24 April 2011 “Seeing is Believing” John 20:1-18
Being truthful this morning of all mornings I come looking for answers. Perhaps you can help. How exactly do you hold an Easter egg? I know, many of you have the same question. Do we hold it delicately or firmly? Do we hold our Easter egg delicately so we don’t break it or firmly so we don’t drop it? It’s been a year since last Easter and I always forget.
I bring this up because many of you have already held an Easter egg this morning and you could advise us on this matter. But, perhaps latter, for today is a day to set aside such deep and complex problems.
For today we are in high celebration of a different, sort! Today is a day like no other. Amazing grace has filled the morning dawn and today of all days God’s amazing grace has taken hold of us. Being truthful this morning we come looking for that grace. Have you felt it yet today? Have we felt God’s grace? Have we seen God’s grace filling the space around us? It is here with us this morning in our sanctuary.
Look around, who do you see? There, right there in that pew in front of you, God’s grace. There in that pew behind you, God’s grace. There in that person to your right or to your left, God’s grace. God’s grace has filled their hearts as it has yours and mine, and we are radiant this morning! We are all clothed in the newness of life that has come to us in our risen Lord Jesus. We are God’s grace this morning. He is risen! He is risen indeed!
Even the weather is spectacular, it is a glorious Easter Sunday and the world is glowing. The world is outshining itself and just now we have heard this amazing and true story about Jesus. Our Jesus, taken from us so quickly, now has come back. He is risen! He is risen indeed!
In Jesus’ death and resurrection, we have been cleansed of our sin; we are now able to be reborn, resurrected to new life. We have a fresh start where sin may no longer be our sole cross to bear, a fresh start where love may have another chance. Love coming to us from Christ’s dying for us. Love extending from us filling us with grace and joy and blessings and an unbounded desire in our heart to give it all away to the most surprised people. Those whom we least expect, surprising even ourselves.
These past 40 days of Lent was a time for clearing and cleaning and digging out the rocks and thorns and weeds in our lives. These were the days set aside to help us be honest with ourselves and, with God’s help, get rid of the unhealthy life habits we have been holding on to.
With God’s wisdom, space has been cleared that will allow us to tend to a new life, a new garden where we have been planted with God’s love, where we may realize new growth, new beauty and joy.
Space has been made where we may cast our new love upon the world, one person at a time. Space has been made where God’s kingdom will come, where resurrection will bring God’ grace, God’s hope to our life and to all we gather to God.
Through so much of our life God reminds us of God’s grace and Easter Sunday is one of those special times. The kids are excited about the day and the adults are too. There is that egg question after all and that question about God’s grace, and we know today is the day for answers.
In the midst of this excitement, we are drawn to church. Christmas and Easter have this effect on us. They draw us to the church to find our answers and hear once again the stories of God’s truth that ground us IN the world while not grounding us TO the world.
So, the Easter story: Mary came to the tomb early that Sunday morning. The stone covering the tomb had been rolled away. Without looking in, and in shock, she ran to Peter and the others to tell them what she had seen.
For Mary, still in her grief because Jesus had died on the cross, this was too much. She laments, “They have taken the Lord,” his body, they have taken his body from the grave. And I don’t know where they have taken him.”
Peter ran to the tomb to see for sure. Unlike Mary, he entered the tomb searching frantically for Jesus and saw only piles of rags. He and John saw that Jesus was gone and they too were in shock. They have taken the Lord, what are we to do now?
Mary was back now at the tomb, she stood weeping, and she bent over to look into that space where Jesus had been and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had been lying, one at the head and the other at the feet. The angels questioned her tears and her sadness, “Woman, why are you weeping?
Don’t you know, she replies, they have taken the Lord, he is not here, he is gone, forever, he is gone from us and we will never see him again. Why don’t you understand? The angels understood, they understood what Mary did not.
She turned around and was face to face with Jesus, but she did not recognize him. She thought he was a gardener. He asked her, “Woman, why are you weeping?”
Mary was so filled with sadness and hopelessness, sadness that Jesus had been crucified, sadness that she has come to the tomb to prepare his body for burial only to find he is no longer there. She was filled with her fear that Jesus, the one whom she loved, her savior, had abandoned her.
Still believing Jesus to be the gardener, Mary said to him, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” She asked him if he knew where they had taken her Lord. Jesus knew. He said to her, Mary.
Jesus began his new life, his new ministry as the resurrected Christ by calling the first disciple of the new chapter in human history by her name, Mary. Mary recognized his voice and then she understood, this is Jesus, he is not missing after all, Christ is risen. He is risen indeed.
Mary has suddenly felt renewed, resurrected from sadness and fear and hopelessness and her lost sense of self. Jesus said to her, “Go to my brothers and say to them, “I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God”. With uncontrolled joy Mary ran and told them all, “I have seen the Lord.” Christ is risen. He is risen indeed.
It is fair to wonder this morning what this all means. We understand the story. Jesus, once dead to us, dead so that our sins would be forgiven, is now alive and risen, risen so we will be risen too. We get this. We’ve read it in scripture, we’ve learned it in Sunday School class, and we’ve heard it preached many, many times before. We may even understand what we think this all means. After all, we are intelligent faith filled Christians.
