humanity – Salvaged Faith

You Will Be My Witnesses

Posted on May 17, 2015Leave a comment

I want us to take a few moments this morning to reflect on what God has done in our lives.

In the back of each of the pews, there are little notepads and there are pencils and pens. Or you can take some of the space in your bulletin where it says “I praise God because…” As we think about what God has done in our individual lives, I want to encourage you to jot down some notes.

Take a deep breath and pay attention to your life.

Where has the power of creation and creativity been present?

Where have you experienced healing or forgiveness?

When were love and joy given to you?

What about grace and peace?

Forty days after Jesus rose from the grave and conquered death, he led the disciples out to the countryside to the little town of Bethany. And he reminded them of everything he had done.

Jesus reminded them of how he healed and forgave.

He reminded them of his words and truth.

He connected the dots for them and helped them to understand his suffering and death.

And then he said five simple words: “you will be my witnesses.”

He blessed them.

And he left them.

On that day, forty days after Easter, Jesus was taken up into heaven.

And the disciples worshiped him, were filled with joy, and continuously praised God.

One of the questions I always have wrestled with is WHY the ascension is such good news. Why is this moment so important?

Wouldn’t it be so much better if Jesus had stayed here on earth with us? Teaching and preaching? Leading us? Showing us how to live?

The disciples, who had been so scared and timid in the days after his death are suddenly celebrating his leaving.

In their commentary on this text, the General Board of Discipleship reminded us that heaven is not really “up.” As we know from our modern scientific inquiry – and I quote from the GBOD: “If Jesus went ‘up there,’ he would have frozen to death, suffocated, been dangerously irradiated, or ripped to shreds by black holes (if he got that far!).”

No, this language of going up… of ascension… is really the “language of enthronement.”

In the ascension of Jesus, he rises not simply from the grave, but up to his full authority.

He no longer walks and talks among us but he is now “seated at the right hand of the Father.”

He is no longer the prophetic carpenter from Galilee, but he has risen to his fullest stature as the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

The ascension is the completion of the resurrection.

And that is a good and holy and awesome thing.

But there is something else to the ascension that we often miss.

In the incarnation of Jesus, we celebrate the word of God was made flesh. We witness how God came down and was born as a tiny babe in Bethlehem.

Every aspect of our human life was experienced by God.

Love and loss.

Stubbed toes and broken promises.

Laughter and tears.

Disappointment and overwhelming joy.

Fear and grief.

Jesus experienced the fullness of our lives – and the ultimate depths of suffering and death.

God entered our humanity in the birth of Jesus… that little child who was fully divine.

And when Jesus Christ – a man of flesh and blood, a fully human being who ate and drank and lived and died – when Christ is taken up into heaven, all of humanity is taken up to God also.

These two moments: the incarnation and the ascension unite the human and the divine. They establish an unbreakable relationship.

The reason that we can “go up” and experience the fullness of life in the divine presence is because Jesus is already there. He has shown the way.

The majestic and awesome Lord and King knows us and in spite of that, loves us and died for us and has made space for us.

For that… we praise and thank God.

So with the psalmist, we clap our hands in joy! For God is king of the whole world. God has gone up with a joyous shout! Sing praises!

This holy and awesome God intimately knows our lives. Jesus has not left us… he has united us with the divine.

You will be my witnesses.

You are going to tell my story.

Jesus unites humanity with God and empowers us to carry on the work of love and grace and transformation in the world. “You will be furnished with heavenly power,” he says as he is carried up into heaven.

We don’t have to share this good news in order to earn our place with God… it is something we do out of deep gratitude for what we have already been given.

Think about that list you made.

Of the ways God has worked in your life.

You didn’t have to do anything to earn that love and grace and forgiveness. It was freely given to you out of love.

And out of gratitude and thanksgiving, you are invited to tell the world.

Go, be my witnesses, Jesus says. Tell the world about what I have done. Love them because I love them. Share my kingdom with them!

One of my favorite blogs is rev-o-lution and the author tells about a sign she saw once in England. It reads: “We believe in life before death.”

We can get so caught up in life after death, in what happens up there with Jesus and whether or not we are going up there, that we forget about this life.

Jesus invites us to live before we die.

He invites us to go and share and tell and bless and love.

He invites us to not only live, but to share new life with the broken and hurting of this world.

As Rev. Mindi writes on her blog: “This is why we work for justice and peace in this world. This is why we stand against hate and stand for love.”

