Saturday, April 23, 2016

Wearing The Uniform

"Wearing The Uniform"
John13:31-35

What the world needs now is love, sweet love
It's the only thing that there's just too little of
What the world needs now is love, sweet love
No, not just for some but for everyone.

This was a nice song.  Kind of sappy.  But a nice song.

What does it mean, though?  What is "love, sweet love"?   What the world needs now is love...  But the assumption behind that line in the song is that love is this stand-alone thing that you can sprinkle like some sparkly glitter upon the world, and all of a sudden, like magic, the world has love.  Is love this stand-alone medicine that you can bottle, make everyone drink it, and there is love.  Coca-cola tried to make us think their soft drink was bottled love, and if you only drank coke, the world would be a better and happier place.

Many medicines need an excipient.  An excipient is a base or medium in which the medicine is carried.  A lot of pills, lotions and ointments, elixirs and syrups, are not pure, straight medication.  The medication is carried in excipients.  They are ingredients that allow pills to be compressed, medicines to be mixed well with anti-flocculating agents, flavorings, artificial colors, sweeteners, etc.

So, let's say love is the medicine.  But love, as a medicine, needs an excipient.  Let's push this a bit further and say that we are the excipients, the agents, the base materials, that carries the love needed in the world.  As excipients for love, we don't change the basic medicine of love.  We simply "package" it, flavor it, color it, determine the way it is "presented" to the the person needing it.

In this way, love must be presented properly or it may not be accepted.  Often we assume, like the line in our song states, "What the world needs now is love, sweet love...".  But the truth is, it's hard for us to get an understanding of what love is apart from someone who carries love or shows love.

The world may need love, but what love looks like all by itself, I have no idea.  It has to be carried, packaged, encapsulated, hidden in an act, a word, a gift, a gesture, an expression.  Love needs an excipient, a medium, in which to be carried, and for it to have its full effect.

Jesus makes a similar, “What the world needs now is love, sweet love” statements.  Jesus said, “Love one another.”  It’s like one of those Miss USA, or Miss America contestant answers to a question like, “What do you wish for the world?”
Answer:  “That we would all love one another.”

It’s like one of those unrealistic goals like “world peace,” or, “an automobile that never needs repair,” or “poop that doesn’t stink.”  Things like that just aren’t going to happen.  “Love one another.”  Did Jesus expect us to really, or ever, pull that off?

The big difference between the line in the song, (“What the world needs now is love, sweet love”), and Jesus’ line (“Love one another”), is statement vs. volition.  That is, the song line is just making a statement, that the world needs love.  As a statement it isn’t asking anything of anyone.  It’s just an assessment or personal opinion.

Jesus, on the other hand, isn’t making a statement; he is making a demand.  “Love one another.”  He even tells the disciples it is a new commandment.  It’s new marching orders.  It’s a demand, not a statement.  Notice there is no subject in Jesus’ new command.  It’s one of those phrases with an understood subject, which is “You.”  “(You) love one another.”

Jesus went on to lay two more layers upon his initial command to love one another.  The second layer is, “…as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.”  So, the key here is figuring out how Jesus loved us.  What did Jesus’ love actually look like?  What were the elements of Jesus’ love?

Children learn by modeling.  Whatever they see us adults doing, children will mimic or mirror.  There was a couple who had a number of guests over for dinner.  When everyone had sat down at the table, the mother asked her little daughter to say the prayer.  The little girl replied, “I don’t know what to pray.”
The mother said, “Just say what I say.”
So the little girl bowed her head and prayed, “Good Lord, why did I have all these people over for dinner?”

Sometimes we have to be careful about what we say, or how we act around our children, because they are watching all the time, picking things up about how to act.  Jesus was doing the same things with his disciples, modeling certain behaviors that he hoped they would make their own—like loving others.

So if we look back through some of the stories in the gospels that demonstrated how Jesus loved the disciples, we can see how we need to demonstrate that same kind of love.

I think one of the main ways Jesus showed his love for his disciples is what I was just talking about in terms of modeling.  A lot of what Jesus did with his disciples was modeling through mentoring.  Mentoring is a way Jesus showed his love for his disciples.

That mentoring took the form of teaching, both one-on-one and collectively.  One notable example is one I developed a sermon around when Jesus took Peter alone by himself, after the Resurrection and gave Peter a chance to prove his love.  Whether teaching hundreds on a hillside, or in a personal conversation, Jesus is always making a connection of love through that teaching.  It wasn’t just the lessons Jesus was trying to get across to people.  It was that connection of love that came in the teaching moments.  If we are to love others as Jesus loved his disciples, it means taking the time for teachable moments that just don’t get information across, but develop a loving relationship.

