different roles, one faith, 9.1.13

Today's sermon talks about Paul's arrest in Jerusalem, but more than that, about the tensions of different identities we share in the light of our faith. It's heavily influenced by listening to the discussion of a likely US military intervention in Syria. So, if you're interested in reading a few Presbyterian resources on that situation they are also linked here and here, the most important one is linked here. The sermon is below:

Acts 21:17-26

¹⁷When we arrived in Jerusalem, the brothers welcomed us warmly. ¹⁸The next day Paul

went with us to visit James; and all the elders were present. ¹⁹After greeting them, he related one by one the things that God had done among the Gentiles through his ministry. ²⁰When they heard it, they praised God.

Then they said to him, “You see, brother, how many thousands of believers there are among the Jews, and they are all zealous for the law. ²¹They have been told about you that you teach all the Jews living among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, and that you tell them not to circumcise their children or observe the customs. ²²What then is to be done? They will certainly hear that you have come.

²³So do what we tell you. We have four men who are under a vow. ²⁴Join these men, go through the rite of purification with them, and pay for the shaving of their heads. Thus all will know that there is nothing in what they have been told about you, but that you yourself observe and guard the law. ²⁵But as for the Gentiles who have become believers, we have sent a letter with our judgment that they should abstain from what has been sacrificed to idols and from blood and from what is strangled and from fornication.”

²⁶Then Paul took the men, and the next day, having purified himself, he entered the temple with them, making public the completion of the days of purification when the sacrifice would be made for each of them.

Acts 21:27-34, 22:22-30

²⁷When the seven days were almost completed, the Jews from Asia, who had seen him in the temple, stirred up the whole crowd. They seized him, ²⁸shouting, “Fellow Israelites, help! This is the man who is teaching everyone everywhere against our people, our law, and this place; more than that, he has actually brought Greeks into the temple and has defiled this holy place.” ²⁹For they had previously seen Trophimus the Ephesian with him in the city, and they supposed that Paul had brought him into the temple.

³⁰Then all the city was aroused, and the people rushed together. They seized Paul and dragged him out of the temple, and immediately the doors were shut. ³¹While they were trying to kill him, word came to the tribune of the cohort that all Jerusalem was in an uproar. ³²Immediately he took soldiers and centurions and ran down to them. When they saw the tribune and the soldiers, they stopped beating Paul. ³³Then the tribune came, arrested him, and ordered him to be bound with two chains; he inquired who he was and what he had done. ³⁴Some in the crowd shouted one thing, some another; and as he could not learn the facts because of the uproar, he ordered him to be brought into the barracks.…

(quick bridge to Paul’s defense)

²²Up to this point they listened to him, but then they shouted, “Away with such a fellow from the earth! For he should not be allowed to live.” ²³And while they were shouting, throwing off their cloaks, and tossing dust into the air, ²⁴the tribune directed that he was to be brought into the barracks, and ordered him to be examined by flogging, to find out the reason for this outcry against him. ²⁵But when they had tied him up with thongs, Paul said to the centurion who was standing by, “Is it legal for you to flog a Roman citizen who is uncondemned?” ²⁶When the centurion heard that, he went to the tribune and said to him, “What are you about to do? This man is a Roman citizen.” ²⁷The tribune came and asked Paul, “Tell me, are you a Roman citizen?” And he said, “Yes.” ²⁸The tribune answered, “It cost me a large sum of money to get my citizenship.” Paul said, “But I was born a citizen.” ²⁹Immediately those who were about to examine him drew back from him; and the tribune also was afraid, for he realized that Paul was a Roman citizen and that he had bound him.

----------------------------------------------------

Each of us plays different roles in our life. We are parents and children and spouses. We are employees and retirees and Christians. We are Americans and Republicans and Democrats. We are brothers and sisters, friends and swimmers, walkers, readers, workers. We are alumni of East High and East Ridge, Syracuse, Fredonia, Ithaca, Penn State and MCC. We have different roles and influences in our lives.

