God's word

1 Thessalonians 2:9-13

⁹You remember our labor and toil, brothers and sisters; we worked night and day, so that we might not burden any of you while we proclaimed to you the gospel of God. ¹⁰You are witnesses, and God also, how pure, upright, and blameless our conduct was toward you believers. ¹¹As you know, we dealt with each one of you like a father with his children, ¹²urging and encouraging you and pleading that you lead a life worthy of God, who calls you into his own kingdom and glory.

¹³We also constantly give thanks to God for this, that when you received the word of God that you heard from us, you accepted it not as a human word but as what it really is, God’s word, which is also at work in you believers.

 Matthew 23:1-12

¹Then Jesus said to the crowds and to his disciples, ²“The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses’ seat; ³therefore, do whatever they teach you and follow it; but do not do as they do, for they do not practice what they teach. ⁴They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on the shoulders of others; but they themselves are unwilling to lift a finger to move them. ⁵They do all their deeds to be seen by others; for they make their phylacteries broad and their fringes long. ⁶They love to have the place of honor at banquets and the best seats in the synagogues, ⁷and to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces, and to have people call them rabbi.

⁸But you are not to be called rabbi, for you have one teacher, and you are all students. ⁹And call no one your father on earth, for you have one Father — the one in heaven. ¹⁰Nor are you to be called instructors, for you have one instructor, the Messiah.¹¹The greatest among you will be your servant. ¹²All who exalt themselves will be humbled, and all who humble themselves will be exalted.

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My grandmother got me a Bible when I was 12. She says I told her I was going to read the wholething. Then I read two or three verses and said that was enough for the night. She said, in her lovely southern accent, “Sam, it’s going to take an awful long time to read the Bible like that.”

I don’t remember exactly when or how it happened, but soon I fell in love with the Bible. I read it on my own, which made me more interested in the sermons I heard on Sundays. I was captivated by the world of the Bible, so different than the world we live in today but still connected. I loved the stories of Moses, Israel, and King David.

More than anything I was captivated by the story of Jesus. His teaching was so powerful. He had a way of cutting through all the subtle deception and political posturing of the religious leaders. His words hit me and stuck. His life also inspired me. His love for us and his courage blew me away as did the courage and conviction of the early church.

In seventh grade I went to Catholic school and I found out that I was truly a protestant, or as my English teacher would say a protest-ant. As we studied the teachings of the Catholic church, much of it made perfect sense to me since the Christian faith is one faith no matter what church you go to.

But other things didn’t make sense to me at all. I distinctly remember learning some teaching that didn’t make sense to me and didn’t fit what I understood about scripture. I asked the teacher: “Where does that come from in the Bible?” The teacher didn’t have a good answer.

Part of my opposition was run of the mill teenage defiance; I was a pretty smart-allecky kid, after all. But part of my resistance was my reformation heritage coming through. I’ve come to value that heritage more and more. We celebrate the reformation today not to disrespect our Catholic brothers and sisters, but to stir up the spirit of the reformers in our church and in our lives.

Whenever we take scripture seriously, reformation naturally follows. That’s because scripture is God’s word, and God’s word is powerful to challenge, encourage, empower and change us. God has blessed the church with a huge variety of interpretation. Some Christians read the Bible literally; others with a more critical view. We can be faithful either way.

Caring for God's vineyard, 10.2.11

Philippians 3:4b-14

^4bIf anyone else has reason to be confident in the flesh, I have more: ⁵circumcised on the eighth day, a member of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew born of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; ⁶as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless.

⁷Yet whatever gains I had, these I have come to regard as loss because of Christ. ⁸More than that, I regard everything as loss because of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and I regard them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ ⁹and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but one that comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God based on faith. ¹⁰I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the sharing of his sufferings by becoming like him in his death, ¹¹if somehow I may attain the resurrection from the dead.

¹²Not that I have already obtained this or have already reached the goal; but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. ¹³Beloved, I do not consider that I have made it my own; but this one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, ¹⁴I press on toward the goal for the prize of the heavenly call of God in Christ Jesus.

