This is Just the Beginning (Second Sunday of Advent)

Mark 1:1-8

1 The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. 2 As it is written in the prophet Isaiah, "See, I am sending my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way; 3 the voice of one crying out in the wilderness: "Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight,' " 4 John the baptizer appeared in the wilderness, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. 5 And people from the whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem were going out to him, and were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. 6 Now John was clothed with camel's hair, with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey. 7 He proclaimed, "The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his sandals. 8 I have baptized you with water; but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit."

Beginnings: every story has to have one, but every good story has a good one. Sure some are a bit cliché: “Once upon a time, in a land far, far away, there was a beautiful princess…” When you hear a beginning like that, you know that you’re about to hear a fairy tale, perhaps one involving a princess, her prince charming, dragons, fairy godmothers, and the whole nine yards. That sort of beginning prepares you for the story you’re about to hear. Of course there are different kinds of beginning: “It was the best of times. It was the worst of times.” Perhaps when some of you hear that sort of beginning your mind drifts back to high school English class and those long novels you had to read even though you hated them. No matter what kind of story it is, every story has to have a beginning, and every beginning prepares us in some way for what we are about to hear.

Stories of faith are no different. “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.” What do you think that beginning is preparing you for? You know, when it comes right down to it, the four gospels of the New Testament are some pretty good stories, but it seems like when it came to good beginnings, there were only three to go around. Think about it: Matthew and Luke have great beginnings—we know theirs probably best of all. Matthew has a full forensic list of Jesus’ ancestors, tying him to the line of David. He has Magi who come from far away to visit Jesus when he was a boy, bringing him gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Matthew tells us that Jesus’ family had to take a detour through Egypt because of a baby-murdering tantrum from King Herod, letting us in on Matthew’s attempt to connect Jesus with the prophetic role of Moses. Now that’s a pretty good beginning to one of the greatest stories ever told.

Personally, I like Luke a little better. Luke’s beginning reads like something out of Shakespeare (especially when read in the King James Version). Luke’s beginning, with the use of songs and moments of character reflection, attempts to show us the more psychological sides of the characters of the nativity as he describes shepherds who were “sore afraid” and the new mother Mary “pondering these things in her heart.” In his beginning, Luke gives us some background on John the Baptizer, has angels appearing left and right to herald the good news to the unsuspecting, and then, there at the cradle of the baby Jesus, Luke even includes the everyday, working man—the shepherds. Now that too is a pretty good way to begin one of the greatest stories in human history.

But let’s not forget about the fourth gospel, the Gospel according to John. Sure, John doesn’t have a beginning that folks have written Christmas carols about, but that doesn’t make it any less amazing. In fact, theologically speaking, John seems to be trying to trump both Luke and Matthew: while they have stories about the earthly birth of Jesus, John tells us about the eternally divine nature of the Christ, existing as the eternal logos, which “was with God…and is God.” John’s beginning prepares us for the great theological revelation that is about to unfold in front of us in his gospel. Jesus is revealed as the “Light of the World,” and the rest of the gospel sets out to drive that point home.

Matthew and Luke both have great narrative beginnings that fill our hearts and minds with thoughts of Christmas and the joyous occasion of the Advent of Jesus, and John’s beginning is pregnant with the theological language of a doctoral dissertation, preparing us to meet the divine logos that is Jesus the Christ…but what about Mark? I mean, let’s be honest, as the beginning to what is supposed to be the greatest story ever told, it falls pretty flat. There are no Magi, no angels, no shepherds, and no heaven-bound language describing some eternal mystery—there’s nothing like that at all! You almost get the feeling that maybe Mark didn’t try, or maybe he wasn’t that creative; after all, if you read the rest of his gospel, Mark seems to be writing in a hurry, skipping important events or details the other gospels fill us in on later. There just doesn’t seem to be any pop or zing to Mark’s beginning, so how are we to know exactly what it’s preparing us for?

Take the text before us this morning. This is Mark’s beginning…THIS is Mark’s beginning? Don’t you feel a little bit like you may have walked in the living room hoping to catch the very beginning of your favorite show, but instead a severe weather report has thrown off the schedule, so now you have to pick up in the middle of a different show with no idea what’s going on because you were just sort of dropped in? Mark doesn’t take any time to prime the pump—he just starts at the Jordan River, with that camel-hair diaper-wearing wild man John. Who is John in the first place? If you’re only reading Mark (and for the first time), you don’t know! He just shows up! Furthermore, what’s he doing there anyhow? What is it that John is doing that may help Mark’s beginning prepare us for what’s to come?

Well, it just so happens that Mark actually tells us what John is doing there in the Jordan valley in verse 4: “John the Baptizer appeared in the wilderness, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.” So that’s what he was up to: proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. But what exactly does that mean as a beginning? Is this supposed to be a story about John the Baptizer? Is this a story about his preaching, his ministry? Well, no in fact, because Mark tells us what John says while standing in the cool, muddy waters of that Ancient Near Eastern creek in verses 7 and 8: “He proclaimed, ‘The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his sandals. I have baptized you with water; but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.’” It turns out that John himself is actually a beginning—a beginning that prepares the way for another. He is there preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins…but that’s only the beginning! John’s message is only a beginning, a beginning for something, or someone, else.

Then, Mark, in an amalgamation of prophetic quotations in verses 2 and 3 tells us about this sort of preparation: As it is written in the prophet Isaiah, "See, I am sending my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way; the voice of one crying out in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.'” We’ve already seen that John has claimed to be the beginning, the one preparing the way for another, and now we see Mark quoting Scripture about one who is paving the way of the Lord.

John prepared us for the one who was to come, and this one who is coming is coming by the way of the Lord. But who is it? Of course, you and I know the answer. We do not prepare for Advent unaware of the identity of the One who was, is, and is to come. We’ve heard the story before, or at least we live in a context where the story is somewhat familiar to us. But that wasn’t necessarily the case for Mark’s first audience: for them Mark’s gospel new. It was for many of them the first time they heard the Good News, the first time they heard about John and the beginning of the gospel. John was preparing the way. John was the beginning, the beginning for Jesus, and Jesus was bringing with him the way of the Lord.

But remember, this is the beginning, the beginning of Mark’s gospel. This isn’t the whole story. There has to be more to this, more than just a wild-looking, baptizing, hype man. There has to be more to this “way of the Lord” he was preparing. In fact, the Greek word for “way” (hodos) is all over Mark’s gospel; you could even say it’s a key word in understanding Mark’s gospel, because anywhere you see the word hodos (or in English: way, road, path, etc.) there’s a pretty good chance something important is going on, something kingdom-oriented is taking place, and Jesus is there in the midst of it.   

So John is prepared the way for Jesus, and here’s what we see throughout Mark’s gospel: Jesus is always preparing the way for us. You see, this isn’t the whole story; Mark’s gospel isn’t the whole story. He didn’t sit down to write a complete summation of THE WAY just so others could read it and say to themselves, “that was a good story with a mediocre beginning.” After all, look at verse 1 again. Mark says this is “The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” That phrase stands alone. Mark isn’t saying that this little story about a crazy baptizer and his antics in the Jordan River are the beginning of a good story. No. In fact, what Mark seems to be saying is that his entire gospel is the beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Mark’s gospel is preparing us for the WAY OF THE LORD! This entire gospel is the beginning of the good news!