            For Paul it was the same thing, and like us, sometimes that was complicated. Paul was a Jew and a Christian. He was a Pharisee and an evangelist to the gentiles. He was born in Tarsus, raised in Jerusalem and a citizen of the Roman Empire. He was a tentmaker, pastor and prophet.  

Paul is a man of different worlds. He never stops being Jewish, regardless of persecution. He also holds his Roman citizenship tightly as it gives him the right to speak and be protected. When he is speaking to Roman officials, he talks about his rights as a citizen and how the charges against him have nothing to do with Rome. When he speaks to Jewish crowds he talks about the Law and the Prophets and how they predicted Christ. Even while he is in prison, he continues to be a pastor; in fact several of Paul’s letters were written during his final imprisonment in Rome. So, while as a prisoner he defends himself, as a pastor he also advises communities and coworkers on questions of ministry. In all he does, he seeks, first of all to be faithful to his ministry as an apostle of Christ.

As Christians, we live different roles in different parts of our lives, but in every part of our life we are called to live faithfully. That doesn’t mean that we are inconsistent or hypocritical, just that we do different things based on the situation.

In my role as a pastor, I lead with others, specifically the elders. That means we make decisions together. As a paramedic, I control a scene. A medical emergency is not a democracy; I tell people what to do. If I did that here, most people wouldn’t appreciate it, and if I invited people to share different ideas and vote about how to treat a cardiac emergency, I wouldn’t be an effective paramedic. I lead in different ways depending on the situation, but in every situation I strive to treat others with respect, compassion and love.

I imagine it’s the same for you. You do things differently at work than you do at home. You speak differently with your kids than with your friends. But in that diversity, there can be unity and consistency, because in everything we are called to follow Jesus. That means loving our kids and helping them to learn to be loving. It means doing our job at work conscientiously and treating our coworkers kindly so that even if we don’t talk explicitly about our faith, people can see love shining through.

Paul talks about citizenship in this passage, because as a citizen of the empire, he is entitled to a fair hearing in court. I’ve been thinking a lot this week about being a Christian and a citizen because of news and history. It’s been a blessing this week to hear excerpts from Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “I have a dream speech,” because this week was the fiftieth anniversary of the March on Washington.

Like Paul, Martin Luther King was a citizen and a minister of the gospel. When he read the scriptures, it was clear that God created all people equal and calls us to treat each other with kindness and justice. That faith commitment led King to oppose the injustice of segregation and economic oppression. He spoke for justice because his humanity and his faith told him segregation was wrong.

As a citizen of the United States, King saw his calling and responsibility in the same way. King’s speech from the Lincoln Monument reminded America that equality is in the very foundation of the nation by quoting the Declaration of Independence. Sometimes we need to challenge our community to live up to its own best values, which is what the civil rights movement did. As a citizen, King quoted Jefferson; as a Christian, he quoted Amos, but in everything he sought to be faithful to his calling in Christ. That calling and the struggle for justice and equality continues today for us because it is part of our faith.

Syria has also been on my mind a lot this week, which is especially relevant as we think about what it means to be a Christian and a US citizen. Paul claimed his citizenship to give him the protection he needed to continue to preach. He never imagined that citizens could shape their government. We live in a democratic society, which means we have more political freedom than Paul could have imagined as well as a responsibility to use our political voice faithfully as disciples of Jesus.

That can be a hard thing to do, because followers of Jesus do not always agree on political questions. At last summer’s General Assembly in Pittsburgh I served on the committee on Middle East Peacemaking. Our committee talked about Syria, because the civil war there had already been going on for a year and a half at that point. On this question the General Assembly passed a resolution to pray for Syria and to urge the US and others not to intervene militarily in the conflict. This resolution passed by a vote of 621 to 19 with five abstentions.