Then, perhaps understand is too strong a word. Saying each of us is to be part of a life of resurrection from the old life of sin to the new life of grace is one thing, knowing how that life would look is another.
Do we have the faith that it takes to honestly believe that the resurrection life, begun in Jesus back on that first Easter Sunday, has become our new life? This is 2011 after all. Do we have the faith to believe we are to live a new resurrection life? Dearest ones, we must.
We must believe our life is a resurrection life if we ever expect to know who God is and what God has in store for us. Believing in the truth of the resurrection and believing, through our baptism, we are included in this new life with Christ takes a leap of faith. But from that leap we see that Jesus Christ has walked from that tomb right into our lives, and if we haven’t heard it, he calls us by our name.
Jesus calls your name and mine this morning no less than he called those early disciples. His call is to come and follow him, to leave the old life behind. He expects this morning that we will finally give him our answer.
That is our real Easter surprise. Jesus wants to hear from each of us this morning. Not about how to hold an egg, but have we felt God’s grace tugging on our hearts and will we accept his call. Dearest ones, we must.
Easter Sunday is the day the Lord has made for you and for me. Easter Sunday is God’s answer to our lives of struggle and pain, confusion and indecision. God’s voice is clear, we are called to accept Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior for we are to be resurrected from our life of separation by sin, separation from our Holy Lord God. In Jesus’ resurrection we are lifted up, saved, to live in God’s kingdom where we become our authentic selves. Disciples of Jesus Christ.
Initiated by God, Jesus came to Mary, and Jesus comes to us. The results of that encounter are dramatic. It changes our lives. We are sought out and we encounter the risen Lord who calls us to follow him giving us a glimpse of who we are meant to be, of who we can become. For we, dear brothers and sisters, are meant to be like Christ. We are created to be like Christ.
Open any egg you may find, peel away any shiny chocolate covered bunny, find the jelly beans, our real treasure this day is Jesus Christ.
He is risen. He is risen indeed. And he is not alone.
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Monday, April 18, 2011
"Fetching Donkeys" Mark 11:1-11
17 April 2011 Fetching Donkeys Mark 11:1-11
We never raised donkeys on the farm at Greenvine. I don’t know why, we raised just about everything else. Maybe it was because of my friend Johnnie. Johnnie raised horses and when we ran on Saturday mornings it was one complaint after another about those horses; they ate too much, they cost too much, they were too much trouble. Then one kicked him in the face. He was lucky it didn’t kill him. I know horses and donkey’s aren’t exactly the same, but Johnnies stories probably had a lot to do with our not having donkeys.
I do have a favorite book about a donkey though. It is called “Platero and I” by Juan Ramon Jimenez. Listen to how the man who loves Platero describes him ( pg.3).
Today’s scripture doesn’t tell us much about the donkey. I say donkey because the Greek will allow a translation of both “the foal of a donkey” and “the foal of a horse.” For me, donkey it is.
We do not know how this particular donkey was chosen over the others. Jesus apparently knew him and the roll he would play and Jesus likely loved him. We do know he was in the village, we know he had never been ridden; he was tied up there near a door, outside in the street.
When this donkey was brought to Jesus his disciples threw their cloaks on him and Jesus sat on him. It appears the donkey never objected to any of this. Though never ridden, he had never met someone like Jesus before. When he did, apparently all went well. All went well with this little donkey who was the chosen one. He was the one chosen from all the rest by Jesus to bear him to Jerusalem.
As the story of that journey is told we can easily imagine those who spread their cloaks on the road, those who spread leafy branches, those who went ahead and those who followed. They might have seen the procession that day and said, as was said of Platero, “Look, He is like steel”.
I wonder, would they have said this about the little donkey or about Jesus?
Clearly, Mark’s gospel reading this morning is of Jesus’ final journey, one that would take him from the Mount of Olives into Jerusalem and to the cross. As Jesus and his apostles were approaching Jerusalem Jesus sends two of his disciples ahead into town. Not to scout things out, not to find lodging, not to set up a meeting between Jesus and those who were out to take his life. No, they are sent on a mission to fetch a donkey.
No other place in scripture has Jesus sending his disciples on what appears to be such a minor assignment. I can only imagine their disappointment. They were with Jesus after all, he had become famous among the people, and they were recognized as his disciples, an important position. It would not be surprising for the people to look at them with the same awe and respect they had for Jesus. They were his crew after all, his advance men, part of his inner-circle, very important people!
They knew Jerusalem was to be a special stop for Jesus. I imagine they were looking forward to a far grander and more noble assignment on this day than that of fetching a donkey. To add to their dismay, they may have felt this particular assignment eliminated all hope of their being known as the greatest disciple. All of the disciples had been jockeying for advantage, angling for glory, arguing about being the greatest. They had asked Jesus, “Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory.”
Yet here were these two, not at all in glory, but mucking around a stable, probably feeling like horse thieves, all they while trying to wrestle an untamed and no doubt balky animal toward the olive grove. They might have thought, “For this we left our families and our fishing nets!”
