Here’s a passage packed with dramatic moments like “get behind me, Satan” and “take up your cross and follow me.”
For the second Sunday in Lent, I preached from Mark 8:31-9:1. The lectionary reading did not include Mark 9:1, but I felt it was important to add that verse to get the full effect of Jesus’s words to his disciples.
Here’s the message title, “A Difficult Call To Discipleship.” I hope it’s helpful.
Sunday, June 4, 2017, was Pentecost Sunday! In our church we all wore something red, which is the liturgical color of that Sunday. And, of course, I preached from Acts 2:1-21, Luke’s account of the Day of Pentecost. Here’s the audio of that message:
For this Palm Sunday, we took a different approach. We combined elements of the Liturgy of the Palms about the triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem, with elements of the Liturgy of the Passion. This enabled us to move from the joyous crowds which greeted Jesus on his entry into Jerusalem, to the vengeful crowd that cried, “Crucify him!”
We took this approach because many in our congregation will not attend a Maundy Thursday or Good Friday service. If they attended a joyful Palm Sunday service, and then a celebratory Easter service, they might miss the events of Good Friday and the drama surrounding the crucifixion. To solve this problem, here’s what we did:
1. For our first reading early in the service, we read the Gospel story of the triumphal entry into Jersusalem, from Matthew 21:1-11.
2. We sang appropriate Palm Sunday hymns of celebration including All Glory, Laud and Honor, and Hosanna.
3. During our children’s time, the children heard the story of Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem. Then, they distributed palm fronds to each person in our congregation. When everyone had a palm frond, the entire congregation waved their palm branches and said in unison, “Praise God for the Son of David! Bless the one who comes in the name of the Lord! Praise God to highest heaven!” (Matthew 21:9 – NLT). It was a little chaotic, but then the first Palm Sunday probably was a little chaotic, too.
4. Our organist provided a musical transition from the Palm Sunday celebration to the events after Jesus’ Passover meal with the disciples.
5. During the time alloted for the sermon, I read the following scripture lessons from the Liturgy of the Passion. Because the entire narrative moves from scene to scene, I separated each scene with a corporate prayer of confession. After I read each passage, I then invited the congregation to pray with me the prayer of confession. Here’s the sequence:
Palm Sunday Liturgy of the Passion
Reading: Matthew 26:14-30 — The Last Supper
All: Lord, we confess that just like Judas we have come to your table with thoughts of betraying you in our hearts. Like Judas, we have taken the bread from you hand and the cup from your table while harboring doubts about you and your teaching. Forgive us, O Lord, for this spirit of betrayal that presumes we know more about your Kingdom than you. Amen.
Reading: Matthew 26:31-56 — The Garden of Gethsamene
All: Lord, we confess that when you struggled in agony, we slept in apathy. When they came to arrest you, we betrayed your teaching by fighting back, and then abandoned you in your hour of need. When they accused us of being your disciples we denied ever knowing you. And when the cock crowed, we wept over our own failure to be faithful. Forgive us, O Lord, for our apathy, our fear, and our faithlessness. Amen.
Reading: Matthew 27:1-26 — Jesus Before Pilate
All: Lord, we confess that like the crowd gathered before Pilate, we have chosen Barabbas instead of you. Like the crowd that day, when Pilate asked, “What shall I do with Jesus who is called the Messiah?” — we have answered, “Crucify him!” Forgive us for our failure to choose you and the freedom you offer. Amen.
Reading: Matthew 27:27-66 — The Crucifixion and Burial of Jesus
All: Lord, we confess that we see ourselves in the faces of the Roman soldiers who nailed you to the cross; we hear ourselves taunting you as you hang silently before us; and, we feel the bitterness of one thief and the contrition of the other. May we be counted among those who, in great sorrow, lovingly laid you to rest in the garden tomb, hopefully waiting for God’s salvation. Amen.
I wrote the prayers of confession, so feel free to edit them for your use.
6. After the readings and prayers, our choir sang the anthem, The Hour Has Come, which was a solemn and powerful account of the last days in Jesus’ life.
7. When the anthem ended, the congregation left the sanctuary in silence, with a solemn organ postlude played during their exit. We included this note in the bulletin:
“In the tradition of the Liturgy of the Passion, there will be no benediction after the choral anthem. Please leave the sanctuary in silence as we contemplate the death and burial of Christ, and wait in hope for God’s salvation.”
Many people commented on how powerful and meaningful the service was for them. While it was hard for me to resist preaching on Palm Sunday, the narrative of the events of the last week in the life of Christ needs no explanation.
However you choose to celebrate and commemorate the events of Palm Sunday through Good Friday, give careful attention to including them all, including the betrayals, the trials, the mocking, and the crucifixion. The glory of the resurrection shines brightest when celebrated against the backdrop of evil, suffering, and death.
In John 21:15-19, Jesus asks Peter three times, “Do you love me?” Most Bible scholars agree that Jesus is giving Peter the opportunity to atone for his betrayal of Jesus during Jesus’ arrest. But what does this mean for us today? How do we know if we love Jesus? In this passage we find the simple evidence of our love for Jesus.
During these Sundays between Easter and Pentecost, I am departing from the revised common lectionary to explore several of the post-resurrection appearances of Jesus. Here’s the link to the podcast, If You Love Jesus.
As a young child, my mother would tell me to “Put on your thinking cap” when I had to solve a problem. Jesus says something of the same thing to Peter, but much more directly. How do we develop Kingdom thinking? This brief look at the an encounter between Peter and Jesus might give us some clues.
Developing A Kingdom Mindset
Matthew 16:21-28 NIV’84
21 From that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.
22 Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. “Never, Lord!” he said. “This shall never happen to you!”
23 Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men.”
24 Then Jesus said to his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. 25 For whoever wants to save his life[h] will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it. 26 What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul? 27For the Son of Man is going to come in his Father’s glory with his angels, and then he will reward each person according to what he has done. 28 I tell you the truth, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.” — Matthew 16:21-28 NIV’84
From Demonstration to Decision
During these summer months we have been looking at various passages from the Gospel of Matthew, thinking together about the Kingdom of God; or, as Matthew calls it, the Kingdom of Heaven. We have looked primarily at the words and actions of Jesus that demonstrated the kingdom of God.
We have seen Jesus teach about the kingdom. Matthew in chapters 5-7, records the Sermon on the Mount. The Sermon is the compendium, the substance, of the Jesus’ Kingdom teachings. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus begins to lay out the ethical and spiritual distinctives of the Kingdom. These are characteristics that distinguish the Kingdom of God, which he has come to both announce and inaugurate, from the current practice of first century Judaism.
But Jesus does more in Matthew’s Gospel than just teach about the Kingdom.
We have seen him demonstrate what life will be like in the Kingdom of God by healing the paralyzed man by first forgiving his sins.
We have seen Jesus call disciples to follow him, to learn from him, and to embrace life in this Kingdom, which will stand in contrast to the world in which he and they now live.
We have seen Jesus describe the Kingdom of God using parables like the sower and the soils, the wheat and the weeds, and the treasure in the field.
We have seen Jesus demonstrate the abundance of the Kingdom of Heaven by feeding 5,000, and then on another occasion by feeding 4,000 people.
We have seen the King of the Kingdom, Jesus, exercise his dominion over the created elements by walking on water.
And last week we saw Jesus prod the disciples to verbalize who he really was. And it was Peter who got it out first with his confession – “You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God.”
So we have seen Jesus gently, yet persistently teach, demonstrate, and clarify the ideas and actions of the Kingdom of God before his disciples.
But today we come to the hinge point of Jesus’ ministry – the point at which he moves from demonstrating the Kingdom of God for his disciples, and begins to push them toward their own decision regarding their place in the Kingdom.
As I just mentioned, Peter’s confession of Christ was the first public acknowledgement by the disciples that Jesus was the Messiah, the Anointed One, the Christ. But an acknowledgment is one thing for even Satan recognized who Jesus was.
No, Jesus needed for the disciples to do much more than acknowledge him as the Christ. His teaching and demonstration of the Kingdom was to lead them to a point of decision, a point of commitment that heretofore they had not made.
