This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church on Sunday February 28, 2010, the Second Sunday in Lent.
Genesis 15:1-12, 17-18
Psalm 27
Philippians 3:17-4:1
Luke 13:31-35
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable to you, O Lord, our rock and our redeemer. Amen
“The sky is falling.” This cry is heard from many different stories, but its most usually cited source is the Aesop fable of the same name; though we commonly call that story by the name of its main character, Chicken Little.
Oh, yes, the sky is falling. Chicken Little is beaned by an acorn while eating her lunch under the shade of an old oak tree. Being civically minded, she decides she must inform the king of their impending doom. Along the way, several other animals come to help Chicken Little spread the word including Henny Penny, Cocky Lockey and Goosey Loosey and others. Finally, they come across Foxy Loxy who offers to help spread the word. All the while, it’s Foxy Loxy’s intent to lure the gang down into his den where he will eat them for his dinner.
Now, a jester can tell a king things in story and song that no one else would ever dare say aloud. So when the storyteller would get to this point in the fable there would be several different directions the tale can be taken depending on what moral the teller intends to share.
In this tradition, there are several different endings to this fable. In the most famous ending,[1] Foxy Loxy eats Chicken Little’s friends, but the last one, usually Cocky Lockey, survives long enough to warn her and she escapes. In this ending, we learn the dangers of making poor decisions based on worse information and believing everything we hear.
In the “happy ending” version,[2] all of the characters are saved by an unnamed little gray squirrel who has seen the fox’s game before and warns them of a more likely doom than the sky falling. To free the unknowingly trapped menagerie, the squirrel hurls a rock into Foxy’s skull creating enough of a diversion to free the captives. One of the lessons we take from this ending is to be brave like the squirrel and not, well chicken.
Reading these tales with all of their characters and all of their voices conveys a level of energy that creates a sense of confusion. In a manic rendering of this story with its sudden climax, we are trapped much like all of the animals in Foxy Loxy’s den. Comparing this fable to our gospel reading, I would say that, the Pharisees would fulfill in the role of Chicken Little and the gang all too well.
“Get away from here, for Herod wants to kill you!” It has a nice “the sky is falling” ring to it, doesn’t it? There is terror in the wings, the apocalyptic sign of the ages, sure and certain death is on the way and running is your only salvation.
If in my recasting of this fable, the Pharisees serve as Chicken Little and her band of followers, and Jesus serves as the King, of course; it looks like Herod appears in the guise of Foxy Loxy having his eyes on something bigger than small livestock.
So as we read of Jesus calling Herod “that fox,” we can tell he means business. Let’s begin with the fact that the biblical witness on foxes is hardly favorable. As it was for Aesop, the fox Jesus refers to is sly, cunning, and voraciously destructive. Yet Jesus isn’t worried. Jesus knows what time it is and his Blackberry is up to date with his schedule from now until Passover and beyond.
Jesus is warned that Herod wants to kill him. Jesus gives a warning in return. Jesus tells Herod and the Pharisees and the world that he will not be hindered. His work will not be impeded by Herod or by anybody else. He will cast out demons. He will perform cures. Then on the third day, he will finish his work.
Finish, this is the same word Jesus will use upon the cross as he commends his spirit into his Father’s hands. On that Good Friday Jesus will say “It is finished.” Today he says, “On that day I finish.”
Jesus knows his fate, and he knows that today it has nothing to do with Herod Antipas. He knows it so well that he knows that his fate will be met down the road in Jerusalem.
Jerusalem, oh Jerusalem, this is a city that does not live up to its name. The Hebrew word for “City of Peace,” Jerusalem kills the prophets and stones those sent to it. This is where Naboth[3] and Zechariah[4] were stoned. This is where Stephen[5] will be stoned. This is a city that has been besieged over forty times and razed to the ground seventeen.[6] City of Peace? Not so much.
As Jesus warns the Pharisees that he will not be rushed, as Jesus warns Herod that he is not finished, and as he warns Jerusalem that he is coming; Jesus laments. He doesn’t lament his fate, no; he laments the city where his fate will be sealed. He laments the city where his fate will be unsealed.
In the City of David, in the City of Solomon’s Temple, In the City of God, Jesus laments how often he has wanted, longed to gather the people. As a hen gathers her brood, Jesus longs to gather the children of Jerusalem. As Jesus longs to gather the children of Jerusalem, Jesus longs to gather the children of God in this day and time.
I would like to share two stories with you:
Victor Shepherd is a Canadian minister, theologian, and author.[7] In his seminary training, he had a course with Dr. James Wilkes, a Toronto psychiatrist. During one class, a student lamented that in this age of agnosticism and secularism we were no longer sure of the church’s vocation. Wilkes stared at the student for the longest time as if the student were half-deranged and then remarked, “Are you telling me that you can have a suffering human being in front of you and you don’t know what the church’s vocation is?”[8]
A professor laments that seminarians can believe the church has difficulty finding its place in a world of pain and suffering. Vocation lays in front us in poverty, hunger, and despair. Here in Lapeer County, the unemployment rate is 9.5% and 8.5% of families live below the poverty level. Poverty numbers shoot up to 14.4% of families with children under age eighteen and 21.7% of families whose children are all under the age of five.[9] Some of these numbers are in line with national percentages, some higher, some lower.[10] We don’t have to look far to see that the church’s vocation to show compassion and be the light of Christ in the world is all around us.
The second story comes from the Landisville, Pennsylvania Mennonite Church where every Sunday members pray for a son of their congregation. Every month they send him a small sum of money, and every month some of them visit him.
Prayer, money and visits: fairly typical examples of congregational care giving, one might suppose. What's atypical is that nine years ago, after a meal with relatives on a calm Sunday afternoon, 14-year-old Keith Weaver killed his parents, Clair and Anna May, and his sister, Kimberly. The inexplicable horror of the crime and the loss of lives rocked the Weavers’ family, church, and community to the core.
In the middle of their grief and disillusionment, however, members of the Landisville congregation got busy. They helped clean the house where the murders occurred, established a legal support committee to care for Keith's needs so that the surviving brother and sister wouldn't have to, and founded a seventy times seven fund to collect money for his expenses. They studied grief, forgiveness and victimization in Sunday school and sermons, calling on the expertise of area chaplains and counselors. A year after the tragedy, they held a memorial service to lament the loss of their loved ones and to recommit themselves to the journey of forgiveness.[11]
The Landisville story reminds us that in every crime there are countless victims who need to receive the peace and love of Jesus Christ. The congregation in Landisville continues that journey, through prayers and financial help and visits to Keith in prison. “Forgiveness is an act of God's grace,” says Landisville pastor Sam Thomas. “You don't forgive and forget; you forgive again and again and again.”
In the midst of every lament, there is a call to action. Jesus laments the victims and the victimizers of Jerusalem. He laments a city that is not willing to be called to serve as the heart and hands of the Lord in the City of God. Jesus continuously wants to gather the city and protect the children of Jerusalem.
Yes, we remember wonderful promises like “wings of eagles” which will make us able to run and not be weary; walk and not faint.[12] But instead of likening himself to the majestic hunter, Jesus likens himself to a hen. Jesus is not the bird that strikes terror into prey of all sizes; he compares himself to a maternal protector. This is the king who will ride into Jerusalem on the back of a colt, not astride a great warhorse. Jesus responds to lament in love and nurture, not in war and destruction.
The 27th Psalm gives us the image of a great king facing the greatest dangers of his civilization. Ordained and installed as the head of the nation of Israel by the power and glory of the Lord, he still has many enemies. Evildoers have come upon him to eat up his flesh. Armies have encamped against him. He laments that even his father and mother will forsake him, but it is the Lord who will sustain him. Let us hear the words of the 27th Psalm:
For on the day of trouble the LORD shall shelter me in safety;
the LORD shall hide me in the secrecy of the holy place
and set me high upon a rock.
Even now the LORD lifts up my head
above my enemies round about me.
Therefore I will offer in the holy place an oblation
with sounds of great gladness;
I will sing and make music to the LORD.[13]
There is woe, danger. Herod has been waiting at the door for thousands of years, and by the light of Christ that shines, the darkness is pierced. Jesus lives and works, praying for Jerusalem and for us in the midst of the things that cause us to lose sight of the church’s vocation.