 Matthew 21:33-46

³³“Listen to another parable. There was a landowner who planted a vineyard, put a fence around it, dug a wine press in it, and built a watchtower. Then he leased it to tenants and went to another country. ³⁴When the harvest time had come, he sent his slaves to the tenants to collect his produce. ³⁵But the tenants seized his slaves and beat one, killed another, and stoned another. ³⁶Again he sent other slaves, more than the first; and they treated them in the same way.

³⁷Finally he sent his son to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ ³⁸But when the tenants saw the son, they said to themselves, ‘This is the heir; come, let us kill him and get his inheritance.’ ³⁹So they seized him, threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him. ⁴⁰Now when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?” ⁴¹They said to him, “He will put those wretches to a miserable death, and lease the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the produce at the harvest time.”

⁴²Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the scriptures: ‘The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; this was the Lord’s doing, and it is amazing in our eyes’? ⁴³Therefore I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people that produces the fruits of the kingdom. ⁴⁴The one who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; and it will crush anyone on whom it falls.”

⁴⁵When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard his parables, they realized that he was speaking about them. ⁴⁶They wanted to arrest him, but they feared the crowds, because they regarded him as a prophet.

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            Ok, so let’s start with this story Jesus tells. What’s the problem in the story?

How does the owner of the vineyard try to resolve it? What might some other options have been for the owner?

What’s the outcome?

Now, Jesus doesn’t just tell this story at random. Matthew tells us that the chief priests and scribes figured out that Jesus told the parable about them. Let’s think that through.

If the parable is about the religious leaders, who are they in the parable?

What does the vineyard stand for?

Who is the landowner?

What does it mean that the religious leaders refused to give the vineyard’s produce to God? What would that produce be? What are they doing instead of giving it to God?

What servants does God send to convince the religious leaders to share their bounty?

How do the leaders treat those messengers?

Why do the leaders kill the son? What are they trying to accomplish? How do you think that’s going to work for them?

What might it mean in this context for God to give the vineyard to others?

This gives us one great image of the church. In fact, several great biblical images for Israel work really well for the church. It’s important for us to remember that we in the church join God’s story; we don’t replace Israel. God and Israel have an ongoing story that is in conversation with our story. The stories are related, but not identical: we can’t live Israel’s story and neither can they live ours.

So the vineyard is one great image of the church from the Bible. What would stewardship look like in that image?

There are many images of the church in scripture and others we can come up with on our own. Each image focuses on some aspects of the church and may leave out others. Even though we all might have images that speak to us more than others, it’s important to know that no one image tells the whole story, so we can learn from each other.

Institutional religion?

Matthew 21:23-32

²³When he entered the temple, the chief priests and the elders of the people came to him as he was teaching, and said, “By what authority are you doing these things, and who gave you this authority?” ²⁴Jesus said to them, “I will also ask you one question; if you tell me the answer, then I will also tell you by what authority I do these things. ²⁵Did the baptism of John come from heaven, or was it of human origin?” And they argued with one another, “If we say, ‘From heaven,’ he will say to us, ‘Why then did you not believe him?’ ²⁶But if we say, ‘Of human origin,’ we are afraid of the crowd; for all regard John as a prophet.” ²⁷So they answered Jesus, “We do not know.” And he said to them, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I am doing these things.

²⁸“What do you think? A man had two sons; he went to the first and said, ‘Son, go and work in the vineyard today.’ ²⁹He answered, ‘I will not’; but later he changed his mind and went. ³⁰The father went to the second and said the same; and he answered, ‘I go, sir’; but he did not go. ³¹Which of the two did the will of his father?” They said, “The first.” Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are going into the kingdom of God ahead of you. ³²For John came to you in the way of righteousness and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and the prostitutes believed him; and even after you saw it, you did not change your minds and believe him.”