I am sure the disciples were intrigued with Jesus. I am sure they found his teaching amazing in its clarity and stunning in its restatement of the Law.
But, they needed to do more. They needed to decide for themselves not only that Jesus was unique, but that they would link their lives with his, that they would follow him not only on the dusty roads of Galilee, but in the way they lived their lives, too.
What does that have to do with us today? Just this – it isn’t enough to believe that Jesus is extraordinary, or even to believe that he is the divine Son of God.
In 2008, the Pew Forum on Religious Life reported that their surveys indicated that 92% of Americans believe in a higher power, a being that most would call God. But, is that enough? Is it enough to believe that God exists, or does that knowledge, that belief lead logically to the next step – a decision to live in accordance with God’s will?
That’s why this passage today is so important. It is the point at which Jesus pushes the disciples past the stage of acknowledgement, past demonstrations of the Kingdom, to a point at which they must make a decision regarding their place in the Kingdom themselves.
Exposing Peter’s Mistaken Mindset
But before Jesus can push them to a decision about the Kingdom, he first has to expose the earthly mindset of the disciples. Peter, as we might suspect, gives Jesus that opportunity.
Matthew says that after Peter’s confession that Jesus is the Christ, the conversation changes:
“21 From that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.”
Now Jesus begins to explain what is going to happen to him. He is headed to Jerusalem and there he will have a showdown, a power encounter with the religious rulers of first century Judaism.
I think it’s interesting that Jesus says that he will “suffer many things at the hands of the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and that he must be killed…”
In truth, it is the Roman Empire that imposes the death penalty on Jesus, and carries it out. But Jesus recognizes that the Roman Empire, with the governor of Judea, Pontius Pilate as its representative, will only be carrying out the desires of the leading religious leaders of his day.
Jesus will be dealt with as they have already dealt with others who challenged their authority and power – they will marginalize him, and failing that, they will eliminate him.
So, we see repeated attempts to discredit Jesus. They come at him with trick questions; with implications that he and his disciples are not following the Law, the Torah; and, finally, with charges of blasphemy and speaking against the Temple.
The disciples have witnessed this tension between Jesus, whose popularity is the only thing that has kept him from the hands of the Pharisees, Saduccees and other religious authorities.
So, when Jesus begins to lay out for the disciples, now that they have acknowledged who he is, that these very same religious leaders are going to cause him great harm, even to the point of taking his life, Peter can’t take it.
Matthew says that Peter takes Jesus aside. That’s interesting because Peter ususally just blurts out whatever he has to say, just as he did with his great confession.
But, Peter takes Jesus aside to privately chastise his own teacher. We miss the point of that because we don’t understand the reverence with which teachers, rabbis, of the first century were accorded.
It was kind of like when I was in the fifth grade at Johnson Elementary School in Columbus, Georgia. In the fourth grade, I had a wonderful teacher who everyday after lunch read to us from Laura Ingalls Wilder’s prairie book series. She was a kind and gentle teacher, who mothered her fourth graders with great care and concern.
But fifth grade was an entirely different story. My fifth grade teacher was Mrs. Cooksey, and Mrs. Cooksey believed it was her duty to take innocent fourth graders and prepare them for the rough-and-tumble work of junior high school. Never mind that we didn’t get to junior high until seventh grade; Mrs. Cooksey was determined to make us grow up, fast and in proper form. Needless to say, she did not read Little House on the Prairie to us, or anything else for that matter.
To her credit, Mrs. Cooksey was a good teacher. I learned a great deal in her class because I had to. I was too afraid to find out what would happen if I didn’t! But she was stern, no-nonsense, and definitely not our mother.
I would no more have contradicted Mrs. Cooksey than I would have the principal of the school himself.
So, when Peter takes it upon himself to set Jesus straight, he at least has the consideration to take Jesus aside and rebuke him privately.
After he had Jesus alone, I am sure Peter repeated what he thought Jesus had said. Something like this, I imagine –
Peter: “Lord, let me get this straight. Did I hear you right? Do you think that when we get to Jerusalem that the religious leaders are going to give you a hard time? Why that’s nothing new, they’ve been doing that to us for almost three years now.
But, this business that they’re going to kill you, I can’t believe you said that. I’m not sure what all that business about rising on the third day was, but you’re not going to have to rise from anywhere on any day! Wouldn’t that be better?
No, this will never happen to you! I promise you that as long as I’m around nobody will do you any harm.”
At this point, I am sure that Peter is feeling pretty good about himself. After all, he’s the only one, again, with the boldness and courage to knock this silly notion that Jesus is going to be killed by a bunch of effete, soft-handed religious leaders. What match would they be for a fisherman, or a bunch of fishermen for that matter?
But unfortunately for Peter, Jesus response comes as a complete surprise.
Jesus: “Peter, I’ve just called you the Rock, but now I call you Satan. Get out of my sight, quit blocking my way on the road to Jerusalem. You’re thinking the wrong way, you’re thinking like they think, like the religious leaders I’m challenging. All they know is power and force and violence and threats and intimidation. No, you’re thinking like they are. You need to think like you belong to the Kingdom of Heaven.”
Of course, that is the Warnock Revised Version, but I think you get the point. Peter has failed to grasp that what Jesus is about is not bringing in the Kingdom of God like the religious leaders of his day, by collaborating with the most powerful military juggernaut on earth, the Roman Empire.
Jesus is again telling the disciples how different life is in the Kingdom of God, and how Kingdom living requires Kingdom thinking.
Developing A Kingdom Mindset
Listen again to what Jesus tells the disciples. I imagine that Peter hasn’t taken Jesus so far to the side that Jesus can’t turn and address them all. I also imagine that Jesus has emphatically made his point with Peter, so much so that the firm and commanding tone of his voice has already gotten their attention.
Jesus must have turned and addressed them all:
“If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. 25 For whoever wants to save his life[h] will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it. 26 What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul? 27For the Son of Man is going to come in his Father’s glory with his angels, and then he will reward each person according to what he has done.
That is definitely not the way the world thinks. First, Jesus might have pointed to a man hanging on a cross to issue his challenge to them. When the Romans put down a minor rebellion in Jerusalem during Herod’s reign, they crucified 2,000 men, lining the roads into Jerusalem with their crosses on which they left their bodies to become food for the vultures.
So, the image might have been graphically before them. “Here’s what happens when you follow me,” Jesus might have said. “You take up a cross and follow me, because that’s my way.”
Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s famous book, The Cost of Discipleship, contains Bonhoeffer’s comment that “when Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die.” Bonhoeffer would give his life in a German concentration camp only shortly before the Allies would crush the Third Reich and liberate that Nazi death camp.
But to help them understand the significance of what he was telling them, Jesus added,
For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it. 26 What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul?
In other words, the more we try to hold on to our lives, the more we seek to save ourselves, the more we operate as this sad world operates, the less chance we have of actually finding life, of being the people that God created us to be.
Kingdom thinking does not start with “I.” Rick Warren began his mega-million seller, The Purpose-Driven Life with these words, “It’s not about you.”
Kingdom thinking, a Kingdom mindset, starts with Jesus. If Jesus is not worthy of our lives, then we are not thinking Kingdom thoughts.
If we gain the whole world, and here I think Jesus meant all that the present life in this existence has to offer – fame, money, material possessions, friends, family, and so on – but have failed to understand that all of that is temporary, fleeting (a vapor as the writer of Ecclesiastes put it) then we have failed to understand the purpose for which God has placed us on this earth.
Kingdom thinking is not conventional wisdom. The reason Jesus said, “Turn the other cheek,” was because they had always heard “an eye for an eye.” The reason Jesus said, “Go the second mile,” is because they had practiced the art of obedient hostility toward the Roman soldiers who could compel an able-bodied Jewish man to carry his pack for one mile.
The reason Jesus said to “love your enemies” was because they had heard they were supposed to “love their neighbors and hate their enemies.”