In this, we can rest assured that in the grand scheme of life, nothing happens outside of the love and protection of the Lord God Almighty. Where last week we heard the story of Jesus and the devil in the wilderness, this week we hear the story of another temptation, Jesus is invited to run for his life. Jesus cuts through the worldly political twists and turns, knowing that his time will not come today or tomorrow. Jesus is in control even when it will appear to the world that he is not.
In the grand scheme, while we must let God be God who will act in God’s own time and in God’s own way; we must not allow ourselves to let this be our call to inaction. We must begin by being willing to be collected as chicks gathered by their mother, and then we must allow ourselves to be nurtured and grow into the people God calls us to be. As chicks will follow their mother hen, we must follow Christ seeking and finding the vocation of the church to share the good news with the world, using words when necessary.
We begin by hearing that the sky is falling all around us, and in many very real ways it is. Still, we cannot let ourselves be distracted by Herod or any of the other foxes that make their ways into our lives. In the fable, the king shows Chicken Little that the sky is not falling; it is just a tiny acorn. Let us go to the King of Kings, the one who protects us from every foxy Herod, and shows us the way to say, “Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.”
[1] Chicken Little, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sky_Is_Falling_(fable), retrieved February 25, 2010.
[2] Chicken Little, http://www.edsanders.com/chickenlittle/, retrieved February 25, 2010.
[3] 1Kings 21:8-14
[4] 2Chronicles 24:20-22
[5] Acts 7:52, 58
[6] Tan, Paul Lee, “Encyclopedia of 7700 Illustrations, Sign of the Times.” Chicago: Assurance Publishers, 1979, entry #2593.
[7] Victor Shepherd, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victor_Shepherd, retrieved February 25, 2010.
[8] HomileticsOnline.com, referencing Victor Shepherd, “Mandate for a congregation,” January 1998, Victor Shepherd Web Site, victorshepherd.on.ca. Found at Illuminating Illustrations, http://homileticsonline.com/subscriber/illustration_search.asp?keywords=lament, February 23, 2010.
[9] Census.gov website, http://factfinder.census.gov/servlet/ADPTable?_bm=y&-geo_id=05000US26087&-qr_name=ACS_2008_3YR_G00_DP3YR3&-ds_name=ACS_2008_3YR_G00_&-_lang=en&-_sse=on, retrieved February 25, 2010.
[10] Census.gov website, http://factfinder.census.gov/servlet/ADPTable?_bm=y&-geo_id=01000US&-qr_name=ACS_2008_3YR_G00_DP3YR3&-ds_name=ACS_2008_3YR_G00_&-_lang=en&-_caller=geoselect&-redoLog=false&-format=, retrieved February 25, 2010.
[11] HomileticsOnline.com, referencing Valerie Weaver-Zercher, God's Crime Bill, www.christianitytoday.com. Found at Illuminating Illustrations, http://homileticsonline.com/subscriber/illustration_search.asp?keywords=lament, February 23, 2010.
[12] Isaiah 40:31
[13] Psalm 27:5-6, “The Book of Common Worship.” Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1993, page 639.
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Laying in Wait
This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Berryville, Arkansas on Sunday February 21, 2010, the 1st Sunday in Lent.
Deuteronomy 26:1-11
Psalm 91:1-2, 9-16
Romans 8b-13
Luke 4:1-13
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable to you, O Lord, our rock and our redeemer. Amen.
“When the devil had finished every test, he departed from [Jesus] until an opportune time.” Such foreboding has been seen in scripture before, but there is something subtle about this sentence that gets it lost in the midst of Jesus’ glorious revelation. Jesus has just fought the devil and won using the most powerful tool in his arsenal, the Word of God. Yet in light of this great and lopsided victory, lest we think that the devil is vanquished, we receive one final warning in this little sentence. “When the devil had finished every test, he departed from [Jesus] until an opportune time.”
My favorite scripture on the existence of the devil[1] (and yes, I have a favorite “devil” reference) is from the book of Job. In Job 1:6-7 and later in 2:2 we hear this conversation. “The LORD said to Satan, ‘Where have you come from?’ Satan answered the LORD, ‘From going to and fro on the earth, and from walking up and down on it.’”
Scripture doesn’t deny the existence of Satan, on the contrary. This passage from Job shows that the Lord and Satan are long time acquaintances. Job tells us the Lord is in the highest heaven as the heavenly beings present themselves. As a king receives his vassals, the King of Kings receives the sons of God.[2] Is Satan one of these sons? Well, I don’t know if their relationship is that close. What I am certain of is that Satan did not have to storm the gates of heaven to present himself before the Lord. We can safely say they were familiar with one another.
This familiarity is continued as Jesus recognizes the devil in the wilderness. Luke writes that for forty days Jesus was tempted by the devil. Throughout his entire time in the countryside Jesus was tempted by the one who slanders[3] creator and creation. The greatest temptations a man can be offered were laid before him, but Jesus is not just a man. The fully human and fully divine Lord Jesus knows that his life is for more than earthly temptation and earthly reward.
There is an old saying that the devil’s greatest trick is to get people to believe he doesn’t exist. Well, the Lord our God and his Son Jesus didn’t fall for that trick.
Our notion of the devil comes from many places that are not biblical. One of the oldest of these sources is Dante Alighieri’s “Divine Comedy.” In 1321 Dante introduced readers to the “emperor of all the realms of woe.”[4] He describes this being as having two great wings more like those of a bat than a bird. He likens their size to “Sails so immense [they] were never known at sea.”
So it comes as no wonder that when we think of the devil we think of the goat legged, spade tailed, winged and horned creature so popular on the Halloween costume sales rack. Beginning with Dante’s wings, Wormwood from C. S. Lewis’ “The Screwtape Letters,” and more recently Anne Rice’s Memnoch, literature presents us with many images of the devil.
In cinema, horror movies have given us such memorable twists on the devil as “Rosemary’s Baby” and Damien in “The Omen.” Film comedies have given us more unorthodox devils including “Little Nicki” featuring Harvey Keitel as Satan and Adam Sandler as the most inept of his three sons; and “Bedazzled” featuring Elizabeth Hurley as the “devil in a blue dress” version of the prince of darkness.
In what is in my opinion one of the strangest examples of Satan in American culture comes from the realm of jurisprudence. In 1971 Gerald Mayo filed suit against Satan and his servants in United States District Court. The suit claimed Satan placed deliberate obstacles in Mayo’s path and caused his downfall. In what is neither a landmark civil, criminal or theological decision, the court did not deny the existence of Satan; rather, the court asserted that it was unlikely that Satan was ever present in the geographic area included in the Western District of Pennsylvania.[5]
Something people try to do everyday is look for Satan around the corner, looking for the devil in the details. Everyday people are telling us who the great Satan is and that he’s just laying in wait to get us. We have been told that foreign world leaders are evil personified. Leaders of the Axis of Evil have been vetted as the head of the underworld. We have also been told that our domestic leaders are the root of all that is wrong in this world. And maybe it’s just me, but that rhetoric seems to have been ramped up over the past five years.
Twenty years ago, a friend in Colorado was sharing a tape someone recorded from the radio that claimed Prince Charles of Wales was the antichrist. I never bothered to listen to the tape, but she was convinced.
Everyday people look for the devil in our midst so that we can point to someone and say, “That’s him, that’s the source of evil.” Here’s a question, why do we bother to look for the devils we don’t know when we can identify the devils we do?
There are devils all around us that we don’t bother to identify because these devils don’t fit the mold we expect to see from books and movies. We need to look for the devils that break the mold. Then when we find these devils, we can find how they can be conquered. In a sense, our reading from Luke presents us with a devil we know all too well, temptation.
The devil tempts Jesus using the kind of stuff that tempts us everyday. Jesus is first tempted with his physical needs, particularly hunger. Jesus’ response turns this temptation on its ear. While the devil may have hoped Jesus would fall for bread alone, invoking the words of Deuteronomy 8:3, Jesus reminds us “One does not live by bread alone.” Jesus hungers for spiritual food.
The devil offers the most human of needs, nourishment. But Jesus turns away from earthly satisfaction in favor of something more substantial. Recorded in the Gospel, Luke is teaching the readers that the need for bread is secondary to the fact that it is God alone who gives bread.[6] Jesus teaches that the one who gives the gift is more important than the gift itself.
The second temptation is one of power and authority. The second temptation is offered, “To you I will give their glory and all this authority; for it has been given over to me, and I give it to anyone I please.”