And the way starts here, in the muddy water of the Jordan, listening to John crying out in preparation for Jesus, who prepares the way for you and me. He prepares our way for deeper relationships with one another as he calls us to love our neighbors; he prepares our way as we follow his example in the words of Mark’s gospel; he prepares our way as he willing lays down his life on the cruel cross of Calvary and as he leaves behind an empty tomb on Sunday morning, so that you and I may have a real, loving relationship with the God of creation. Mark begins with John, who prepared the way for Jesus, and now, Jesus has prepared the way for you. Will you follow him on THE WAY? Will today be the day you begin following Jesus on THE WAY OF THE LORD? Will this day, this second Sunday of Advent, be the day you mark as a beginning, a beginning when you let go of more of yourself and took hold of more of who Christ is and who Christ is calling you to be? May today be a beginning for you in your relationship with the Prince of Peace, the coming Christ. Amen.

Here Comes Jesus! (First Sunday of Advent)

Mark 13:24-37

24 "But in those days, after that suffering, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, 25 and the stars will be falling from heaven, and the powers in the heavens will be shaken. 26 Then they will see "the Son of Man coming in clouds' with great power and glory. 27 Then he will send out the angels, and gather his elect from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to the ends of heaven. 28 "From the fig tree learn its lesson: as soon as its branch becomes tender and puts forth its leaves, you know that summer is near. 29 So also, when you see these things taking place, you know that he is near, at the very gates. 30 Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place. 31 Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. 32 "But about that day or hour no one knows, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. 33 Beware, keep alert; for you do not know when the time will come. 34 It is like a man going on a journey, when he leaves home and puts his slaves in charge, each with his work, and commands the doorkeeper to be on the watch. 35 Therefore, keep awake—for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or at dawn, 36 or else he may find you asleep when he comes suddenly. 37 And what I say to you I say to all: Keep awake."

            It has been over three decades since it happened. For thirty-one years thousands (maybe millions) of people have been waiting: some of them have not been waiting patiently. When it happened, those three decades ago, the world seemed as if it would never be the same. In the meantime, there were rumors, lots of rumors, rumors about what happened before and what would happen afterward. There were stories conjured up by those with incredible imaginations, stories that helped some cope with what happened, while only enraging others and confusing countless more. With the advent of the internet, those rumors and stories took on lives of their own, and it seemed as if the unrest would simply continue on indefinitely into the future.

            But then, about fifteen years ago, there seemed to be a new hope. Rumors and speculation were put to rest as facts came forward about the events that led up to what had happened. Some of the facts were predictable. Some of them were detestable. Some of them didn’t make any sense at all, and some of the things that came out caused many to give up on the whole thing altogether. These new developments rolled out for about five years, ending just about ten years ago. Still, there were unanswered questions, so the masses continued to conjure up theories and create their own sort of myths to fill in the gaps. It seemed as if they’d never find closure, as if their only hope was to be found in the theories and crackpot prophecies of those who hid behind scree names and aliases. They were left to just guess…until just a few days ago. That’s when it happened.

            It only lasted 91 seconds, but in those precious few seconds millions of people were once again filled with anticipation. For three decades they’ve been waiting. For three decades there have been rumors. For three decades there have been conjured myths. But no more, because this past Friday, the new trailer for Star Wars, Episode VII: The Force Awakens was released! That’s right, in just over a year the world will get to see what actually happened after Return of the Jedi (which came out thirty-one years ago), and hopefully we can all move past the prequels and Jar-Jar Binx (they were released fifteen years ago, with the final instalment released in 2005). All of the rumors swirling around the world on the internet will finally be put to rest, and fans will get what they’ve been waiting for long to see…though it may not be exactly how they’ve imagined it.

            Of course, that’s how things are when we have to wait for so long: the mystery, the uncertainty surrounding them birth speculation, rumors, and myth. Often, if the wait is long, those speculations take on a life of their own, becoming in some cases more important to people than what it is they are actually waiting for. In other words, sometimes, when we have to wait for something, those things which occupy our time in the interim becomes our obsession. It becomes what matters the most to us, and when the very thing we’ve been waiting for finally arrives, we miss it, or refuse to acknowledge it because it isn’t the way we imagined it, because it isn’t exactly how we wanted it to be.

            I have a feeling that was one of the reasons folks rejected Jesus early on: he didn’t exactly live up to their expectations, the expectations they had for the Messiah. If they had glorious visions of a conquering warrior, Jesus was definitely a disappointment when he said, “Blessed are the peacemakers…”[1] If they had grand hopes of a prosperous life under the reign of God’s Messiah, they were surely upset when Jesus called them to “Sell all that [they] own and distribute the money to the poor…”[2] If they had been looking forward to the day when God’s anointed would drive out the Roman occupiers at the end of a sword, then surely they were at a loss when those same Romans nailed him to a cross to execute him. If they had been looking for the Son of God to descend from the clouds riding a fiery chariot with a host of angels at his disposal, you can bet they completely missed him when he arrived naked and crying, born to a teenager and laid in a manger.

            Of course, we’re not without such faults. We presently live in a time of waiting, a time of anticipation. We are looking forward not only the celebration of Christ’s first Advent, his first arrival, but we are also looking forward to his second Advent, that day when Christ will return and the fullness of God’s kingdom will be realized on earth as it is in heaven. And in this interim period (nearly two thousand years) we have read passages like the one we’ve heard this morning and allowed our imaginations (often aided by the imaginations of others) to create wonderfully vivid pictures of what Christ’s return will look like. Some with greater imaginations and the ability to find a so-called “prophecy” hiding even in the most obscure places in Scripture have made millions of dollars with their own depictions of what Christ’s return will be like. 

            We can read words like those in verses 24-31 and find ourselves imagining a dark, dystopian future that can only be fixed by even darker, drastic, cosmic events. We read those words and then when we are inundated by the 24-hour cable news cycles with stories of violence and terror from around the world with their obviously biased finger-pointing, when we see the reports of anger and unrest like those from Ferguson, Missouri, when we log onto to Facebook and Twitter accounts and see the way people treat other one another, when there’s yet another school shooting and no one wants to really talk about why, some of us find these kinds of stories perversely comforting. We say things like, “It just means the end is near…it’s a sign of the ‘end of days’…it means Jesus is coming soon and all of ‘them’ will find out just what all of ‘us’ have been talking about…”

            We read those words and the various passages like those found in Christ’s Revelation to John and our imaginations run wild, dreaming up what it might be like when Christ makes his Second Advent known. In the midst of that sort of speculation, however, I’m afraid we too often overlook other words from Scripture, the rest of the words from Jesus in the gospels. We can get so caught up in the guesswork of unraveling what the future holds and untangling the mysterious words of Scripture, that we overlook those things that are right in front of us, those words from God that are not so cryptic. It seems to me that we are likely to repeat the mistakes of those who, in the time prior to Christ’s birth, allowed their predictions and assumptions to blind them to the actual arrival of Christ.