But the response to this is and has always been, “But that will never work in the real world.” And yet, the individuals in history who have captured our imagination have been those who have showed kindness in the midst of hostility, love in the midst of hate, and who have given their lives for causes most of us think are impossible and pointless.
Mother Teresa who started a home for the dying, so those dying in the streets of India could die surrounded by those who loved them. She captures our imagination because we would not do what she did. We might start a hospital to help cure them, or give funds to those who build houses, but those who are dying are dying anyway, why waste time and attention on them? And, that is the difference in our conventional thinking and Kingdom thinking.
So, how do we develop a Kingdom mindset?
First, by realizing that the life and teaching of Jesus is the basis for the way we live our lives. Jesus said to the disciples that “…the Son of Man is going to come in his Father’s glory with his angels, and then he will reward each person according to what he has done.”
I don’t think that means that Jesus is going to reward folks for doing a few good deeds. What I think Jesus means is that your reward will be based on what decision you have made, what you have done, in order to live your life by Kingdom values. And, the first thing you must do in order to think Kingdom thoughts is to let your life be transformed by the King of that Kingdom.
Secondly, we must realize that there are times, quite a few of them actually, when the words of Jesus and the thinking of this world system in which we find ourselves will not agree. Our decision then has to be to stay with Jesus. Against the opinions of our friends, our family, our political party, and our neighbors. Why? Because conventional thinking, like Peter’s, is not Kingdom thinking.
Finally, we must remember that the Kingdom of God has already begun. We are not waiting for death to usher us into the Kingdom. The Spirit of God has already done that when by the mystery of God we were, as Paul said, transferred from the Kingdom of darkness into the Kingdom of light.
We must admit things have gone terribly wrong in this world. I don’t think I have ever seen a time in my life when there is so much violence, so much discord, so much conflict, so much poverty, so much hatred, so much discontent around the entire globe, as there is today.
Without faith in Christ, without a commitment to a different way to live, one would have to despair for the future. But, there is another way to think. Not the way that Peter was thinking. But a new way to think.
That’s what Jesus meant when he would say, “You have heard it has been said…but I say unto you….” You’ve heard the old way to think and act, but there’s a new way, a Kingdom way, a way that is hard, involves sacrifice, and may lead to your losing everything. But that is the only way you’ll gain anything.
If you want to enter the Kingdom, learn to think like the King.
Feeding the Sheep and Following the Shepherd
Feeding Jesus’ sheep means following Jesus as his disciples. We cannot do one without the other.
1Afterward Jesus appeared again to his disciples, by the Sea of Tiberias. It happened this way: 2Simon Peter, Thomas (called Didymus), Nathanael from Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two other disciples were together. 3″I’m going out to fish,” Simon Peter told them, and they said, “We’ll go with you.” So they went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing.
4Early in the morning, Jesus stood on the shore, but the disciples did not realize that it was Jesus.
5He called out to them, “Friends, haven’t you any fish?”
“No,” they answered.
6He said, “Throw your net on the right side of the boat and you will find some.” When they did, they were unable to haul the net in because of the large number of fish.
7Then the disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, “It is the Lord!” As soon as Simon Peter heard him say, “It is the Lord,” he wrapped his outer garment around him (for he had taken it off) and jumped into the water. 8The other disciples followed in the boat, towing the net full of fish, for they were not far from shore, about a hundred yards. 9When they landed, they saw a fire of burning coals there with fish on it, and some bread.
10Jesus said to them, “Bring some of the fish you have just caught.”
11Simon Peter climbed aboard and dragged the net ashore. It was full of large fish, 153, but even with so many the net was not torn. Continue reading “Sermon: Feeding the Sheep and Following the Shepherd”
Entertaining Angels: The Messengers and Armies of God
5So Peter was kept in prison, but the church was earnestly praying to God for him.
6The night before Herod was to bring him to trial, Peter was sleeping between two soldiers, bound with two chains, and sentries stood guard at the entrance. 7Suddenly an angel of the Lord appeared and a light shone in the cell. He struck Peter on the side and woke him up. “Quick, get up!” he said, and the chains fell off Peter’s wrists.
8Then the angel said to him, “Put on your clothes and sandals.” And Peter did so. “Wrap your cloak around you and follow me,” the angel told him. 9Peter followed him out of the prison, but he had no idea that what the angel was doing was really happening; he thought he was seeing a vision. 10They passed the first and second guards and came to the iron gate leading to the city. It opened for them by itself, and they went through it. When they had walked the length of one street, suddenly the angel left him.
11Then Peter came to himself and said, “Now I know without a doubt that the Lord sent his angel and rescued me from Herod’s clutches and from everything the Jewish people were anticipating.”
12When this had dawned on him, he went to the house of Mary the mother of John, also called Mark, where many people had gathered and were praying. 13Peter knocked at the outer entrance, and a servant girl named Rhoda came to answer the door. 14When she recognized Peter’s voice, she was so overjoyed she ran back without opening it and exclaimed, “Peter is at the door!”
15“You’re out of your mind,” they told her. When she kept insisting that it was so, they said, “It must be his angel.”
16But Peter kept on knocking, and when they opened the door and saw him, they were astonished.17Peter motioned with his hand for them to be quiet and described how the Lord had brought him out of prison. “Tell James and the brothers about this,” he said, and then he left for another place.
The Ministry of Angels
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4Therefore, among God’s churches we boast about your perseverance and faith in all the persecutions and trials you are enduring.5All this is evidence that God’s judgment is right, and as a result you will be counted worthy of the kingdom of God, for which you are suffering. 6God is just: He will pay back trouble to those who trouble you 7and give relief to you who are troubled, and to us as well. This will happen when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven in blazing fire with his powerful angels.
The Book of Revelation is filled with the most descriptive imagery of angels as God’s warriors, but I want to leave that book for the week when we deal with angels and the end of time.
The book of Jude contains one very interesting, but mysterious event. Jude is writing about the brazenness of those who do not believe in God, or who live their lives in open defiance of God’s word. He contrasts that kind of arrogant attitude by saying —
9But even the archangel Michael, when he was disputing with the devil about the body of Moses, did not dare to bring a slanderous accusation against him, but said, “The Lord rebuke you!”
Jude’s point is to speak of the humility and restraint of even an archangel, but of course, we are very curious about what this brief verse means. You remember that Moses died in the presence of God, and God buried him. In Deutoronomy 34, the death of Moses is presented. The Bible only says that Moses died and was buried, and that no one knows where his tomb is. But, there must have been some dispute, some struggle between Satan and Michael over the body of Moses before its burial, and undoubtedly Michael wins.
Paul reminds us that even that we are in a spiritual battle. In Ephesians 6, Paul writes —
10Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. 11Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. 12For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. 13Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. 14Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, 15and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. 16In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. 17Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. 18And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the saints.”
Paul suggests that “our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.” That is a battle that started long before man was created, and continues to this day.
It is a battle for which we are ill-equipped, unless the scale is tipped in our behalf by the Holy Spirit, our own obedience, and God’s holy angels.
Down through the years, fantastic stories of angels fighting real battles have been told. The most famous of these in modern history is the story of the Angels of Mons. The story goes that during World War I, the British army was struggling, in retreat actually. But somehow they blundered forward into the small mining town of Mons, France. Two German army corps divisions attacked the British on August 23, 1914. And here’s where the story gets interesting. During the fight, either celestial bowmen led by St. George, or angels themselves, routed the Germans, allowing the British to safely retreat later.
The story had so much support that British historian, A. J. P. Taylor, included the account in his book titled, The First World War, published in 1963. Although the story has been largely discounted, it remains a popular legend concerning angels.
But, Jesus reminds us that his kingdom is not of this world. I am sure that implies that whatever battles he sends his angels to fight for us are battles that concern eternity, not politics.
Peter’s experience, and the experience of the early church, was that the power of God was evident in their preaching, their ministry, and their protection. God will send his angels.
I am presenting this message tonight at a meeting of pastors and lay leaders who are concerned about the economy. I’d be interested in your comments.
Toward A Theology of Economics
Acts 5:1-11
1Now a man named Ananias, together with his wife Sapphira, also sold a piece of property. 2With his wife’s full knowledge he kept back part of the money for himself, but brought the rest and put it at the apostles’ feet.