With this offer, we are reminded that the devil has power in the world, power that can be delegated and allocated as he sees fit. The devil offers this power to Jesus; and for Jesus there is a lot of good that can be done with that kind of power.
But there is a nasty condition. This power is given with a catch, “If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.” A catch doesn’t get catchier than this. Fly paper wishes it was this sticky.
But Jesus does not get trapped by earthly power. He denies the devil his worship using the words of Deuteronomy 6:13, “Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.” The devil offers power over this world, a world that is temporary, a world that is limited. Jesus knows that there is a greater power than the earthly power of the devil and the price of this power is too high.
Jesus rejects the devil’s demand of worship insisting that the only real power comes from God.[7] Jesus shows us the source of power is more important than power itself.
Finally, the devil tempts Jesus to prove God’s faithfulness. The devil takes Jesus to the pinnacle of the temple in Jerusalem. And from there, the devil goads Jesus. “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here, for it is written, ‘He will command his angels concerning you, to protect you,’ and ‘On their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.’”
This time, it is the devil’s turn to invoke scripture, Psalm 91:11-12. Now this is a good temptation, using the Word of God to suit his own bad intentions.
Jesus responds in kind to temptation shrouded in scripture. Quoting Deuteronomy 6:16, Jesus denies the devil reminding him “Do not put the Lord your God to the test.” The Old Testament reminds us that Israel tested the Lord time and time again, and in every case the Lord is faithful. It is said that scripture is best interpreted by scripture, and this is a shining example.
Jesus is invited to test God’s fidelity; Jesus reminds us the Lord is not to be tested.
These are the temptations, physical satisfaction, power and authority, and testing God’s faithfulness. These are the things the devil puts on the table. But there is more at stake than this.
The devil prefaces the first and last temptations with this phrase, “If you are the Son of God…” So while it is easy to say that the temptations are about earthly matters, there is something more sinister happening. The greater, more subtle temptation the devil tries to place in Jesus’ mind is the doubt that he is the Son of God. Yes, on one level the devil asks if God will do what God has promised the Son. But it is far more devastating if Jesus doubts whether he is the Son or not. If the devil can plant this seed of doubt, then everything else is lost.
But this seed has no purchase. Jesus will not allow the devil to define what being the Son of God means. The devil will not define what kind of Messiah Jesus will be, that is between Father and Son. Jesus reminds us that being the children of God is more important than anything else.
Reinhold Niebuhr wrote, “Despair is the fate of the realists who know something about sin, but nothing about redemption.”[8] We know the sins that Satan presents us, and when these sins are couched in the best things in life we tend to look at them differently. It is Jesus who reminds us that all Satan offers is a barrier between us and God. Satan offers sin, Jesus offers redemption.
It is these barriers that we need to break, the devil is in these details; and when we overcome these temptations, the power of Satan is broken. No, on this side of glory that victory is not permanent. After Jesus faced the devil, he faced scribes and Pharisees and Sadducees who brought their own barriers to place between God and God’s people. So too will there be people who will erect barriers around us.
So know this, this is what we know and share with the world. First is that the devil is in the world. Just as surely as the Lord saw Satan and just as surely as Jesus was tempted by the devil; the devil is still in the world today. We must also remember that we don’t have to look for the Lord of the Flies because the temptations that surround us are as devilish as any personification of Satan.
The second thing to take into the world is that in Christ there is victory. Throughout this season of Lent we will see the princes of this world working to defeat God incarnate, the living Lord Jesus Christ. They will try, and for a moment it will look like they will succeed, but ultimately they will fail. Are the princes of this world the minions of the Prince of Darkness? Surly not, these were the holiest men in Judea. What they wielded, poor imitations of relationship with the almighty bound by laws and customs, these were devils finding their opportune time.
Finally, even in our post-resurrection world, Satan is laying in wait bringing lies and temptations as attractive now as they were then. And again, only in God is there victory. Yes, what Satan offers us are lies, but in the words of the Irish rock band U2, “The truth is not the same without the lies he made up.”[9]
Temptations surround us, and we must revel in the truth and reveal through our lives that victory is assured in Christ Jesus.
[1] If this were a seminary paper, it might be considered a bit of a stretch to use “the devil” and “Satan” interchangeably, but some of the greatest writers of the New Testament did the same thing, so I beg you allow me to follow their precident. (P. L. Hammer , “Devil,” The Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible.”)
[2] Text note, NRSV.
[3] Ibid., Hammer
[4] Alighieri, Dante, “The Divine Comedy.” Trans. Lawrence Grant White. New York: Pantheon Books, 1948, Canto XXXIV, line 28.
[5] United States ex rel. Gerald Mayo v. Satan and His Staff, 54 F.R.D. 282 (1971), http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/United_States_ex_rel._Gerald_Mayo_v._Satan_and_His_Staff, retrieved February 19, 2010.
[6] Cousar, Charles B., Gaventa, Beverly R., McCann, Jr., J. Clinton, Newsome, James D., Texts for Preaching, A Lectionary Commentary Based on the NRSV, Year C. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, page 197.
[7] Ibid.
[8] Coffin, William Sloane, “The Collected Sermons of William Sloane Coffin, The Riverside Years, Volume 2.”Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2008, page 66.
[9] God, Part II, from “Rattle and Hum.” Words by Bono, Music by U2.
Deuteronomy 26:1-11
Psalm 91:1-2, 9-16
Romans 8b-13
Luke 4:1-13
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable to you, O Lord, our rock and our redeemer. Amen.
“When the devil had finished every test, he departed from [Jesus] until an opportune time.” Such foreboding has been seen in scripture before, but there is something subtle about this sentence that gets it lost in the midst of Jesus’ glorious revelation. Jesus has just fought the devil and won using the most powerful tool in his arsenal, the Word of God. Yet in light of this great and lopsided victory, lest we think that the devil is vanquished, we receive one final warning in this little sentence. “When the devil had finished every test, he departed from [Jesus] until an opportune time.”
My favorite scripture on the existence of the devil[1] (and yes, I have a favorite “devil” reference) is from the book of Job. In Job 1:6-7 and later in 2:2 we hear this conversation. “The LORD said to Satan, ‘Where have you come from?’ Satan answered the LORD, ‘From going to and fro on the earth, and from walking up and down on it.’”
Scripture doesn’t deny the existence of Satan, on the contrary. This passage from Job shows that the Lord and Satan are long time acquaintances. Job tells us the Lord is in the highest heaven as the heavenly beings present themselves. As a king receives his vassals, the King of Kings receives the sons of God.[2] Is Satan one of these sons? Well, I don’t know if their relationship is that close. What I am certain of is that Satan did not have to storm the gates of heaven to present himself before the Lord. We can safely say they were familiar with one another.
This familiarity is continued as Jesus recognizes the devil in the wilderness. Luke writes that for forty days Jesus was tempted by the devil. Throughout his entire time in the countryside Jesus was tempted by the one who slanders[3] creator and creation. The greatest temptations a man can be offered were laid before him, but Jesus is not just a man. The fully human and fully divine Lord Jesus knows that his life is for more than earthly temptation and earthly reward.
There is an old saying that the devil’s greatest trick is to get people to believe he doesn’t exist. Well, the Lord our God and his Son Jesus didn’t fall for that trick.
Our notion of the devil comes from many places that are not biblical. One of the oldest of these sources is Dante Alighieri’s “Divine Comedy.” In 1321 Dante introduced readers to the “emperor of all the realms of woe.”[4] He describes this being as having two great wings more like those of a bat than a bird. He likens their size to “Sails so immense [they] were never known at sea.”
So it comes as no wonder that when we think of the devil we think of the goat legged, spade tailed, winged and horned creature so popular on the Halloween costume sales rack. Beginning with Dante’s wings, Wormwood from C. S. Lewis’ “The Screwtape Letters,” and more recently Anne Rice’s Memnoch, literature presents us with many images of the devil.
In cinema, horror movies have given us such memorable twists on the devil as “Rosemary’s Baby” and Damien in “The Omen.” Film comedies have given us more unorthodox devils including “Little Nicki” featuring Harvey Keitel as Satan and Adam Sandler as the most inept of his three sons; and “Bedazzled” featuring Elizabeth Hurley as the “devil in a blue dress” version of the prince of darkness.