Chemical weapons are terrible. The international community is right to condemn and oppose their use in any situation, and we need to find ways to work together to pressure both sides to respect civilian life. It’s hard to stand by and not respond to such a gross violation of human rights, but if we have learned anything from the last 12 years of military engagement in Iraq and Afghanistan it must be that there are always unintended consequences. The Bible teaches that there is a time for war and a time for peace. Jesus says that those who live by the sword will die by the sword. There may be times that military action is necessary, but Christians should always have a strong bias towards peace.

As citizens and Christians we speak in different ways, but we must always try to be faithful to Jesus. We have the blessing and responsibility to use our voice to encourage love, peace and justice. Faithful Christians disagree on how to handle issues like Syria. It’s not my role to tell you what you should think. I never want this to be a bully pulpit. I’m not an expert on foreign policy or the Middle East by any stretch of the imagination.

One of the blessings of our Presbyterian system is that the pastor doesn’t rule. Instead, my job is to help you think about your life in the context of the faith we share. In this case, that includes sharing an overwhelming agreement in the General Assembly that the US should not intervene in this civil war. Our wider church is speaking for peace today as we spoke as a body for peace a year ago. Our partner churches in Syria and Lebanon have called on the church to oppose military intervention as well as to pray and care for the victims of this enormous suffering.

            What I can say clearly and with conviction is that your faith should be a big part of how you think about what it means to be a US citizen (and how you think about being an employee, parent, spouse and so on).  Our job as Christians is not to change the course of history, though sometimes we will. Our job is to be faithful to our calling regardless of fear, danger and opposition. For me, that means writing to our president and encouraging the denomination to pick up what we have already said about this conflict. I don’t know what it will mean for you; if nothing else, I hope you will be praying for peace and for wisdom for our leaders as they struggle with difficult decisions.

            Paul’s strategy in the last years of his life is interesting. He asks the Roman leader for permission to speak to the crowd and begins what he calls a “defense.” The goal of his defense isn’t to escape death. Instead, it is to tell the truth about his calling, regardless of whether that makes Jewish leaders accept him or reject him. His job is to tell God’s message, no matter what. And this wasn’t the only part of Paul’s calling. Sometimes we get sucked into thinking one thing defines us, or on the opposite side, that we have to do everything. The truth is we have to use our gifts and our time faithfully for our ministry. The question isn’t our success, but our faithfulness. 

            So in the footsteps of Paul and Martin we take our place as voices for God’s love in a challenging world. We take our place as people who live in many roles at the same time, united by faith in a God who loves us and, mysteriously, works all the chaos of life into a story that makes sense. We believe that God comes to us not with overwhelming force but in the cry of a child in a manger, the cry of a body broken on the cross, and the Spirit of love speaking truth through Christians in every age.

As we gather at Christ’s table to share the feast of love, this ancient symbol of the peaceful kingdom to come, we remember our brothers and sisters across history and around the world. We break bread together with scared families in refugee camps and in churches rattled by bombs. We break bread to find strength to live faithfully now in the tensions of life as we pray and hope for God’s new heaven and new earth where nation will no longer raise up sword against nation and we will study war no more.

Come, Lord Jesus; quickly come.

claiming our baptism, 1.8.12

Isaiah 43:1-7

¹But now thus says the LORD, he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel:

Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine.

²When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; 

and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you;

when you walk through fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you.

³For I am the LORD your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior.

I give Egypt as your ransom, Ethiopia and Seba in exchange for you.

⁴Because you are precious in my sight, and honored, and I love you,

I give people in return for you, nations in exchange for your life.

⁵Do not fear, for I am with you; I will bring your offspring from the east,

and from the west I will gather you;

⁶I will say to the north, "Give them up," and to the south, "Do not withhold;

bring my sons from far away and my daughters from the end of the earth —

⁷everyone who is called by my name, whom I created for my glory,

whom I formed and made."

Luke 3:21-22, 4:1-13

²¹Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heaven was opened, ²²and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.”

4:1 Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness, ²where for forty days he was tempted by the devil. He ate nothing at all during those days, and when they were over, he was famished. ³The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become a loaf of bread.” ⁴Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘One does not live by bread alone.’”