            That is why I think on this first Sunday of Advent, a season of hope-filled waiting, that we focus our attention—not on the ominous words of apocalyptic mystery, but—on the words of Jesus in verses 32-37: "But about that day or hour no one knows, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. Beware, keep alert; for you do not know when the time will come. It is like a man going on a journey, when he leaves home and puts his slaves in charge, each with his work, and commands the doorkeeper to be on the watch. Therefore, keep awake—for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or at dawn, or else he may find you asleep when he comes suddenly. And what I say to you I say to all: Keep awake."

            Whatever that coming day may look like, whenever it may happen, the most important thing for us as followers of Jesus to remember is this: we are called to “keep awake,” and that means that we are to be about the work to which Christ has called us. We are to be about helping, healing, serving, and loving others right here, right now. We are to be awake, not daydreaming about a day when we won’t have to be burdened with all this responsibility. We are to be about bringing God’s kingdom to reality here on earth, not simply shrugging our shoulders and chalking up bad news to a premillennial, dispensationalist understanding of the world.

            On this first Sunday of Advent, a Sunday when we reflect on the hope that we have in Christ, may we choose to be heralds of that hope to the world and not callers of cataclysmic doom. May we be vessels of Christ’s hope, proclaimers of the gospel, doers of the word. May we be people who claim during this wonderful season that Christ has come, Christ is here, and Christ will come again. May we be people who hope, people who in such hope, keep awake and do the will of our Lord. Amen.

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[1] Matthew 5:9

[2] Luke 18:22

King and Judge (Reign of Christ)

Matthew 25:31-46

31 "When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on the throne of his glory. 32 All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats, 33 and he will put the sheep at his right hand and the goats at the left. 34 Then the king will say to those at his right hand, "Come, you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; 35 for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, 36 I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.' 37 Then the righteous will answer him, "Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food, or thirsty and gave you something to drink? 38 And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you, or naked and gave you clothing? 39 And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you?' 40 And the king will answer them, "Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.' 41 Then he will say to those at his left hand, "You that are accursed, depart from me into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels; 42 for I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not give me clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.' 44 Then they also will answer, "Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not take care of you?' 45 Then he will answer them, "Truly I tell you, just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.' 46 And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life."

            It was his first Sunday in the pulpit as the new pastor. In the days leading up to that first Sunday, members of the church and community had been welcoming, offering words of encouragement, telling him how excited they were to have him and just how much they couldn't wait to hear him preach his first sermon in worship with them. As it turned out, that first Sunday the new pastor preached from a passage in the gospels and declared the grace of God through the love of Jesus Christ and the call of Christ to all Christians to share that love unconditionally with everyone they meet. As the new pastor stood at the door of the sanctuary following the service, it seemed everyone who walked by and shook his hand said something like, “That was a great sermon, preacher,” to which he would respond with a simple “thank you.”

            Well, a week later (as you might expect) Sunday came again, and the new pastor was set to deliver his second sermon to the congregation. That second Sunday, the new pastor climbed up behind the pulpit and preached from a passage in the gospels and declared the grace of God through the love of Jesus Christ and the call of Christ to all Christians to share that love unconditionally with everyone they meet. At first, a few members of the congregation had puzzled looks on their faces, but soon there began to be whispers between some of them saying, “Isn't this the same sermon he preached last week?” For the most part, the congregation chalked up the apparent mistake to nerves and all the complications that come with a new pastorate, and once again, after the service, folks filed by and said to their new pastor, “Good sermon, preacher.”

            That week, just as the week before, the new pastor spent time among the folks of the community, visiting homes, hospital rooms, and meeting members in his office at the church, and just as the week before, Sunday came right after Saturday. When it came time in the worship service for the pastor to preach, one of the ladies on the back row leaned over to one of the other ladies on the back row and said, “I hope he found some new material.” She was to be disappointed though, for that third Sunday the new pastor (once again) preached from that same passage in the gospels and declared the grace of God through the love of Jesus Christ and the call of Christ to all Christians to share that love unconditionally with everyone they meet. This time, there were fewer folks saying, “Good sermon,” and more folks quietly grumbling under their breath as the exited out the side doors of the sanctuary. 

            Later that week, some deacons and leaders of the church called a meeting with the pastor in his office. Thinking he was shucking his duties to deliver a fresh sermon every week, they confronted him about his apparent laziness. One of the more outspoken and short-tempered deacons, demanded to know if their new pastor was going to continue to preach the same sermon every week: “We pay you enough money and give you this office so you have the time and place to prepare a new sermon for every Sunday!” he shouted. Others in the room echoed the sentiment, claiming that they needed to hear something besides the same sermon every week.

            Well, the new pastor looked at each of the dozen or so faces crowded in his office and replied to their complaints and demands. He said, “I've been your pastor now for three weeks—nearly a month—and I've spent time getting to know people in this church and in this community, and after each Sunday I sit in my office to pray about what I should preach the next Sunday. The way I see it, I figure a sermon ought to be more than a time-filler on a Sunday morning; a sermon is a call to action. So, I figure I’ll just keep preaching the same sermon until y’all get it!”

            Now, perhaps repetition isn't the best way to learn, to grow, to change one’s way of seeing the world, but it is quite effective when it comes to making a point. While I don’t think I’d stand up here and preach the exact same sermon three weeks in a row, I do think there are some words, some lessons from the Lord we need hear more than once. There are some words from Christ in which we need to stew for a while, until they really sink in deep. In fact, Jesus himself repeated the same message three times (although in three different ways) in chapter twenty-five of Matthew’s gospel.

            In this chapter, Jesus repeatedly expresses the importance of being ready, of being about the Lord’s work until his return. In what we call “The Parable of the Ten Bridesmaids” in verses 1-13, Jesus warns about the danger of being rejected, left out in the darkness, if one is not prepared when the bridegroom (that is, Jesus) returns. Last week we read verses 14-30 and Jesus’ “Parable of the Talents,” in which we heard the Lord speak about the danger of allowing our fears to keep us from the work of love, the work of God’s kingdom until his return. Now, in the text before us, we hear (in Jesus’ own words) the only detailed account of that final judgment in all of the New Testament (I bet you thought it was in Revelation didn't you?), and what is Jesus' message? Be ready, doing the work of love—the Lord’s work—until he returns.

            While these words from Jesus don’t really conjure up the grandiose images of the likes of Hal Lindsey or Tim LaHaye and their Late Great Planet Earth or Left Behind (respectively), they are words that describe the reality of that final judgment, when Christ the King will take his seat upon his throne and separate the righteous sheep from the unrighteous goats. And just what is the criterion for this sacred sorting? What is the basis for the King’s judgment that brands one a sheep or a goat? Well…that question may have a relatively surprising answer for some of us.

            To get to the answer to that question, we have to ask another question about this text: what exactly is the difference between the sheep and the goats in the first place? On the surface, the answer is simple: the sheep cared for “the least of these” and the goats did not. The righteous fed the hungry, gave drink to the thirsty, welcomed the stranger, clothed the naked, cared for the sick, and visited the prisoner. Meanwhile, the unrighteous did none of those things. But for me, that brings up another question: why did the sheep do these things when the goats didn't?