Philippians 2:1-13

¹If then there is any encouragement in Christ, any consolation from love, any sharing in the Spirit, any compassion and sympathy, ²make my joy complete: be of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. ³Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than yourselves. ⁴Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others. ⁵Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus,
⁶   who, though he was in the form of God,
          did not regard equality with God
          as something to be exploited,
⁷   but emptied himself,
          taking the form of a slave,
          being born in human likeness.
     And being found in human form,
⁸        he humbled himself
          and became obedient to the point of death —
          even death on a cross.

⁹   Therefore God also highly exalted him
          and gave him the name
          that is above every name,
¹⁰  so that at the name of Jesus
          every knee should bend,
          in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
¹¹  and every tongue should confess
          that Jesus Christ is Lord,
          to the glory of God the Father.

¹²Therefore, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed me, not only in my presence, but much more now in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; ¹³ for it is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

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One of the things we notice when we read the Bible is that there are different voices in it that often tell the story a little differently. We see this especially in the Gospels: there are four Gospels and each writer has a distinct style and writes with different audiences and issues in mind. The big picture is the same because they are all telling the story about Jesus, but they sometimes tell that story very differently.

Sometimes we feel threatened that the differences in the stories weaken the overall story. We want to know what really happened or try to fit the pieces from each Gospel into an overall history.

It’s more fun and productive to read each story on its own and get to know the different personalities of the Gospels. John is the most different from the others with a beginning at the moment of creation and a mystical writing style. Luke has a special eye for the outsider including women, gentiles and the poor. Mark is the shortest account, crisp and to the point with a keen sense of conflict between Jesus and the leaders right from the beginning.

Matthew is longer with more focus on Jesus’ teaching and on building a church. He seems less concerned with the conflict between Jesus and the religious leaders, which is a major theme for Mark and John throughout the Gospel.

In Matthew Jesus spends most of his ministry away from Jerusalem. When he teaches and heals he encounters religious leaders, who Matthew calls Pharisees and “teachers of the law,” occasionally accompanied by Sadducees. These leaders and Jesus argue and sometimes the Pharisees ask Jesus questions “to test him,” but the conflict isn’t the main focus and we don’t hear anything from Matthew about the leaders plotting to kill Jesus.

Along the road, Jesus predicts his death three times before he reaches Jerusalem. In those predictions he says the people who will kill him are the chief priests and elders in Jerusalem, so we know that Jesus expects deadly conflict with the religious leaders in Jerusalem. Once Jesus gets to Jerusalem he encounters those leaders. We don’t hear much about Pharisees anymore; instead Jesus argues with the chief priests and elders and the conflict between them becomes more important and more dangerous.

That doesn’t mean the religious leaders have already made up their mind when Jesus arrives; it just means Jesus knows where the story is going. Knowing that, Jesus goes into the city quite aggressively. His entrance into the city on Palm Sunday is a royal procession where he pretty explicitly claims to be the Messiah. Then he goes right to the temple and starts turning over tables before leaving the city to spend the night in Bethany.

The next day Jesus goes back to the temple to teach. That’s when the chief priests and elders start asking him questions. They ask what gives him the right to turn things upside down in their place of worship.

New and Old (May 22, 2011)

1 Peter 2:2-10

²Like newborn infants, long for the pure, spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow into salvation — ³if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.

⁴Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and ⁵like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. ⁶For it stands in scripture:
     “See, I am laying in Zion a stone,
          a cornerstone chosen and precious;
          and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.”
⁷To you then who believe, he is precious; but for those who do not believe,
     “The stone that the builders rejected
          has become the very head of the corner,”
⁸and
     “A stone that makes them stumble,
          and a rock that makes them fall.”
They stumble because they disobey the word, as they were destined to do.

⁹But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.
¹⁰  Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people;
     once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.

Acts 6:8-15, 7:1-2, 51-60

6:8 Stephen, full of grace and power, did great wonders and signs among the people. ⁹Then some of those who belonged to the synagogue of the Freedmen (as it was called), Cyrenians, Alexandrians, and others of those from Cilicia and Asia, stood up and argued with Stephen. ¹⁰But they could not withstand the wisdom and the Spirit with which he spoke. ¹¹Then they secretly instigated some men to say, “We have heard him speak blasphemous words against Moses and God.”