Jesus’ mentoring of love took place by giving the disciples great experiences.  For example, when Jesus took Peter, James and John up on a mountain to pray, and Jesus was enveloped in a bright light with Moses and Elijah—what an experience!  It was such a great experience, Peter and the other disciples fell on their knees and said, “Lord, it is a great thing that we are here!”  If we are to love others like Jesus loved the disciples, it might mean leading people into great experiences that have the possibility to transform their lives, and lead them into greatness.

Jesus’ mentoring of love also took shape when Jesus exemplified humility and service.  One of the best instances of this was when Jesus washed his disciples feet during the Last Supper.  Imagine it.  The disciples were finally catching on to who Jesus was:  The Messiah; The Savior; The Son of the Living God.  For two years they had watched Jesus do amazing, miraculous things.  And this man, this Son of God, strips down to nothing but a loin cloth, gets down on his knees and washes the disciples feet.  It would have been such an intimate and powerful moment.  He asks the disciples, “Do you understand what just happened, and what this is about?”  If we are going to love others, like Jesus loved his disciples, we are going to have to realize, as the disciples did in that moment, that that love is not about power, but about humility and servanthood.

Read through the gospels.  Understand how Jesus loved the disciples, how Jesus showed that love.  And then go out and love others in the same way.

One more point I want to make before I leave this part of the message.  Jesus said, “…as I have loved you, you love one another.”  What if that “I” in that statement was you?  Could you say that to your family, to your friends, to your church members, to anyone you might see on any given day?  “…as I have loved you, you love one another.”  That’s your goal as a disciple of Christ, to be able to make that statement with confidence to others, to be that model of Christlike love.

OK.  Remember I said there were two other layers Jesus put on top of his initial statement, “Love one another.”  We’ve got two layers now:  “That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.”  Now comes the third:  “By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.”

Here, in this third layer of understanding love, we find out it’s a matter of witness.  Showing love isn’t just about relationships, and mentoring, and teaching, and great experiences, and humility, and servanthood.  Loving others is about doing all that so that you are a capable witness for your faith.  Loving others is a part of your outreach as a disciple.  Loving others is what people will look at in order to put 2 and 2 together to get to 4.  That is, people will see our loving ways and the light bulb will go on in their heads when they realize, “Oh!  That person is a disciple of Jesus!”

Our loving ways are an identifier of who we are.  I have some pictures I want to show you.  I will show you some uniforms or parts of uniforms and you identify what kind of person would wear that uniform.

First picture:



Identify the person who would wear this as part of their uniform.  (Fireman)

Next picture:



Identify the uniform of the person who would wear this.  (US armed forces)


Next picture:



Identify the uniform of the person who would wear this.  (KC Chief; pro football player)

Last picture:




Identify the uniform of the guys who would wear this.  (A hint is to look at the two poles a couple of them are holding.)  (Norwegian curling team)


My point is this.  We can identify different people simply by the uniform they wear.  By that uniform, we know who they are associated with, and to what organization they belong.  We may not know them as an individual, but once we see the uniform, we can know a lot about them.

When Jesus said, “By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another,” I think he is talking about our uniforms.  Our love for others is the uniform we wear that lets others know who we are.  That uniform of love tells so much about who we are associated with, and what our organization is.

Wearing the “uniform” of loving one another immediately identifies us as disciples of Jesus.  It’s a matter of witnessing to who we are as disciples, and whose we are as followers of Jesus.  Without that uniform of loving others, others won’t get it.  They won’t get Jesus.


So, loving one another for Jesus isn’t just a beauty pageant contestants answer.  It’s a command, a demand:  Love one another.  It’s a way to model and mentor other in how Jesus loved us:  As I have loved you, that ye also love one another.  And it is our basic uniform of witness to let others know we are disciples of Jesus:  By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.

Monday, April 18, 2016

Stupid, But His

"Stupid, But His"
John 10:22-30

Why sheep? Why didn't Jesus compare his followers to other animals?  Like cheetahs or wolves or tigers or some animal that raises the hairs on your arm just at the mention of their name? But Jesus tells us often that we are sheep.  And Jesus is the shepherd.

Sheep are not survivors. They are not strong and independent animals, not skilled hunters or fierce predators. They’re actually kind of pathetic, entirely dependent upon a shepherd.  In a word, sheep are stupid.

Take this news story for example.  Hundreds of sheep followed their leader off a cliff in eastern Turkey, plunging to their deaths this week while shepherds looked on in dismay. Four hundred sheep fell 20 feet to their deaths into a ravine.  But the ones who went over the edge first did brake the fall of another 1100 sheep who survived. Shepherds from a nearby village neglected the flock while eating breakfast, leaving the sheep to roam free, and eventually fall to their deaths. The loss to local farmers was estimated at $74,000.

