Belief: The Heart of Peace

We continue our summer series on peace with the familiar story of Nicodemus and Jesus. Last Sunday, Michelle reminded us of the importance of prayer as a path to peace with God. The Lord’s Prayer provides us with a model for all of us to use as we seek a clear relationship with God.

Today, we have the example of Nicodemus, who sought out Jesus with his questions. Jesus pointed him towards the necessity of a spiritual birth as the start of a spiritual life that will last forever with God. You and I have been born physically, and we live our natural lives here on earth until we die. Jesus tells us – as he told Nicodemus – that we must also be born spiritually if we want to live spiritually with God.

John summarizes all of this with what are perhaps the best loved verses in all of Scripture: “God loved the world so much that he gave his only begotten son, and whoever believes in him [Jesus] will not die (spiritually) but can live forever (spiritually). God did not send his son into the world to condemn us, but that everyone might be saved through him.”

Excursus: A brief rabbit trail about that phrase “only begotten Son”. In chapter 1, John tells us that the creative Word of God came into the world, but the people he had prepared for his coming rejected him. Then he writes, “But to as many as did receive him he gave the right to become children [sons and daughters] of God, even to those who believe in his name.” Many translations leave out “begotten”, because it is an unfamiliar word (in Greek: monogenetes). But John 3:16 paired with John 1:12 shows us both how we are like Jesus and how Jesus is unique. We are like Jesus because we also are adopted into God’s family as God’s children, with Jesus as our elder brother. But Jesus is unique in that he alone is monogenetes. “Begotten” means that the child shares the DNA of the parents. Jesus shares the DNA of God – uncreated, eternal, pure Spirit (as well as fully human), all-knowing and all-powerful, and so on. Whatever we can say about God, we say about Jesus, because Jesus – the eternal uncreated Word – is God made flesh.

Believe in Jesus

I have two simple thoughts on this verse this morning. Here’s the first one. “Believe in Jesus”: What does it mean to believe in Jesus?

Suppose I asked you if you believe in Santa Claus. Most of us would respond by saying no. We mean that we do not believe that Santa Claus exists, although we know the stories about him. We may even use those stories in our own family’s celebration of Christmas. When our sons were young, I wrote several letters from Father Christmas about that year’s work of life at the North Pole. (I borrowed the idea from J.R.R. Tolkien, who wrote a letter a year for many years, enlisting the mail carrier to bring it to the house with his own hand made stamps from the North Pole on them!)

When we say we don’t believe in Santa Claus (even while we use the idea of this strange man with a white beard), we mean that we don’t believe he really exists. What do we mean when we say we do believe in Jesus?

First, we mean that we believe that the stories about him in the New Testament are true, but the way John uses the words here goes deeper than simple belief that Jesus exists.

Consider a different example. Charles Blondin was a tightrope walker who lived in the 1800s. In 1859, he crossed the Niagara Gorge on a tightrope, a feat that he repeated many times after that. One thousand one hundred feet across the river and 160 feet above the water. Blondin demonstrated a remarkable belief in his own abilities, pushing a wheelbarrow across the rope, stopping part way to cook an egg and eat it, and even carrying a man (his manager) across on his back.

It's that last one that really gets me. Harry Colcord was the man who agreed to go on Blondin’s back. You could say that Colcord believed in Blondin. He trusted Blondin with his life. What happens if Blondin has to sneeze? I know that I would not have trusted Blondin with my life like that! You hear that phrase: “trust him with his life.” That’s what it means to believe in Jesus. It’s not enough to believe that Jesus lived. It’s not even enough to believe that Jesus is the Word made flesh, the incarnate Son of God. The verse goes deeper: “Whoever believes in him shall have everlasting life”: “Whoever trusts him with their life shall have everlasting life.” “Believe in Jesus” means to trust him with your life, just as deeply as Colcord trusted Blondin with his life crossing the Niagara Gorge.

Our theme for the summer is peace with God, with the people around us, and with the whole of creation. Last Sunday we heard of the path to peace: a life of prayer modelled on the Lord’s Prayer. Believing in Jesus walks on that path to find the heart of peace with God. As we trust Jesus with our lives, we fall in love with Jesus and experience God’s love poured over us. That love brings us peace with God.

An Integrated Life

This brings us to my second point: This peace operates at every level. Believing in Jesus leads to peace with God; and believing in Jesus leads to peace with our brothers and sisters in faith; and believing in Jesus leads to peace with the world around us, including the whole of creation.

When we find ourselves with a ruptured relationship, John brings us back to this verse: God loved the world so much that God gave us Jesus to believe in and receive life and peace. This point is easy to see and remarkably difficult for us to see and do in practise. Let me spell it out a bit and try to move beyond a simplistic answer to life’s problems.

Suppose you are married, and you have a conflict with your spouse. A common occurrence, which many of us have experienced. The integration of peace at every level of our lives means that the conflict ripples through every part of our lives, so that our relationship with God also suffers.

Similarly, if our relationship with God is weak, our relationships with others also suffer. If we participate in the abuse of the environment, that abuse causes conflict with others and with God. Conflict at any one level of our lives affects every other area as well, like plucking a spider web and watching the whole web vibrate. Like someone who kicks the dog at home because their boss (metaphorically) kicked them at work,

We have to be careful with this understanding of an integrated life. Sometimes people think that if I just pray hard enough – nurturing peace with God – then the conflict with my spouse will just go away. It doesn’t work like that. Remembering the various levels of conflict in our lives means that we work on reconciliation with our spouse, and we pray more, deepening our relationship with Jesus. We seek the renewed health of the environment, and we pray more, seeking God’s face. We pursue peace at every level of our relationships together.