⁵Then the devil led him up and showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world. ⁶And the devil said to him, “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. ⁷If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.” ⁸Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.’”

⁹Then the devil took him to Jerusalem, and placed him on the pinnacle of the temple, saying to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here, ¹⁰for it is written, ‘He will command his angels concerning you, to protect you,’ ¹¹and ‘On their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.’” ¹²Jesus answered him, “It is said, ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’” ¹³When the devil had finished every test, he departed from him until an opportune time.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

            Today we’re starting a sermon series on personal discipleship. I haven’t really done a sermon series before, so this is a new kind of experiment for me. I felt like following Jesus in our own lives would be a good topic for our first series and to start the year. I’d love to hear if this series raises things you would like to explore more. In general too, I’d love to hear your thoughts on what you’d like to hear sermons about. My job is equipping you for ministry in the world. I want our sermon time to be engaging and helpful for you in your spiritual journey, and that is more likely to happen if I preach on topics you want to hear about.

            I felt like the right place to start a series on following Jesus is with our calling and identity in Christ. This story from Luke fit right in, not only because today in the church year is Baptism of the Lord Sunday, but also because Jesus’ calling is our calling.

            I love the image of Jesus standing in the water praying after his baptism. Suddenly, the Holy Spirit flies down from heaven like a dove and rests on Jesus. God’s voice from heaven calls out that Jesus is God’s son and that God loves him very much.

            I imagine most of us haven’t had that experience, but never the less, God knows each of our names and loves us. Our passage from Isaiah drives that point home. God says to Israel: “Do not fear for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name and you are mine.”

God has a special relationship with Israel, that’s for sure, but God’s love doesn’t end at the border. The end of the same passage extends God’s loving care beyond Israel to the world. God repeats the earlier refrain and broadens the welcome: “Do not fear for I am with you…everyone who is called by my name, whom I created for my glory, whom I formed and made."

God created the whole universe including you and me. God calls us by name because we are each special to God. God’s knows and calls us before we have any idea who God is. That’s why we baptize infants in the Presbyterian Church, because God calls before we know how to answer. Our calling is at the very root of our being whether we can feel it or not. God loves you and wants you to hear your calling and follow.

God’s calling is loving, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy. Notice in the passage from Isaiah God talks about being with us in floodwaters and fire. Passing through the water reminds us of baptism, but it also reminds us of floods, hurricanes and tsunamis. We read this passage in worship as we began and ended a trip to New Orleans to help with rebuilding work there. Isaiah reminds us that even when we feel overwhelmed, God is with us. God is always with us, but that doesn’t mean we won’t face trouble in our lives.

The passage from Luke reinforces that lesson. Right after Jesus’ baptism, after this spiritual peak experience of hearing the voice of God and seeing the Holy Spirit fly down to him like a dove, the same Holy Spirit drives Jesus out into the wilderness to face Satan on his own.

The passage doesn’t say why the Spirit drives Jesus out to face temptation. Maybe God knows facing temptation head on early in his ministry will strengthen Jesus for the more subtle temptations that will threaten him along the way. Maybe the solitude was to strengthen Jesus and Satan thought he had an opportunity to strike while Jesus was weak with hunger.

Whatever the case, Jesus’ calling as God’s beloved Son and our savior led immediately to temptation and finally to the cross. Being God’s beloved children isn’t a free pass from suffering; it’s not a get out of jail free card. Often following Jesus will lead to suffering we might have otherwise avoided; being a Christian is not an easy calling.

But it is a calling that’s full of joy. Following Jesus leads us into a community of wild diversity and daring love. Following Jesus frees us from falling into the temptation of power or greed or narcissism. It frees us from thinking that the world is about us or our family or our group. And it frees us from the terrible lies the world tells us about how we aren’t worthwhile if we don’t have the right clothes or hair or body.