All it took was one sheep.  It wandered off a cliff and nearly 1500 others just followed along. Can you picture it? 1500 sheep, each walking off a cliff, one after the other. Soon they were piled so deep that the ones at the bottom were crushed to death and the ones on top were lying on a big pile of woolen death. It is completely head-shaking and tells us one important fact about sheep: they are not the smartest animals in the world.

And yet, Jesus says we are like sheep.  Jesus wasn’t paying us any complement.  It was actually a tongue-in-cheek insult.  But at least he said, My sheep.  For good or for ill—or for stupid—we are his.

As Jesus’ sheep, though, there are certain advantages.  Jesus mentions those benefits in a conversation with some people who surrounded him during the Temple Festival in Jerusalem.

The first says Jesus, is, “My sheep hear my voice…”  But it’s just not hearing, as if we heard a noise in the middle of other noises as we go about our day.  It’s hearing with attention.  It’s hearing and attending to what we are hearing.  It is considering and thinking about what is, or what has been said.

The story is told of Franklin Roosevelt, who often endured long receiving lines at the White House. He complained that no one really paid any attention to what was said. One day, during a reception, he decided to try an experiment. To each person who passed down the line and shook his hand, he murmured, "I murdered my grandmother this morning." The guests responded with phrases like, "Marvelous! Keep up the good work. We are proud of you. God bless you, sir." It was not till the end of the line, while greeting the ambassador from Bolivia, that his words were actually heard. Nonplussed, the ambassador leaned over and whispered, "I'm sure she had it coming.”

As Jesus’ sheep, as dumb as we may be, at least he says we pay attention.

And what are we paying attention to?  Jesus’ voice.  The word Jesus used doesn’t mean just voice, but the tone of that voice.  The sound of the words as they came out of Jesus’ mouth.

How good a listener are you?  Here are some questions to ask yourself in order to discern how deeply your are listening to another person’s voice. 
1) Since you think about four times faster than a person usually talks, do you use this time to think about other things while you're keeping track of the conversation? 
2) Do you listen primarily for facts rather than tone of voice or emotions when someone is speaking? 
3) Do you avoid listening to things you feel will be too difficult to understand? 
4) Do you judge from a person's appearance and delivery that there won't be anything worthwhile said? 
5) When someone is talking to you do you appear to be paying attention when you're not? 
6) Do certain words and phrases prejudice you so you cannot listen objectively? 
7) When listening are you distracted by outside sights and sounds?

All those questions are important to ask ourselves when we are the sheep, and Jesus is speaking.  Because sheep usually don’t listen well, or pay attention to the shepherd’s voice, because they are so easily distracted.  Yet, despite that, Jesus says we, as his sheep, listen to his voice.

A second benefit of being Jesus’ sheep is that Jesus says, of his sheep, “I know them.”  The word Jesus uses for know, means not just to know, but to learn to know.  It’s knowing someone, but being in a continual process of getting to know them.  It’s knowing someone without making any assumptions that you know all about them.  There is always something to learn about another person.

I think couples who do the best in their relationships have this kind of “knowledge” about each other.  They don’t assume they know everything about the other.  Mystery writer, Agatha Christie, once said, “An archaeologist is the best husband any woman can have; the older she gets the more interested he is in her.”  That’s the great thing about being Jesus’ sheep—he knows us, and he wants to keep on getting to know us.

Thirdly, an advantage to being Jesus’ sheep is that we follow him.  To follow Jesus doesn’t mean we are just tagging along behind.  It means we are on the same way with Jesus.  Instead of stupidly following Jesus in a line, it is more that we are accompanying him out into the world.

There is a difference between being a fan of Jesus and a follower of Jesus—being on the way with him.  Jesus was never interested in having fans. When he defined what kind of relationship he wants, "Enthusiastic Admirer" isn’t an option. Sanctuaries shouldn’t become stadiums. If we come to stadiums instead of sanctuaries, all the fans cheer for Jesus but have no interest in truly following him. The biggest threat to the church today is fans who call themselves Christians but aren’t actually interested in following Christ. They want to be close enough to Jesus to get an autograph, but not so close that it requires anything from them.

Following puts us on the same way with Jesus, which means we will face what Jesus faces, but with him beside us for guidance and strength.

Another benefit Jesus has for his sheep is eternal life:  “And I give them eternal life,” Jesus said.  It’s hard for us to imagine life going on and on without end.  Everlasting life.  Perpetual life.  Part of the reason we have a hard time getting our heads around eternal life is that we now live within time.  But we believe that time is part of God’s creation of the universe.  Time is a created thing.  We live in linear time because it’s the way God created the world.  To have eternal life, to live forever, though, would mean living outside time.  It would mean living an existence where there is no time, nor concept of time.  You just are.