3Then Peter said, “Ananias, how is it that Satan has so filled your heart that you have lied to the Holy Spirit and have kept for yourself some of the money you received for the land? 4Didn’t it belong to you before it was sold? And after it was sold, wasn’t the money at your disposal? What made you think of doing such a thing? You have not lied to men but to God.”
5When Ananias heard this, he fell down and died. And great fear seized all who heard what had happened. 6Then the young men came forward, wrapped up his body, and carried him out and buried him.
7About three hours later his wife came in, not knowing what had happened. 8Peter asked her, “Tell me, is this the price you and Ananias got for the land?”
“Yes,” she said, “that is the price.”
9Peter said to her, “How could you agree to test the Spirit of the Lord? Look! The feet of the men who buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out also.”
10At that moment she fell down at his feet and died. Then the young men came in and, finding her dead, carried her out and buried her beside her husband. 11Great fear seized the whole church and all who heard about these events.
Thinking About The Economy
We don’t have time today to review the almost countless articles, books, interviews, YouTube videos, podcasts, newscasts, newspaper reports, and other media all saying pretty much the same thing — the economy is in big trouble.
Unemployment is approaching 10%, and the government has promised us that, “Yep, before this is over it will hit 10%,” or more. And that’s just the latest bad news.
I’ve been following the economy with more interest than understanding for months. I bought several books, read Paul Krugman’s column in The New York Times, subscribed to Nouriel Roubini’s economics website, and engaged in long conversations about the economy with a member of my church who is a former international banker, responsible for financing international business deals in South and Central America.
My conclusion from all of this reading, listening, and talking is this — the economy is in big trouble.
So let’s see what sense we can make of subprime mortgages, credit default swaps, securitized assets, and the like. Actually, we’re not going to make any sense of any of those things, because I haven’t the foggiest idea what those terms, and the other 1,000 terms like them, really mean. I’ll leave that to our other guests this evening.
But what I do want us to do is this — I want us to think about the economy. But not in the ways that all of us, pundits and non-pundits alike, have been trying to think about it. I want us to think about the economy differently tonight. I want us to think about it theologically.
Of course, we can’t think about every facet, nuance, and detail of the economy, even theologically-speaking, so I have titled our time together, “Toward a Theology of Economics.” The idea being that the word “Toward” means we’re heading in the right direction, but we probably are not going to get there, at least not in the 20-minutes or so we have to think together.
Moving Toward a Theology of Economics Means Thinking Differently
One of my favorite books of the last 5 years is the book, Freakonomics, subtitled, A Rogue Economist Explores The Hidden Side of Everything. Apparently, Steven Levitt was a rogue before Sarah Palin took the title. Anyway, Levitt teaches economics at the University of Chicago, and is a wunderkind of sorts among economists. Levitt’s particular gift is looking at things in society differently.
His co-author of Freakonomics, Stephen Dubner, writes,
So, Levitt asks interesting questions, such as, “Why do drug dealers still live with their moms?” Now that’s a pretty interesting question, and as you can imagine the story that provides the answer is both fascinating and too long for me to tell completely, so get the book.
But, the short version is that Sudhir Venkatesh, a PhD student at the University of Chicago, began interviewing members of the Black Disciples gang for a research project. In the course of those interviews, one of the gang members, their bookkeeper actually, gave Sudhir several spiral-bound notebooks containing the gang chapter’s accounts — income, expenses, salaries, overhead, cost of weapons, and so on — things all respectable gang businesses had to keep records of.
Sudhir talked to Levitt, and together they analyzed the contents of the gang’s books. What they found was that first, the gang was organized pretty much like a McDonald’s franchise — owners, bosses, workers, and wanna-be workers. Income came from the sale of drugs, club dues, and protection money paid to the gang by businesses. The head of that unit, or that particular gang franchise, made about $100,000 per year. But the guys next on the gang organizational chart made about $7/hour, and the street dealers made even less — about $3.30/hour. Thus answering the question, “Why do drug dealers live with their moms?”
So, the first lesson of our theology of economics is — Things aren’t always what they seem. That is especially true when you’re developing a theology of economics.
What Do We Mean By ‘Economy?’
Okay, let’s back up just a minute and ask ourselves, “What do we mean by economics?” Because if we’re moving toward a theology of economics, we might mean something different than what a Steven Levitt or a Paul Krugman or a Nouriel Roubini might mean when they use that word.
I am sure you all know this, but for the record, our English word “economy” comes from the Greek word “oikonomia,” which meant “the management of the household.” But, it also had the implication that the manager was managing the household for another, meaning the master of the household.
You can see where I’m going with this, can’t you? Economics is more than money. Economics encompasses everything about managing the household, including, but not limited to money. And a theology of economics has to be more than “how can we get our members to give more?”
Okay, in the interest of time, let’s go ahead and define what we mean by “household.” Since we’re headed toward a theology of economics, let’s assume that the household, the enterprise being managed is God’s created order. Everything God made, over which God gave humankind dominion.
So, this is God’s household, this creation of God’s. And, we are the managers. We’re God’s economists.
So, the second lesson is — economics is the management of God’s household, and we’re God’s economists.
What Are We Supposed To Do?
So far, we’re making good progress. We’ve determined that things are not always what they seem, and that economics is really the management of God’s household.
But, it’s right here that we have to ask, “What are we supposed to do?” How do we manage God’s household exactly, and where do we find some guidance for doing it?
Well, we could get some help from financiers and global economists who tell us that economic growth is the goal of all economies. This year the US economy is expected to grow by about 2%, but China’s by about 9%. And so on down the roll-call of nations and growth rates. But, aren’t these the same guys who got us into this mess? The-growth-is-the-goal crowd, who like Gordon Gecko in the movie Wall Street, taught us that “greed is good.” And so, they gave us the greatest economic crisis since World War II, and a near-miss at another world-wide depression. Maybe we need to look elsewhere for guidance.
We could also look at the global business managers who continue to move production from developed countries to developing countries, looking for the lowest labor costs in places like China, Viet Nam, and other developing nations. I used to be one of those — I ran a small manufacturing company that produced goods in China. I told myself that low wages were better than the subsistence farm life Chinese workers endured.
I told myself that until I toured some of the factories and saw the horrific working conditions that existed. OSHA would close those plants in a nano-second because workers’ lives and health are endangered every day. And some of those workers are involuntary or underage workers.
Do you know what the big deal about Chinese New Year is? Chinese New Year, or Lunar New Year as they call it in China, is a period of two-to-four weeks just before spring when all the factories close and production stops. But, do you know why this is so important? Because hundreds of thousands of workers from the rural areas of China will travel from their factory dormitories in Guangdong or Wuxi or Nantong, back home to visit their families.
This is the only time of the entire year that most have to see their loved ones, who include wives, parents, and even their children. The dorms in which they live crowd dozens of workers together in barracks-like settings that are usually under-equipped with restrooms, showers, drinking water, and the simple comforts of home. I am no longer a globalist, as you can imagine. So, maybe we need to look elsewhere for our model to manage God’s household.
An Example From Nature
Of course, both Scripture and nature give us ample examples. Actually, Jesus used nature as the example of God’s economy. Jesus said,
28“And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 30If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? 31So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.
So, this is God’s household, but God also provides everything we need, including food, drink, and clothing. And, to worry about this stuff is to act like a pagan — one who doesn’t believe in the One True God.
A Characteristic of Economics: Extravagant Abundance
Debbie and I have had a vegetable garden for the last two years. And the words of Jesus we have just read were illustrated in our garden. We planted about 25 or so tomato seeds, and set out about that many tomato plants this year. But, on each plant, dozens of tomatoes grew. And when we cut those tomatoes open, thousands of seeds came gushing out. As a matter of fact, we had about a dozen volunteer tomato plants from last year because tomatoes fell on the ground, and rotted, but the seeds fell onto good soil and sprouted. (That’s another parable, by the way.)