In what is in my opinion one of the strangest examples of Satan in American culture comes from the realm of jurisprudence. In 1971 Gerald Mayo filed suit against Satan and his servants in United States District Court. The suit claimed Satan placed deliberate obstacles in Mayo’s path and caused his downfall. In what is neither a landmark civil, criminal or theological decision, the court did not deny the existence of Satan; rather, the court asserted that it was unlikely that Satan was ever present in the geographic area included in the Western District of Pennsylvania.[5]
Something people try to do everyday is look for Satan around the corner, looking for the devil in the details. Everyday people are telling us who the great Satan is and that he’s just laying in wait to get us. We have been told that foreign world leaders are evil personified. Leaders of the Axis of Evil have been vetted as the head of the underworld. We have also been told that our domestic leaders are the root of all that is wrong in this world. And maybe it’s just me, but that rhetoric seems to have been ramped up over the past five years.
Twenty years ago, a friend in Colorado was sharing a tape someone recorded from the radio that claimed Prince Charles of Wales was the antichrist. I never bothered to listen to the tape, but she was convinced.
Everyday people look for the devil in our midst so that we can point to someone and say, “That’s him, that’s the source of evil.” Here’s a question, why do we bother to look for the devils we don’t know when we can identify the devils we do?
There are devils all around us that we don’t bother to identify because these devils don’t fit the mold we expect to see from books and movies. We need to look for the devils that break the mold. Then when we find these devils, we can find how they can be conquered. In a sense, our reading from Luke presents us with a devil we know all too well, temptation.
The devil tempts Jesus using the kind of stuff that tempts us everyday. Jesus is first tempted with his physical needs, particularly hunger. Jesus’ response turns this temptation on its ear. While the devil may have hoped Jesus would fall for bread alone, invoking the words of Deuteronomy 8:3, Jesus reminds us “One does not live by bread alone.” Jesus hungers for spiritual food.
The devil offers the most human of needs, nourishment. But Jesus turns away from earthly satisfaction in favor of something more substantial. Recorded in the Gospel, Luke is teaching the readers that the need for bread is secondary to the fact that it is God alone who gives bread.[6] Jesus teaches that the one who gives the gift is more important than the gift itself.
The second temptation is one of power and authority. The second temptation is offered, “To you I will give their glory and all this authority; for it has been given over to me, and I give it to anyone I please.”
With this offer, we are reminded that the devil has power in the world, power that can be delegated and allocated as he sees fit. The devil offers this power to Jesus; and for Jesus there is a lot of good that can be done with that kind of power.
But there is a nasty condition. This power is given with a catch, “If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.” A catch doesn’t get catchier than this. Fly paper wishes it was this sticky.
But Jesus does not get trapped by earthly power. He denies the devil his worship using the words of Deuteronomy 6:13, “Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.” The devil offers power over this world, a world that is temporary, a world that is limited. Jesus knows that there is a greater power than the earthly power of the devil and the price of this power is too high.
Jesus rejects the devil’s demand of worship insisting that the only real power comes from God.[7] Jesus shows us the source of power is more important than power itself.
Finally, the devil tempts Jesus to prove God’s faithfulness. The devil takes Jesus to the pinnacle of the temple in Jerusalem. And from there, the devil goads Jesus. “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here, for it is written, ‘He will command his angels concerning you, to protect you,’ and ‘On their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.’”
This time, it is the devil’s turn to invoke scripture, Psalm 91:11-12. Now this is a good temptation, using the Word of God to suit his own bad intentions.
Jesus responds in kind to temptation shrouded in scripture. Quoting Deuteronomy 6:16, Jesus denies the devil reminding him “Do not put the Lord your God to the test.” The Old Testament reminds us that Israel tested the Lord time and time again, and in every case the Lord is faithful. It is said that scripture is best interpreted by scripture, and this is a shining example.
Jesus is invited to test God’s fidelity; Jesus reminds us the Lord is not to be tested.
These are the temptations, physical satisfaction, power and authority, and testing God’s faithfulness. These are the things the devil puts on the table. But there is more at stake than this.
The devil prefaces the first and last temptations with this phrase, “If you are the Son of God…” So while it is easy to say that the temptations are about earthly matters, there is something more sinister happening. The greater, more subtle temptation the devil tries to place in Jesus’ mind is the doubt that he is the Son of God. Yes, on one level the devil asks if God will do what God has promised the Son. But it is far more devastating if Jesus doubts whether he is the Son or not. If the devil can plant this seed of doubt, then everything else is lost.
But this seed has no purchase. Jesus will not allow the devil to define what being the Son of God means. The devil will not define what kind of Messiah Jesus will be, that is between Father and Son. Jesus reminds us that being the children of God is more important than anything else.
Reinhold Niebuhr wrote, “Despair is the fate of the realists who know something about sin, but nothing about redemption.”[8] We know the sins that Satan presents us, and when these sins are couched in the best things in life we tend to look at them differently. It is Jesus who reminds us that all Satan offers is a barrier between us and God. Satan offers sin, Jesus offers redemption.
It is these barriers that we need to break, the devil is in these details; and when we overcome these temptations, the power of Satan is broken. No, on this side of glory that victory is not permanent. After Jesus faced the devil, he faced scribes and Pharisees and Sadducees who brought their own barriers to place between God and God’s people. So too will there be people who will erect barriers around us.
So know this, this is what we know and share with the world. First is that the devil is in the world. Just as surely as the Lord saw Satan and just as surely as Jesus was tempted by the devil; the devil is still in the world today. We must also remember that we don’t have to look for the Lord of the Flies because the temptations that surround us are as devilish as any personification of Satan.
The second thing to take into the world is that in Christ there is victory. Throughout this season of Lent we will see the princes of this world working to defeat God incarnate, the living Lord Jesus Christ. They will try, and for a moment it will look like they will succeed, but ultimately they will fail. Are the princes of this world the minions of the Prince of Darkness? Surly not, these were the holiest men in Judea. What they wielded, poor imitations of relationship with the almighty bound by laws and customs, these were devils finding their opportune time.
Finally, even in our post-resurrection world, Satan is laying in wait bringing lies and temptations as attractive now as they were then. And again, only in God is there victory. Yes, what Satan offers us are lies, but in the words of the Irish rock band U2, “The truth is not the same without the lies he made up.”[9]
Temptations surround us, and we must revel in the truth and reveal through our lives that victory is assured in Christ Jesus.
[1] If this were a seminary paper, it might be considered a bit of a stretch to use “the devil” and “Satan” interchangeably, but some of the greatest writers of the New Testament did the same thing, so I beg you allow me to follow their precident. (P. L. Hammer , “Devil,” The Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible.”)
[2] Text note, NRSV.
[3] Ibid., Hammer
[4] Alighieri, Dante, “The Divine Comedy.” Trans. Lawrence Grant White. New York: Pantheon Books, 1948, Canto XXXIV, line 28.
[5] United States ex rel. Gerald Mayo v. Satan and His Staff, 54 F.R.D. 282 (1971), http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/United_States_ex_rel._Gerald_Mayo_v._Satan_and_His_Staff, retrieved February 19, 2010.
[6] Cousar, Charles B., Gaventa, Beverly R., McCann, Jr., J. Clinton, Newsome, James D., Texts for Preaching, A Lectionary Commentary Based on the NRSV, Year C. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, page 197.
[7] Ibid.
[8] Coffin, William Sloane, “The Collected Sermons of William Sloane Coffin, The Riverside Years, Volume 2.”Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2008, page 66.
[9] God, Part II, from “Rattle and Hum.” Words by Bono, Music by U2.
Sunday, February 14, 2010
It Is Good for Us to Be Here
This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Berryville, Arkansas on Sunday February 14, 2010, Transfiguraton of the Lord Sunday.
Exodus 34:29-35
Psalm 99
2 Corinthians 3:12-4:2
Luke 9:28-36
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable to you, O Lord, our rock and our redeemer. Amen.
Today we celebrate Transfiguration of the Lord Sunday. Transfiguration, now there’s a fancy word. It comes from the Latin, so it sounds very impressive but it’s really pretty simple once it’s taken apart. “Trans-” is a prefix meaning change. “Figure” refers to the appearance of the individual. So transfiguration means, “A marked change in form or appearance.”[1] But in this case, it means so much more. It means the marked change in appearance is supernatural, a glorified change.[2] This change of appearance isn’t like me shaving my beard, even though that would surely qualify as a marked change in appearance. No, this is something more.