The word for life that Jesus used for “eternal life” literally means life that is real and genuine.  How much of your life, now, would you describe as real and genuine?  True and authentic?  Honest-to-God?  That’s what makes life real and genuine—it’s that our lives belong to God.  In eternity, we will belong to God, outside of time, in truth and as authentic souls.

Coupled with this thought, Jesus says that his sheep will never perish.  This is a great word Jesus used to describe his sheep.  The word literally means, “render useless.”  As Jesus’ sheep, we will never be rendered useless.

When Irving S. Olds was chairman of the U.S. Steel Corporation, he arrived for a stockholders' meeting and was confronted by a woman who asked, "Exactly who are you and what do you do?”
Without batting an eye, Olds replied, "I am your chairman. Of course, you know the duties of a chairman--that's someone who is roughly the equivalent of parsley on a platter of fish." 

Jesus is saying, my sheep will never just be parsley on a platter of fish.  No one is useless in Jesus’ eyes.  No one.  Anyone who is his sheep has a role to play, a mission to complete, lives to save.  Paul wrote to the Corinthian church:
…don’t hold back.  Throw yourselves into the work of the Master, confident that nothing you do for him is a waste of time or effort.  (1 Corinthians 15:58)

And lastly, Jesus said no one will snatch his sheep out of his hands.  Jesus is letting us know that it is the strategy of the evil one to separate the sheep from the shepherd, the believers from Jesus.  It seems to be the natural way of sheep that they wander off.  Of course, no one can get inside a sheep’s head and figure out what they’re thinking that would make them wander off like they do.  Or walk off a cliff, one after another.

But for people, it’s much easier to find out what makes us wander off from the Savior:  compromise, laziness, poor habits, self-centeredness, arrogance.  There’s a long list.  The evil one uses all these choices and attitudes, that are ours and ours alone, to try to separate us from Jesus.

Jesus promises, though, that even with misguided choices and frivolous attitudes, if we are one of the Savior’s sheep, we will always be his.  We are always in his grasp, in his embrace.  And try as he may, the evil one will never be able to pull us from Jesus’ grasp and control.  Never.


So, we are Jesus’ sheep.  Stupid, yes; but we are his, and we will always be his.  And despite being sheep, Jesus still gives us so many advantages, even when we are behaving like stupid sheep.  We are his, and will always be his.

Sunday, April 10, 2016

The Journal of St. Peter

"The Journal of St. Peter"
John 21:1-19

I

During one of my travels, I happened to stop in a run down shop that sold run down books, operated by a run down man.  As I was browsing through the piles of books, stacked up like some child’s building blocks, I gravitated toward the religion section.  It was a series of disheveled stacks of books that looked like buildings after they had all been bombed and fallen down.  The heaps of religious books were in a seldom searched out corner of the shop, according to the foot patterns in the dust on the floor.

It was hard to see the worn titles in the dimly lit corner, especially on those books that were buried further down and further back than the others.  I knelt down and rested my chest against one stack of books.  I was excavating through one of those back piles.  I felt like an archaeologist who had just stumbled upon a room full of treasures.  I handled each book as if it were a priceless work from antiquity.

There were so many fascinating old books with titles done in exquisite, but faded gold lettering.  The Institutes of the Christian Religion by John Calvin.  The Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan.  A little book simply titled Money, by Rev. Andrew Murray.  There was a book by A.J. Gordon with the long title The Twofold Life or, Christ’s Work For Us and Christ’s Work In Us.  Another intriguing title was, The Wonders of Prayer: Facts Stranger Than Fiction.  And then I ran across a more modern book titled The Tall Preacher, which was an autobiography of Dr. James W. Fifield, Jr.   I couldn’t pass that one up.

Then I spied a “well-loved” leather-bound book with no discernible title on the cover.  It appeared, at first, to be a Bible.  But as I gingerly pulled it from its place and carefully opened the the creaky, leather cover, I discovered it was filled with long-hand writing in the Greek language.  I could make out a few of the words, but my Greek language skills were a little rusty.  Even though I knew it would be hard going to translate, it was enough of a mystery to entice me into buying it.

I walked out of the shop with my purchased treasures wondering how I was going to squeeze them all into an already jam-packed suitcase.

II

Once home, and with my trip behind me, I set to the task of translating my enigmatic book, handwritten in Greek.  It didn’t take me too long to discover that it was a journal or diary of some kind.  The more I worked, the more I found that what was recorded on those pages paralleled most of the stories recorded in the Gospels.  Especially those that involved the disciple Peter.  The author of this journal never used his own name.  But it became more and more evident to me that it was Peter.

What was written in this journal that I was holding, discovered in a dusty old book shop, was more than just historical information.  These were personal thoughts and reflections on the events that were happening during Jesus’ life and how those events affected the journal writer.  I have not completely finished translating my most amazing find.

I would like to read some excerpts from what I am now calling, St. Peter’s Journal.  The part that I will read deals with the time Peter spent with Jesus after the Resurrection.