It’s a calling that leads us into action, because we know that everyone else is a child of God too, so we are called to care for others. That’s a humbling reality because against the desperate poverty of many places our problems can seem shallow. Fortunately, even though we are called to serve our neighbors, when we remember that this is God’s world we know that we are not alone. We don’t have to save the world: that’s what Jesus did. We are free to play our part and follow our calling, trusting God to do the rest.

So this new year claim your calling; claim your baptism; claim your identity as a beloved child of God and a disciple of Jesus Christ. When the world tells you you’re not living up to some ridiculous standard of productivity or consumption remind yourself that you are not defined by your job or your things, but by your Lord. When you’re tempted to think too much of yourself and to look down on someone else, remind yourself that you are a servant of Christ Jesus and that in the waters of baptism and at the foot of the cross we are all equal.

Claim your identity as God’s child and Christ’s disciple, and nurture that calling like Jesus did. Make time in your busy life to listen for God’s voice in scripture. At the beginning of his ministry Jesus took forty days apart from family and friends, apart from everything, in the wilderness to prepare for his calling. We need to prepare for our calling too.

who are we?

Deuteronomy 26:1-11
1When you have come into the land that the LORD your God is giving you as an inheritance to possess, and you possess it, and settle in it, 2you shall take some of the first of all the fruit of the ground, which you harvest from the land that the LORD your God is giving you, and you shall put it in a basket and go to the place that the LORD your God will choose as a dwelling for his name. 3You shall go to the priest who is in office at that time, and say to him, "Today I declare to the LORD your God that I have come into the land that the LORD swore to our ancestors to give us."
4When the priest takes the basket from your hand and sets it down before the altar of the LORD your God, 5you shall make this response before the LORD your God: "A wandering Aramean was my ancestor; he went down into Egypt and lived there as an alien, few in number, and there he became a great nation, mighty and populous. 6When the Egyptians treated us harshly and afflicted us, by imposing hard labor on us, 7we cried to the LORD, the God of our ancestors; the LORD heard our voice and saw our affliction, our toil, and our oppression. 8The LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, with a terrifying display of power, and with signs and wonders; 9and he brought us into this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey. 10So now I bring the first of the fruit of the ground that you, O LORD, have given me." You shall set it down before the LORD your God and bow down before the LORD your God. 11Then you, together with the Levites and the aliens who reside among you, shall celebrate with all the bounty that the LORD your God has given to you and to your house.

Luke 4:1-13
1Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness, 2where for forty days he was tempted by the devil. He ate nothing at all during those days, and when they were over, he was famished. 3The devil said to him, "If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become a loaf of bread." 4Jesus answered him, "It is written, 'One does not live by bread alone.'"
5Then the devil led him up and showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world. 6And the devil said to him, "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. 7If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours." 8Jesus answered him, "It is written, 'Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.'"
9Then the devil took him to Jerusalem, and placed him on the pinnacle of the temple, saying to him, "If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here, 10for it is written, 'He will command his angels concerning you, to protect you,' 11and 'On their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.'" 12Jesus answered him, "It is said, 'Do not put the Lord your God to the test.'" 13When the devil had finished every test, he departed from him until an opportune time.
-----------------------------------------------------------
A lot of people say they are spiritual but not religious or that they believe in God but can’t get into organized religion. For many people it makes sense that there is a greater power out there looking after us in some way, but human rituals and institutions feel far away from the relationship we crave.

The thing is ritual gives us structure; it helps us remember what is important. Big ideas like God are hard for us. God is the source of everything around us and yet it’s easy to forget that our relationship with God is the foundation of everything else. Without regular practices and a community of faith we quickly drift into talking God for granted or forgetting about him entirely.

There are times when the experience of God’s presence breaks into our lives with power. Sometimes a gorgeous sunset or a sleeping baby stops us in our tracks and fills us with awe at the glory of God’s creation. Or a piece of art will remind us of the depth of Christ’s suffering for us and we will be cut to the heart. But most days sail along full of work and bills and demands and we lose sight of the ultimate in the thick trees of the everyday.