpews.com/the-borg-option-v-the-benedict-option/
(2) Don Wardlaw, "Ephesians 5:8-14: Homileticial Perspective,” Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010), Year A, vol. 2, 111-115.
(3) Maudlin, op.cit.
(4) Ibid.
(5) Ibid.
Unless noted otherwise, all scripture references are from The Common English Bible, © 2011 www.commonenglishbible.com.
Copyright © 2017 First Presbyterian Church of Waverly, Ohio. Reprinted by permission.
Sunday, March 8, 2015
O Foolish Cross
1 Corinthians 1:18-25; Exodus 20:1-17; John 2:13-22
Dictionary.com provides the following definition for the world “foolish”:
Adjective:
1. resulting from or showing a lack of sense; ill-considered; unwise: a foolish action, a foolish speech.
2. lacking forethought or caution.
3. trifling, insignificant, or paltry.
Our British friends would add several additional definitions: “silly; resulting from folly or stupidity; ridiculous or absurd; not worthy of consideration; weak-minded; simple.”
Was Paul foolish to use the word “foolish” in the same sentence as the word “cross”? Not in the least. It was no slip of the tongue. He used it five times:
There can be no doubt whatsoever that Paul used the word on purpose. If we run those back through with the various words used in the definition of “foolish,” that is quite a litany.
The church in Corinth was divided by factions and partisanship. In addition to this, the city of Corinth was a sophisticated, cosmopolitan city of its day. These factors worked together to make ministry in the Corinthian church quite challenging.
Even though the scene is different, the diversity of today’s community population makes for a very similar kind of challenge. Those of you born in the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940's grew up with an understanding of the world that is very different from those of us born in the 1950s and 1960s, the so-called Baby Boomers. And if those two sets of views are divergent, the views of the next generation, the “Gen-Xers,” born in the 1970s and 1980s, differ even more sharply. Curiously enough, as the years wind on, the thoughts of the “Millennials,” born in the 1990s and 2000s, while based a still different view of the world, may not be so different from the folk sixty or more years their elders. Because there are now five different generations involved in today’s civic community as well as the church, ministry is truly challenging.
Paul realized that the major truth of the gospel, the major theme of the redemptive story, must not get lost in all the social and cultural clutter of Corinth. So he determined to preach Christ and to preach Christ crucified. This was a message that scandalized the Jews and seemed improbable to the Greeks; but it was in fact the Christian message, and Paul would not water it down, avoid it, or depart from it.
Many people today want to find a way to eliminate the need for a “crucified Christ.” Yet, if we face reality, we must understand that we will never fully appreciate the truth of the gospel until we appreciate the reality of sin. That’s why this passage is so appropriate during Lent. We need a long view of what the Christ event is all about. Too often we slice and dice the Gospel into manageable and innocuous segments and form them to fit our own biases about God. It is important for us to step back and take in the whole breadth of the passion narratives on Palm/Passion Sunday and Good Friday.
But even the complete passion story may not be enough. How often we are consumed by the details of the state-sanctioned execution or by the inevitable question of why jubilant “Hosannas” of Sunday turn into jeering judgment on Friday. There wasn’t a sudden turn around in the space of five days. The “foolishness of the cross” didn’t happen overnight. It at least started when Jesus rose out of the water of John’s baptism, and if truth be told, it probably started long before the holy messenger Gabriel showed up in Mary’s garden.
In the gospel reading, John 2:13-22, we are confronted with the anger of Jesus. Again, the picture of Jesus doing something other than being nice and placid ruins the image of Jesus we have worked so hard to cultivate in our thinking and in the thinking of the church. We don’t get angry, we turn the other cheek, we roll up into balls and play dead like opossums. What angered Jesus was that the Pharisees he encountered thought they could turn God's anger aside simply by adhering to their rituals and paying their sacrifices.
When the temple cleansing is paired with the Exodus passage citing the Ten Commandments, we can’t help but note the way in which those ten almighty, all-worshiped statements have been developed into a complex set of rules by which one might win salvation, whereas Jesus simplified them into the law of love: “Love God – love neighbor.”
John is perhaps very prescient in placing the temple cleansing at the beginning of the accounts of Jesus’ ministry, for it was not the last straw that caused Jesus’ execution, but the first. His whole ministry was repugnant to those who clung to power within the religious and cultural system. And to anyone with the slightest sense larger socio-political trends, what Jesus was about was silly, foolish, nonsensical, ridiculous, weak-minded, absurd, simple, not worthy of consideration. Sure he touched the lives of a number of people in very precious ways – returning life, healing long-term physical maladies, restoring psychological and spiritual wholeness. But for the average person, Jesus was a spectacle, a ludicrous mockery of the status quo, a nut-case just waiting to be cracked.