III

I am tired of waiting for Jesus to make some appearance to me.  I am waiting here at home.  It seems to have been forever since I was at the tomb.  My friends have come to tell me that they have all talked with him.  They think they are cheering me up.  But their words are having the opposite effect.  They only depress me and make me more anxious to talk with him for myself, other than his brief, scary appearances.  “Why was I left out?” I ask them.
“Quit feeling sorry for yourself,” they tell me.  It’s easy for them to say.  They speak of these wonderful meetings with Jesus.  All I have seen is the empty tomb and the wrapping cloths.  I feel strangely left out.  I am separated by experience from my one time companions.  They all share something in common that I do not.  I grow lonelier the more I hear them talk amongst themselves.  I sometimes wonder if I slowly backed out of the room and escaped from having to listen to their conversations that I wouldn’t be better off.

IV

Today has been full of the same.  I can’t stand just waiting around hoping that Jesus might appear.  I keep looking out the window thinking I will recognize his face amongst the crowded alley below.  I pretend I see him coming in the direction of my house.  But each time it is the same--nothing.
Secretly, I know the reason he has not come.  The others don’t know.  At this point I’m not about to tell them that three times I denied ever knowing him.
(I must mention, that on this page of the journal there are water stains.  Not large ones.  Just little drops here and there.  I wonder if they were tear drops.)
It is clear then, to me at least, why Jesus has not shown himself to me.  Harsh reality evaporates my wishful thinking.  I am not good enough.  I did not pass the test.  I have done something too damaging to our relationship.  I have put myself beyond the reach of any life-line that might pull me back and keep me from drifting further and further away.
That look of his that night.  Oh, when he turned and caught my eye, after the third terrible denial.  I will remember that look as long as I live.  The hurt in his expression has countered any sleep I hoped to get.  I have cut him too deeply.  I have denied him too many times.  I have done the unforgivable.
Why would he want to waste his time with me?  Others have apparently been more faithful.  Jesus must see them as much more useable than me.  Maybe it’s time for me to back out of this whole thing.  It will be better for everyone involved.  I will hold on to my secret yearnings for a while longer.  Then I will let them fade.  I will keep no more great expectations.  Jesus will not waste his time with the likes of me.  And I don’t think I can make it through one more evening of having to listen to the others.

V

I have decided to go back to my work of fishing.  It is really the only thing I know how to do.  What else can I do?  It has been a long time--over three years--since I have been out in a boat.  I will have to buy all new equipment.  When I left fishing before, to follow Jesus, I didn’t think I would ever return to it.  So I sold all my equipment, including my boat.
My muscles are not as strong and my fingers have lost all their callouses.  I have little money.  I will probably have to borrow from my father to get restarted.  That will be a hard thing to do.  It’s going to be a painful process all the way around.  But I have made up my mind.
At least I think I have.  I don’t know if I’m just using this as a distraction to help get my mind off of other more plaguing thoughts, or what.  At least I’ll be doing something!  I’ve done it before.  I can do it again.
I’m tired of doing piddly little odd jobs.  It’s time I started thinking about my future.  I’ll have to tell the others, which won’t be too hard.  They may not understand.  But that’s tough.  I have to do what I have to do.  If some of them want to come in on the deal with me, fine.  I would welcome them.  If not, that’s fine too.  I’ll break the news to them tomorrow, just before I go out to look for some new equipment.

VI

We have been out in the boat all night.  Thomas came with me.  I think he understands me better than some of the others.  Nathanael is out here.  James and John.  And a couple of the others borrowed a boat and were helping me get started.  They were scouting the clear waters for any signs of fish.
My arms and shoulders are sore.  I’ve lost my sea legs and have fallen in the water twice.  Luckily the air is warm enough that I can take off my fishing coat.  I must be some sight stripped down to my loin cloth.  Thank goodness the darkness has become my coat.
We have not caught a single fish.  Not only am I a loser at being a disciple; I have lost my magic touch at fishing as well.  Some guy on shore keeps shouting out, almost every hour, asking if we have caught anything yet.  Whatever his purpose is escapes me.  All I know is he’s getting on my nerves, rubbing salt in my already wounded spirit.  Now he’s giving us advice about where we should throw our nets.  My gullible friends are doing what he says.  If it’s one thing I can’t stand, it’s a landlubber trying to tell me how to fish.  It’s time I give him a piece of my mind.