            At first I’m tempted to say it is because the sheep, the righteous ones, recognized Jesus in the faces of those they helped, welcomed, and visited, but that is quite the opposite of what Jesus says in verses 37-39: “Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food, or thirsty and gave you something to drink? 38 And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you, or naked and gave you clothing? And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you?’” The righteous don’t recognize Jesus in those they cared for. What’s more, the unrighteous, the goats, their response seems to suggest that if they had known that Jesus claimed such people as his family they would have cared for them: (verse 44) “Then they also will answer, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not take care of you?'”

            It seems that if these unrighteous people had just known that Jesus was going to hold them accountable for their actions towards the least of us, then they would have surely gone out of their way to serve them, to care for them, to welcome them. But again, the righteous were not motivated by how Jesus would respond to them at the time of judgment; they didn't know they were serving Jesus when they served the hungry, thirsty, stranger, who was naked, sick, or imprisoned. The goal of the righteous in their service was not some eternal pat on the back, some divine promotion. No, in fact it seems as if the righteous whom Jesus calls “blessed by my Father,” those to whom he beckons “inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world,” it seems as if these righteous ones are not motivated by any self-serving goal whatsoever. In Jesus’ words they seem downright surprised by the King's blessing: their very response says something about their very nature, for they could have simply said, “Thanks, Jesus,” but instead they respond to the King as if there has been some kind of mistake: “When did we do these things you’re talking about? Are you sure you’re talking about us?”

            You see, I’m convinced that the difference—the real difference—between the righteous and the unrighteous is this: the righteous are motivated by selfless love, the kind of love that can only come from God, while the unrighteous are motivated by selfishness. That’s why I’m convinced that when that day comes, and we are all gathered together (whatever that may look like), and the Lord holds his final judgment, that we will not be judged by the trivial hash marks of man-made religion. We will not be judged based our accomplishments in this world, the amount of money that has passed through our hands, the number of hours we've logged inside the four walls of a church building, or the number of proof texts we've stuck on our bumpers and in others’ faces. No, I am convinced, that when that day comes, there will be those who say, “Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many deeds of power in your name?” and the Lord “will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; go away from me, you evildoers.'”[1] I am convinced that on that day there will be those who stand before the Lord with their chests out, their heads held high, and their hands outstretched for the keys to their mansions, and the Lord will say to them “I never knew you.”

            I am convinced of these things because I see firsthand the way Christ’s name has been used for selfish gain, how the promise of heaven drives people more than the power of Christ’s love. I live in a world that says to the least of these, “If you’re hungry or thirsty that’s your fault…If you’re sick and can’t afford to get better that’s not my problem… if you’re not from around here or I don’t know you, stay over there where you came from and leave us alone…if you’re without the basic needs of life, don’t use my tax dollars to pay for what you need…if you’re in prison you deserve it.” I see a world, a culture, that says these things and then with its next breath demands to be recognized as Christian!

            The day of Christ’s return (his Second Advent) is coming. The day of judgment is coming. It may be hours or centuries away, but it is coming, and all of us will be gathered together to stand before the throne of the King and Judge, our Lord Jesus. We will be gathered before him and he will separate the sheep from the goats, and I pray that on that day, when I stand before my King, that I can say to him, “I did my best to love without condition, to care for the outcast, the hungry, the thirsty, the stranger, the poor, the sick, and the prisoner,” and I pray that he will say to me, “Come, you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.” I pray that all of us here this morning may hear our King say those words to us, so let us be ready. Let us live this day and each day hereafter in the selfless love that comes only through God. Amen.

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[1] Matthew 7:22-23

Wasted Talents, or Fear and The Gospel (Twenty-Third Sunday after Pentecost)

Matthew 25:14-30

14 "For it is as if a man, going on a journey, summoned his slaves and entrusted his property to them; 15 to one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability. Then he went away. 16 The one who had received the five talents went off at once and traded with them, and made five more talents. 17 In the same way, the one who had the two talents made two more talents. 18 But the one who had received the one talent went off and dug a hole in the ground and hid his master's money. 19 After a long time the master of those slaves came and settled accounts with them. 20 Then the one who had received the five talents came forward, bringing five more talents, saying, "Master, you handed over to me five talents; see, I have made five more talents.' 21 His master said to him, "Well done, good and trustworthy slave; you have been trustworthy in a few things, I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your master.' 22 And the one with the two talents also came forward, saying, "Master, you handed over to me two talents; see, I have made two more talents.' 23 His master said to him, "Well done, good and trustworthy slave; you have been trustworthy in a few things, I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your master.' 24 Then the one who had received the one talent also came forward, saying, "Master, I knew that you were a harsh man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you did not scatter seed; 25 so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here you have what is yours.' 26 But his master replied, "You wicked and lazy slave! You knew, did you, that I reap where I did not sow, and gather where I did not scatter? 27 Then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers, and on my return I would have received what was my own with interest. 28 So take the talent from him, and give it to the one with the ten talents. 29 For to all those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away. 30 As for this worthless slave, throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.'

            I must have been about twelve or thirteen years old when my buddy John asked if I wanted to go with him and a group from his church on a little trip over to Dothan one Friday night. I wasn’t really sure where we were going to go or what we were going to do, but it was my best friend asking if I wanted to go somewhere and do something, so of course I figured it was going to be something fun. The old, tan, Dodge church van, with “Goodman Baptist Church” hand-painted on the side pulled into our driveway, and I climbed in and over the slick vinyl seats to sit in the very back with John as we rode the way to Dothan. We parked in the lot of an old, converted strip mall, which was already dotted with church vans and buses, and there was a line of people coming out the front door of the center store. I remember there being masking paper over all the windows, so you could just see the silhouettes of those who were gathered inside. I had no clue what we were doing.

            Eventually, after waiting our turn, we made it inside. We were in this large, open room, with various old couches and chairs strewn about, and there was a console television playing Christian music videos from a cassette tape in a VCR on top of the TV. We waited as a group until our church’s name was called, but while we waited we filled out blue cards that asked for our name, address, telephone number, whether we were regular church attenders, and where we went to church. When they called our group, we were instructed to walk in single file, holding hands with the person in front or behind if we needed to. We were going to be walking through a series of rooms they told us, and in each room we’d witness something different.

            We weaved our way through the building as teenagers and adults enacted various scenarios involving drunk driving, terminal illness, and murder. With each room, with each scene the message was obvious: “This could happen to you, so what will happen to you when it does?” The last room, though, really stood out. It was dark—pitch-black—and hot. There was a sound system in that room with the volume turned all the way up playing sounds of screams, cries of agony, and maniacal laughter. This room was hell (or at least a low budget version). The message of this room was clear: “This is where you will spend eternity if you don’t do what we’re about to tell you.”

            It was a judgment house, a hell house, a place designed to literally scare the hell out of you. And it did just that to me: I remember being terrified of that place, of that thought that I could spend one more second in a place that scary, so when a “counselor” asked me later in a room for “guests” if I wanted to accept Jesus in to my heart so I’d stay out of hell, well of course I said yes. However, he could have asked if I wanted to ask the Barney the Dinosaur into my heart to avoid hell and I would have said yes.