This pursuit flows from our commitment to trust Jesus with our very lives. We believe in Jesus means that we commit ourselves to him and his ways every day and every moment of our lives. As we do so, we bring God into the centre of the conflicts and disruptions of our lives, seeking God’s peace at every level of our lives.

Contrast to the World around Us

This pursuit of peace stands in sharp contrast to the world around us. Conventional wisdom tells us that when we find ourselves in a conflict, we should end the conflict as soon as possible and cut ties with the person with whom we are in conflict. People don’t change, we are told, and the only recourse to conflict is to get out.

There is real wisdom in conventional wisdom. If you are in an abusive relationship with your spouse, I do not counsel you to stay there, seeking peace: Sometimes you do indeed need to leave and not return. But our society has taken this truth much further.

The underlying belief for many in our society is that people don’t change; in fact, we would say, people cannot change. We hear voices that sway any conflict makes it clear that the person you are in conflict with is unsafe. Reconciliation is impossible. We hear them say they are bad people, and you must avoid them forever. This is the spirit behind what we sometimes call “cancel culture”, and it works to perpetuate conflicts rather than to bring peace.

In contrast to this stance, John reminds us that God gave Jesus for us. Jesus lived for us, and Jesus died for us. He took our rebellion against God into himself and rose from death to reconcile us with God. His victory over death is also victory over the power of evil in our world. Therefore, we can change. Therefore, we can reconcile – both with God and with other people. Therefore, we can live at peace with God and experience peace with others and with the whole of creation.

Conclusion

I remember a dramatic example of this pursuit of peace, with God’s love for us and our love for God at its heart. Fifteen or 20 years ago, Reaksa Himm spoke at Providence. He graduated from the seminary the year before I came, and he visited us again ten years later in 2006. He told us his story, which you can read in his book, The Tears of My Soul.

Reaksa was a survivor of the killing fields in Cambodia. He was shot by the Khmer, along with the rest of the people in his village. Somehow, he survived in the open grave where they were dumped and escaped into the jungle. In 1989, he left Cambodia as a refugee and came to Canada. He expected never to return, but God had other plans for him.

In his journey as a refugee, he left Buddhism and became a Christian. His conversion brought him peace with God, but his heart was tormented by the memories of his bitter experiences at the hands of the Khmer Rouge, including the death of his family. In 1998, he was invited to return to Cambodia as a Bible teacher to help train leaders in the young church growing there. He resisted, with the hurt and pain of the past strong in his life, but God would not let him rest. Finally, in 1999, he agreed and returned to Cambodia. In the years that followed, he started a school in his home village among the people who had helped to kill his family. Here is his description of returning to his home village:

Then on 6^th June 2003, I went back to the village where my family was killed. I discovered that four of the six men involved had been killed and one had moved to a different village. I met the remaining one. He was fearful of meeting me but I spoke to him of God’s love and forgiveness. By God’s grace I was able to forgive him and set him free in my heart.

        I thank God for sparing my life so that I can bring the message of salvation and forgiveness to my broken people. I also thank God for the healing of my hurt and pain that I had endured for more than 25 years. Now, I can see the glory and experience the joy of serving him in my hometown. (Sokreaksa Himm, 156)

Reaksa’s story illustrates the way that God’s love brings peace to every area of our lives – even if it takes our whole life to do so. Peace with God leads to peace with others and peace with the whole of creation. For God loved us so much that he gave his only begotten son, and when we believe in Jesus we receive everlasting life, the life of God’s Spirit that lasts forever.

Steinbach Mennonite Church

2 July 2023

Text -- John 3: 1 to 21

Fixing What’s Broken (The New Creation)

Last Sunday was Pentecost Sunday. Today is Trinity Sunday. It makes sense to move from the day when we remember the giving of the Holy Spirit to a day when we remember the nature of God – three persons; one essence. God is one in essence, a perfect unity, but experience God as three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

I don’t plan to explain the trinity today – that kind of exploration is useful, but it is best done in another setting, with people who can see more deeply into such mysteries than I can. Instead, I want to reflect on the Scriptures that the lectionary gives us to think of Trinity.

Genesis 1 tells of creation, the action of God at the beginning of everything. “The Spirit of God moved upon the face of the deep.” “And God said, ‘Let there be …, and there was ….’” God: Creator, Spirit, and Word. John 1 picks up on this creation account and makes clear what this creative word is: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. … Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.”

Genesis 1: God – Creative Power, Word, and Spirit – present in the beginning, an eternal three persons, one essence. Matthew 28 refers then to the same trinity as part of what we call the Great Commission: “Baptizing in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.” Last Sunday, we performed a baptism as part of our service. You may remember that Pastor Lee used these words as they poured the water over Katie’s head: “We baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.”

A natural question follows. Why does the lectionary tie the Great Commission to the creation narrative like this? What’s going on? There are various possible answers, I suppose, and I want to consider first Genesis 1 and then Matthew 28 to get at least one of them.