VI

I am embarrassed to read over what I had, just a short time ago, written here.  What I have written has been a grievous blunder.  Which is pretty much the story of my life.  But how was I to know that the man on the shore was Jesus?  John, who is always the perceptive one, recognized him at first.  It didn’t take any more convincing on my part to test out John’s vision.  I knew I can swim faster than my friends can row.  I threw myself into the water and swam as fast as I could before Jesus disappeared on me again.
Little did I know that behind me, John and the others were trying to hold on to one of the largest catches of fish I would ever see.   When I crawled up out of the water onto the beach, there he was.  He’s sitting by a small charcoal fire, smiling at me.  Smiling!  I walk slowly toward him and sit by the fire.  I can’t believe I’m looking across at his face through the glow and the dance of the orange firelight.  I needed to be sure it was him.  It was like waking, with a dream fresh in my head, and not sure whether I was still dreaming.  Or if I was awake and alert and this is really happening to me.
I ran to help the others pull the net to shore.  We counted and divided up the catch amongst ourselves.  153 fish in all!  They weren’t just little ones, either.  They were all large fish--and that’s not just a fish story.
When we finished our work, Jesus called us over and we ate together. He had brought some bread.  And we had the fish we just caught.  I mostly sat in silence, like the others.  No one needed to confirm who he was.  We all, myself included, knew that it was Jesus.

VII

I have a great deal to think about.  Maybe it will help to write it down.  While we were eating, Jesus leans into me and quietly asks if I love him more than the others.  If I loved him more than anything else.  I tell him what I hope he already knows--that of course I love him.  He asks me again.  I give him the same answer.  If that isn’t enough, he asks me a third time.  I am feeling exasperated at having him ask me three times if I love him.
Maybe it’s important for him.  But what I really want to know is does he still love me.  After what I had done, what I need to know is, am I still worth loving in his eyes?  Can I ever be accepted by the one whom I had wronged?  Am I in or am I out?
So, why did he ask me three times?  THREE times!  Wait a minute!  Of course!  One for each time I had denied him.  Three “yeses” to erase three “no’s.”  By giving me the chance to say, “I love you,” he was also telling me that I was loved, accepted, and forgiven.  Jesus is giving me an out.  No, not an out, exactly.  An in.  Surely an out of my misery, yes.  But also an in, back into the circle with him.  He is throwing me a life line even when I was thinking I had swam myself out of reach.  So, that’s what he was smiling about at the fire...”


VIII

There is one thing more that happened that night.  It happened during my private conversation with Jesus.  It has blown my world wide open.  After each time that Jesus asked me if I loved him, and I told him that I did, he had the same reply:  “Feed my sheep.”
It occurs to me, suddenly, that the two are meant to go together.  “Do you love me?  Feed my sheep.”  Jesus doesn’t want me to just love him.  Jesus wants me to love him by showing that love for other people.  By taking care of other people.
I had become so self-centered when I was sitting in my stew pot, thinking about my rotten life.  I had sat around, for how long?  Thinking it was all about me.  Poor old me.  Why is life so unfair to me?  Blah, blah, blah.
I remembered something Jesus had said a couple of years back:  “As much as you have done it to the least of these, you have done so to me...” (Matthew 25:40).  And then, in one of those brief appearances right after the crucifixion he said, “As the Father sent me, so I send you.”
I feel like Jesus is giving me this amazing opportunity to be a leader in what he started.  He is asking me to have a large hand in the direction of the movement.  But as long as I, and the others, get locked up in survival mode--self-survival, stewing about what little we think we have--we will not be showing love for Jesus.  Showing love for Jesus is an outward-bound, other-oriented, un-self-concerned movement and activity.
Now I am the one smiling.  And I feel on fire!

IX

That’s where that journal entry ended.  There were many more entries.  But for right then, it was like Peter must have put his pen down right at that moment and went and did whatever it was that was upon his heart to do.  We can only imagine.  And maybe we can do that best by following his personal insights and see where they lead us.

Monday, April 4, 2016

Upgrade--2016

"Upgrade--2016"
John 20:19-31

There’s one bad thing I’ve found out about computers.  Well, actually, there are a lot of bad things, but here is one of them.  The programs and the hardware is set up so that we who own computers and operate them are never satisfied.

I’m an Apple computer person.  I just think they’re better and easier to use.  But that’s personal opinion.  Anyway, I keep getting these notifications that my apps need upgrading.  Now they are even better than before.  Now they will do fifty more things than they did before.  Or there are fewer bugs in the program than before.  The problem is, I hardly used a fourth of all the things on those apps that are already there to use.  What am I going to do with 50 more options?

There are a bazillion controls in each app, most of which I have no idea what they do.  I’m afraid if I toggle the wrong command, I’ll get hopelessly messed up, and I’ll lose whatever it is I’m working on at the time.  It’s kind of intimidating.  So when I get one of those update messages, I get even more intimidated about the fact they’ve added new stuff that I won’t understand, but think I should have.

And then, there’s new gadgets.  I have a MacBook Pro, an iPhone, an iPad Air, and two different versions of the Kindle eReader.