Fear is a powerful force. Fear is a powerful motivator. Fear is a powerful rhetorical tool. But fear is not the gospel.

About now you may be wondering what in the world a judgment house and fear have to do with a parable that is obviously about stewardship, a parable that many of us have been taught our whole lives is about using the talents God has given us to make more for God (or, if we’re honest about our own desire for the meaning of the parable, how to make more for ourselves). Well, I have to be honest with you; I’ve never really liked this parable from Jesus. I didn’t like the notion that Jesus would belittle someone in a parable who was just trying to do the right thing, while taking what he had and giving it to someone else. Having grown up as a poor kid, I always flinched at the words of the parable in verses 28 and 29: “So take the talent from him, and give it to the one with the ten talents. For to all those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away.” Surely Jesus isn’t condoning this notion that the rich should get richer while the poor get poorer.

I’ve always wrestled with this parable and what was really at the heart of Jesus’ words. That is, until I had one of many conversations with a dear friend and brother recently. When I came back to this parable, something caught my attention more than ever. It’s right there in verse 25; it stands out like a neon sign, pointing to the purpose, the truth of this parable. You see, in verses 24 and 25 the third slave says this: “Master, I knew that you were a harsh man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you did not scatter seed;  so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here you have what is yours.” Did you catch it?

The first two slaves went and took risks, used the talents their master had given them. I believe even if they had lost some of their investment, their master would not have scolded them, for they did just what he had entrusted them to do. But this third slave…he did nothing. He’s the definition of a conservative: he doesn’t take a chance; he isn’t risky with his investments; he takes the sum of fifteen years of hard work and buries it in a hole (a practice seen as wise in the first century and perhaps at this point in the 21^st century when inflation is up and interest rates are down!). He knows the smart thing to do. He’s done the safe thing, and in the end he hasn’t lost a dime. So why does Jesus tell us the master scolds this slave? Why does this slave have his wisely saved talent taken away? Why is he thrown into the outer darkness to gnash his teeth and weep? Look again at verse 25: "…I was afraid…”

Fear is a powerful force. Fear is a powerful incentive to do nothing. Fear is a powerful motivation to keep us from the master’s work. But fear is not the gospel, because fear keeps us from entering into the joy of our Master.

Like the third slave in Jesus’ parable, too many of us are afraid. We’re afraid to take a chance, to invest our lives, to enter into the joy of our Master. We’re afraid that God is an angry, old man in the sky who will punish us forever and ever if we don’t “do right.” We’re afraid that we’ll be less of a person if we don’t pray more, read our Bibles more, or come to church more.  We’re afraid that Jesus might have meant all that stuff he said about loving our neighbor (whoever they may be) as we love ourselves, all that stuff he said about letting the one of us without sin cast the first stone. We’re afraid Jesus may have meant it when he said that the meek, the poor, the broken-hearted, and oppressed will be blessed. We’re afraid that Jesus meant all that stuff about denying ourselves and taking up a cross to follow him. We’re afraid that the log in our own eye really is bigger than the speck in our neighbor’s eye. But perhaps most of all, what terrifies us more than we can confess is this: too many of us are afraid that God doesn’t love us.

Some of us are terrified by the thought that God may not love us, that Christ’s words and witness to the love of God may not be true, that it’s not enough to simply let God love us, to let God love through us. So we cling to the law, to commandments that tell us we aren’t good enough, to proof texts that tell us we are better than other sinners. We do our best to keep a tally of those sins we aren’t guilty of, hoping that when the Master returns we can say, “Master, I knew that you were a harsh Lord…so I was afraid, but I followed the commandments, and I held others at a distance when they didn’t. I did right. I followed the rules, and I know I was better than a whole bunch of others who broke your commandments and didn’t have nearly the attendance record for church services I did.”

Some of us are terrified that God doesn’t actually love us, that it really is up to us to try to work our way to righteousness, or at least a righteousness better than those people we don’t like, those people we don’t want in our church, those people who we secretly hope will be thrown into the outer darkness to weep and gnash their teeth. Some of us are so afraid that God doesn’t love us that we won’t let God love us.

Fear is a powerful force. Fear is a powerful incentive to do right to be right. Fear is a powerful way to keep ourselves from loving others. Fear is a powerful way to keep ourselves from letting God love us.

Then again, there are those of us who are afraid that Jesus meant all those things he said and that God actually does love us, without condition, without prerequisites, with all of our sins, our flaws, our weaknesses, and our shortcomings. We’re afraid that God really does love us, and we’re afraid that means God loves the people we don’t like, and we’re afraid that God is calling us to love them too.

Fear is a powerful force. Fear is a powerful way to keep ourselves from letting God love us. Fear keeps us from entering into the joy of our Master. But thanks be to God that fear is not the gospel!

This is what I know: God is love, and God calls us to be loved, and God calls us to show love to everyone—without exception, just as Christ has loved us without exception. I know that “There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear; for fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not reached perfection in love.”[1] I know that until we let ourselves be fully loved by God, until we let go of fear—fear of failure, fear of acceptance, fear of those who are different, fear of those we don’t like—until we let go of fear we cannot let ourselves be fully loved by God. Fear is not the gospel: love is the gospel.

So what are you afraid of? Are you afraid that you cannot do enough to gain God’s love? Are you afraid that you have to hold to a set of rules and commandments in order to be loved by God? Are you afraid that God might actually love everybody else too? Are you afraid that if you don’t “stand up” and call out the more egregious sins of others that God won’t love you as much? Will you let go of your fear this day, let go of the fear that keeps you from letting yourself be loved by God? Will you let go of fear and embrace the love—the full, endless, unconditional love—of Christ? May you know this truth today: fear is not the gospel; love is the gospel. Thanks be to God!

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[1] 1 John 4:8

The Golden Oldie (Twenty-Second Sunday after Pentecost)

Leviticus 19:1-2, 15-18

1 The Lord spoke to Moses, saying: 2 Speak to all the congregation of the people of Israel and say to them: You shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy… 15 You shall not render an unjust judgment; you shall not be partial to the poor or defer to the great: with justice you shall judge your neighbor. 16 You shall not go around as a slanderer among your people, and you shall not profit by the blood of your neighbor: I am the Lord. 17 You shall not hate in your heart anyone of your kin; you shall reprove your neighbor, or you will incur guilt yourself. 18 You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against any of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord.