We do not work for the Kingdom of God in order to get up there, but because that Kingdom has already come down here and already dwells in our hearts. And in Jesus’ ascension, we have been given keys to the Kingdom.

Because he has gone up, we can get down and dirty and engage people in the real mess of their lives.

Because he has gone up, we can stop worrying about whether or not we are saved and we can simply tell people about Jesus and invite them to get to know him and us better.

Because he has gone up, we can stop counting dollars and cents and we can start measuring how deep our conversations are, how real our expressions of love are, and how many people we have shared the story with.

Because “up there” there is really not “UP” at all… all of humanity has been given the opportunity to live life right now in the presence and the power of the divine.

And for that we give thanks.

And we can’t wait to start telling the story.

The Long Hurt

Posted on September 11, 2011Leave a comment

The second most difficult thing in the world to do is to harbor anger and pain.

This week, I read the story of a woman who had refused to forgive. As John van de Laar tells the story:

Whenever a visitor came for a cup of tea or coffee, she would pour the drinks and then reach for an old and battered plastic sugar bowl. Then, apologetically, she would tell her story of the beautiful bone china bowl that her mother had owned, but that her sister had taken when her mother died and they divided up her possessions. She had never forgiven her sister, and had turned her bitterness into a daily routine that kept it fresh and growing.

Every single time she reached for that plastic sugar bowl, she rekindled the anger.

She had never forgiven her sister.

Van de Laar goes on to say that we sometimes let “our lives be defined by our wounds.” We spend all of our days looking backwards at what was and refusing to see the possibilities of healing and hope and forgiveness in our lives.

And while on the surface, it may not seem to take much energy or thought, the truth is that refusing to forgive is exhausting. It is a burden that you carry with you every moment. It is bitterness that never leaves your mouth.

As Nelson Mandela once said – “Resentment is like a glass of poison that a man drinks; then he sits down and waits for his enemy to die.”

And the only person that it hurts, is yourself.

September 11th, 2001 is a terribly sad and painful day in our history. And on this day, exactly 10 years later, we have a question to answer: How are we going to let that day define our lives?

Is it a wound, perpetually reopened, refusing to let us move forward?

Is it a source of anger and bitterness that causes us to lash out in fear?

Or in the midst of our grief and pain, can we also remember the tremendous acts of courage and love from that day? And can we look not only backwards but also look forward to as David Lose puts it, “a future that is not defined by the calamity of that day but instead is shaped by hope, possibility, and the grace of God.”

That is what forgiveness is after all. It is letting go of the pain. It is releasing the anger. It is refusing to allow what has happened in the past define your future.

Photo By: Alex Bruda

And while hanging on to old wounds might be the second most difficult thing in the world, the act of forgiving is the first.

Forgiving goes against our nature. We want revenge. We want answers. We want apologies. We want justice. We want someone in this world to pay. We want to hold guilt over another person. Overcome by sadness, anger, and pain, we do not want to move on.

As I have talked about many times in these messages – my own extended family is trapped in a pattern of unforgiveness. I, myself, find it extremely difficult to let go of that pain and imagine a future of mercy and love. Even when I find myself getting close to the point where I can, something else happens, another wrench thrown in, that makes saying, I’m sorry and I forgive you, that much harder.

And yet, over and over again, I find these words in the scriptures that say: Forgive.

Proverbs 17:9 – He who covers and forgives an offense seeks love, but he who repeats or haprs on a matter separates even close friends.

Matthew 6:14 – If you forgive people their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.

Colossians 3:13 – Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.

Mark 11:25 – And when you stand praying, if you have anything against anyone, forgiven him and let it go, in order that your Father who is in heaven may also forgive your own failings and shortcomings and let them go.

Luke 6:37 – Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven.

from Romans this morning: Why do you pass judgment on your brother or sister? Or you, why do you despise your brother or sister? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God.

Or the even more difficult passage from Matthew: “Lord, if another member of the church sins against me, how often should I forgive? As many as seven times?” Jesus said to him, “Not seven times, but, I tell you, seventy-seven times.

Forgiveness is the most difficult thing in the world to do, and yet over and over and over again, the scriptures command us to forgive.

Why?

Because without forgiveness, there is no life.

Without forgiveness, there is no hope.

Without forgiveness, there is no future.

And we are not talking about the people who hurt us here… we are talking about ourselves.

You see, if debts always have to be paid and sins must always be punished, then there is no hope for us.

And there is no hope for our communities.

You see, a family does not work without forgiveness.