Creation

Genesis 1 one has several important themes. One of them is the way that God brings order into chaos. The first statement about creation is that the earth was formless and empty, and darkness was over the surface of the deep. Formless – Empty – Deep: in the Hebrew, tohu va vohu … tehom. These are words that mean chaos and trouble. The deep is where bad things come from. Formless emptiness is dangerous. The first readers of Genesis would have expected trouble.

Then the narrative shifts: “The Spirit of God hovered over the waters, and God said, ‘Let there be light’, and there was light.” So begins an ordering of chaos, so that by the end of the chapter all is well ordered and made ready for the human pair.

A second theme is how good this ordering is. The next sentence after “there was light” is “God saw that the light was good.” Throughout the six creative days, this theme repeats: in verse 10, God calls the sea and dry land good; in verse 13, God calls vegetation in all its forms good; in verse 18, God calls the sun, moon, and stars good; in verse 21, God calls all living creatures good; and finally in verse 31, God calls the whole of creation, ruled over by the man and the woman made in his image, very good. God’s creation is good – when God orders it and blesses it and rules over it.

A third theme is the place that the man and the woman occupy in creation. As we saw, God calls creation ruled over by the human couple “very good”. They are made “in the image and likeness of God.” So, the human pair were made “like God”. Why does the text add “in the image”. We can see what the word “image” means here by listening to the Ten Commandments, “You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them.” Why not? Because the man and the woman were the image. The Israelites were not to bow down to any other creature as God’s image, because they were God’s image.

In short, the human couple in creation represent God, ruling over the earth in God’s place. What does that mean? Remember what God did in creating the world. God took a place of chaos and disorder and made it ordered and good. God brought shalom – wholeness and peace and good – into creation and then gave the human couple the task of continuing to bring order and peace.

Fast forward to the present. How have we done? How well have we brought order and peace into chaos and disorder? Not very well! Which sets the stage for Matthew 28.

The Great Commission

As with the Creation account, there are many themes we could consider. The little statement, “but some doubted”, is worth exploring. In the presence of the risen Lord, some were not sure what this meant or how they should respond. We can take courage from their confusion. When we feel doubts and uncertainty, we know we’re in good company, and we know that Jesus does not abandon us, any more than he abandoned his first followers.

We could also explore the precise nature of the commission – going; baptizing; teaching. These three words take us deep into the life of the first church, but they belong in another sermon, not today.

I want instead to note the way that Jesus begins the commission: “All authority in heaven and on earth is given to me.” Jesus is the Word, the creative word of God present at the creation of the heavens and the earth. He holds the authority of the ruler of the universe because he made all that is. His commission for the disciples, then, is the action of the ruler telling his representatives what they are to do. Just as God left the human pair at the beginning of the world as his images to rule over the earth, Jesus leaves the church as his representatives to bring the good news of the gospel to all people. That is, we are restoring creation – fixing what’s broken.

Why?

Why would Jesus give the church this task? Why do we need a new creation? Simply because the old creation has failed. The human race had the task of ordering creation and bringing about peace and justice throughout the world. We failed. We continue to fail. Therefore, the church has the task of bringing all people into the new creation where God reigns in perfect justice and peace.

This task is not a political task. We are not trying to create a Christian nation, which would mirror the Old Testament people of God. When Jesus went to his death, his disciples were ready to fight to protect him. Jesus stopped them with these words: “My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, then my servants could fight for me.” (John 18:36) As it is, God’s reign is not a political realm. Again, in Luke 17, Jesus says, “The kingdom of God is within you.” This is not a personal abstract spirituality, but rather it affirms that God’s reign is made visible in the church.

God’s reign is much bigger than the church; it includes the whole of creation. But we are given the task of making God’s reign visible. We show what a community of people who have been baptized into the death of Christ look like. We show what a community of people who “obey everything that Jesus commands” looks like. We make visible the new creation in which God’s Spirit is present and active. In short, we are the ones who complete the mandate given to the first man and woman in Genesis 1 to work at the task of bringing order and peace and wholeness and goodness into the world. That’s our job. That’s who we are.

An Objection

Some people think that the world is actually okay and that we don’t really need this gospel of the kingdom. I have news for you. It’s not okay. It’s bad. There are places here and there where God’s Spirit is active, bringing goodness and life, but the truth is we live in a world that is on the brink of destruction. Chaos and disorder threaten us all around. I don’t need to go into details; just listen to the news for a week and you will be sufficiently depressed.

Someone might reply, “The world’s bad, but I’m okay. I don’t need any help. I can handle what faces me and my family.” Maybe you can. I admit that I’m doubtful. Life has a way of throwing a curve ball at us. Just when we think we know what’s happening, it drops out of the strike zone and we miss the ball completely. Life’s like that.

But even if you can handle what happens to you personally, can you take care of the climate crisis? Can you end the war in Ukraine? My daughter-in-law used to work in a school in a deprived neighbourhood; she saw poverty and its effects up close. Can you fix the poverty that destroys families and fuels addictive behaviour?

The only way you can really think you’re okay is by drawing a circle around yourself and keeping all the problems outside. But it doesn’t work. Sooner or later someone you know, someone you care about, gets caught up in chaos and pain. Then you remember that it’s our job in the church to bring order into chaos, to bring peace into conflict, to bring light into darkness.

How Do We Do This?