¹²They stirred up the people as well as the elders and the scribes; then they suddenly confronted him, seized him, and brought him before the council. ¹³They set up false witnesses who said, “This man never stops saying things against this holy place and the law; ¹⁴for we have heard him say that this Jesus of Nazareth will destroy this place and will change the customs that Moses handed on to us.” ¹⁵And all who sat in the council looked intently at him, and they saw that his face was like the face of an angel.

7:1 Then the high priest asked him, “Are these things so?” ²And Stephen replied: “Brothers and fathers, listen to me…

⁵¹”You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you are forever opposing the Holy Spirit, just as your ancestors used to do. ⁵²Which of the prophets did your ancestors not persecute? They killed those who foretold the coming of the Righteous One, and now you have become his betrayers and murderers. ⁵³You are the ones that received the law as ordained by angels, and yet you have not kept it.”

⁵⁴When they heard these things, they became enraged and ground their teeth at Stephen. ⁵⁵But filled with the Holy Spirit, he gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. ⁵⁶“Look,” he said, “I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God!” ⁵⁷But they covered their ears, and with a loud shout all rushed together against him. ⁵⁸Then they dragged him out of the city and began to stone him; and the witnesses laid their coats at the feet of a young man named Saul. ⁵⁹While they were stoning Stephen, he prayed, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” ⁶⁰Then he knelt down and cried out in a loud voice, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” When he had said this, he died.

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            This faith we share is both new and old. As Christians, we are part of a story God has been building with people for thousands of years. That’s the main point Stephen is making to the religious council at his trial. They accuse him of overthrowing the traditions of the Jewish faith, and he responds by telling them how Jesus is a part of the Jewish story.

            The first Christians were all Jewish. They didn’t see themselves as a new religion, just a continuation of their ancient faith. They understood Jesus as the fulfillment of the savior prophets had promised for hundreds of years. Jesus was part of the continuing story of God and Israel.

            So when the chief priest asks Stephen if he really claimed that Jesus was going to destroy the temple, he reminds the council of Israel’s story. The accusation is interesting in itself since that was one of the accusations made against Jesus. Both for Stephen and for Jesus the answer is, no, they didn’t say anything about destroying the temple. At the same time Jesus does offer access to God outside the purity and power structure of the temple.

Stephen doesn’t directly answer the charge. Instead, he reminds them that God has often sent prophets to lead and correct the people. When Moses led the people out of Egypt God promised that one day he would raise up a prophet like Moses to save the people again. Jesus is the prophet like Moses. 

Stephen reminds them that many times in the past the chosen people turned away from the law of Moses and the ways of God. He reminds them that often when God sent prophets to bring the people back to God’s path, those in power rejected the prophet. His point is that the same thing is happening again. God sent Jesus and the leaders have rejected him. As if to prove his point, instead of listening to Stephen’s words, the religious leaders put him to death.

The trouble with a passage like this is that we often put the blame the wrong place. Many Christians over the last two thousand years have blamed Jewish people for Jesus’ death and for the church’s persecution. Often we Christians have interpreted stories that criticize religious leaders as opposed to Jewish people. The issue isn’t Christians versus Jews, it’s prophetic voices versus the religious establishment.

When Stephen spoke he was criticizing his own people. He was criticizing the leaders of his own faith for rejecting God’s correction. He was speaking within his community to defend himself and accuse the religious leaders of ignoring God’s word. That’s very different from blaming a different group for the problems a religious community is having.

There are a couple of ways to learn from a passage like this today. First, we can hear Stephen’s words as if they were directed at us. That’s especially true for those in leadership, but it applies to all of us. How do we fail to listen to God’s messengers? How do we turn away from the truth? How do we reject the prophets and Jesus?

The truth is that the Jewish religious leaders acted like powerful people usually do. When they were faced with a challenge to their authority, they felt threatened and tried to defend themselves. When the Jesus showed God’s love in a new way; they worried their authority would be undermined, so they put him to death. When Stephen pointed out that rejecting prophets was nothing new, they killed him as well.