Jesus went to the mountain to pray taking Peter, John, and James with him. While this will not be the case at Gethsemane, they will stay awake while Jesus is in prayer. The three are transfixed while Jesus is transfigured. Jesus speaks with two of the greatest heroes of the faith, Moses and Elijah, talking about what Jesus is about to accomplish at Jerusalem. Oh to be a fly on the rock during that conversation.
Peter, John, and James saw exactly what happened. They recognized Moses and Elijah, and they saw Jesus in his glory. Just as the two eternal visitors were leaving, Peter cried out, “Master, it is good for us to be here.” Oh my yes, it is good for us to be here. But why, why is it good for them to be there?
Let us begin with one of the ways the gospel is presented in Luke. Often, the way the narrative is structured there is a question about who Jesus is, the answer is offered, then the disciples are sent out and taught about the meaning of discipleship. Eight days and ten verses earlier, Jesus asks the twelve, “Who do the crowds say that I am?” Two verses after that Jesus asks the twelve, “Who do you say that I am?” The question of Jesus’ identity is firmly asked. In the transfiguration, the answer is given with equal vigor.
The answer to the question of Jesus’ identity is found in what the three see on the mountain. The appearance of his face changed, and his clothes became dazzling white. This appearance reminds us of when Moses returned from the mountaintop and his face shone from being in the presence of God.
Exodus makes it clear that mere humans are unable to look upon the face of the Lord. Moses is said to be in the presence of the Lord, but scripture distinctly tells us they never met face to face. According to today’s reading, Moses leaves the presence of the Lord with the Ten Commandments, the two tablets of the covenant. Upon his return to the camp, the people noticed that there is a change in Moses’ appearance. The skin of his face shone, it shone because he had been talking with God.
How do the people respond to Moses’ radiance? They were afraid to come near him. Everyone, even Moses’ brother Aaron was afraid to come near him. By the grace of God, Peter, John, and James did not respond the same way.
Another thing Peter, John, and James saw was a glorious image of the personification of the Old Testament. They not only saw Jesus shining, they saw him chatting with Moses and Elijah. Moses, as again we saw from our Exodus reading, brought the law from the Lord to the people. To the Jews, Moses represented the law.
As for Elijah, many believe he represented the prophets. It is Elijah, who in 2Kings[3] walked with Elisha when the chariot and horses of fire separated the two of them; Elijah ascending without suffering death in a whirlwind into heaven.
It was Malachi who in the final words of the Old Testament tells us, “Lo, I will send you the prophet Elijah before the great and terrible day of the LORD comes. He will turn the hearts of parents to their children and the hearts of children to their parents, so that I will not come and strike the land with a curse.”[4] St. Matthew’s gospel proclaims this prophecy fulfilled saying Elijah returned unrecognized as John the Baptist.
These are just a few of the ways this passage helps Peter, John, and James define the answer to the question “Who do you say that I am?” The question of Jesus’ earthly and divine identity.
As for what this means about the meaning of discipleship, the three hear a word about the future. What they heard was Jesus, Moses, and Elijah speaking of Jesus’ departure, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem. This cryptic little sentence is filled with glory because what he accomplishes in Jerusalem begins in this moment.
On this, the Sunday before the beginning of Lent, as we prepare for Ash Wednesday, Peter, John, and James become privy to the greatest story ever told. They hear about what is going to happen on the road to and while in Jerusalem. They hear of the triumphant entry. They hear of the institution of what we call the Lord’s Supper. They hear of the betrayal. They hear of the trial. They hear of the crucifixion. Then and only then do they hear of the glory of the resurrection.
Did they understand what they heard, did they understand all which he was about to accomplish? I fear they did not have an appreciation for the complete gravity of the situation. Yet, they were able to hear of the mission that lay ahead of them as disciples of the living God and as disciples of the risen God.
They also heard the first commandment of discipleship from the cloud. They heard a voice that said, “This is my Son, the Chosen; listen to him!”
It’s fashionable to bash Peter for wanting to create the first “Shrine of the Transfiguration.” I did it the last time I preached this passage three years ago.[5] This year though, let us focus on what Peter said first, after seeing the blinding whiteness of Jesus’ radiance, after seeing the personification of the law and the prophets, after hearing what was going to happen, and after hearing the voice from the cloud commanding, “This is my Son, the Chosen; listen to him;” after these wondrous and glorious events, Peter said the most wonderful thing he could, he said, “It is good for us to be here.”
The words Peter spoke in awe and wonder in the first century still apply to us today. It is good for us to be here. It is good for us to be together in worship of the Lord God. It is good for us to confess that we fall short in the eyes of God and be assured that by the power of the resurrected Lord we are forgiven.
It is good for us to sing. The Directory for Worship reminds us that “song is a response which engages the whole self in prayer.”[6] We celebrate the sacraments, the visible signs of God’s invisible grace. Today, we share in the Lord’s Supper, the sacrament instituted by Jesus on the day before he was betrayed. We share the sacrament Peter, John, and James heard about on that mountainside on that day Jesus was transfigured so long ago, the supper they will share in only a few days time with the Lord. Then after worship, we will share a meal together in fellowship.
On this day so long ago, Peter, John, and James came together in the presence of the glory of the Lord and were able to see and hear the full measure of God in grace and glory. They received the answer to the question which is constantly asked by peoples the world over; “Who are you Jesus of Nazareth?” Today we continue to meet together to ask this very same question. Today we continue to meet together to hear the answer to this very same question.
We live surrounded by this answer everyday, we live in the presence of the living God. Still, we often have trouble seeing the answer as it lives and breathes before our very eyes. Oswald Chambers was a teacher and writer who died almost 100 years ago. His most lasting and treasured writing is a devotional called “My Utmost for His Highest.” I found this gem recently in Chambers’ writing:
One of the reasons for our sense of futility in prayer is that we have lost our power to visualize. We can no longer even imagine putting ourselves deliberately before God… The power of visualization is what God gives a saint so that he can go beyond himself and be firmly placed into relationships never before experienced.[7]
Chambers notes that even 100 years ago, the ability to visualize putting ourselves deliberately before God was fleeting, this loss of imagination is not new.
It is good for us to be here together so that we can as a people regain that lost power of visualization. It is good for us to come together in the power of the Holy Spirit and the love of Jesus Christ becoming the community that we are called to be in the Lord so that we may truly seek life eternal as God intends for all creation.
As I noted earlier, it is fashionable to bash Peter. Peter wanted to freeze this moment and commemorate this place. Faithfulness requires us not to freeze in time and place, faithfulness requires us to pick up and follow Jesus; follow him unto the cross.
So today we come and go with the revelation that it is good for us to be here. It is good for us to be here because in worship we gain what we need, a firm and certain revelation of the gospel of Jesus Christ. As it was for Peter, John, and James; this revelation would not be complete without its note on mission and discipleship. As was true for these three first disciples, we receive the fullness of the gospel and the call on our lives that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, the Chosen of God, and that we are called to listen to him and follow.
[1] transfiguration. Dictionary.com. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/transfiguration (retrieved February 17, 2007).
[2] Ibid.
[3] 2Kings 2:11
[4] Malachi 4:5-6
[5] Here’s Your Sign,” Time Loves a Hero, http://timelovesahero.blogspot.com/2007/02/heres-your-sign.html, uploaded February 18, 2007
[6] PC(USA) Book of Order, Directory for Worship, W-2.1003.
[7] Chambers, Oswald, “My Utmost for His Highest, an Updated Edition in Today’s Language.” James G. Reimann, Editor. Grand Rapids, MI: Discovery House Publishers, RBC Ministries, 1935, 1963, Updated Edition, 1992, February 10 posting.
Exodus 34:29-35
Psalm 99
2 Corinthians 3:12-4:2
Luke 9:28-36
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable to you, O Lord, our rock and our redeemer. Amen.
Today we celebrate Transfiguration of the Lord Sunday. Transfiguration, now there’s a fancy word. It comes from the Latin, so it sounds very impressive but it’s really pretty simple once it’s taken apart. “Trans-” is a prefix meaning change. “Figure” refers to the appearance of the individual. So transfiguration means, “A marked change in form or appearance.”[1] But in this case, it means so much more. It means the marked change in appearance is supernatural, a glorified change.[2] This change of appearance isn’t like me shaving my beard, even though that would surely qualify as a marked change in appearance. No, this is something more.