How do we do this? That’s the question. Some people reduce the answer to handing out tracts or going door to door with a gospel presentation. The first church did it another way. They told about the resurrection over and over again, and they lived out the Great Commission: Teaching them to obey everything that Jesus commands.

That action – living it out – was critical. Stephen Neill was a missionary scholar. Here is his description of Christians in the first three hundred years of the church’s life:

In those days to be a Christian meant something. Doubtless among the pagans there were many who lived upright and even noble lives. Yet all our evidence goes to show that in that decaying world sexual laxity had gone almost to the limits of the possible, and that slavery had brought with it the inevitable accompaniments of cruelty and the cheapening of the value of human life. Christians were taught to regard their bodies as temples of the Holy Spirit. The Church did not attempt to forbid or abolish slavery; it drew the sting of it by reminding masters and slaves alike that they had a common Master...and that they were brothers in the faith. (Stephen Neill, A History of Christian Missions, 1964: 41)

I like that line: “In those days to be a Christian meant something.” Christians were different – in a good way! I’ve used this example before, and it’s worth repeating again. A hundred years ago, my ancestors in Ontario were part of the Brethren in Christ (Tunkers). Morris Sider (I think) tells how they used to have Love Feasts each year, and before they could take part in feetwashing and communion, they had to make sure there was no sin in their lives. Some of them were farmers who had crossed the border and bought farm equipment in the state of New York. Occasionally, a farmer would realize he had not paid duty on what he bought, so he went down to the border to declare the item and pay duty on it. The border guards declared that they never worried about the plain people (as they called us), because they knew that we would always come back and pay.

I think that’s really cool! Integrity was baked into their lives so that the border guards knew they were telling the truth. What would it look like if the way that God wants the world to be were baked into our lives? It would take another sermon to explore what that would look like, but I  can summarize it by using the terms we heard in the Creation account: We would be people who bring order into chaos, peace into conflict, God’s presence into every arena of life.

Drew Strait (NT prof at AMBS) tells a story of defusing conflict and seeking peace, even in the vitriol that passes for virtual conversations online. He had written an article on 9/11 and Christian nationalism, which appeared online. One of the commenters attacked him quite viciously, and Strait describes his peaceable response – leading to the commenter deleting his attack from the conversation. Even in the polarization of contemporary politics, it is possible to build for peace.

Conclusion

Part of the trouble is that we want quick results. We want to know what we can do so that things are better right away. Remember Neill’s description of the first church? They made their mark and conquered the Roman Empire with God’s love, but it took them three hundred years. They were small groups of people scattered throughout the cities of the Roman Empire. They really did not look like representatives of the king of the universe, but they were!

We also may not feel like a place filled with God’s power. Eighty to a hundred or so people, so many of us over 70 years old – and you think that this is where God reveals God’s reign to the people of the earth? You bet it is! It’s a long slow process, working night and day. That’s why Jesus says in the Great Commission, “I am with you always, to the very end of the age!”

We play our part: maybe actively; maybe quietly; living out the resurrection of Jesus every day. We pray and we live Saint Francis’ prayer, bringing about the new creation, the world as God meant it to be:

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace: where there is hatred, let me sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; where there is sadness, joy. O divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console, to be understood as to understand, to be loved as to love. For it is in giving that we receive, it is in pardoning that we are pardoned, and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen.

Steinbach Mennonite Church

4 June 2023

Sermon Texts:

Genesis 1:1 to 2:4a

Matthew 28:16 to 20

Focus Statement:

God gives us the commission to "make disciples" -- that is, to represent God recreating the world the way that God wants it to be. We are God's people inviting everyone around us to join in the new creation.

Thinking Ahead Question: What is broken in our world, and how can we fix it?

Digging Deeper:

1. What is wrong with our world?

2. What can we do about it?

3. How do you feel about the idea that fixing the world may take 300 years?

4. What examples do you know about of God’s kingdom breaking into our lives? How can we participate in bringing in the new creation?

Encountering (Others’) Faith

We know that Canada is filled with many cultures. Manitoba was already a multicultural province long before the present surge of migrants entered. Consider the presence of reserves – not just First Nations and Metis reserves, but an East Reserve for Mennonites (where I live in Steinbach), and a French Reserve for towns like St. Pierre and Ste. Anne, and a Ukrainian Reserve for towns like Tolstoi and Sarto.

It is no accident that one of Winnipeg’s most beloved festivals is Folkorama, celebrating the multiplicity of cultures in our city and province. From Filipinos to Scottish immigrants, from the Indians playing cricket in Assiniboine Park to what one authority called “the most secular Jewish community in Canada”, diversity is in our lifeblood.

Ironically, the first time I ever visited Winnipeg was in 1990 for Mennonite World Conference. Southern Manitoba has a well-deserved reputation as a Mennonite enclave; but Steinbach and Winkler have their own mosques now, and Winnipeg has more gurdwaras than it does Hindu Temples – many Sikhs as part of the Indian diaspora in this part of the world. We may still be the bible belt in Canada, but we also have a remarkable array of cultures and faiths.

In this context, how do we relate to our neighbours, often people of no specific religion or of a religion quite different from our own Christian faith? That is the question I want to consider for the next few minutes.

Ethnocentrism

The natural response to people of other cultures and religions is one of suspicion. We are naturally ethnocentric, just as babies begin life as naturally egocentric. We know our group, and we assume that the way we do things is natural and right. Others, therefore, are unnatural and wrong.