In the gospel of John, Jesus doesn’t send anyone looking for an un-ridden donkey. Jesus enters Jerusalem on foot. The donkey enters the story only after the crowd gets caught up in the excitement of the moment. And in John, Jesus finds the donkey, not his disciples.
This sort of makes Marks telling seem rather trivial doesn’t it? Finding the donkey seems more like a designated chore – sort of like making sure the bathrooms don’t run out of hand soap, or watering the new flower bed or one of a multitude of routine and mundane details of church work that are necessary but may not help us feel like we are being involved in the really important work.
The presiding officer at the ordination of an Elder, a Deacon or a Minister of Word and Sacrament will ask the candidate, “Will you in your own life seek to follow the Lord Jesus Christ, love your neighbors and work for the reconciliation of the world?...Will you seek to serve the people with energy, intelligence, imagination and love?” These words stay with us our entire ordained lives.
At first such language may give us the impression that the nature of any calling to follow God, is a brave, exciting, fast paced, rock star like existence. Calling us into the fore front of life’s experience, working for the reconciliation of the world, where we are the key to helping people regain their lost dignity or something grand like that, lifting folks through their pain filled life experiences and bringing them cheerfully to the promised land, to a life of prosperity where only the best reign with God. Really important work for really important people.
While this rock star picture sounds promising, we all know that’s not how being a disciple really works. Glamour and glitz are not part of our calling. Never once is it mentioned that serving people with energy, imagination and love often boils down to ordinary stuff like ordering bulletin covers, changing light bulbs in the restroom, visiting people in nursing homes who aren’t quite sure who you are, running around town looking for lilies when the florist looses our order, being called at the last minute to set-up fellowship hall for a luncheon and everyone else is out of town or not answering the phone because they have caller ID and they just know you are going to ask them to do something at the last minute. Again!
Or even as two of Jesus’ disciples found out, by finding a suitable donkey at the last minute.
This gospel of Mark sets a tone from the very beginning that is different from the other gospels. Matthew begins with a genealogy, Luke begins with an historical account of the development of the mission of the church as the instrument of God’s purpose in history. And John takes us back to the beginning, the creation, and theological reflection.
Marks’ gospel begins instead with a call to “prepare the way of the Lord.” The beauty of Mark’s message is found in the way we are to go about preparing that way. Not, surprisingly, as grand, powerful, and all knowing defenders of the faith, which is perhaps a blessing in disguise.
No, we are to prepare the way of the Lord just as we are, just as we live, just as we go to work, to school, to church, on vacation, to the store, even as we pay our taxes. It is that time of the year again isn’t it!
We are called this morning to prepare the way of the Lord as we go about living our ordinary lives, staying humble, being obedient, to the point of embracing our routine daily tasks as exactly what God expects of us as we become defenders of the faith.
We see this in the gospel message as a whole, Jesus never asks the disciples to join in the typical power structures of their day in order to have a representative voice in the running of things. No, that is not Jesus’ style. Instead the apostles do ordinary things, they get a boat ready for Jesus, they find out how much food is on hand for the multitude, they find a room and prepare the table for the Last Supper and, of course, they chase down a donkey for the Lord and his entry into Jerusalem.
This call to discipleship ministry is our call to full Christian participation in the gritty details of everyday life; humbly, obediently, with love and genuine caring for God and for one another in our hearts. It is a sign of our mature faith when we embrace these gritty details in the midst of the ordinary and are thankful this is who God has really called us to be. For we are far from being rock stars.
While these words may speak the truth about where we are in our personal walk with the Lord, we know words alone will not save us. Joel Marcus, a Markan scholar, believes Mark understands, “the preparation of the Lord’s way in a rather prosaic manner as the arrangements people make for the ministry of Jesus.”
Perhaps we haven’t understood the Christian life this way, this notion that we are to make “arrangements” in our lives for the ministry of Jesus. It reminds us that we are called to give up control of our lives, to turn our lives over to God and then, the most radical of things, to listen for God to tell us what “arrangements” we are to make to prepare the Lord’s way.
On the one hand, each of us is called by God to help prepare the way for the good news of Jesus’ ministry. God knows us and the roll we will play and God loves us. We are called to be apostles no less than the original apostles, going out to teach the world who Jesus is and to make disciples, to introduce people to the truth that just as the rising sun chases away the night, so God has scattered the power of death in the rising of Jesus Christ! That is what we are to do, live the truth.
But let us be cautious.
Clearly, it is Jesus’ ministry that the world depends upon, not ours, our role is to prepare the way. We are the ones who fetch the donkeys!
Yet our task in crucial, as ones who fetch the donkeys for Jesus, as ones who are called to live through our routine life, the often exhausting and terrifying and mundane life, these very details of our service to the Lord are how we help prepare the way for the Lord. Our faithful service is gathered into the larger truth of Jesus’ redemptive work in the world. Our faithful service is to mirror Jesus’ even as we make arrangements to walk with him to the cross.