A marriage falls apart without forgiveness.

A church cannot survive without forgiveness.

Even a nation will find itself spinning out of control if revenge and justice are the only goals that it seeks… if it cannot find ways to compromise and show mercy and yes, even forgive.

Left to our own devices, we do not have the strength to do the hard task of forgiveness.

But in the midst of remembering the events of September 11th… in the midst of grieving the destruction and loss caused by four hijacked airplanes and grieving the death and destruction cause by the cycle of revenge that came afterwards… we also take time to remember the events of 2000 years ago.

You see, that is when our ability to truly forgive was realized.

On the cross, looking out on a world of brokenness and destruction, facing his tormenters in the eye, Jesus Christ called down forgiveness and not vengeance. “Forgive them, Father, for they know not what they do.”

Our future was forever changed through the life, death, and resurrection of Christ. The wounds that we caused were forgotten. The sins we committed were forgiven. The debts of the past were canceled.

The future of Christ is one of mercy and not judgment, hope and not despair, healing and not violence, abundance and not scarcity, love and not hate, new life instead of death. (from David Lose, paraphrased)

That is the power of forgiveness.

Life, love, hope, healing, mercy.

The most powerful stories that I have heard in recent days are the ones in which loved ones recounted the conversations they had with loved ones who were trapped high above the ground in towers one and two of the World Trade Center.

They are stories full of tears and goodbyes and I love yous. I was driving down the road, listening to a woman tell of the last time she spoke with her husband and I had to pull over, because the tears just overwhelmed me.

But what I realized in the midst of those stories is that not once did those courageous people who died tell their loved ones to seek revenge.

They spent the few precious moments they had saying I love you.

They said, I’m proud of you.

They said, I’m sorry.

They said, All is forgiven.

They said, remember I love you.

And as we remember those who perished. As we grieve… and we must… we also need to look to our futures. We need to put away the wounds.

I we keep pulling out that old beat-up plastic sugar bowl and refuse to seek peace or forgiveness, then evil has already won and we are truly defeated. (van de Laar paraphrased)

It is hard and painful to forgive… and we cannot do it alone.

But the good news is that through the love and grace of Jesus Christ, we can find the strength and courage we need to let go. To admit when we have caused pain. To say, “I forgive you.”

Today, as we remember, let us forgive… and let us imagine together a future in which God’s peace truly reigns.

The Human Condition

Posted on January 10, 2010Leave a comment

What effect has the practice of ministry had on your understanding of humanity and the need for divine grace?

Over and over again I am reminded about our utter need for grace. In my own life and ministry the work I do would not be effective or positive if it were not for God’s grace. As someone who is beginning this journey of ministry I make more mistakes that I would care to admit, and yet somehow God takes my feeble and human attempts at faithfulness and transforms them mightily. This fall, I was called to the bedside of a congregation member who was actively dying and the family wanted me to say a prayer with him before he passed. In my vanity, I had worn this cute pair of boots, but they were very loud as I stepped into the room. Embarrassed, I tried to take them off so that I wouldn’t disturb the peacefulness and the quiet music in the background. By the time I got my boots off and moved over to the side of the bed and began my prayer, he was taking his last breath. At first, I was angry with myself for having worn the wrong shoes and for taking so long. But the first comment out of his son’s mouth was about how wonderful it was that his father had passed from this world in the midst of prayer.

My understanding of humanity has also been tried and tested in my congregational work. We welcomed a gentleman back into our congregation after he had been in some trouble. Overall, our congregation was very gracious and welcoming! After some time had passed, even connected with our community, he found himself in trouble once again. I think for the first time, I really saw the destructive powers of sin in someone’s life – sin that not only imprisoned his spirit, but also led once again to the imprisonment of his body. And yet through it all, we have continued to be in relationship with him. I was amazed by his power to seek and ask God’s forgiveness and the fact that he kept praying for us in the midst of his struggles.

I have also worked a lot with families in need in our area. As I work with them, I am reminded about how little power so many people have to change their lives. Sin (our own and that of others) digs us into deep holes and creates patterns that we cannot even imagine being different. It isolates us from the help we need and from relationships of love, kindness and mercy. Only by the grace of God can we as a church continue to have the patience to minister to these families and maintain the relationships… and only by the grace of God can their hearts and minds be transformed. But I am also reminded that as a part of this relationship there must be honesty and accountability – there must be confession and a desire for repentance in order for God’s grace to transform our lives.

Photo by: Mateusz Stachowski