You see this ethnocentrism all over the place. For example, China calls itself “the middle kingdom”, meaning that China is the centre of the earth. And Toronto thinks that it is the centre of the earth! Or look at a world map. If you look at a map made in Australia or Japan, you will not find North and South America at the centre; Australia and Asia are in the middle.

North Americans are of course as ethnocentric as anyone else. Consider our neighbours to the south. I heard a lecture broadcast on NPR some 15 years ago in which the speaker considered the meaning of the American Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal …”

He observed that the first question Americans faced when they became a country was, “Does all men include Black men?” They ended up fighting a civil war before they agreed that it does. Then they asked, “Does all men include women?” After much debating and protesting, they finally agreed that women are people too in 1919. (We beat them in Canada, but only by a year!) The speaker then went on to the current question, “Does all men mean all men everywhere, or does it mean only all Americans are created equal?” That question our American neighbours have not yet settled. Events at their border with Mexico this past week reinforce the sense that some Americans see themselves as better than the rest of humankind.

If you think that ethnocentrism is an American problem, try calling a Canadian an American. His/her response will leave you in no doubt that we also are focused on our identity as Canadians. Ethnocentrism is the natural human response to people of other faiths and other religions!

In this context, then, we turn to the Scriptures that we read this morning.

John 14

We referred last Sunday to Jesus’ teaching his disciples after the last supper. He assured them that they – and all who place their trust in him – will enter God’s presence both here and in eternity. Jesus said that he is the way, truth, and life, not just for his disciples but for all people.

In the verses we read this morning, Jesus promised his disciples the presence and help of his Holy Spirit. He knew that they would embark on a long and difficult journey from their ethnocentric identity as God’s Chosen People, the Jews, to God’s People drawn from every nation under heaven. They would need his presence and power to transition from an exclusive group who kept outsiders at bay to an inclusive church who welcomed everyone.

Acts 17

The account of Paul speaking to the philosophers in Athens is just one example of this shift. Consider Paul’s own experience. He began his life as a Pharisee, one set apart to defend the Mosaic Law, Torah, from all attacks and especially from outsiders. When the new sect of Christ-followers came on the scene, he was vigorous in his attacks on them. Then he met Jesus, the crucified and risen Jesus, on the road to Damascus. As he pursued Jesus’ disciples to kill or imprison them, Jesus met him in a blinding encounter and transformed his life.

Paul still called himself a Pharisee. The name means one who is set apart by God for a purpose, but the purpose had changed. He retained deep appreciation for Torah and God’s grace in giving Torah to the Jews, but his core commitment had shifted to the gospel of Jesus Christ. He summarizes the gospel in a remarkable passage in 1 Corinthians 15:

³ For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, ⁴ that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, ⁵ and that he appeared to Cephas, and then to the Twelve. ⁶ After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. ⁷ Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, ⁸ and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born. 

If you want a summary of the gospel, there it is! Jesus Christ crucified and risen. That is what Paul now lived for.

A critical element of this gospel is that Jesus lived and died and rose for all people. There are no outsiders. God’s grace is freely available to all people of every class, ethnicity, and gender. In place of the ethnocentrism that flows so easily from the human heart, Jesus calls everyone to eternal life, life with God. As Paul puts it elsewhere, “There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28). Sometimes we think of Paul as one who introduced all kinds of rules and guilt into Jesus’ wonderful gospel of freedom. In fact, Jesus is the one who said, “Small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it” (Matthew 7: 14). Paul was (in the words of scholar F.F. Bruce) “the apostle of the heart set free.”

Accordingly, wherever he went, Paul preached the gospel to Jews and to Gentiles. Normally, he entered the synagogue and preached the gospel and then went out into the streets and kept on preaching the gospel. When he got to Athens, he was waiting for the rest of his team to join him. He became aware of the cultural and religious life of Athens, which was a centre of philosophy. If you wanted to know what was on the cutting edge of religious and philosophical thinking, you went to Athens and listened to the latest and best minds of that day debating what was true.

This impression of Athens is behind the way that Paul preached there – reasoning with both Jews and Gentiles and anyone else who happened to be there. They were only too happy to have a leader from this new sect of Judaism tell them what this new way was all about. Paul went about his task with relish, quoting from their own best poets and philosophers to talk about the religious practices in which they were engaged. One has the impression that people listened with interest as long as he moved in familiar territory, but then he used their ideas as a foundation to talk about Jesus. He pivoted to the story of Jesus and told how he had been killed and raised from the dead. Talk about the resurrection divided his hearers. Some scoffed, and some wanted to hear more.

What Does This Tell Us?

I assume that we agree we should share our faith with people around us. Paul’s example can help us in our own context. Athens was also highly multi-cultural and multi-religious. The philosophers of Athens would have said that they were well qualified to tell people which of these competing faiths was worth taking seriously. Paul and his companions could well have felt intimidated, but they went into the marketplace and shared what they believed. What can we learn from them?

1) Note that Paul began by making connections. He quoted authorities within the philosophers’ schools of study. He paid attention to the public monuments and rituals that he saw all around him. He did not start by saying condemning them. He started by looking for points of connections and building relationships. Donald Smith (in Creating Understanding) notes that communication always begins with building relationships.