Jesus tells his apostles, “Go into the city to a certain man.” First we make arrangements for a donkey, now for a man where we will have our last supper. Then we make arrangements to go with Jesus to that place called Gethsemane where Jesus will be arrested. Then the arrangements take us with Jesus to Pilate who after flogging Jesus, handed him over to be crucified there at Golgotha. Where Jesus cried out with a loud voice and breathed his last. Yet, not finished was he and not finished are we.
We are to make arrangements to prepare the way of the Lord. What our preparation of the Lords way looks like is often a matter of speaking a quiet word in a committee meeting, spending time with someone who is incoherent and coming apart at the seams, giving a ride to church, emptying a bedpan for someone we love or scratching a few halting words on a note to someone suffering, in pain, confused, lost, or failing to heal.
In Marks’ world, “preparing the way of the Lord’ usually looks like standing hip-deep in the mire of some stable trying to corral a donkey for Jesus. All the while shouting, “Holy, holy, holy Lord, God of power and might, heaven and earth are full of your glory. Hosanna in the highest. Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest!
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.
Additional sources:
“Christian Century”, April 4, 2006, pg. 18.
We never raised donkeys on the farm at Greenvine. I don’t know why, we raised just about everything else. Maybe it was because of my friend Johnnie. Johnnie raised horses and when we ran on Saturday mornings it was one complaint after another about those horses; they ate too much, they cost too much, they were too much trouble. Then one kicked him in the face. He was lucky it didn’t kill him. I know horses and donkey’s aren’t exactly the same, but Johnnies stories probably had a lot to do with our not having donkeys.
I do have a favorite book about a donkey though. It is called “Platero and I” by Juan Ramon Jimenez. Listen to how the man who loves Platero describes him ( pg.3).
Today’s scripture doesn’t tell us much about the donkey. I say donkey because the Greek will allow a translation of both “the foal of a donkey” and “the foal of a horse.” For me, donkey it is.
We do not know how this particular donkey was chosen over the others. Jesus apparently knew him and the roll he would play and Jesus likely loved him. We do know he was in the village, we know he had never been ridden; he was tied up there near a door, outside in the street.
When this donkey was brought to Jesus his disciples threw their cloaks on him and Jesus sat on him. It appears the donkey never objected to any of this. Though never ridden, he had never met someone like Jesus before. When he did, apparently all went well. All went well with this little donkey who was the chosen one. He was the one chosen from all the rest by Jesus to bear him to Jerusalem.
As the story of that journey is told we can easily imagine those who spread their cloaks on the road, those who spread leafy branches, those who went ahead and those who followed. They might have seen the procession that day and said, as was said of Platero, “Look, He is like steel”.
I wonder, would they have said this about the little donkey or about Jesus?
Clearly, Mark’s gospel reading this morning is of Jesus’ final journey, one that would take him from the Mount of Olives into Jerusalem and to the cross. As Jesus and his apostles were approaching Jerusalem Jesus sends two of his disciples ahead into town. Not to scout things out, not to find lodging, not to set up a meeting between Jesus and those who were out to take his life. No, they are sent on a mission to fetch a donkey.
No other place in scripture has Jesus sending his disciples on what appears to be such a minor assignment. I can only imagine their disappointment. They were with Jesus after all, he had become famous among the people, and they were recognized as his disciples, an important position. It would not be surprising for the people to look at them with the same awe and respect they had for Jesus. They were his crew after all, his advance men, part of his inner-circle, very important people!
They knew Jerusalem was to be a special stop for Jesus. I imagine they were looking forward to a far grander and more noble assignment on this day than that of fetching a donkey. To add to their dismay, they may have felt this particular assignment eliminated all hope of their being known as the greatest disciple. All of the disciples had been jockeying for advantage, angling for glory, arguing about being the greatest. They had asked Jesus, “Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory.”
Yet here were these two, not at all in glory, but mucking around a stable, probably feeling like horse thieves, all they while trying to wrestle an untamed and no doubt balky animal toward the olive grove. They might have thought, “For this we left our families and our fishing nets!”
In the gospel of John, Jesus doesn’t send anyone looking for an un-ridden donkey. Jesus enters Jerusalem on foot. The donkey enters the story only after the crowd gets caught up in the excitement of the moment. And in John, Jesus finds the donkey, not his disciples.
This sort of makes Marks telling seem rather trivial doesn’t it? Finding the donkey seems more like a designated chore – sort of like making sure the bathrooms don’t run out of hand soap, or watering the new flower bed or one of a multitude of routine and mundane details of church work that are necessary but may not help us feel like we are being involved in the really important work.
The presiding officer at the ordination of an Elder, a Deacon or a Minister of Word and Sacrament will ask the candidate, “Will you in your own life seek to follow the Lord Jesus Christ, love your neighbors and work for the reconciliation of the world?...Will you seek to serve the people with energy, intelligence, imagination and love?” These words stay with us our entire ordained lives.
At first such language may give us the impression that the nature of any calling to follow God, is a brave, exciting, fast paced, rock star like existence. Calling us into the fore front of life’s experience, working for the reconciliation of the world, where we are the key to helping people regain their lost dignity or something grand like that, lifting folks through their pain filled life experiences and bringing them cheerfully to the promised land, to a life of prosperity where only the best reign with God. Really important work for really important people.