God’s household, the natural part of it anyway, exhibits an extravagant abundance.
And that’s the first characteristic of our theology of economics — extravagant abundance. God did not plan for shortages. We have more than enough oxygen to breathe, more than enough water to drink, more than enough sunshine to fall of the earth.
We do not have a shortage in God’s household, we have a problem with distribution. Some of us have more that the rest of us. Now I realize that capitalism is based on just that idea — some people get rich, and some don’t. But remember, we’re moving toward a theology of economics, not a politics of economics.
God’s economy is not a giant, finite pie with only so many pieces to go around. There is an extravagant abundance, if we manage it correctly.
Unfortunately, there are too many examples of how we are not managing it correctly. Climate change, global warming, poverty, disease, and so on. But, let me give you an example a little closer to home, from the Lowe’s store in Danville.
Every spring we make the trek to Lowe’s to buy plants — flowers, mostly, because we grow our vegetables from seed.
Lowe’s has a great variety of both annuals and perennials, and it’s convenient for us to shop there. But this spring, I picked up a pot containing a plant which read — “Unlawful to propogate this plant. Copyrighted by….” whatever the name of the company was.
Some bio-geneticists have figured out how to produce a strain that has some unique characteristics. And, they’ve decided that they want to keep all the profits from that discovery for themselves. They want to sell you a new plant every year. You can’t share a clipping with a friend or fellow-gardener, or even root another for yourself.
That isn’t extravagant abundance, that’s greed.
Another Characteristic: Exceptional Generosity
Okay, we’re making progress. The second characteristic of our theology of economics is exceptional generosity.
Not only does God provide the food, the drink, and the clothes we need, in other words, our necessities, God provides it to everyone.
Jesus said, “God causes the rain to fall on the just and the unjust.” So, if you’re a bad, wicked person, it will probably still rain on your garden. The sun will still shine on your tomato plants.
In Matthew’s Gospel, Matthew tells us that Jesus healed all their sick. (Matt 12:15) Not just some, or even many, but all. Everyone who was sick got healed that day. Exceptional generosity.
Of course, the cross stands at the center of our theology of economics. The cross is God’s best example of extravagant abundance, and exceptional generosity.
Little children learn a verse that captures both the idea of extravagant abundance, and exceptional generosity — John 3:16.
16“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”
God gave all God had — his only Son — that is exceptional generosity. God gave God’s only Son so that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. Extravagant abundance is all the salvation we could ever need, made available to anyone, everyone, all who believe — without limit, without qualification, without hesitation. There is enough for all, and it is available to all.
The cross is God’s comment about economics. The cross is God’s object lesson to the world about giving. The cross is God’s acceptance of all who will stand in its shadow.
The same Jesus who died on the cross, God raised from the dead and has made him both Christ and Lord. Now, we have no problem believing that Jesus is Lord of the first century, or that Jesus is the Lord of heaven. But, we need to realize that Jesus is also Lord of the economy, the real world in which we live.
Which brings us to our final theological characteristic.
A Third Characteristic: Eternal Consequences
A third theological characteristic of managing God’s household is this — our management of God’s household, God’s economy, has eternal consequences. Listen to Jesus in Matthew 25 —
34“Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 35For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, 36I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’
37“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? 39When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’
40“The King will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’
41“Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’
44“They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’
45“He will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’
46“Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.”
The interesting thing in this passage is that both groups, the righteous and the unrighteous were totally surprised that their managing of God’s household had eternal consequences.
I wrote about this passage last week in my blog under the title, “Foolproof Evangelism Needs No Training or Budget.” My point was, this is something every person knows how to do, and can do immediately. I got some amazing responses. One respondent said,
You call this EVANGELISM!? No wonder America sinks in its depravation and sin! How about: …faith comes from H-E-A-R-I-N-G THE MESSAGE, and the message is heard through THE WORD of God.
My reply was, “These aren’t my words, take this up with Jesus.”
But, my point is this — how we manage the economy, God’s household, has eternal consequences.
Back To Ananias and Sapphira
Which brings us back to Ananias and Sapphira. I really like this story.
In the brand new church of the book of Acts, believers were practicing this theology of economics that we have been discussing. They realized that while some had more than others, that all would have enough if they pooled their resources. They recognized the extravagant abundance of God’s blessings. They just had to solve the distribution problem.
So, they sold what they had, and pooled the money. Those who sold property brought all the money and laid it at the apostles’ feet. Everybody had plenty, an abundance, because they were generous with those who needed it most. From abundance to generosity the early church experienced God’s favor and blessing.
But, Ananias and Sapphira decided they wanted the same recognition others had enjoyed. So they sold their property, but they decided not to give all the money to the church. They would keep back some. Rather than see abundance, they saw limit. “This is our only piece of property,” they must have said. “We deserve some of the money for ourselves.”
So, when Ananias brought the money to the apostles’ he said the same thing everyone else had said — “We sold our property, and we are giving the proceeds to the church.”
Peter knew Ananias was lying. So, Peter said,
“Ananias, how is it that Satan has so filled your heart that you have lied to the Holy Spirit and have kept for yourself some of the money you received for the land? 4Didn’t it belong to you before it was sold? And after it was sold, wasn’t the money at your disposal? What made you think of doing such a thing? You have not lied to men but to God.
At that, Ananias fell down dead. They carried him out.
Three hours later, his wife, Sapphira arrived at church. She probably expected to be greeted with cheers and hugs for their generosity, but instead Peter asked her, “Tell me, is this the price you and Ananias got for the land?”
“Yes,” she said, “that is the price.”
Peter rebuked her just as he had rebuked Ananias, and she falls down dead.
An amazing story, that’s also a little scary, but what does it have to do with a theology of economics?
Just this — Ananias and Sapphira believed in one economy, but lived their lives in another economy. They wanted the benefits and blessings of believing the right thing, without really having to do it.
And that’s where we find ourselves today. Living one economy, but wanting the benefits of God’s economy. Especially when the economy we live in is in big trouble. Peter said they were lying to the Holy Spirit. Their theology of economics had eternal consequences for Ananias and Sapphira. What about ours?
It is not enough for us to figure out what to do in this economic crisis. It’s not enough that we find something that works. Our understanding of economics begins with God.
For if we understand that God provides all we need, we can live our lives out of God’s extravagant abundance.
And, when we realize that there is plenty to go around if we share with one another, then we are practicing exceptional generosity.
Our actions will not only have immediate effect, but more importantly, our actions will have eternal consequences.
But, the protest is always, “But in the real world, things don’t work like that.” “No one else will act like this.” But isn’t that the point, that we, the followers of Christ are different? That our confidence is God, the God who made heaven and earth. So, even if no one else manages God’s household like we do, we can still do it. After all, we’re reading about first century Christians in the book of Acts, not because they failed to change the world, but precisely because they did change the world. But remember, in economics things aren’t always what they seem.
Why We Need The Apostles’ Creed: I Believe in Jesus Christ, His Only Son, Our Lord
13When Jesus came to the region of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, “Who do people say the Son of Man is?”
14They replied, “Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets.”
15″But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?” 16Simon Peter answered, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”
17Jesus replied, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by man, but by my Father in heaven. 18And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it. 19I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”
20Then he warned his disciples not to tell anyone that he was the Christ. 21From that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life. 22Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. “Never, Lord!” he said. “This shall never happen to you!” 23Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men.”
24Then Jesus said to his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. 25For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it. 26What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul? 27For the Son of Man is going to come in his Father’s glory with his angels, and then he will reward each person according to what he has done. 28I tell you the truth, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.” — Matthew 16:13-28
The Largest Section of the Apostles’ Creed
We’re continuing our look at the Apostles’ Creed, using this ancient confession of faith as our outline for the great teachings, or doctrines, of the Christian faith. Last week we looked at the opening statement of The Creed — “I believe in God the Father, Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth…” That brief line put us in good company.
First, for those who confess faith in God, we identify ourselves as theists, those who believe in a god; as opposed to atheists, those who do not believe in a god. But, that line also affirms that we believe not just in a god, but in the God who is Almighty, unequalled, unparalleled by any other so-called gods. We believe in God, who is Almighty, and who is the one Creator of all that exists.