            Hillel the Elder sounds like a character from a J.R.R. Tolkien novel, perhaps an aged wizard with a long grey beard and crooked fingers. He is, however, perhaps one of the most important figures in Jewish history. He lived to be around one hundred years old, dying about ten years after the birth of Jesus. He was a renowned scholar of the Torah (the Law), a wise sage who founded the House of Hillel to train other Jewish sages. His influence on Jewish religious culture can still be witnessed today in everything from the use of the Mishnah and the Talmud to the traditions of the Passover Seder.[1] Hillel may be best known though for his summation of the Torah into one expression of just a few, simple sentences: "That which is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow. That is the whole Torah; the rest is the explanation; go and learn."[2]

Karen Armstrong sounds like just another name you may come across in the white pages (if you still use those sorts of things), perhaps a middle-class, stay-at-home-mom with two kids who goes to the gym three times a week and meets with a book club every Monday. She is, however, a former nun, and one of the major thinkers in the realm of religion. She has written over twenty books on the subject of religion, particularly those things that all major religions have in common, and in 2008 she won the TED prize which helped her launch the Charter for Compassion, a document written by contributors from around the world through a sharing website, a document designed to help religious leaders work together for peace.[3] The foundation of the charter—and the common thread Armstrong points out as running through all of the major religions of the world—is “the Golden Rule.” In her TED Talk titled, “Let’s Revive the Golden Rule,” Armstrong says, “If we don’t manage to implement the Golden Rule globally, so that we treat all peoples, wherever and whoever they may be, as though they were as important as ourselves, I doubt that we’ll have a viable world to hand on to the next generation.”[4]

Rev. Frederick McFeely Rogers sounds like just another minister whose name would appear in moveable white letters on an encased church sign in front of any little Presbyterian church in any county seat town. He was, however, one of the most beloved and well-known people in this country for generations (and arguably still is, even though he died over eleven years ago). You see, Rev. Rogers was known to most people as Mister Rogers, and for over 30 years on Mister Roger’s Neighborhood, he invited his audience to be his neighbor. Through his gentle, direct lessons as Mister Rogers, and through the very real actions of his life that have become folkloric, Fred Rogers lived out the truth of what it means to be a good neighbor to everyone.

Hillel the Elder, Karen Armstrong, and Fred Rogers: three very different people, with very different stories, yet all three knew very well the truth we find in this “golden oldie” before us today in the words of Leviticus. Of course, we find these words all over Scripture, both the Old and New Testaments, in the words of Moses, the oracles of the prophets, the words of Paul and the Apostles, and not surprisingly, it seems to be the very rhythm to which Jesus moves throughout the gospels. We commonly call it “The Golden Rule,” because it is so universal to the human experience. In its common paraphrase it’s stated as “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” (or something like that), but I think it is best stated as it is here in Leviticus 19:18 and elsewhere throughout Holy Scripture: “you shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

Love. Perhaps that is the shortest way to express it. After all, to simply treat others the way you wish to be treated rings with just a touch of selfishness; it sounds a little too…I don’t know…programmed, as if I’ll treat others in the same fashion I would like them to treat me so that they might treat me better. Or maybe it sounds a little too open to condition: I’ll treat others the way I wish to be treated if they were like me or if I were like them. But love…now that’s different isn’t it? To love someone as yourself, that doesn’t leave room for conditions or programmed possibilities. Love is direct. Love is active. Love doesn’t wait for a reason to be: love just is. That’s why I think God and all those who quote this “Golden Rule” throughout Scripture put it that way: Love your neighbor…

If you read those verses leading up to that command in verse 18 you’ll read an explanation of what it means to avoid judgment based upon the social and cultural differences we create in order to keep others at a distance, to keep them separate in order to deny their identity as our neighbor. You’ll read words, commands, laws about the prohibition of hatred and vengeance among the people of God. This Golden Rule is universal, applying to all areas of life, calling those of us who call ourselves children of God to love those we meet without condition, without review, without basing our compassion upon whether or not they meet our predetermined criteria for neighbors. In other words, this command—this Golden Rule—means we don’t get to run a credit check, a background check on others before we love them; we don’t have to know the deep, dark secrets of our neighbors, their sins or the great burdens they bear before we allow ourselves to bestow the privilege of our love upon them. When we live by the commandment of the Golden Rule, everyone we meet is our neighbor. We cannot erect gated communities in the hopes of creating a loophole that allows us to love only those we like, those who we are like.

You see, it’s those words in verse two, those words that are included in our text this morning on purpose, that speak to why we need the Golden Rule, why we are called—commanded—to love our neighbors, whoever they may be. God commands Moses to say to the gathered people: “You shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy…” That word holy is the Hebrew word kadash, and it means literally, “to be set apart; to distinguish, to sanctify.” It is a fitting way to describe God, who is so often in the Hebrew Bible set apart from the people, whether it is by a tabernacle, a pillar of fire or smoke, or a temple. But did you notice what God said in that verse? “You shall be holy, for I…am holy…” God commands God’s people to be holy, to be set apart, sanctified, distinguished, yet at the same time God calls us to love our neighbors as ourselves…as holy, set apart, sanctified, distinguished.

How can that possibly make sense?! After all, if God is God—high, holy, omnipotent, Almighty—how can God expect us to be holy, while loving all these “unholy” people all around us, these reprobates, these slanderers, these unclean, degenerate, sinners?! How can God expect us to love these nasty neighbors? Because this same, high, holy, omnipotent, Almighty God loved us—all of us—first. Because this same holy God, who calls us to be holy, has been among us already and has shown us what it is like to love our neighbors as ourselves. Because this same God in the flesh of his Son Jesus, walked among those reprobates, those slanderers, those unclean, degenerate sinners and loved every, single one of them. Even when they nailed him to a cross to die, his love for them could be heard in his words, “Forgive them, for they don’t know what they are doing.”

“You shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy…you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” If there were no other words written in all of Scripture, the power of God’s words would still be the same. This is the commandment, the one the sums up all the others, the one that defines the life lived in the light of the gospel. This is our mission statement as Christ’s Church in the world, as God’s people. This “Golden Oldie” is the lens through which we ought to read every other commandment in Scripture, for we can cut our hair the right way, wear the right blend of fabrics, keep a kosher diet, maintain what others call “biblical relationships,” abstain from work on the Sabbath, and never say the first “cuss” word or take the Lord’s name in vain, but if we don’t love our neighbors—whoever or whatever they may be—we miss the point. We miss the point of Scripture’s teaching, and we miss the point of Christ’s teachings handed down to us through the New Testament and the Holy Spirit. We can keep every jot and tittle, but if we do not love…we cannot be holy as the Lord our God is holy, as the Lord our God has called us to be.

May we choose this day to be holy, to live our lives as God has commanded us, to love our neighbors as ourselves—without precondition, without consideration of their rank and status in this world, and without those labels that mark them as “unclean sinners.” May we choose this day to live by the example of Christ our Lord, who, as God incarnate, chose to love all of us broken, imperfect people. And may we all live a life guided by the love of God in Christ, expressed in that “golden oldie”: “love your neighbor as yourself.” Amen.

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[1] Shulamis Frieman, Who's Who in the Talmud, Jason Aronson, Inc., 2000, p. 163.

[2] http://www.jewishpress.com/sections/books/book-reviews/beyond-pirkei-avos/2013/12/12/

[3] You can read about Karen Armstrong, her TED prize, and her TED Talks here: http://www.ted.com/speakers/karen_armstrong

[4] Ibid. 

"It's All About Him" (a sermon in memory of Roy Barker, Minister of Music at FBC Williams)

Hebrews 12:1-2

1 Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, 2 looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the sake of the joy that was set before him endured the cross, disregarding its shame, and has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God.