While this rock star picture sounds promising, we all know that’s not how being a disciple really works. Glamour and glitz are not part of our calling. Never once is it mentioned that serving people with energy, imagination and love often boils down to ordinary stuff like ordering bulletin covers, changing light bulbs in the restroom, visiting people in nursing homes who aren’t quite sure who you are, running around town looking for lilies when the florist looses our order, being called at the last minute to set-up fellowship hall for a luncheon and everyone else is out of town or not answering the phone because they have caller ID and they just know you are going to ask them to do something at the last minute. Again!
Or even as two of Jesus’ disciples found out, by finding a suitable donkey at the last minute.
This gospel of Mark sets a tone from the very beginning that is different from the other gospels. Matthew begins with a genealogy, Luke begins with an historical account of the development of the mission of the church as the instrument of God’s purpose in history. And John takes us back to the beginning, the creation, and theological reflection.
Marks’ gospel begins instead with a call to “prepare the way of the Lord.” The beauty of Mark’s message is found in the way we are to go about preparing that way. Not, surprisingly, as grand, powerful, and all knowing defenders of the faith, which is perhaps a blessing in disguise.
No, we are to prepare the way of the Lord just as we are, just as we live, just as we go to work, to school, to church, on vacation, to the store, even as we pay our taxes. It is that time of the year again isn’t it!
We are called this morning to prepare the way of the Lord as we go about living our ordinary lives, staying humble, being obedient, to the point of embracing our routine daily tasks as exactly what God expects of us as we become defenders of the faith.
We see this in the gospel message as a whole, Jesus never asks the disciples to join in the typical power structures of their day in order to have a representative voice in the running of things. No, that is not Jesus’ style. Instead the apostles do ordinary things, they get a boat ready for Jesus, they find out how much food is on hand for the multitude, they find a room and prepare the table for the Last Supper and, of course, they chase down a donkey for the Lord and his entry into Jerusalem.
This call to discipleship ministry is our call to full Christian participation in the gritty details of everyday life; humbly, obediently, with love and genuine caring for God and for one another in our hearts. It is a sign of our mature faith when we embrace these gritty details in the midst of the ordinary and are thankful this is who God has really called us to be. For we are far from being rock stars.
While these words may speak the truth about where we are in our personal walk with the Lord, we know words alone will not save us. Joel Marcus, a Markan scholar, believes Mark understands, “the preparation of the Lord’s way in a rather prosaic manner as the arrangements people make for the ministry of Jesus.”
Perhaps we haven’t understood the Christian life this way, this notion that we are to make “arrangements” in our lives for the ministry of Jesus. It reminds us that we are called to give up control of our lives, to turn our lives over to God and then, the most radical of things, to listen for God to tell us what “arrangements” we are to make to prepare the Lord’s way.
On the one hand, each of us is called by God to help prepare the way for the good news of Jesus’ ministry. God knows us and the roll we will play and God loves us. We are called to be apostles no less than the original apostles, going out to teach the world who Jesus is and to make disciples, to introduce people to the truth that just as the rising sun chases away the night, so God has scattered the power of death in the rising of Jesus Christ! That is what we are to do, live the truth.
But let us be cautious.
Clearly, it is Jesus’ ministry that the world depends upon, not ours, our role is to prepare the way. We are the ones who fetch the donkeys!
Yet our task in crucial, as ones who fetch the donkeys for Jesus, as ones who are called to live through our routine life, the often exhausting and terrifying and mundane life, these very details of our service to the Lord are how we help prepare the way for the Lord. Our faithful service is gathered into the larger truth of Jesus’ redemptive work in the world. Our faithful service is to mirror Jesus’ even as we make arrangements to walk with him to the cross.
Jesus tells his apostles, “Go into the city to a certain man.” First we make arrangements for a donkey, now for a man where we will have our last supper. Then we make arrangements to go with Jesus to that place called Gethsemane where Jesus will be arrested. Then the arrangements take us with Jesus to Pilate who after flogging Jesus, handed him over to be crucified there at Golgotha. Where Jesus cried out with a loud voice and breathed his last. Yet, not finished was he and not finished are we.
We are to make arrangements to prepare the way of the Lord. What our preparation of the Lords way looks like is often a matter of speaking a quiet word in a committee meeting, spending time with someone who is incoherent and coming apart at the seams, giving a ride to church, emptying a bedpan for someone we love or scratching a few halting words on a note to someone suffering, in pain, confused, lost, or failing to heal.
In Marks’ world, “preparing the way of the Lord’ usually looks like standing hip-deep in the mire of some stable trying to corral a donkey for Jesus. All the while shouting, “Holy, holy, holy Lord, God of power and might, heaven and earth are full of your glory. Hosanna in the highest. Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest!
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.
Additional sources:
“Christian Century”, April 4, 2006, pg. 18.
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
10 April 11 Being Raised John 11:1-45
10 April 11 Being Raised John 11:1-45
It is not difficult to recognize these stories of death and resurrection as a foretelling of what is coming for Jesus, death then resurrection. We should not be surprised I expect, this being Lent and our anticipating Easter.