Everything gets ramped up with computers, tablets and eReaders.  Processors get faster.  Monitors get thinner and crisper.  Hard drives get bigger.  I’ve got a back up hard drive that has an astronomical amount of gigabytes of storage space on it.  I think I could store several libraries of information on there.

So, just when I’m getting comfortable with this beast--because that’s what computers are:  cunning animals with a mind of their own, that act up for the fun of it whenever they feel like it, just to let us know that nothing goes 100% smoothly in this life (as if we didn’t already know that).

After having my MacBook Pro laptop computer for six months or so, I get on the Apple site, and what do I see?  Upgrades!  Oh, my gosh!  I could have more!  My programs aren’t doing all they can.  For just a little bit more money, my programs could be doing more, faster, or with a greater level of safety and security.  To think that I’m missing out on more, better, faster, safer, I get all anxious that I’m not up to date.  I get upgrades and feel satisfied again.  Until 6 months later and the next upgrade comes out.

Why don’t they just put everything in it the first time?  Why can’t they get it right the first time?  Why can’t they make it just like it’s supposed to be, with all the possibilities taken care of, and then just leave it alone?  There are so many products that become “new and improved.”  Does that mean that what we were using before was inferior?  If so, then I’m mad that I had been using an inferior product all along!

At some point, I think I’ll stop running out and buying the newest upgrade every time it comes along.  It’s really hard because the iPad Pro, 9 inch version just was introduced—the one you can use the cool Apple Pencil with ($100 extra) and the new and improved Apple attachable Smart Keyboard ($149 extra).  At some point I’ll have to be satisfied with what I’ve got and just come to the realization that each progression of improvements may not be necessary for what I’m doing with my computer.  But then if you have an older version of that hardware, they stop supporting it, and you have to upgrade.  But it would be nice to just stop upgrading at some point.


II

That may be good advice for computer upgrades.  For life upgrades, it is most likely bad advice.  Like the computer advertisements, there are also a multitude of come-on’s that make all kinds of promises to upgrade your life.  Diets, exercise techniques and equipment, personality changes, yoga, career shifts, education, etc. etc.  A lot of those kinds of upgrades are good and healthy.  Some of you may be doing some of those things now.  They may have been New Year’s resolutions.  How are you doing on those, by the way?

The one upgrade that people seem most to resist are the spiritual upgrades.  You know; the upgrades that would bolster your faith journey and the depth of meaning you feel in your lives.  Seldom do people ask themselves questions like:  What kind of follower of God am I?  What kind of believer am I?  What is the level of my relationship and activity with God?

If those kinds of questions are asked at all, the follow-up questions may never be asked:  What do I need to do to upgrade my level of relationship or involvement with God?

Every once in a while God may give us a glimpse that we are sitting on a plateau.  We’ve been sitting there for a long time.  We, hopefully, haven’t sunk any lower than where we might be.  But neither have we risen any higher.  Stretched ourselves any further.  Ventured out into any uncharted ground.  Taken any risks.  We’ve become too content to just be where we are.

III

I’ve been thinking a lot about things that are broke.  Like systems.  Like denominations.  And presbyteries.  And governments.  And courts.  And educational systems. And elections.  It seems like it’s been a main theme of life--how different human systems have broken down, and individuals get run over by these broken systems.  How do we change?  How do we move out of the awful ruts we get ourselves in, and travel a new path?

As I’ve been thinking about the brokenness of our world, and how we need to change, I remembered a bit of folk wisdom that I ran across several years ago.  It’s horse sense, basically.  It comes from old cowboy wisdom.  Simply stated, it is this: “If the horse you're riding dies, get off.”  Like I said, it seems simple enough.

Yet, when you’re dealing with a broken system, for some reason people think they can keep riding the dead horse.  The same is true for your individual life.  If what you’re doing in your life with God isn’t working, why are you still trying to ride a dead horse?  We don’t want to follow that good, simple advice.  Instead, we often choose from a long list of other alternatives in dealing with the reality of the dead horses we’re still trying to ride.  Here are some of them:

Using a stronger whip.
Trying a new saddle.
Switching riders.
Moving the dead horse to a new location.
Saying things like, “This is the way we’ve always ridden this dead horse.”
Appointing a committee to study the dead horse.
Visiting other places where they ride dead horses more efficiently.
Changing the rules for riding a dead horse.
Comparing how we’re riding now with how we rode 10 or 20 years ago.
Coming up with new styles of riding dead horses.
Blaming the parentage of the dead horse.
Switching one dead horse for another dead horse.

You get the idea.  You could probably come up with other ways we try to stay on the dead horses we were riding in our lives.

IV

Living the Christian life is a constant process of making changes, or upgrades.  We think we are comfortable where we’re at, on a certain plateau.  Or sitting on a certain dead horse.  But God will not let us lay there, or sit there for very long.  The Risen Lord will come to us and give us the opportunity to do more, to be more.