Jesus went to the mountain to pray taking Peter, John, and James with him. While this will not be the case at Gethsemane, they will stay awake while Jesus is in prayer. The three are transfixed while Jesus is transfigured. Jesus speaks with two of the greatest heroes of the faith, Moses and Elijah, talking about what Jesus is about to accomplish at Jerusalem. Oh to be a fly on the rock during that conversation.
Peter, John, and James saw exactly what happened. They recognized Moses and Elijah, and they saw Jesus in his glory. Just as the two eternal visitors were leaving, Peter cried out, “Master, it is good for us to be here.” Oh my yes, it is good for us to be here. But why, why is it good for them to be there?
Let us begin with one of the ways the gospel is presented in Luke. Often, the way the narrative is structured there is a question about who Jesus is, the answer is offered, then the disciples are sent out and taught about the meaning of discipleship. Eight days and ten verses earlier, Jesus asks the twelve, “Who do the crowds say that I am?” Two verses after that Jesus asks the twelve, “Who do you say that I am?” The question of Jesus’ identity is firmly asked. In the transfiguration, the answer is given with equal vigor.
The answer to the question of Jesus’ identity is found in what the three see on the mountain. The appearance of his face changed, and his clothes became dazzling white. This appearance reminds us of when Moses returned from the mountaintop and his face shone from being in the presence of God.
Exodus makes it clear that mere humans are unable to look upon the face of the Lord. Moses is said to be in the presence of the Lord, but scripture distinctly tells us they never met face to face. According to today’s reading, Moses leaves the presence of the Lord with the Ten Commandments, the two tablets of the covenant. Upon his return to the camp, the people noticed that there is a change in Moses’ appearance. The skin of his face shone, it shone because he had been talking with God.
How do the people respond to Moses’ radiance? They were afraid to come near him. Everyone, even Moses’ brother Aaron was afraid to come near him. By the grace of God, Peter, John, and James did not respond the same way.
Another thing Peter, John, and James saw was a glorious image of the personification of the Old Testament. They not only saw Jesus shining, they saw him chatting with Moses and Elijah. Moses, as again we saw from our Exodus reading, brought the law from the Lord to the people. To the Jews, Moses represented the law.
As for Elijah, many believe he represented the prophets. It is Elijah, who in 2Kings[3] walked with Elisha when the chariot and horses of fire separated the two of them; Elijah ascending without suffering death in a whirlwind into heaven.
It was Malachi who in the final words of the Old Testament tells us, “Lo, I will send you the prophet Elijah before the great and terrible day of the LORD comes. He will turn the hearts of parents to their children and the hearts of children to their parents, so that I will not come and strike the land with a curse.”[4] St. Matthew’s gospel proclaims this prophecy fulfilled saying Elijah returned unrecognized as John the Baptist.
These are just a few of the ways this passage helps Peter, John, and James define the answer to the question “Who do you say that I am?” The question of Jesus’ earthly and divine identity.
As for what this means about the meaning of discipleship, the three hear a word about the future. What they heard was Jesus, Moses, and Elijah speaking of Jesus’ departure, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem. This cryptic little sentence is filled with glory because what he accomplishes in Jerusalem begins in this moment.
On this, the Sunday before the beginning of Lent, as we prepare for Ash Wednesday, Peter, John, and James become privy to the greatest story ever told. They hear about what is going to happen on the road to and while in Jerusalem. They hear of the triumphant entry. They hear of the institution of what we call the Lord’s Supper. They hear of the betrayal. They hear of the trial. They hear of the crucifixion. Then and only then do they hear of the glory of the resurrection.
Did they understand what they heard, did they understand all which he was about to accomplish? I fear they did not have an appreciation for the complete gravity of the situation. Yet, they were able to hear of the mission that lay ahead of them as disciples of the living God and as disciples of the risen God.
They also heard the first commandment of discipleship from the cloud. They heard a voice that said, “This is my Son, the Chosen; listen to him!”
It’s fashionable to bash Peter for wanting to create the first “Shrine of the Transfiguration.” I did it the last time I preached this passage three years ago.[5] This year though, let us focus on what Peter said first, after seeing the blinding whiteness of Jesus’ radiance, after seeing the personification of the law and the prophets, after hearing what was going to happen, and after hearing the voice from the cloud commanding, “This is my Son, the Chosen; listen to him;” after these wondrous and glorious events, Peter said the most wonderful thing he could, he said, “It is good for us to be here.”
The words Peter spoke in awe and wonder in the first century still apply to us today. It is good for us to be here. It is good for us to be together in worship of the Lord God. It is good for us to confess that we fall short in the eyes of God and be assured that by the power of the resurrected Lord we are forgiven.
It is good for us to sing. The Directory for Worship reminds us that “song is a response which engages the whole self in prayer.”[6] We celebrate the sacraments, the visible signs of God’s invisible grace. Today, we share in the Lord’s Supper, the sacrament instituted by Jesus on the day before he was betrayed. We share the sacrament Peter, John, and James heard about on that mountainside on that day Jesus was transfigured so long ago, the supper they will share in only a few days time with the Lord. Then after worship, we will share a meal together in fellowship.
On this day so long ago, Peter, John, and James came together in the presence of the glory of the Lord and were able to see and hear the full measure of God in grace and glory. They received the answer to the question which is constantly asked by peoples the world over; “Who are you Jesus of Nazareth?” Today we continue to meet together to ask this very same question. Today we continue to meet together to hear the answer to this very same question.
We live surrounded by this answer everyday, we live in the presence of the living God. Still, we often have trouble seeing the answer as it lives and breathes before our very eyes. Oswald Chambers was a teacher and writer who died almost 100 years ago. His most lasting and treasured writing is a devotional called “My Utmost for His Highest.” I found this gem recently in Chambers’ writing:
One of the reasons for our sense of futility in prayer is that we have lost our power to visualize. We can no longer even imagine putting ourselves deliberately before God… The power of visualization is what God gives a saint so that he can go beyond himself and be firmly placed into relationships never before experienced.[7]
Chambers notes that even 100 years ago, the ability to visualize putting ourselves deliberately before God was fleeting, this loss of imagination is not new.
It is good for us to be here together so that we can as a people regain that lost power of visualization. It is good for us to come together in the power of the Holy Spirit and the love of Jesus Christ becoming the community that we are called to be in the Lord so that we may truly seek life eternal as God intends for all creation.
As I noted earlier, it is fashionable to bash Peter. Peter wanted to freeze this moment and commemorate this place. Faithfulness requires us not to freeze in time and place, faithfulness requires us to pick up and follow Jesus; follow him unto the cross.
So today we come and go with the revelation that it is good for us to be here. It is good for us to be here because in worship we gain what we need, a firm and certain revelation of the gospel of Jesus Christ. As it was for Peter, John, and James; this revelation would not be complete without its note on mission and discipleship. As was true for these three first disciples, we receive the fullness of the gospel and the call on our lives that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, the Chosen of God, and that we are called to listen to him and follow.
[1] transfiguration. Dictionary.com. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/transfiguration (retrieved February 17, 2007).
[2] Ibid.
[3] 2Kings 2:11
[4] Malachi 4:5-6
[5] Here’s Your Sign,” Time Loves a Hero, http://timelovesahero.blogspot.com/2007/02/heres-your-sign.html, uploaded February 18, 2007
[6] PC(USA) Book of Order, Directory for Worship, W-2.1003.
[7] Chambers, Oswald, “My Utmost for His Highest, an Updated Edition in Today’s Language.” James G. Reimann, Editor. Grand Rapids, MI: Discovery House Publishers, RBC Ministries, 1935, 1963, Updated Edition, 1992, February 10 posting.
Sunday, February 07, 2010
Turn and Follow
This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Berryville, Arkansas on Sunday February 7, 2010, the 5th Sunday in Ordinary Time.
Isaiah 6:1-8
Psalm 138
1Corinthians 15:1-11
Luke 5:1-11
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable to you, O Lord, our rock and our redeemer. Amen.
We all know this story in one way or another. It’s been a long day at work, and frankly, it hasn’t been too productive. You’ve done the hard work, you haven’t just gone through the motions; and still what’s to show for it all, nothing, nada, bupkis. But the day isn’t over yet. Somebody, maybe it’s your boss, or that clown down the hall; maybe it’s come down from the school Principal or the district Superintendent; if you work at home maybe it’s one of your kids, or worst of all—your spouse, somebody gives you one more thing to do.