What we know from the eye witness reports of Lazarus’ illness and death is this. His sisters, Martha and Mary, send word to Jesus, “Lord, he whom you love is ill.” We know Jesus’ response to Martha and Mary will surprise them. Jesus knows Lazarus’ illness is not leading to the sort of death expected, but to an intervention by Jesus to restore Lazarus’ life, and to glorify God. So he waits.
Then knowing that Lazarus has died, Jesus goes to the place where he is. Even knowing that Lazarus had been in the tomb four days Jesus says, “take away the stone”. Then he cried with a loud voice, “Lazarus come out!” and Lazarus came out, alive.
Martha and Mary felt sure that with Jesus present when their brother was ill, he would be healed and would certainly not die. They base their plea on the Lord’s love for their brother and their love for him. Jesus, as we will discover, is looking beyond death. Jesus says death will not be the final outcome of this illness. When the dust settles we will all see the glory of God in action, but Lazarus must die first.
There are deep emotions at play in this story. Martha meets Jesus when he finally comes to Bethany where they live. Her soul is overcome by grief over the death of a brother whom she loved. But, she is also a disciple of Jesus, so her heart and soul are filled with reverence for her Lord. Hers is a heart stirred to its very depths, and swaying between grief and hope.
Jesus tells Martha even though Lazarus has died he will rise again. He assures her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.” Then he asked Martha if she believed this. She did not waver as she says, “Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world.”
Martha is right, Jesus is the resurrection and the life in person. Because he lives, we too shall live. With him present, resurrection and life is assured. He is always the conqueror of death.
At the tomb he assures us once again, “Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?” If we would only believe, if we would have even the faintest faith, by that faith alone, these great truths become ours. As a result of who Jesus is, the resurrection and the life, the life of one who believes always conquers death.
Then his proof, Jesus says, “Lazarus, come out.” And Lazarus does. You see, the dead respond to Jesus’ call. The glory of God, the revelation of his wonderful attributes of power and love, grace and forgiveness were there for all to see in Lazarus emergence alive from the tomb.
Having shown God’s glory in Lazarus’ death and resurrection Jesus has set the table for his own glorification in his approaching death and resurrection. The stage is also set for us and for our calling to glorify God as we live our life as a disciple and he raises us too to glorify God.
We know what this life requires, faith, deep love and trust, allowing our worldly life to die in order for our glorified life to begin. It’s just a lot to ask, to believe and have faith and be sure about this born again promise.
In Lazarus’ story is the assurance we need. We are Martha and Mary and our loved ones have died. We are Lazarus sure to die some day. We love Jesus and we know he loves us. We do have a believer’s faith. We are sure about ourselves. This morning’s gospel assures us about Jesus, about what Jesus will do for us. For in saving us from ourselves, Jesus glorifies not just himself or us for that matter, he also glorifies God.
He glorifies God in his life and, miracle of all miracles; even in our lives we will glorify God. When we join our lives with God’s, we glorify God. We dear ones are called by Jesus to join our lives to God’s. God’s stream of life flows naturally down and around and through all life. Our life is naturally drawn to flow into God’s. It is to this natural state our lives are drawn if we will live honestly to who we are and who we are to be. This is the only life that wants to be alive in us that matters.
The Quaker’s have a saying, “Let your life speak.” “Before you tell your life what you intend to do with it, listen for what it intends to do with you. Before you tell your life what truths and values you have decided to live up to let your life tell you what truths you embody, what values you represent.”
Before we can tell our life what we want to do with it, we must listen to our life telling us who we are. That is if we believe.
If we believe and have faith this is the truth that will collect us and direct us to God’s truth, to God’s grace, known through the action of Jesus Christ and known through our own lives if we live this authentic truth. Cultivating that life truth becomes our authentic way to live and show the world God’s grace.
That cultivation of life begins for us here in church this morning. It is as if there is a purpose and an intention that God has woven into church that we must listen to. God has a purpose and an intention for our life that we might not know of if we don’t listen. Truth and values are being revealed in God’s holy Word each Sunday and the voice of our life will speak in these stories being told even from this pulpit.
Lazarus’ story isn’t the only one telling us about our life. In 20:7-12, we read.
“A young man named Eutychus, who as sitting in the window, began to sink off into a deep sleep while Paul talked still longer. Overcome by sleep, he fell to the ground three floors below and was picked up dead.”
I know church can be a place where the preacher talks longer and longer. And I know how easy it is to be overcome by sleep. I too have sat in the pews on Sunday morning. Church, for some, is a favorite place for sleeping.
I recently read of a preacher who tells about the Sunday he had divided up parts of the sermon with the liturgist for effect and to give broader participation. Following the service the organist, who couldn’t see the pulpit from the organ said to the pastor, “I didn’t know that the liturgist was helping you out with the sermon so after you spoke and then I heard the liturgist speak I assumed that you had collapsed and died and that he had to take over the sermon.”
Church can become a place of slumber, a place where a death of sorts is expected. Sad – it ought to be a place of resurrection and awakening.
Eutycus’ story is a strange story; Paul arrives with Luke in Troas. On Sunday they join other Christians for worship. Sunday of course is the first day of the week when Jesus rose from the dead. Every Sunday is supposed to be Easter all over again.