            On many Sunday mornings, as he stood behind this pulpit to lead us in the worship and praise of God, Roy would by saying four simple words: “It’s all about Him.” It didn’t matter what songs we sang, how many we sang, or how well we sang them. What mattered was to Whom we were singing them—Almighty God.

            I quickly came to appreciate that sentiment, that when we come to gather in this place on Sunday morning it is indeed all about Him, all about God and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. It’s about God and how He has met us in this place as we gather to worship. It’s about Christ and how He meets us each and every week in this place to speak a word of faith, hope, and love to each one of us. It’s all about the Holy Spirit and how It knows the deepest places of our hearts and longs to make us whole and one with God and each other. When we gather in this place on Sunday mornings for worship it is indeed all about God and the manifold ways God loves us.

            Yet I know today, as we have gathered in this room, we have gathered with heavy hearts. We have come together for worship, yet there is a very big part of us that is absent from this place this morning. After 30 years (as long as many of us can remember), it seems surreal to think that we won’t gather for worship to be led by one we’ve grown to love, one we’ve grown to expect to be here even when we are not. It feels as if we may have entered the wilderness of worship without our Moses to show us the way. Yet like so many great people of faith in the history of Christ’s Church, Roy would say the same thing he has said to us on so many mornings like this one: “it’s not about Roy; it’s not about us; it’s all about Him.”

            While we wait for that coming day when we shall no longer see as in a “mirror, dimly, but [when] we shall see face to face…[when we] will know fully, even as [we] have been fully known,”[1] I take comfort in these words from the author of the book of Hebrews: “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses…” In the chapel at Beeson Divinity School, encircling the interior of the dome, is a depiction of that great cloud of witnesses. Among the saints of Holy Scripture and the angels of heaven are some of the heroes and heroines of Church history: Martin Luther, St. Augustine, Jonathan Edwards, Lottie Moon, and others. I often think about that scene in that dome of Hodges Chapel and those words from Hebrews whenever we lose another saint, but I don’t picture those we’ve lost as spiraling up towards some great light, gone from our presence until we join them again on the other side of eternity. No, when I read those words from Hebrews, I believe that we are in fact “surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses,” that here, among us now, with the Holy Spirit of God, we are surrounded by the saints who have gone before us. And what a cloud of witnesses it is!

            It is with that sense of communion, that sense that we are indeed surrounded by the saints, that the passage before us continues, “since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us…” In seasons like these time seems to stand still; the hands of the clock move at a glacial pace. In seasons like these we will grieve; we will mourn as our lives seek to find a new sense of normal, as we seek to discover what it means to live on this side of glory without one who’s gone with us for so long. Yet in these words from Hebrews (words that echo with “it’s all about Him”) we are encouraged by the presence of that great cloud of witnesses. We are encouraged that Roy’s life and the lives of those saints before us were not lived in vain. We are encouraged to shake off those things that keep us from God, that keep us from what God would have us to do.

            We are encouraged as we reflect on the life of our friend and those friends who have gone before us, and we are encouraged as we continue, just as they did, “looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the sake of the joy that was set before him endured the cross, disregarding its shame, and has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God.” We are encouraged because “it’s all about Him.” It’s all about Jesus.

            That’s not my sermon to you this morning. No, that has been Roy’s sermon to you for the past 30 years. It’s all about Jesus. There is no one else deserving of our praise, our adoration, our honor, our lives, than Jesus. And I know this morning, as we have gathered in this room once again to worship and praise our God, the eternal worship and praise of God in glory is a bit louder with a bit more bass. As we have gathered in this room for worship this morning, we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, and I know who we can count among them, and I know that in that cloud of the saints, there is one this morning who would tell you the same thing he’s told you for years: “It’s all about Him; it’s all about Jesus.” May our lives ever reflect that glorious truth Roy has shared with us for so long. Amen.

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[1] 1 Corinthians 13:12

Stewards of the Vineyard (Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost)

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. 34 When the harvest time had come, he sent his slaves to the tenants to collect his produce. 35 But the tenants seized his slaves and beat one, killed another, and stoned another. 36 Again he sent other slaves, more than the first; and they treated them in the same way. 37 Finally he sent his son to them, saying, "They will respect my son.' 38 But when the tenants saw the son, they said to themselves, "This is the heir; come, let us kill him and get his inheritance.' 39 So they seized him, threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him. 40 Now when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?" 41 They 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." 42 Jesus 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'? 43 Therefore 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. 44 The one who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; and it will crush anyone on whom it falls." 45 When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard his parables, they realized that he was speaking about them. 46 They wanted to arrest him, but they feared the crowds, because they regarded him as a prophet.

            Behind a two-story house on Coffee County Road 606, rusting away in a barn is an old delivery jeep. Once upon a time, it was likely used to carry equipment and personnel on a military base, and sometime after that it was used as a work and recreation vehicle for some hunter in the panhandle of Florida. I know that because that was the first place I ever saw that jalopy. It was about a one hour drive pulling a car trailer, and once we got there, we pushed and pulled that junk heap on that trailer with the help of a come-along. My buddy’s dad had paid $100 for that jeep just so my friend could have a project, something to do to keep him busy, maybe even get a little work vehicle to haul hay and feed for some horses. Now, as some of you know, I have a bit of experience as a mechanic, so my friend and his dad asked if I’d help get the old jeep running, help keep it running, and in return I may even get to drive the jeep from time to time. Of course I agreed to help out my friend, not because of any deal they struck, but simply because he was my friend and I like tinkering around with old vehicles.

            When we got back to his house with the jeep, we rolled it off the trailer, and proceeded to push it on four flat tires on to the cement slab in the center stall of the barn. We opened the hood, and I messed around with the carburetor, checked out the clutch, and just gave it a general once over. That jeep was like Frankenstein’s monster: it had a four cylinder engine and a five speed transmission from an eighties model Nissan pickup, along with an assortment of unidentifiable pieces from part stores of all brands. It didn’t run, and even if it did it couldn’t stop: it needed a new carburetor, fuel pump, clutch master cylinder, tires, exhaust…the list seemed endless. That, however, didn’t stop us from daydreaming about what it was going to be like when that jeep was finally running: we talked about how we’d use to drive to Buckmill Creek and set nets out for sucker fish, how we’d be able to fit a square bail in the back along with a couple of saddles and tack, how it’d just be a fun thing to drive around the community.

            We sat out in the barn, drinking Winn-Dixie brand “cokes” talking about what we were going to do when we got all the pieces and parts for that jeep. I was even able to get the engine to run a little bit (so long as I was kneeling on the fender, leaning over the engine and pouring a slim stream of gasoline down the carburetor). We sat out there for hours, until dark talking about what it was going to be like when that jeep finally ran, and then…we never touched it again! It quickly became obvious that that jeep needed time and parts, and, well, we just had other things we’d rather do with our time and what little money we had. As far as I know, it is still sitting in the barn behind my friend’s parents’ house.