But at this point we have merely joined the ranks of other theists who acknowledge a personal, powerful God. And so Christianity joins Islam, and Judaism as representatives of the world’s great monotheistic religions.
But with our declaration that we also believe “…in Jesus Christ, His only son our Lord…” we have now parted company with both Judaism and Islam. We as Christians now stand alone, unique in all the world’s religions. We believe that God has a son whose name is Jesus.
This line of the Apostles’ Creed is attributed to Andrew, the brother of Simon Peter. As we have noted before, this legend is more fable than fact, but perhaps Andrew gets the credit for this line because he was among the first to recognize who Jesus was, and then Andrew brought his own brother, Peter, to meet the Lord.
Most likely the Apostles’ Creed has three major sections — I believe in God, I believe in Jesus Christ, and I believe in the Holy Spirit — because the creed was usually said at the baptism of a new convert. Matthew records the instruction of Jesus that we are to “make disciples, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.” The creed was probably part of the baptismal ceremony, recited one line at a time by the baptismal candidate when asked the three questions —
— Do you believe in God? I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth.
— Do you believe in Jesus Christ? I believe in Jesus Christ, His only son, our Lord.
— Do you believe in the Holy Spirit? I believe in the Holy Spirit.
With that the candidate was baptized into the faith, and his or her confession of faith was called the “faith delivered” or “the symbol” of the faith.
Peter’s Confession of Faith
All of that brings us to our text today, found in Matthew’s gospel. Matthew presents the scene of Jesus and the disciples traveling through the countryside. They reach Caesarea Philippi, the home of the shrine to the pagan god, Pan.
In this pagan setting, Jesus asks the disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” By “people” we presume that Jesus means his fellows Jews because he has just had a confrontation with the Pharisees and Sadducees who asked Jesus for a sign from heaven. It is obvious that religious leaders do not think Jesus is any one special because they ask him to prove his divine connection with some type of indication from God.
After warning the disciples about the “yeast of the Pharisees and Sadducees” Jesus asks them, not for their own opinion of him, but the opinion of others. The answers seem to come effortlessly because these 12 men have undoubtedly heard people talking about their Teacher, their rabbi.
The disciples respond — “Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” We can gather a couple of things about these answers. The good news is that most people seem to think that Jesus is special. They liken him to John the Baptist, now dead. Perhaps he is John come back from the dead. Others say Jesus is Elijah. This is even more special because Elijah is the expected guest at every passover meal. An empty place at the table is reserved for Elijah, just as the widow made a place in her home for the prophet. Elijah, they thought, would come before the Messiah of God, so his coming was an important sign for the Jews. If Jesus was Elijah, then God had not forgotten his people in the midst of Roman occupation and persecution.
Others said that Jesus was Jeremiah or one of the prophets. Probably they thought this because Jeremiah railed against the corrupt religious figures of his day, just as Jesus had pronounced condemnation on the Pharisees and Sadducees in his day.
What Do People Say About Jesus Today?
All of these answers remind us of what many people say about Jesus today. Many will say that Jesus was a great teacher. Or that Jesus was a great ethicist who gave us new ways of relating to one another with his admonition to turn the other cheek, go the second mile, repay evil with good, and forgive one another. Even some Christian scholars have described Jesus as a mystic, a seer, and a spiritual pioneer.
None of the apostles ever described Jesus in those terms. While Jesus certainly was a great teacher, a moral ethicist who broke new ground in human relations, and one who had a mysterious relationship with God, none of the apostles ever described Jesus in those terms. The Jesus Seminar is the latest attempt by serious theologians to separate the historical Jesus from the Jesus they believe has become hidden by time and myth. The Jesus Seminar, and the other attempts to find the historical Jesus, do not come to Jesus in the manner of the apostles, however.
Our attempts to “explain” Jesus to the rational western mind betray our own limitations, rather than discover who Jesus really is and was.
Who Do You Say I Am?
Jesus follows up his first question — Who do people say I am? — with a logical next question: “But who do you say that I am?” This question puts us on the spot, and that was Jesus’ intent. It is not enough to repeat what others have said about Jesus, we must come to our own belief about who this carpenter from Nazareth is.
Simon Peter speaks first, which is neither unusual nor a surprise. Saying more than he knows in his head, Peter’s mouth responds —
“You are the Christ, the son of the living God.”
Jesus quickly tells Peter he is blessed because he has not made that confession because of others, or because of his own intellect, but because God has revealed it to him.
But what did Peter actually say? First, Peter confesses Jesus as the Christ. In our reading of this text and others where the name Jesus Christ appears, we might mistakenly get the impression that Christ is Jesus second name, like Chuck Warnock, or John Smith.
But Christ is the Greek word that means Messiah, or the Anointed One. The big deal about that is the Messiah, or God’s Anointed, is the one the Jews were looking for. They were looking for the Messiah to come and save them. And, their idea of being saved is less spiritual and more political.
The Roman army occupies the land of the Jews in the first century. Antonio’s Fortress, the Roman garrison, shares a common wall with the most sacred site in Jerusalem for Jews, the Temple. The Jews consider themselves exiles in their own land, captives to an empire which allows them to practice their religion as long as it does not interfere with the goals or peace of the empire.
Their civil and religious leaders are puppets of the Roman regime, and the Roman eagle parades with impunity in the streets of the city of David. This is an outrage for the Jews, and they look to God to deliver them. The Jews believe their current bondage is no different from the 400 years they spent in slavery in Egypt; and no different than the 70 years of the Babylonian captivity.
Already many self-proclaimed messiahs have come and gone. Most gathered small bands of insurrectionists, and all were defeated before their plots could hatch.
Now Peter has identified Jesus as God’s Messiah. The Anointed of God, the One who will save God’s people from their sins, not to mention the Roman empire.
I Believe in Jesus Christ
So, when we say, “I believe in Jesus Christ” we are pronouncing our faith in both the historical figure, the carpenter from Nazareth, and in the fact that Jesus is God’s Anointed. Paul would say later that God has made him “both Lord and Christ.”
To believe in Jesus the man, the carpenter from Nazareth, means that we believe in a real person, who lived a real life, in a real first century world. But we’re making that confession 2,000 years later. The amazing thing is that the followers of Jesus, the apostles, believed in this Jesus during and after his death and resurrection. They were eye witnesses to the historical events of his teaching, his miracles, his compassion, his praying, his companionship, and his friendship. They lived with this man, ate with him, walked dusty roads together with him for three years. For them, he was real.
John as he begins his first letter says,
1That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life. 2The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us. 3We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. 4We write this to make our[a] joy complete.
So, this Jesus was not a figment of their imaginations, nor a figure so lost in the recesses of time that he no longer bore any resemblance to a man. He was real, they had seen him, and now they were telling the story. But they also recognized him as the Messiah. Certainly in the day of his confession, Peter said more than he knew. But on the day of Pentecost, Peter stands and boldly declares —
22″Men of Israel, listen to this: Jesus of Nazareth was a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders and signs, which God did among you through him, as you yourselves know. 23This man was handed over to you by God’s set purpose and foreknowledge; and you, with the help of wicked men,[a] put him to death by nailing him to the cross. 24But God raised him from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on him. — Acts 2:22-24 NIV
The book of Acts tells us that they were “cut to the heart” and 3,000 of those who heard Peter acknowledged Jesus as their Messiah, too.
His Only Son
But, the creed, and the story, don’t stop there. John will proclaim that God so loved the world that he sent his only son, that whosoever believes in him might be saved. Jesus is not just “a” son of God, he is the only son of God. Now we don’t even have time to begin today to unpack all the meaning in that phrase. Peter said Jesus was not only the Messiah, but “the son of the living God.”
Now there is a sense in which all of us are sons and daughters of God. At creation, God breathed into mankind the breath of life, made us in God’s own image, and stood us up in fellowship with Him.
But Jesus is different. Jesus is God’s only son. God has lots of children, but only one son, and his name is Jesus. But it doesn’t stop there.