Human beings get so wrapped up in the ideas they take as their own, that they somehow get inoculated against anything outside of themselves. We are quick to label as fools anyone who thinks differently from us and to label as foolish any ideas that don’t agree with our own ideas. We can get all haughty and say that we would never have called for Jesus’ crucifixion. And maybe we wouldn’t have. But then again, we might have just kept our mouths closed and not said anything against those who were bound and determined to do away with Jesus.
Perhaps we don’t know what to think. Perhaps we can’t believe that an actual crucifixion was necessary to pay the price for our sin. We say, “After all, I’m not that bad. Sure, I make a few mistakes, but nothing calling for a death sentence, for me or for Jesus. There are those who I have my suspicions, I bet they are guilty.”
That’s like trying to be our own spiritual optometrist. We can’t see our way out of a fully glassed-in room. The gospel, that foolish preaching, tells us that we need to come to the point where we view our sin in the same way that the Holy God views it. We are powerless to do the right thing; but God intervened and sent his Son into the world to be crucified and on our account to suffer the pain of separation from God for a time. This is the message of the cross. It may not make any sense to us. It is the foolishness of God; but truly, it is the only thing that does make any sense.
The Good News of Jesus Christ still sounds foolish to many and offensive to others. It is foolishness to any who have chosen another way to face their unavoidable appointment with death and what comes after. It is offensive to those who attempt to maintain a facade of self-righteousness or self-confidence in the face of life’s persistent questions. Those who cannot consider their own sinfulness will find that the gospel offers a solution they insist they do not need.
Our society worships power, influence, and wealth. Jesus came as a humble, poor servant, and he offers his kingdom to those who have faith, not to those who work hard or improve themselves. This may look ridiculous to the world, but Christ is our power, the only way we can be saved. When we know Christ personally, then we’ll have the greatest wisdom anyone could desire.
God does not seek out the people whom the world admires; instead, God reveals the divine to humble and searching hearts, regardless of their worldly position. God can use us no matter what our position or status. To the worldly wise, it would have made more sense for God to call the leaders and the influencers. But God does what seems foolish to the world—God calls those who do not have those characteristics and achievements. The 19th century English preacher Charles H. Spurgeon famously wrote, “I expect to be amazed by three things when I first arrive in heaven. I will be delighted by those I find are actually there. I will be shocked to note who isn’t there whom I assumed I would see. And then I will be speechless with wonder as I realize that by God’s grace I am there!”
O foolish cross! Thanks be to God for it.
Unless noted otherwise, all scripture references are from The Common English Bible, © 2011 www.commonenglishbible.com.
Copyright 2015 First Presbyterian Church of Waverly, Ohio. Reprinted by permission.
Dictionary.com provides the following definition for the world “foolish”:
Adjective:
1. resulting from or showing a lack of sense; ill-considered; unwise: a foolish action, a foolish speech.
2. lacking forethought or caution.
3. trifling, insignificant, or paltry.
Our British friends would add several additional definitions: “silly; resulting from folly or stupidity; ridiculous or absurd; not worthy of consideration; weak-minded; simple.”
Was Paul foolish to use the word “foolish” in the same sentence as the word “cross”? Not in the least. It was no slip of the tongue. He used it five times:
- “Foolishness to those who are being destroyed,”
- “God made the wisdom of the world foolish,”
- “the foolishness of preaching,”
- “foolishness to Gentiles”, and
- “the foolishness of God.”
There can be no doubt whatsoever that Paul used the word on purpose. If we run those back through with the various words used in the definition of “foolish,” that is quite a litany.
The church in Corinth was divided by factions and partisanship. In addition to this, the city of Corinth was a sophisticated, cosmopolitan city of its day. These factors worked together to make ministry in the Corinthian church quite challenging.
Even though the scene is different, the diversity of today’s community population makes for a very similar kind of challenge. Those of you born in the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940's grew up with an understanding of the world that is very different from those of us born in the 1950s and 1960s, the so-called Baby Boomers. And if those two sets of views are divergent, the views of the next generation, the “Gen-Xers,” born in the 1970s and 1980s, differ even more sharply. Curiously enough, as the years wind on, the thoughts of the “Millennials,” born in the 1990s and 2000s, while based a still different view of the world, may not be so different from the folk sixty or more years their elders. Because there are now five different generations involved in today’s civic community as well as the church, ministry is truly challenging.
Paul realized that the major truth of the gospel, the major theme of the redemptive story, must not get lost in all the social and cultural clutter of Corinth. So he determined to preach Christ and to preach Christ crucified. This was a message that scandalized the Jews and seemed improbable to the Greeks; but it was in fact the Christian message, and Paul would not water it down, avoid it, or depart from it.