            I suppose if we’re all honest, we’re like that with a lot of things, aren’t we? We daydream about the end result, or we fantasize about the future without taking into account what is right in front of us, those steps, those tasks, that lie between our present and the future. In a very real way, that is what Jesus’ parable we’ve heard this morning is about.

It might be difficult to hear that word in this parable at first, but let’s consider its context: Jesus has entered the temple in Jerusalem, and his authority has been questioned by the religious leaders he met there, so Jesus offers three parables in response—the one before us this morning is the second of those parables. Now, in this particular parable, Jesus tells the story of a landowner who leases his vineyard to some tenants (the description of the vineyard is most surely meant to call to mind the vineyard of Isaiah chapter five). When the harvest time comes, the landowner sends slaves to gather his produce from the tenants, but when they arrive, the tenants deal with them in progressively harsher ways (beating, killing, and then stoning). The landowner (rather than seeking retribution on the tenants) sends more slaves, who are treated in the same harsh manner as the first group, and eventually, the landowner sends his son.

Now, in verse 38, “when the tenants saw the son, they said to themselves, ‘This is the heir; come, let us kill him and get his inheritance.'” That verse says a couple of things to us: it shows us that the tenants truly have no respect or fear of the landowner and all they are genuinely concerned about is the son’s inheritance. In other words, these tenants want what belongs to the landowner and his son, and they want it without doing the very thing the landowner has asked them to do—tend to the vineyard. In their rejection of their duties, they see the son of the landowner as an obstacle in their way, as one who will keep them from having their way, from getting the inheritance—the goods—they want. In other words, for these tenants who are focused on a future that they have conjured up in their own minds of wealth and an inheritance, the son is a problem, and impediment to having everything they want (even if what they want isn’t necessarily what they have been promised).

We hear through the conversation that follows this parable in verses 40 through 46 that the chief priests and Pharisees figure out that this parable is actually about them, and they’re offended to the point of wanting to arrest Jesus, but they resist because of the crowds and their admiration of Jesus as a prophet.  Still, it points to the deeper meaning of this parable (which may be better categorized as an allegory): God has put tenants (i.e. religious leaders like the chief priests and Pharisees) in charge of overseeing his vineyard (i.e. the Jewish people, or in our day the Church), yet in their desire to obtain a future reward, that they have in many ways come up with themselves, they have rejected God and labeled God’s Son as a stumbling block between them and their “reward.” And here’s the thing friends… we do the very same thing all the time!

Somewhere along the way, in the history of Christ’s Church, the end result, our “inheritance,” heaven, became the primary focus of all that we say and do as believers (especially as evangelicals in the West). The afterlife became the moral imperative, the reason we did some things and abstained from many other things. Our post-death destiny became the sole reason we evangelized, because we wanted people to join us in heaven and avoid hell. At some point, we became so focused on the hereafter that it even became the nucleus of our theology, even redefining salvation as a simple change in one’s destination on the other side of the grave. This is especially evident in the relatively recent development of dispensationalism and the popularity of books like Hal Lindsey’s Late Great Planet Earth, and Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins’s best-seller the Left Behind series (which was released as a major motion picture this week). Christianity has become a religion focused on the end, on what lies on the other side of this world and on the other side of death.

Now I know for some of you, that is what you’ve always believed, that the point of religion in general is what happens to us when we die, and that is most assuredly a large part of it. It’s also extremely important, however, to understand that our faith is indeed a faith concerned about the future, though it may not be in the way the so-called “popular theology” of premillennial dispensationalism (the eschatology of the Left Behind series) would have us believe. You see, when our faith becomes completely defined by what we believe to be some future reward, when salvation is only about where we’ll spend eternity, well, then Jesus—the Son of God—becomes little more than the ticket that gets us into the heavenly gates. With a faith constructed completely on the notion that the only thing that matters is what we’ll get when the dust settles after Armageddon Jesus is little more than our benefactor who paid the entry fee for eternity. When our faith consists only in a belief in the afterlife and Jesus as a means to an end, then the actual, embodied, Christ, the one who ate with sinners, loved the rejected, healed the hurting, and taught all who would follow him to do the same becomes little more than a stumbling block between us and our imagined inheritance!

When our faith is only about that, when it is only about what we’re going to get when it’s all over, well my friends, then we miss the point, for the kingdom of heaven isn’t about what we’ll get when we get there. Our faith isn’t only about what happens “then and there;” it is most certainly about what fruit we bear for the kingdom “here and now.”

Hear again what Jesus says in verses 42 through 44: 42 Jesus 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’? 43 Therefore 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. 44 The one who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; and it will crush anyone on whom it falls." Jesus (using a line or two from Psalm 118) explains to these religious leaders who were more concerned about the power they would receive from their offices and the eventual reward they believed they would obtain as such powerful religious leaders that they have failed to bear fruit for the kingdom. They have failed to produce fruit because of their own selfish ambitions, so the responsibility of the kingdom will be given to different people, to those whose love for God and devotion to Christ produces kingdom fruit. Furthermore, Jesus explains that this “cornerstone” (referring to Christ himself and his gospel) will “crush anyone on whom it falls.” That’s a frightening proposition indeed! It as if Christ said to those chief priests and Pharisees, “In your selfish pursuits, in your misplaced focus on your imagined inheritance, you have ignored and stumbled over the truth right before you, here and now, and because of your arrogant ignorance you will be crushed!”

Like those religious leaders of Jesus’ day and like the tenants in his parable, those of us who call ourselves Christians are stewards of the vineyard: we are given the task of watching over what God has given us and bearing fruit for the kingdom. Being good stewards of the vineyard, bearing kingdom fruit is about more than what we think we’ll get when the final day arrives. It’s about more than our own selfishly contrived notions of rewards and inheritances. Whenever our faith makes Jesus out to be a means to an end, whenever our faith makes Jesus to be anything less than all that Jesus is, then we miss the point of our faith altogether.

The reason we still rejoice when one passes through the waters of baptism is not only because they have signified their place among the saints in the hereafter. We rejoice because they have entered into a life of faith that begins right here and right now, a life of faith that is as important on this side of eternity as it is the other side. We rejoice because they enter a growing relationship with Christ that encompasses their entire lives both “here and now” and “there and then.”

The reason we lay hands and ordain those to the ministry is because our faith is about how we serve and love others in this moment, how we show others the fullness of Christ in this life so that they may be drawn to our Lord to follow him in all the peace, joy, and hope Christ brings to us. We still ordain deacons and ministers because we believe that there is still a vineyard that needs tending.

The reason we gather around this table is, as the apostle Paul said, to “proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.” We proclaim that death that sealed our fate, that death that showed to the world that the power of sin has been overcome in selfless love, that death that calls us to fruit-bearing life! We gather around this table in remembrance of the Christ who is present with us here and now, who calls us even this moment to the work of the kingdom.

So as we come to the table this morning, may we lay aside our selfishness, our Christ-less faiths, our hate, our pride that keeps us from knowing and loving all of who God in Christ is. May we come to this table, proclaiming the Lord’s death, remembering all that Christ has done for us that we may live in the presence of God right here, right now, and for all eternity. May we gather around this table this morning, serving one another and Almighty God as stewards of the vineyard. Amen.