We have a skewed idea in our culture that we are faced with only two ways to relate to people of other faiths. Either we think we must set out to convert them, or we think that we should be careful to say nothing about Jesus. I know what both options feel like. I remember the first world religions class I took to a mosque. It was in Fort Wayne, Indiana, and the Muslim preacher of the morning made it his goal to convert my class. He preached at us as hard as he could, inviting us us to leave the confusion of Christianity behind and become Muslims. My class was insulted! They wondered what he thought he was doing! I said to them, “Some of you want to become missionaries. It’s good for you to know what it feels like!”

Or another example: Last week a woman and her daughter were going door to door in our neighbourhood, witnessing to whoever would answer the door. I am sympathetic to their message, but I didn’t know them! I kept the conversation as short as I reasonably could.

Paul shows us how to build relationships. He preaches the gospel clearly, but first he gets to know his audience. Given how many people like to hide their beliefs in our context, it makes sense that we begin by building relationships. We get to know people around us. We don’t act like we think we know what is best for them or try to explain their experience. Rather, we listen and discover. As we get to know each other, we find opportunities to share our lives, including our faith.

2) An important part of Paul’s practice of making connections was the way that he could quote poets and philosophers that his audience knew. He had studied them. He had learned from them. We can do the same.

Consider the indigenous population of Canada. We regularly hear land acknowledgements, and we admit that we live together on treaty land. Such statements are important. They help us to frame our relationships, recognizing the importance of the other. But we must go further. Listen to First Nations people you know. Learn their stories and their view of reality. Learn to think and speak within their categories. As we do so, we discover ways that God’s revelation is already present within indigenous cultures.

As we get to know our neighbours, we discover what their lives are about and what they believe about reality. Like Paul, we keep listening for ways that God was in India or the Philippines or China or Nigeria before the Christian Church showed up. One missions thinker calls this acting like a treasure-seeker. We search for the truth of the gospel already present in every culture and every faith, before Christians arrive.

3) We could say much more, but we come to a close. Finally, Paul was unapologetic when it came to speaking the gospel. We want to be sensitive and relevant. We want to be understanding and avoid insulting people. As a result, sometimes we are so careful that we say nothing about the reality of Jesus in our lives. Paul was not so quiet!

He knew that talking about the resurrection was going to split the crowd, but the resurrection of Jesus was his reason for living! We also can speak naturally about Jesus’ place in our lives. Not like the Muslim imam from Fort Wayne whom I described; not like some Christians I have known who just can’t wait to ask if you know for sure that you’re going to heaven; not in a pushy or violent way – we can share who Jesus is in our lives. Can you tell your story? Do so! Wait until you’ve earned the right to speak. Show a real and genuine interest in the other person. And when the time is right, you can tell how you have met Jesus in your own life.

I started with ethnocentrism. If you act like you and people like you are the centre of the world, don’t be surprised if others don’t listen to you. But if you really do accept everyone around you as another person also made in God’s image, if you are really open to the people around you, I  believe you will find they are also open to you.

In the whole process, remember that it is God’s Spirit who draws us and all people to God. We rest in the work of the Holy Spirit, “for in him we live, and move, and have our being.”

Texts

Acts 17: 22-31

²² Paul then stood up in the meeting of the Areopagus and said: ‘People of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious. ²³ For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: to an unknown god. So you are ignorant of the very thing you worship – and this is what I am going to proclaim to you.

²⁴ ‘The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by human hands. ²⁵ And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything. Rather, he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else. ²⁶ From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands. ²⁷ God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us. ²⁸ “For in him we live and move and have our being.” As some of your own poets have said, “We are his offspring.”

²⁹ ‘Therefore since we are God’s offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone – an image made by human design and skill. ³⁰ In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent. ³¹ For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to everyone by raising him from the dead.’

John 14: 15-21

Jesus promises the Holy Spirit

¹⁵ ‘If you love me, keep my commands. ¹⁶ And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you for ever – ¹⁷ the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you. ¹⁸ I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. ¹⁹ Before long, the world will not see me any more, but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live. ²⁰ On that day you will realise that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you. ²¹ Whoever has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. The one who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love them and show myself to them.’

Grace Bible Church

14 May 2023

Ready to Die

Introduction 

Sermons are contextual. The situations I experience inevitably colour the way that I hear a passage of Scripture, and my context at this point in time is one of loss and death. We held two funerals during Holy Week – one for our congregation’s chairperson and another for a woman I had visited many times as one of our pastors. Over the past three months, we have lost many people we love, and this morning’s sermon deals with the texts in this context of loss.

 

Acts 7 

Stephen is known as the first follower of Jesus to follow him to death. He was a Greek-speaking leader in the first Jerusalem Church, and the religious establishment saw him as a threat to their own existence. Stephen defended himself before the Sanhedrin, the highest religious court in Israel, by reinterpreting Jewish history as an arc leading through the Law and the Temple to person of Jesus Messiah.

 

The religious leaders recognized a challenge to their authority within the Jewish people, and they accused Stephen of blasphemy, for which the punishment was death by stoning. Stephen died with a vision of God in his heart and eyes and with words of forgiveness for his attackers on his lips.

 

John 14 

Jesus’ words in John 14 come just after the last supper in John 13 and before the act of betrayal that led to his own death. He knew what was coming and spoke out of that knowledge to his disciples. He was preparing them for his death, but he was also letting them know how to live their own lives.