You’re tired, you’re frustrated, and if you get paid by the unit you have nothing because that’s what got at the end of the long work day, or as it would be for a fisherman a long work night, either way it’s nothing. You’re living a country-western song and it’s not one of those cheery Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys Texas swing songs, you’re living Patsy Cline.
You know what’s coming next. Simon Peter, James, and John, three partners in a fishing business, were coming in after a very long very unproductive night. They had all of the danger of working all night with none of the reward. Now, just to add insult to poverty, they had to clean and mend their nets so they could do it again the next evening. Fatigue, despondency, worry, sorrow, grief—all of the makings of a Patsy Cline hit were staring them in the face and Jesus wants them to push out from the shore.
Simon knew who Jesus was, and knew he could heal miraculously. The way we receive the story, Jesus healed Simon’s mother-in-law in the previous chapter of Luke’s gospel. So when Jesus asked Simon to push out into the lake so he could teach without being crushed by the crowd, surely it was the least he could do. I imagine Simon would have just assumed get everything done at the shore so he could get on with his day. Still, Simon did as Jesus requested.
The teaching finished, and the words of this teaching lost to the ages, Jesus asks Simon to head out to deep water and cast his nets for a catch. Simon, a man who was seemingly never at a loss for words, says, “Master, we have worked all night long but have caught nothing. Yet if you say so, I will let down the nets.” Another way to translate “if you say so” is “because you say so.” Simon is firmly placing the emphasis on Jesus’ command for the reason he is returning to deep water.
Whether he says it to give Jesus the glory if the catch comes in or the blame if something goes wrong is lost with Simon’s vocal inflection. As for me, I imagine this was said with all of the irony Simon could muster. “Sure, we’ll go out but only because you say so.” Do I have evidence to prove this, no; but you can’t tell me that you can’t imagine this as a possibility.
The man is tired after working all night, he gets to go tell his wife and his recently healed mother-in-law that there is nothing for the kettle, and now Jesus wants him to let down the nets into the sea where nothing had been snared all night long so he can be late to go home after he tends and mends his nets again after this fool’s errand.
“Sure, we’ll go out but only because you say so.”
This is where Simon pays the price for getting snippy with Jesus.
Something wonderful, glorious, miraculous happens. The nets are filled with fish. There is a bounty so great that there is no way one boat can haul in the catch. The bounty is so great that two boats can barely haul in the catch.
Peter bows before the Lord who tells them that they will be catching people, not just fish from now on. This is where we receive the phrase “fisher of men.”[1]
We get focused, overly focused on the miracle in this story. Let’s face it, miracles are flashy. They get attention. It’s the reason we are attracted to miracles, they are meant to draw our attention. For what purpose are we drawn to them, well, that’s the question. It’s tempting to use this miracle to preach a gospel of prosperity, obey and get blessed by the Lord. But this is not what follows. No, Simon’s reaction is not one of thanks for all the fish.
Simon fell down at Jesus’ knees saying, “Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!” Simon says this when he sees the bounty God has laid before him in such a great catch of fish. Simon Peter knows that he is not worthy to receive such generosity. He knows that he has done nothing to earn such a gracious gift. The bounty of God is before him and Simon knows he is sinful. He knows his sin runs so deep that he begs the Lord to go away.
But that’s not Jesus’ style. He doesn’t use recognition of our sin to turn people away from him; he uses it to turn people toward him. Jesus demonstrates what he wants from us; he wants us to respond to him. He shows us that he wants us to turn to him and follow.
Garrison Keillor writes about Larry, a resident of the fictional town of Lake Wobegon. I would love to read this story as Keillor read it, but any attempt I make at imitation will be weak. Doubtless though, I will fall into his cadence.
Larry was saved 12 times at the Lutheran Church, an all-time record for a church that never gave altar calls. There wasn't even an organ playing “Just As I Am Without One Plea” in the background. Regardless of that, between 1953 and 1961, Larry Sorenson came forward 12 times, weeping buckets and crumpled up at the communion rail, to the shock of the minister, who had delivered a dry sermon on stewardship. But now he needed to put his arm around this person, pray with him and be certain he had a way to get home. “Even we fundamentalists got tired of him.” God didn't mean for you to feel guilty all your life. There comes a time when you should dry your tears and join the building committee and grapple with the problems of the church furnace and the church roof. But Larry just kept repenting and repenting.[2]
Keillor catches something in our reading in Larry’s story. Larry keeps falling to his knees and crying “Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!” but he never gets to verse 11 where after “they had brought their boats to shore, they left everything and followed him.” Larry keeps turning away from sin, but never makes the turn toward following Jesus.
There is something interesting about the way we translate “catching people” and even “fisher of men.” One of the things that gets lost in the translation is that the catch is made while the quarry is alive. This makes the verb particularly appropriate for Simon, James, and John. Fishermen bring their catch into the boats alive, fishers of men became a standard, but it lost something in the translation.
In the 1840’s, J. W. Etheridge produced a very literal translation of the gospels which renders Luke 5:10 “henceforth the sons of men shalt thou catch unto life.”[3] What Etheridge found which other translators lose is that part of our vocation is to bring them in alive. What we miss is the intention that by catching the sons of men we catch them unto new life in Jesus Christ.
The miracle shows that there is abundant life in Christ, and Christ’s words show us that our response is to share that word of abundant life with the world as he shares it with us.
Today we celebrate the Lord’s Supper; we celebrate the meal Christ shared with his disciples. As we prepare for this meal today, we will hear these words:
Therefore, loving God,
recalling now Christ's death and resurrection,
we ask you to accept
this our sacrifice of praise.
Send your Holy Spirit upon us
and our celebration,
that we may be fed with the body and blood of your Son
and be filled with your life and goodness.
Strengthen us to do your work,
and to be your body in the world.
Unite us in Christ
and give us your peace.
May we praise you
and give you glory through your First-born, Jesus Christ.
Through Christ, with Christ, and in Christ,
with the Holy Spirit,
in your holy Church,
we worship you, O God,
in songs of everlasting praise.[4]
In these words, we remember this supper with a spirit of repentance. We remember both the turning from our sin which was taken in Christ’s death and resurrection, and we will also remember that by this meal we will be strengthened to do God’s work and be God’s body in the world. We pray that we will be united in Christ to receive his peace.
Then together we will pray to the Gracious God who has made us one with all God’s people in heaven and on earth; fed us with the bread of life; and renewed us for holy service. We will then pray that we who have shared Christ's body and received his cup be Christ’s faithful disciples reaching out into the life of the world through the love of Jesus Christ our Lord.[5]
In the words of the Orthodox liturgy, “The poor eat and are satisfied; those who seek the Lord shall praise him, and their hearts shall live forever.”[6] We receive the bounty, and when we follow the Lord Jesus, when we praise him, we live the life abundant which he has proclaimed, which he has ordained. He calls us to follow, not to enjoy the fish. He calls us that we live forever.
Yes, it’s the flashy miracles that draw all the attention, but it’s what we find in the still deep waters that lie under the surface where we cast our nets, just like Simon did, that brings us to life abundant in Christ. It is in these waters that we receive eternal life and it is in his life giving words that we follow him into the world.
[1] Luke 5:10, The English Bible in Basic English. Printed in 1965 by Cambridge Press in England. ASCII version from the Online Bible Foundation and Woodside Fellowship of Ontario, Canada. Copyright © 1988-1997
[2] Keillor, Garrison, “Leaving Home.” New York: Viking Press, 1987, 182 as found at Homileticsonline.com.
[3] Luke 5:10 and notes from Etheridge Translation of the NT Peshitta (1849), public domain.
[4] Eucharistic Prayer 3 from Celebrating Eucharist Chapter 21 from Liturgy.com, http://www.liturgy.co.nz/resources/epce3.html. Retrieved February 1, 2010
[5] Presbyterian Book of Common Worship, Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, pages 69-70.
[6] Byzantine Daily Worship. Allendale, NJ: Alleluia Press, 1969, page 76.
Isaiah 6:1-8
Psalm 138
1Corinthians 15:1-11
Luke 5:1-11
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable to you, O Lord, our rock and our redeemer. Amen.