Many people today want to find a way to eliminate the need for a “crucified Christ.” Yet, if we face reality, we must understand that we will never fully appreciate the truth of the gospel until we appreciate the reality of sin. That’s why this passage is so appropriate during Lent. We need a long view of what the Christ event is all about. Too often we slice and dice the Gospel into manageable and innocuous segments and form them to fit our own biases about God. It is important for us to step back and take in the whole breadth of the passion narratives on Palm/Passion Sunday and Good Friday.
But even the complete passion story may not be enough. How often we are consumed by the details of the state-sanctioned execution or by the inevitable question of why jubilant “Hosannas” of Sunday turn into jeering judgment on Friday. There wasn’t a sudden turn around in the space of five days. The “foolishness of the cross” didn’t happen overnight. It at least started when Jesus rose out of the water of John’s baptism, and if truth be told, it probably started long before the holy messenger Gabriel showed up in Mary’s garden.
In the gospel reading, John 2:13-22, we are confronted with the anger of Jesus. Again, the picture of Jesus doing something other than being nice and placid ruins the image of Jesus we have worked so hard to cultivate in our thinking and in the thinking of the church. We don’t get angry, we turn the other cheek, we roll up into balls and play dead like opossums. What angered Jesus was that the Pharisees he encountered thought they could turn God's anger aside simply by adhering to their rituals and paying their sacrifices.
When the temple cleansing is paired with the Exodus passage citing the Ten Commandments, we can’t help but note the way in which those ten almighty, all-worshiped statements have been developed into a complex set of rules by which one might win salvation, whereas Jesus simplified them into the law of love: “Love God – love neighbor.”
John is perhaps very prescient in placing the temple cleansing at the beginning of the accounts of Jesus’ ministry, for it was not the last straw that caused Jesus’ execution, but the first. His whole ministry was repugnant to those who clung to power within the religious and cultural system. And to anyone with the slightest sense larger socio-political trends, what Jesus was about was silly, foolish, nonsensical, ridiculous, weak-minded, absurd, simple, not worthy of consideration. Sure he touched the lives of a number of people in very precious ways – returning life, healing long-term physical maladies, restoring psychological and spiritual wholeness. But for the average person, Jesus was a spectacle, a ludicrous mockery of the status quo, a nut-case just waiting to be cracked.
Human beings get so wrapped up in the ideas they take as their own, that they somehow get inoculated against anything outside of themselves. We are quick to label as fools anyone who thinks differently from us and to label as foolish any ideas that don’t agree with our own ideas. We can get all haughty and say that we would never have called for Jesus’ crucifixion. And maybe we wouldn’t have. But then again, we might have just kept our mouths closed and not said anything against those who were bound and determined to do away with Jesus.
Perhaps we don’t know what to think. Perhaps we can’t believe that an actual crucifixion was necessary to pay the price for our sin. We say, “After all, I’m not that bad. Sure, I make a few mistakes, but nothing calling for a death sentence, for me or for Jesus. There are those who I have my suspicions, I bet they are guilty.”
That’s like trying to be our own spiritual optometrist. We can’t see our way out of a fully glassed-in room. The gospel, that foolish preaching, tells us that we need to come to the point where we view our sin in the same way that the Holy God views it. We are powerless to do the right thing; but God intervened and sent his Son into the world to be crucified and on our account to suffer the pain of separation from God for a time. This is the message of the cross. It may not make any sense to us. It is the foolishness of God; but truly, it is the only thing that does make any sense.
The Good News of Jesus Christ still sounds foolish to many and offensive to others. It is foolishness to any who have chosen another way to face their unavoidable appointment with death and what comes after. It is offensive to those who attempt to maintain a facade of self-righteousness or self-confidence in the face of life’s persistent questions. Those who cannot consider their own sinfulness will find that the gospel offers a solution they insist they do not need.
Our society worships power, influence, and wealth. Jesus came as a humble, poor servant, and he offers his kingdom to those who have faith, not to those who work hard or improve themselves. This may look ridiculous to the world, but Christ is our power, the only way we can be saved. When we know Christ personally, then we’ll have the greatest wisdom anyone could desire.
God does not seek out the people whom the world admires; instead, God reveals the divine to humble and searching hearts, regardless of their worldly position. God can use us no matter what our position or status. To the worldly wise, it would have made more sense for God to call the leaders and the influencers. But God does what seems foolish to the world—God calls those who do not have those characteristics and achievements. The 19th century English preacher Charles H. Spurgeon famously wrote, “I expect to be amazed by three things when I first arrive in heaven. I will be delighted by those I find are actually there. I will be shocked to note who isn’t there whom I assumed I would see. And then I will be speechless with wonder as I realize that by God’s grace I am there!”
O foolish cross! Thanks be to God for it.
Unless noted otherwise, all scripture references are from The Common English Bible, © 2011 www.commonenglishbible.com.
Copyright 2015 First Presbyterian Church of Waverly, Ohio. Reprinted by permission.
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