The Bible says that this only son of God is also God himself. Paul in that great hymn to Jesus in Philippians 2 wrote:
5Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: 6Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, 7but made himself nothing, taking the very nature[b] of a servant, being made in human likeness.
The phrase the NIV translates “being in very nature God” is more directly translated, “Who being in the very form of God,” In other words, this Jesus, whose name means “God is our salvation” is God Himself.
He is God’s only Son, co-equal with God the Father and God the Spirit. Now, if that hurts your head, don’t worry. You join a long line of folks who have been puzzled by the Trinity — the Three-in-One. We’re going to talk more about that later in this series, so hold those thoughts for another Sunday.
The point is — Jesus Christ is God’s unique revelation of himself to all humanity.
Jesus is unique in his beginning — he doesn’t have one.
Jesus is unique in his end — he doesn’t have one of those either.
Jesus is unique in his sovereignty — he is King of kings and Lord of lords.
Jesus is unique in his sacrifice — he died so that you and I might live.
Jesus is unique in his resurrection from the dead — God raised him first, so that we might follow.
Jesus is unique in his place in history — we mark time from before and after his birth. And even scholastic attempts to take Jesus out of history by substituting BCE and CE for BC and AD, even those markers revolve around his place in history.
We could go on to talk about the uniqueness of his love, and of his coming again, but we’ll deal with those later in this series. But now we move on the the part of the confession that makes all the rest of it real — “our Lord.”
I Believe in Jesus Christ, His Only Son, Our Lord
The confession of Peter that day was that Jesus was God’s Messiah, that Jesus was the Son of the Living God. But read the rest of this passage, for it betrays Peter’s heart. Listen to the words from Matthew’s gospel:
21From that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life. 22Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. “Never, Lord!” he said. “This shall never happen to you!” 23Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men.”
Peter was quite willing to acknowledge Jesus as Messiah, for that meant God was going to save his people. And, Peter was quite willing to recognize that Jesus was the unique, one and only Son of God. After all, Peter has seen Jesus heal people, feed people, and even raise some from the dead.
But, Peter struggled with acknowledging Jesus as Lord. Peter could not bear the thoughts of Jesus’ suffering and death. And he had little understanding at all of what Jesus meant when he said he would be raised to life on the third day. Peter was determined that none of those things would happen to his friend, his teacher, and so he objected to Jesus. “Never, Lord,” Peter said.
And right there is the problem. Those two words — never and Lord — cannot go in the same sentence. The only response we can make to Jesus is “Yes, Lord.”
So, Jesus went on to explain that anyone who followed him must take up his cross, give up his life, and deny himself and follow Jesus. That’s what Lord means. A life devoted to serving the Master in whatever ways we can serve him. Sometimes we make the Lordship of Christ about us — our obedience, our choices, our lives. But Jesus is Lord, our only choice is to make him our Lord.
When my brother died on Monday, July 27, I was at home sitting in our den. Our granddaughters had just gone to bed, and the phone rang. The person on the other end identified herself as an investigator with the Fulton County Coroner’s Office. She told me that my brother had been found deceased that evening. I asked as many questions as I could think of, then hung up and called my father. I told him that Dana had died, and shared the few details I knew.
It was a call I knew would come some time, we just didn’t know when. As we made preparations for his funeral, we wondered what had taken his life. The autopsy results were “inconclusive” they said, and toxicology and histology tests had been ordered. My first thoughts were that he died of an overdose of something because he had come close to death several other times from overdoses.
I talked with Dana’s roommate by phone, and he promised to be at Dana’s funeral on Sunday afternoon, August 3. My father’s Sunday School class had prepared lunch for the family, just like we do here. Relatives from both my mother’s family and my father’s gathered in the fellowship hall for lunch. Dana’s roommate, Kip had made the drive from Atlanta, arriving just in time for lunch.
During the hour we had for lunch, Kip told us about Dana’s life in those last days. He and Dana enjoyed each other’s company, but Dana continued to go out on the streets of Atlanta at night. We all knew he was looking for some type of drugs, and Kip said he would ask Dana, “What are you looking for our there, Dana?”
But then Kip shared another story that confirmed our hope in Dana’s faith. Kip said that he had grown up in the church, had sung in the youth choir, and later the adult choir. But he said, he had never made a profession of faith in Christ in all those years. Kip talked about how he and Dana discussed history and the Bible on many occasions. Dana graduated from Mercer University with a BA in history, and from Southwestern Seminary, with a Masters in Religious Education.
But Kip also said that Dana talked to him about his faith, about his love for God. Kip said that it was after those long discussions with Dana, that he himself became a follower of Jesus, professing his faith in Christ for the first time.
Kip’s story was a great comfort to us because it confirmed for us that in the midst of his own struggles and despair, Dana still believed in God, and in Jesus Christ his only Son, our Lord. His inability to conquer his own personal demons did not prevent his faith in God.
At the funeral, Dana’s daughters had several verses of scripture printed and handed out. They were translations from a child’s edition of the Bible, which belongs to my great niece, Dana’s granddaughter. The first verse said — “You don’t have to be good at being good for God to love you.”
That is the God we believe in, the God who loves us, the God who in Jesus saves us, the God who reaches out to us when we are not capable of reaching back. I believe in Jesus Christ, God’s only Son, our Lord. Amen.
I’m preaching from Acts 10:34-43 for Easter Sunday, April 12, 2009. I hope you have a wonderful Easter and that the story of Jesus is told in new and powerful ways in every church on Easter Sunday morning. He is risen. He is risen indeed!
He Is The One
Acts 10:34-43 NIV
34Then Peter began to speak: “I now realize how true it is that God does not show favoritism 35but accepts men from every nation who fear him and do what is right.”
36“You know the message God sent to the people of Israel, telling the good news of peace through Jesus Christ, who is Lord of all.
37You know what has happened throughout Judea, beginning in Galilee after the baptism that John preached— 38how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and power, and how he went around doing good and healing all who were under the power of the devil, because God was with him.”
39“We are witnesses of everything he did in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem. They killed him by hanging him on a tree, 40but God raised him from the dead on the third day and caused him to be seen. 41He was not seen by all the people, but by witnesses whom God had already chosen—by us who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead. 42He commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one whom God appointed as judge of the living and the dead. 43All the prophets testify about him that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.”
A Christmas Story at Easter
Paul Hiebert, the late missiologist and teacher, told this story of an experience he had when he served as a missionary in India:
It was Christmas time, and in the little village in South India where he had gathered with Indian Christians in the modest church there, the villagers had put on a Christmas play, the Christmas story.
The boys dressed as shepherds had come stumbling out onto the the stage, acting drunk. Apparently shepherds in that part of India were notorious for their drinking, and so the villagers howled with laughter at the boys’ comical portrayal of the Biblical story with a local twist.
But then the angels appeared and shepherds and villagers sat in rapt attention at the announcement of the birth of Jesus. Wise men soon appeared, making their way to Herod’s court where they enquired as to the exact location of the birth of the new King of the Jews. Everything seemed to be going according to plan as the play went along.
As the Biblical story came to its conclusion, Hiebert thought the play was ending. But just at that moment, the stage curtain was pulled back to reveal Santa Claus with gifts for everyone! Hiebert was shocked. At first he thought that these new Indian Christians were guilty of syncretism — blending in Christianity with their own myths and ancient beliefs.
But then he realized that the missionaries themselves had brought two stories of Christmas. The first, the Biblical story of Mary and Joseph, and baby Jesus born in a stable in Bethlehem. In that story, the setting was not far from India itself, and the climate was subtropical. Palm trees and deserts formed the landscape, and sheep, goats, shepherds, and wisemen were the characters.
The second story was the story of Saint Nicholas, Santa Claus, the giver of gifts with Mrs. Santa Claus, the elves, and reindeer as the supporting cast. Santa was the giver of gifts, and lived in a climate of snow and ice, where it was always cold and wintry.
Hiebert realized that while the missionaries had brought two stories of Christmas, the villagers in South India had combined them into one great Christmas story of Jesus and shepherds and sheep, along with Santa and reindeer and elves. Both wonderful stories, but each with a very different point.