Unfortunately, Christian leaders often fall into the same temptation those earlier religious leaders did. Many times we have failed to hear the voices of prophets God has sent to correct us. Medieval reform movements within the church were met with violent persecution rather than an openness to hear God’s calling. The Protestant reformation led not only to reform, but also to new kinds of religious tyranny and deadly conflict. More recently the church has ignored prophets of equality, and Christians have used Christ’s words to seek power even through violence.

That is the way of human power. People in power try to preserve their power and usually see prophetic voices as threats. That is the way of human power, but it is not the way of Jesus Christ. Christ calls us to listen to his voice. Christ calls us to defend the powerless and to use our power to serve. Christ calls us to pull the log out of our own eye before we try to take the speck out of our neighbor’s eye.

The other way to learn from this passage is to see Stephen as an example for us to follow. Stephen’s ministry was mainly one of service, but whether serving or preaching the word, he bore witness to God’s love. He bore witness even though he knew he was risking his life. He stayed faithful and loving even while on trial and even during his execution.

Like prophets before, Jesus faced rejection and even death from the people who should have been most receptive to his message. In the same spirit, Stephen and others faced persecution when they told Christ’s story. Jesus and the church were a new chapter, but the story of God’s call being embraced by some and rejected by others hadn’t changed.

At the same time as the story of Jesus is part of the larger story of Israel and God, for those outside the people of Israel, Christ’s call is a new beginning. Listen again to Peter’s words: ^“But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.

In general gentiles weren’t part of God’s story with Israel: as Peter puts it, they were not a people as far as Israel was concerned and they were far from God’s mercy. But when gentiles hear the message about Jesus and welcome it with joy, they become part of God’s chosen people. For gentiles, in Christ a new story begins. A story about amazing love, second chances and new life.

That story is the story of God building something new. Christ is the cornerstone, rejected by many people but chosen by God. He is a living stone, not a dead tradition. And those who follow him are also living stones being shaped and joined together into a holy house for God. The living stones, the people Christ makes into a holy building come from many different backgrounds. They are Jews and gentiles, rich and poor, men and women, gay and straight.

For many of these folks the apostles telling the story of Jesus was their introduction into God’s story. They may not have been part of that story before, but now they are welcomed in with joy and their lives take on new meanings. Everything becomes new as their lives are woven into a beautiful tapestry of love and service and redemption.

Like Stephen in Jewish tradition, some of us have been a part of the Christian story for so long we’ve never known any different. Many of us grew up in a church and sometimes take the story for granted. We can be attached to church traditions, but sometimes we loose sight of the power of Jesus to change our lives.

It that sounds familiar (be honest), listen to Stephen’s words as a heads up. Examine your heart to see if you might be turning away from God’s prophetic word for your life. Is God trying to lead you away from something you’re doing now? Is God trying to lead you toward something new? What part of you resists God’s calling? Where does the bold faithfulness of Stephen challenge you?

Maybe your story is more like Peter’s community. Maybe being here this morning is part of something new God is doing in your life. Maybe you never really knew the story about God’s love for you and for others. Maybe you’re just beginning to learn about God’s forgiveness and calling. If that’s the case, follow Peter’s advice, be eager for spiritual milk. Dig into the stories of scripture and the church. Let God form you into a spiritual community. Listen for God’s calling for your life and let yourself be changed.

Whether we’re new to Christian discipleship or well established in our faith (or somewhere in between) God’s calling is new each day. Until the day we die, God is shaping us and changing us to fit the pattern of Christ. We are part of a long story full of twists and turns. We’re part of a story of falling away and coming back. We are part of a constantly winding path guided by God’s love. God’s grace for us is amazing and the places God will lead us in the future will challenge and bless us.

Wherever you are in your faith journey, God has a word for you. We are all in this story together and we need each other. How can I help you take your next step in faith? How is God calling you in the next phase of this adventure called discipleship? What do you need to follow Christ more faithfully?

Thanks be to God.