The disciples after the Crucifixion, after the Resurrection even, were still hiding out.  They were content to just sit in their locked room and have their nice little Bible study, their closed prayer group, and sing their hymns together.  There was nothing wrong with that.  But then the Risen Christ appears and says, “Guess what?  It’s time to upgrade!”

So to the disciples he gives them his peace.  He breathes on them and they receive the Holy Spirit.  The upgrade was in the form of breath.  Like the breath that was breathed into Adam when he was still just a human shaped pile of mud.  Like the breath that was blown across a valley of dry bones.  That breath made the mud mound into a living being.  That breath made the valley of dry bones into a reanimated army of living, breathing, human beings.

We think we’re going to be able to stay the same our whole lives, or at least like we are at the present moment.  And then the Lord comes and faces us when we least expect it and with his breath, blows all that away.  All the old self. The same old church.  All the old ways of doing things.  All the comfortable plateaus.  All the dead horses we were sitting on suddenly became totally different animals--live broncin’ broncos and we’re holding on for dear life.

Thomas discovers he can’t angrily set himself apart from the rest of the disciples any more.  He can’t let his disbelief or laziness form the future of his life anymore.  He won’t be allowed to let “Doubting Thomas” become his permanent nickname.  Now he is being challenged to get off his dead horse of skepticism and ride the live horse of faith and trust.

It’s no easy thing Jesus is asking Thomas to do.  Thomas had fashioned a whole life out of cynicism.  He had been a person whose hope was defined by a marked lack of expectation.  Could Thomas become the new person Jesus was challenging him to be?  Would Thomas upgrade his life by the power of the resurrected Christ?

And then there are the rest of the disciples.  They are dead.  Dead, differently than Jesus was dead.  They lacked animation.  They are locked into a marked lack of vitality.  They are bodies walking around with no spirit.  No fight.  No ambition. No vision.  With Jesus’ death, it is as if the life was at the same time sucked out of their bodies.  All the possibilities they once saw, the exciting future that lay ahead of them, the creative and healing powers that lay on their finger tips, had all faded into the black hole of grief.  They were like an athlete who trained for the big race, the championship game, and then sat in the locker room, refusing to budge, convinced that she will lose, or have nothing to gain.  So she doesn’t even try.

To those disciples, the Risen Jesus appears and breathes his Spirit upon them.  The giving of the Spirit is always a new creation.  The Spirit is given to those who need to be awakened to life in all its newness.  The disciples are given an upgrade in the breathing, life-giving Spirit.  Jesus knows they need to quit sitting on their dead horses, and put their feet in the stirrups, riding a living, breathing, snorting faith for the race ahead.  They need to get themselves in a position to be players, not sideline huggers, or recliner believers.

It wasn’t an easy thing that Jesus was asking the disciples to do.  “Just as the Father sent me, I send you,” Jesus said to them as he breathed on them all.  They weren’t being breathed on so they could sit in their pews and feel more spiritual as they sung their hymns.

Jesus reanimated them so they could move out.  Be sent.  To rub shoulders with the world. To be flavoring for a flavorless culture.  To be light in places where the dark seems to overpower all illumination.  To be a voice for God where there was only the shouting of hucksters and the gossip of busybodies.  To speak to people who have no ears to really listen.  To touch people with healing who would rather remain sin-sick—because remaining sin-sick means not having to take any responsibility in life.

“Get out of here; get out there; there’s a world that needs you to be out there, not in here,” Jesus is telling his timid disciples.  He’s upgrading their level of risk and discipleship to an entirely new level.

V

I have noticed that upgrades for computers and computer programs fall into two categories.  Some upgrades only add a few new bells and whistles.  They allow you to do a handful of things that you weren’t able to do before.  Other upgrades change the whole internal operation of the system.  They allow you to operate the whole computer or program more efficiently or more easily than it was operated before.

The kinds of upgrades that Jesus made on Thomas and on the other disciples were system kinds of upgrades.  He wasn’t just giving Thomas and the others a few new tricks to astound the people with.  Jesus was refashioning their whole ways of being.  He was transforming them, individually and collectively, from the inside out.

You are followers of Jesus.  How long has it been since you have enhanced your Christian living?  How long has it been since you have been upgraded so that your system of living and being in Christ are entirely made over?  How long has it been since God breathed on you and reawakened you from your sleep, kicked you off the plateau you have laid down on for too long?  How long has the horse you’ve been riding been dead, and you hoped no one noticed you were sitting on a steed that wasn’t going to take you anywhere?

Watch out.  Jesus can get in locked doors.  You can’t keep him out.  You can’t avoid facing the Risen Lord, and seeing by that look in his eyes, you are long overdue for an upgrade.