You might wonder why I’m telling a Christmas story here at Easter. Here’s my point: we have to be careful about how we tell the stories of God. And the Easter story is no exception.
The Story of Spring Is Not The Story of Easter
Of course, Easter has some of the same wonderful folk stories that Christmas has. At Easter time, we look for the Easter bunny with baskets of candy and eggs. We dye eggs multiple colors, hide them from each other, and then make a great game of hunting for these prize eggs outdoors among the rest of nature.
We no longer believe the ancient mythic tales of strange gods and goddesses, and of the rites of spring, or other such nonsense. The Easter bunny and Easter eggs have been given a whole new story — a story of fun, of springtime, of a harmless and exuberant children’s activity. And, that’s exactly as it should be.
But, here today, we know there is a difference in the Easter bunny and in Jesus, just as we know there is a difference in Santa and Jesus. It does not hurt us at all to believe in jolly old men who bring gifts, or to believe that as a sign of spring the Easter bunny distributes eggs just for our amusement and enjoyment. But, we know that one story is not the other, that there is a difference in the Easter story in the Bible and the Easter sale at the mall.
Okay, so we aren’t like the villagers in South India who confused two very different stories. But we still must be careful when we tell the story of Easter, because even if we know the story of Easter is not the story of the Easter bunny, we still tell the wrong story sometime.
The Story of Church is not the Story of Easter
One of the stories we tell at Easter is the story of church. And, many people put on their Easter best and come to church on Easter Sunday. That’s a good thing to do. But it’s not the Easter story.
Like many of you, I grew up in the South. And in the South, we have a way of making language mean what we want it to. We say things like, “Ya’ll come to see us,” when we don’t really mean it. And we use phrases to qualify our gossip, like when we say “bless his heart.” That conversation usually goes something like this:
“Did you hear that Billy Smith was out drunk again last night?”
“Well, yes, I did. Bless his heart, he’s not ever going to amount to anything.”
So, the “bless his heart” kind of softens the gossipy part, and makes us sound really concerned for poor old worthless Billy.
Well, we did the same thing with this business of church and faith. I remember as a primary boy, when you walked down the aisle most of the time we called it “joining the church.” Which is exactly what part of that decision was, but not all of it. Somehow, we in the South just couldn’t bring ourselves to say, “He became a Christian today.” Or, “She became a disciple of Jesus today.” No, we talked about the part of that experience that was less difficult. We said, “He joined the church today.”
Now, before you get too concerned, I know we meant to include the full meaning. You joined the church because you had professed faith in Christ, because you had asked Jesus to forgive your sins, because you had repented of all the bad things you had done, even if you were only 6 years old. I know we understood it meant all of that, but mostly all we could say was, “He joined the church.”
The story we were telling then was the story about church. And, here’s how the rest of that story went:
And that was the story about church. We really thought it was the story about being a Christian, but in our Southern culture and minds both of those stories were the same.
I’m reading a fascinating book titled, The Death of Christian Britain. by Callum Brown, who is professor of religious and cultural history at the University of Dundee in the UK. Brown examines the decline of the Christian church in Britain where now less that 7% of the population attends religious services, even though The Church of England is the official state church.
Brown looks at the popular theories for church decline in England. He examines the theory of the “wicked city” which is the theory that urban centers broke ties to family and friends as the population migrated from the rural countryside to the cities during the Industrial Revolution. But Brown actually demonstrates that during the period of manufacturing increase, more people joined churches than ever before.
He also looks at the theory of the Industrial Revolution itself as a contributing factor to the decline of churches, but again the data show that during the 19th and 20th centuries, up to the 1960s, church attendance and participation in Britain actually continued to increase, and at times increased sharply.
Brown concluded that neither the growth of urban centers, nor the rise of manufacturing were the causes of the decline of the church in England.
His conclusion was that the English simply began telling themselves a new story about church. Let me explain. The old story they told themselves about church, as did we in America, is that good people go to church, church is a good influence on growing children, respectable people live according to Christian principles, and that being a church member was a good thing. You were baptized into the church as an infant, confirmed in the church as a pre-adolescent, married in the church as a young adult, and buried by the church when you died. Your life was woven into the fabric of the church.
But some time in the 1960s, during the rise of the Baby Boom generation, a lot of social narratives were being called into question. Women were finding a new place in society, young people were rebelling against their parents and the system, and society was in turmoil. We experienced the same thing here in America, with similar results.
But, in England people began to tell themselves that you can be good and not go to church. You don’t have to be baptized, or confirmed, that life isn’t much different for those who are than for others. That you don’t have to do what the church tells you to do, and you can get along very well without all that religious fuss. And church attendance began a steady decline that is unabated to this day. Part of the point of Brown’s book is that there is a point at which Britain ceases to be Christian at all, and the church becomes totally irrelevant.
So, the story of Easter can’t be the story of the Church, because it’s easy to explain away the need for the institution of church itself.
The Story of Heaven Isn’t The Story of Easter
We have often told the story of Easter this way: Jesus died on the cross and was resurrected so that we can all go to heaven when we die. Now, there is truth in that statement, but that is not the story of Easter. Actually, if you read all of the accounts of the Easter story, and of what the disciples experienced on that first Easter morning, there is nothing about going to heaven when you die in those accounts.
There is wonder, and mystery, and sadness, and surprise, and unbelief, and incredulity, but not much talk about heaven or our own death. Now, we have come to understand that a result of the death and resurrection of Christ is our own salvation which includes being in the presence of God eternally, but the story of heaven isn’t the story of Easter, either.
The Story of Easter is the Story of Jesus
In our passage today, Peter is speaking to Cornelius. Cornelius is a Roman centurion who lives in Caesarea. Amazingly, Cornelius, even though he was in the unit known as the Italian Regiment, was a believer in the God of the Jews. He was well-known and respected by the Jewish community. One day in prayer, Cornelius saw an angel who told him to send for a man named Simon, who was also called Peter. The angel told Cornelius Peter was staying in a house in Joppa, about three days’ journey away.
Cornelius dispatched 2 servants and a soldier to bring Peter to Caesarea. As they were approaching the house where Peter was staying, Peter had a vision. A large sheet was let down from heaven filled with all kinds of animals, birds, and reptiles. The voice told Peter, “Get up, Peter. Kill and eat.”
Peter objected that he had never eaten anything unclean. Jewish dietary laws prohibited the consumption of certain animals, or meat prepared in certain ways. But the vision persisted three times.
Then the Spirit told Peter, “There are some men looking for you. Go with them.”
Peter does, and arrives at the house of Cornelius, where he is well-received. Peter then begins to address Cornelius, and he tells him the story of his vision. Then he begins with the passage we read today.
Peter tells this story:
So, Peter tells the story of Jesus. Not the story of the church, or the apostles, or the things that have happened to him. Peter tells this centurion who seeks God, the only story that matters, God’s story, the story of Jesus.
When we tell God’s story, Paul Hiebert says, “We must begin with the King, for it is the King who defines the kingdom. The central message of the gospels is the coming of Jesus Christ as King and Lord over all Creation.”
Hiebert goes on, “In the end Jesus was tried for treason by the Jewish and Roman courts and executed as all insurrectionists were — on a cross. The high court in heaven found Jesus innocent, and Satan and humans wicked. Jesus rose from the dead and ascended to his lawful throne, and cast out the principalities and powers that had opposed him. Ironically, his death, which looked like defeat to humans, was the means by which God wrought salvation for those who turn to him in repentance. In the end, every knee, in heaven and on earth, [and under the earth] will bend before the King.
With the King comes the kingdom. Within the kingdom is the body of Christ, the church. And the mission given to the church is to tell the story of Jesus. Not the story of an institution, not the story of a myth or legend, but of Jesus.
Peter says, “He is the one God appointed…”
The story of Easter is the story of Jesus. It is the story the world needs to hear, and we need to tell. It is the story in which we find our place, for it is our story. It is a story that goes on, it lives because He lives.
ChuckWarnock.com 
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