Paul was preaching and he was on a roll and this young man, Eutychus is mentioned. This is where we come in to live the gospel if we are like a 16 year old who has trouble staying alive during a sermon. He falls asleep toppling three stories to his death. Scripture then tells us.
“But Paul went down and bending over him took him in his arms and said, “Do not be alarmed, for his life is in him.” Meanwhile, they had taken the boy away alive.”
In a mere two verses we are told that Paul has paused just long enough in his sermon to raise a young man from the dead and then church goes on as if nothing happened. First Lazarus, now Eutykus. Who, I wonder, is next?
Maybe Luke is saying that this is the way church is supposed to be. Somebody seated in the third pew from the back, once was dead, and is now alive. Somebody near the cross in the choir is awakened from a coma.
This is the point of today’s Gospel lesson in the raising of Lazarus. The resurrection of Jesus means not only that Jesus is loose and on the move among us, but it also means that we can get loose. We can be raised and be on the move.
Things like this do happen here on Sunday mornings. Visitors may not notice it but those of us who are regulars, well we know the possibilities. To be raised from our malaise, our dread, our life of turmoil and pain to then be on the move, on the move to a new way of living.
There are a number of us named Eutychus or Lazarus who on some particular Sunday stumbled into this place, sleepy and slow to move only to be shocked awake. We were just praying our prayers, or saying the words of a hymn not really singing, receiving the body and blood of Jesus Christ perhaps, hearing the blessing of peace from our pew mates, when we sat straight up in our pew, our eyes flew open, our hearts leapt within us, like we were raised from the dead.
Born again, to the life we were meant to live, a life we wouldn’t have had if we had not come in here on the first day of the week. And resurrection happened. Just like it did in Jesus’ life, just like it does in ours these first days of the week.
This is the true life that speaks in us. Saying, I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.
This is the life death and resurrection may bring. This is the life that is possible for us when we believe in the seemingly impossible. Jesus Christ died for us. Jesus Christ rose for us. Jesus Christ lives in each one of us.
That, dear friends, should startle each one of us to be wide awake. There will be no sleeping today, there will be no falling to our death today.
Jesus Christ is coming to us. Do you hear him now calling our name, “Lazarus, come out.”
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.
Additional resources:
Christian Century, February 26, 2008, pg. 21.
Pulpit Resource, Volume 37, No. 1, Pgs. 41-44.
It is not difficult to recognize these stories of death and resurrection as a foretelling of what is coming for Jesus, death then resurrection. We should not be surprised I expect, this being Lent and our anticipating Easter.
What we know from the eye witness reports of Lazarus’ illness and death is this. His sisters, Martha and Mary, send word to Jesus, “Lord, he whom you love is ill.” We know Jesus’ response to Martha and Mary will surprise them. Jesus knows Lazarus’ illness is not leading to the sort of death expected, but to an intervention by Jesus to restore Lazarus’ life, and to glorify God. So he waits.
Then knowing that Lazarus has died, Jesus goes to the place where he is. Even knowing that Lazarus had been in the tomb four days Jesus says, “take away the stone”. Then he cried with a loud voice, “Lazarus come out!” and Lazarus came out, alive.
Martha and Mary felt sure that with Jesus present when their brother was ill, he would be healed and would certainly not die. They base their plea on the Lord’s love for their brother and their love for him. Jesus, as we will discover, is looking beyond death. Jesus says death will not be the final outcome of this illness. When the dust settles we will all see the glory of God in action, but Lazarus must die first.
There are deep emotions at play in this story. Martha meets Jesus when he finally comes to Bethany where they live. Her soul is overcome by grief over the death of a brother whom she loved. But, she is also a disciple of Jesus, so her heart and soul are filled with reverence for her Lord. Hers is a heart stirred to its very depths, and swaying between grief and hope.
Jesus tells Martha even though Lazarus has died he will rise again. He assures her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.” Then he asked Martha if she believed this. She did not waver as she says, “Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world.”
Martha is right, Jesus is the resurrection and the life in person. Because he lives, we too shall live. With him present, resurrection and life is assured. He is always the conqueror of death.
At the tomb he assures us once again, “Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?” If we would only believe, if we would have even the faintest faith, by that faith alone, these great truths become ours. As a result of who Jesus is, the resurrection and the life, the life of one who believes always conquers death.
Then his proof, Jesus says, “Lazarus, come out.” And Lazarus does. You see, the dead respond to Jesus’ call. The glory of God, the revelation of his wonderful attributes of power and love, grace and forgiveness were there for all to see in Lazarus emergence alive from the tomb.
Having shown God’s glory in Lazarus’ death and resurrection Jesus has set the table for his own glorification in his approaching death and resurrection. The stage is also set for us and for our calling to glorify God as we live our life as a disciple and he raises us too to glorify God.
We know what this life requires, faith, deep love and trust, allowing our worldly life to die in order for our glorified life to begin. It’s just a lot to ask, to believe and have faith and be sure about this born again promise.