 

I remember the first verses of this passage from listening to my mother give farewell talks to churches in Zimbabwe, when we left Africa to move to Pennsylvania in 1965. She tied them to the final verses of John 16, promising peace to Jesus’ disciples. These three chapters also form a unit, an extended response to the question that Peter asked at the end of chapter 13, and which Thomas and Philip repeated in chapter 14: Where are you going? They could not see what lay ahead. They knew only that Jesus was leaving them, and they wanted to know where he was going and how they could follow him there.

 

Where was Jesus going? He was going to the Father. He was coming up to the end of his life here in earth and preparing to enjoy full communion with his Father. He had said, “I and my Father are one”, and he was preparing to resume that full unity that gives the whole doctrine of the incarnation so much mystery and power.

 

He told the disciples that they could follow him there. Indeed, by following him as disciples, they were already on their way to God, because Jesus said that he himself was that way. Then, with a wealth of imagery, he promised them a future beyond this world in which they – and we – will experience the presence of God in full. Paul describers the same reality in 1 Corinthians 13: “Now we see dimly in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now we know in part; then we shall know even as we are known.”

 

The Promise 

When we start talking about going to be with God, going to Heaven, sometimes people accuse us of making our faith an otherworldly irrelevant thing – “pie in the sky by-and-by. In fact, it is precisely this promise of union with God that leads to peace and joy in this world. Jesus’ promise of room for us with God in eternity is not a fanciful theoretical promise. It is a down-to-earth practical promise that enables us to live in this world the way God wants us to. Here. Now. I want to spend the rest of our time working out how practical this promise is.

 

Carver Model of Governance 

I suspect that several of you have had experience on boards of governors and the like. You know that some boards are working boards. I am on the board for Steinbach Community Outreach, and, although we don’t try to do the work of SCO, we are involved in fundraising and relating to the community.

 

Some boards, on the other hand, are governance boards. They don’t help with any of the work of the organization, but they provide oversight and accountability for all the organization. I spent 20 years on the board of Operation Mobilization (Canada). We were a governance board using the Carver Model.

 

A web resource provides the following definition:

In the Carver model, the board focuses on determining the overarching policies of the organization, the “ends.” At the same time, responsibility is delegated to the CEO and other members to establish the “means” or the implementation of the policies. (https://www.amcnposolutions.com/comparing-3-models-traditional-carver-and-complementary/)

 

An end has at least two basic meanings. One is time related, such as comes at the end of life. Our end is the moment when we die. The other is teleological: The goal or purpose of the organization. That is the meaning in the Carver Model. The board asks a basic question of the organization’s leadership: Have you achieved your ends in the past year?

 

Our Life’s End

This question is one we could usefully ask in our own lives. But first you must discover what your “end” is. What is your purpose in life? What is the goal towards which you are living? One common goal is expressed in the saying, “He who dies with the most toys wins.” If that is your end, your goal, then you will naturally make choices in daily life that move towards that end. You will accumulate goods that help you have fun. When someone in need approaches you, you may help them. Your life goal certainly does not forbid it. But on the whole, you will not have as much disposable income to direct towards helping the needy, because your goal is to accumulate goods for yourself.

Suppose you have a different purpose for living. Suppose that your end, your goal in life, is to reduce the inequities of life that lead to poverty. Someone in need approaches you, and you respond to them out of your life’s goal to reduce life’s inequities. You may indeed choose not to help them, but you make your choice in the context of your purpose for living. You may also choose to buy something just for fun, but on the whole, you will likely have more disposable income to income to direct towards helping the needy – because your goal is not to accumulate goods for yourself.

 

Notice that any individual action of two different people may look much alike. In the example I have given, one is a fun-loving pleasure-seeker and the other is dedicated to making a more just society. Both of them may help the person in need. Often, the person who seeks “the most toys” is also a pleasant person to be around. Such people will often give a helping hand. The difference shows up over the long term. One seeks to help the person in trouble whenever possible; the other helps when it’s convenient. They have different goals in life, and those goals shape the kind of person they are in daily life.

 

What’s your goal in life? What is your life’s “end”? What are you living for? Jesus tells his disciples what to live for. “There’s room in God’s house for you. I am going to God, to perfect unity with God, and you can too. I have done God’s will here on earth, and I want you to do God’s will on my behalf. I am the way to God, the way to life. I want you to walk in ‘the way’, to walk ‘in me’ as my representative until you die.”

 

Our end – in the sense of the end of our lives – will show what our real purpose, the goal of our lives, has been. Our family and friends remember us, and they can see what we lived for. Jesus says, “Live for me.”

 

What Would This Look Like? 

Think of my example again: Someone in need approaches you for help. It might be a friend who needs someone to support them through a difficult time. It might be a stranger who lives on the street. It might be almost anyone; we all need help from time to time. How do you respond to the request? Most of us try to help. We’re caring people and we feel compassion for those who are struggling, whether they need emotional support or financial help or whatever it is. Do you stop to ask yourself how you can walk in the way of Jesus in that moment? Jesus is life and truth. Do you consciously draw on his Spirit living in you for your response?