We all know this story in one way or another. It’s been a long day at work, and frankly, it hasn’t been too productive. You’ve done the hard work, you haven’t just gone through the motions; and still what’s to show for it all, nothing, nada, bupkis. But the day isn’t over yet. Somebody, maybe it’s your boss, or that clown down the hall; maybe it’s come down from the school Principal or the district Superintendent; if you work at home maybe it’s one of your kids, or worst of all—your spouse, somebody gives you one more thing to do.
You’re tired, you’re frustrated, and if you get paid by the unit you have nothing because that’s what got at the end of the long work day, or as it would be for a fisherman a long work night, either way it’s nothing. You’re living a country-western song and it’s not one of those cheery Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys Texas swing songs, you’re living Patsy Cline.
You know what’s coming next. Simon Peter, James, and John, three partners in a fishing business, were coming in after a very long very unproductive night. They had all of the danger of working all night with none of the reward. Now, just to add insult to poverty, they had to clean and mend their nets so they could do it again the next evening. Fatigue, despondency, worry, sorrow, grief—all of the makings of a Patsy Cline hit were staring them in the face and Jesus wants them to push out from the shore.
Simon knew who Jesus was, and knew he could heal miraculously. The way we receive the story, Jesus healed Simon’s mother-in-law in the previous chapter of Luke’s gospel. So when Jesus asked Simon to push out into the lake so he could teach without being crushed by the crowd, surely it was the least he could do. I imagine Simon would have just assumed get everything done at the shore so he could get on with his day. Still, Simon did as Jesus requested.
The teaching finished, and the words of this teaching lost to the ages, Jesus asks Simon to head out to deep water and cast his nets for a catch. Simon, a man who was seemingly never at a loss for words, says, “Master, we have worked all night long but have caught nothing. Yet if you say so, I will let down the nets.” Another way to translate “if you say so” is “because you say so.” Simon is firmly placing the emphasis on Jesus’ command for the reason he is returning to deep water.
Whether he says it to give Jesus the glory if the catch comes in or the blame if something goes wrong is lost with Simon’s vocal inflection. As for me, I imagine this was said with all of the irony Simon could muster. “Sure, we’ll go out but only because you say so.” Do I have evidence to prove this, no; but you can’t tell me that you can’t imagine this as a possibility.
The man is tired after working all night, he gets to go tell his wife and his recently healed mother-in-law that there is nothing for the kettle, and now Jesus wants him to let down the nets into the sea where nothing had been snared all night long so he can be late to go home after he tends and mends his nets again after this fool’s errand.
“Sure, we’ll go out but only because you say so.”
This is where Simon pays the price for getting snippy with Jesus.
Something wonderful, glorious, miraculous happens. The nets are filled with fish. There is a bounty so great that there is no way one boat can haul in the catch. The bounty is so great that two boats can barely haul in the catch.
Peter bows before the Lord who tells them that they will be catching people, not just fish from now on. This is where we receive the phrase “fisher of men.”[1]
We get focused, overly focused on the miracle in this story. Let’s face it, miracles are flashy. They get attention. It’s the reason we are attracted to miracles, they are meant to draw our attention. For what purpose are we drawn to them, well, that’s the question. It’s tempting to use this miracle to preach a gospel of prosperity, obey and get blessed by the Lord. But this is not what follows. No, Simon’s reaction is not one of thanks for all the fish.
Simon fell down at Jesus’ knees saying, “Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!” Simon says this when he sees the bounty God has laid before him in such a great catch of fish. Simon Peter knows that he is not worthy to receive such generosity. He knows that he has done nothing to earn such a gracious gift. The bounty of God is before him and Simon knows he is sinful. He knows his sin runs so deep that he begs the Lord to go away.
But that’s not Jesus’ style. He doesn’t use recognition of our sin to turn people away from him; he uses it to turn people toward him. Jesus demonstrates what he wants from us; he wants us to respond to him. He shows us that he wants us to turn to him and follow.
Garrison Keillor writes about Larry, a resident of the fictional town of Lake Wobegon. I would love to read this story as Keillor read it, but any attempt I make at imitation will be weak. Doubtless though, I will fall into his cadence.
Larry was saved 12 times at the Lutheran Church, an all-time record for a church that never gave altar calls. There wasn't even an organ playing “Just As I Am Without One Plea” in the background. Regardless of that, between 1953 and 1961, Larry Sorenson came forward 12 times, weeping buckets and crumpled up at the communion rail, to the shock of the minister, who had delivered a dry sermon on stewardship. But now he needed to put his arm around this person, pray with him and be certain he had a way to get home. “Even we fundamentalists got tired of him.” God didn't mean for you to feel guilty all your life. There comes a time when you should dry your tears and join the building committee and grapple with the problems of the church furnace and the church roof. But Larry just kept repenting and repenting.[2]
Keillor catches something in our reading in Larry’s story. Larry keeps falling to his knees and crying “Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!” but he never gets to verse 11 where after “they had brought their boats to shore, they left everything and followed him.” Larry keeps turning away from sin, but never makes the turn toward following Jesus.
There is something interesting about the way we translate “catching people” and even “fisher of men.” One of the things that gets lost in the translation is that the catch is made while the quarry is alive. This makes the verb particularly appropriate for Simon, James, and John. Fishermen bring their catch into the boats alive, fishers of men became a standard, but it lost something in the translation.
In the 1840’s, J. W. Etheridge produced a very literal translation of the gospels which renders Luke 5:10 “henceforth the sons of men shalt thou catch unto life.”[3] What Etheridge found which other translators lose is that part of our vocation is to bring them in alive. What we miss is the intention that by catching the sons of men we catch them unto new life in Jesus Christ.
The miracle shows that there is abundant life in Christ, and Christ’s words show us that our response is to share that word of abundant life with the world as he shares it with us.
Today we celebrate the Lord’s Supper; we celebrate the meal Christ shared with his disciples. As we prepare for this meal today, we will hear these words:
Therefore, loving God,
recalling now Christ's death and resurrection,
we ask you to accept
this our sacrifice of praise.
Send your Holy Spirit upon us
and our celebration,
that we may be fed with the body and blood of your Son
and be filled with your life and goodness.
Strengthen us to do your work,
and to be your body in the world.
Unite us in Christ
and give us your peace.
May we praise you
and give you glory through your First-born, Jesus Christ.
Through Christ, with Christ, and in Christ,
with the Holy Spirit,
in your holy Church,
we worship you, O God,
in songs of everlasting praise.[4]
In these words, we remember this supper with a spirit of repentance. We remember both the turning from our sin which was taken in Christ’s death and resurrection, and we will also remember that by this meal we will be strengthened to do God’s work and be God’s body in the world. We pray that we will be united in Christ to receive his peace.
Then together we will pray to the Gracious God who has made us one with all God’s people in heaven and on earth; fed us with the bread of life; and renewed us for holy service. We will then pray that we who have shared Christ's body and received his cup be Christ’s faithful disciples reaching out into the life of the world through the love of Jesus Christ our Lord.[5]
In the words of the Orthodox liturgy, “The poor eat and are satisfied; those who seek the Lord shall praise him, and their hearts shall live forever.”[6] We receive the bounty, and when we follow the Lord Jesus, when we praise him, we live the life abundant which he has proclaimed, which he has ordained. He calls us to follow, not to enjoy the fish. He calls us that we live forever.
Yes, it’s the flashy miracles that draw all the attention, but it’s what we find in the still deep waters that lie under the surface where we cast our nets, just like Simon did, that brings us to life abundant in Christ. It is in these waters that we receive eternal life and it is in his life giving words that we follow him into the world.
[1] Luke 5:10, The English Bible in Basic English. Printed in 1965 by Cambridge Press in England. ASCII version from the Online Bible Foundation and Woodside Fellowship of Ontario, Canada. Copyright © 1988-1997
[2] Keillor, Garrison, “Leaving Home.” New York: Viking Press, 1987, 182 as found at Homileticsonline.com.
[3] Luke 5:10 and notes from Etheridge Translation of the NT Peshitta (1849), public domain.
[4] Eucharistic Prayer 3 from Celebrating Eucharist Chapter 21 from Liturgy.com, http://www.liturgy.co.nz/resources/epce3.html. Retrieved February 1, 2010
[5] Presbyterian Book of Common Worship, Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, pages 69-70.
[6] Byzantine Daily Worship. Allendale, NJ: Alleluia Press, 1969, page 76.
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