In Lazarus’ story is the assurance we need. We are Martha and Mary and our loved ones have died. We are Lazarus sure to die some day. We love Jesus and we know he loves us. We do have a believer’s faith. We are sure about ourselves. This morning’s gospel assures us about Jesus, about what Jesus will do for us. For in saving us from ourselves, Jesus glorifies not just himself or us for that matter, he also glorifies God.
He glorifies God in his life and, miracle of all miracles; even in our lives we will glorify God. When we join our lives with God’s, we glorify God. We dear ones are called by Jesus to join our lives to God’s. God’s stream of life flows naturally down and around and through all life. Our life is naturally drawn to flow into God’s. It is to this natural state our lives are drawn if we will live honestly to who we are and who we are to be. This is the only life that wants to be alive in us that matters.
The Quaker’s have a saying, “Let your life speak.” “Before you tell your life what you intend to do with it, listen for what it intends to do with you. Before you tell your life what truths and values you have decided to live up to let your life tell you what truths you embody, what values you represent.”
Before we can tell our life what we want to do with it, we must listen to our life telling us who we are. That is if we believe.
If we believe and have faith this is the truth that will collect us and direct us to God’s truth, to God’s grace, known through the action of Jesus Christ and known through our own lives if we live this authentic truth. Cultivating that life truth becomes our authentic way to live and show the world God’s grace.
That cultivation of life begins for us here in church this morning. It is as if there is a purpose and an intention that God has woven into church that we must listen to. God has a purpose and an intention for our life that we might not know of if we don’t listen. Truth and values are being revealed in God’s holy Word each Sunday and the voice of our life will speak in these stories being told even from this pulpit.
Lazarus’ story isn’t the only one telling us about our life. In 20:7-12, we read.
“A young man named Eutychus, who as sitting in the window, began to sink off into a deep sleep while Paul talked still longer. Overcome by sleep, he fell to the ground three floors below and was picked up dead.”
I know church can be a place where the preacher talks longer and longer. And I know how easy it is to be overcome by sleep. I too have sat in the pews on Sunday morning. Church, for some, is a favorite place for sleeping.
I recently read of a preacher who tells about the Sunday he had divided up parts of the sermon with the liturgist for effect and to give broader participation. Following the service the organist, who couldn’t see the pulpit from the organ said to the pastor, “I didn’t know that the liturgist was helping you out with the sermon so after you spoke and then I heard the liturgist speak I assumed that you had collapsed and died and that he had to take over the sermon.”
Church can become a place of slumber, a place where a death of sorts is expected. Sad – it ought to be a place of resurrection and awakening.
Eutycus’ story is a strange story; Paul arrives with Luke in Troas. On Sunday they join other Christians for worship. Sunday of course is the first day of the week when Jesus rose from the dead. Every Sunday is supposed to be Easter all over again.
Paul was preaching and he was on a roll and this young man, Eutychus is mentioned. This is where we come in to live the gospel if we are like a 16 year old who has trouble staying alive during a sermon. He falls asleep toppling three stories to his death. Scripture then tells us.
“But Paul went down and bending over him took him in his arms and said, “Do not be alarmed, for his life is in him.” Meanwhile, they had taken the boy away alive.”
In a mere two verses we are told that Paul has paused just long enough in his sermon to raise a young man from the dead and then church goes on as if nothing happened. First Lazarus, now Eutykus. Who, I wonder, is next?
Maybe Luke is saying that this is the way church is supposed to be. Somebody seated in the third pew from the back, once was dead, and is now alive. Somebody near the cross in the choir is awakened from a coma.
This is the point of today’s Gospel lesson in the raising of Lazarus. The resurrection of Jesus means not only that Jesus is loose and on the move among us, but it also means that we can get loose. We can be raised and be on the move.
Things like this do happen here on Sunday mornings. Visitors may not notice it but those of us who are regulars, well we know the possibilities. To be raised from our malaise, our dread, our life of turmoil and pain to then be on the move, on the move to a new way of living.
There are a number of us named Eutychus or Lazarus who on some particular Sunday stumbled into this place, sleepy and slow to move only to be shocked awake. We were just praying our prayers, or saying the words of a hymn not really singing, receiving the body and blood of Jesus Christ perhaps, hearing the blessing of peace from our pew mates, when we sat straight up in our pew, our eyes flew open, our hearts leapt within us, like we were raised from the dead.
Born again, to the life we were meant to live, a life we wouldn’t have had if we had not come in here on the first day of the week. And resurrection happened. Just like it did in Jesus’ life, just like it does in ours these first days of the week.
This is the true life that speaks in us. Saying, I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.
This is the life death and resurrection may bring. This is the life that is possible for us when we believe in the seemingly impossible. Jesus Christ died for us. Jesus Christ rose for us. Jesus Christ lives in each one of us.
That, dear friends, should startle each one of us to be wide awake. There will be no sleeping today, there will be no falling to our death today.
Jesus Christ is coming to us. Do you hear him now calling our name, “Lazarus, come out.”
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.
Additional resources:
Christian Century, February 26, 2008, pg. 21.
Pulpit Resource, Volume 37, No. 1, Pgs. 41-44.
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