 

I had such an experience last Monday. A very ordinary experience. I was leaving Superstore with my groceries, and as I reached the car, a woman approached me. She was dressed as a Muslim woman and carrying a cardboard sign. The sign suggested she was asking for money to buy food and diapers for her children. She may have been part of the Syrian diaspora in Canada. Who knows? I know nothing else of her.

 

I gave her $10. If her need was real, my $10 made almost no difference. If she was faking her need, it went into the bag with other donations she received that day. I have no way of knowing if I should give or not. I gave reflexively, because that’s what we do. As I turned away, I said, “Asalaam aleikum” – “Peace be to you”. She replied “Amin”, the Arabic way of saying, “Amen”, confirming my guess that she was Muslim.

 

But I really do want to be God’s representative here until I die. I really do want to walk in Jesus’ way when I meet a random woman in need. When I got home, I called Steinbach Community Outreach, an organization in Steinbach that specializes in helping people on the margins find housing as well as financial and emotional and social and spiritual support. I asked a friend there if they know of this woman, because they really do know most of the people walking around town with no real home of their own.

 

As we walked my friend went through the possibilities of who this woman was. One likely possibility is that she is someone who is told to stand in the parking lot and solicit donations, then she takes them back to someone else who controls her life. It may be a combination of a scam and a tragedy. My friend said that she appears most summers, not in the winters, and that they (at SCO) would look out for her. If they can sit down and talk with her, they may be able to provide greater help than a ten-dollar bill in the parking lot.

 

I still hadn’t really helped this woman I saw, but I knew that I had done what I could. What more Jesus wants me to do remains to be seen.

 

Generalizing the Case

One problem with this case is that it plays into many of our stereotypes. We are quick to decide that she is exploited, or that she was scamming the people at Superstore, or that society is at fault – or whatever your own particular bias is. Jesus wants us to walk in him, with his life and truth, and to keep walking in him until we get to our final home with God. We don’t have to solve all the problems; we just keep walking with Jesus and learning what we need for the next step.

 

We do that by asking what our life’s purpose is. What is your End? My purpose is to represent Jesus as I walk in his way. I fail often enough, but that’s okay. There is more than enough grace in the death and resurrection of Jesus to take care of my failures.

 

If I generalize from my experience with the woman in the parking lot, one way that I represent Jesus is to treat people I meet as real people. Treat them with respect, whoever they are. SCO has been a good teacher for me. Lois and I were talking recently with SCO’s director, and she told us of a man who walks around our neighbourhood. We have seen him often enough that I found his story interesting. We’ll call him John (not his real name).

 

I won't tell John's story in print, but he has lost his job and family due to mental illness and walks the streets of Steinbach looking for them.He does not read English but can speak some English. He reads and speaks German and Russian. SCO has helped him find lodging, but he has been evicted from the apartment they found. He is not a bad man or a violent man, but he cannot live with people around him. So, he walks the streets. Many of us in Steinbach know him, although we don’t know his name or his story.

 

SCO continues to help as they can, but I wondered what I would do when I next saw him on the street. I could be sure that I would see him because I also walk our streets, and indeed I saw him only a few days later. I was walking into town, and he was headed for Abe’s Hill. As we drew level, I said, “Hello, John.” He didn’t respond, but I thought there was one thing I could always do. I could treat him with the respect we give to other people. I don’t need to treat him as though I am going to fix what’s wrong with him – that can be a kind of arrogance we sometimes show to others around us. I just need to treat him as a person worth my respect and consideration.

 

We’ll see if that turns into anything else, just as we’ll see if I ever meet the woman in the parking lot again. In a way, it doesn’t matter. What does matter is that I am seeking to fulfill my end, to live according to the purpose that God has given me.

 

Conclusion 

We started with the story of Stephen. Stephen was someone who faced the end of his life with courage and love because he was clear about the purpose for his life – to incarnate God’s love as a follower of Jesus. Some of us are old enough to have seen many funerals. We know the grief that comes with separation from loved ones. But death only has a real sting in it if we’re not living for God’s purpose in our lives.

 

Jesus assures us of room enough for everyone with him in Heaven – if we are living with Jesus as our end, our purpose and goal in life. As we walk in the way, truth, and life that is Jesus, we are ready for whatever end may come to our lives. We can live well now each day, knowing what we are living for in eternity.

 

Texts:

ACTS 7:55-60 (NIV)

55 But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, looked up to heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. 56 ‘Look,’ he said, ‘I see heaven open and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God.’ 57 At this they covered their ears and, yelling at the top of their voices, they all rushed at him, 58 dragged him out of the city and began to stone him. Meanwhile, the witnesses laid their coats at the feet of a young man named Saul. 59 While they were stoning him, Stephen prayed, ‘Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.’ 60 Then he fell on his knees and cried out, ‘Lord, do not hold this sin against them.’ When he had said this, he fell asleep.

 

JOHN 14:1-14 (NIV)

14 ‘Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me. 2 My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. 4 You know the way to the place where I am going.’ Jesus the way to the Father 5 Thomas said to him, ‘Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?’ 6 Jesus answered, ‘I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. 7 If you really know me, you will know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.’ 8 Philip said, ‘Lord, show us the Father and that will be enough for us.’ 9 Jesus answered: ‘Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, “Show us the Father”? 10 Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you I do not speak on my own authority. Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work. 11 Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; or at least believe on the evidence of the works themselves. 12 Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father. 13 And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. 14 You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it.

 

Grace Bible Church

7 May 2023