There are times when God does not make sense. There are times when we feel abandoned by God. There is a kind of Christianity that pretends that if we only believe, we will be saved, God will love us, and bad things will not happen to us. No Christian lives very long without coming to understand that this is too simplistic. Bad things do happen to good people. Devout Christians do go through periods of time when God seems distant.

Take the case of a young woman who grows up in a Christian home, goes to a Christian college, marries her Christian boyfriend, has a Christian family, and yet is deserted by her husband in mid-life. She prays for the restoration of her marriage; but it does not happen. She prays that her children will not be injured by this abandonment; but they are. In due time, she prays for a companion; but no one appears. This dark time doesn’t last a day, or week, or year, but for a decade.

Or, take the case of a mid-level executive who devotes his life to the company. He gets good performance reviews. His loyalty is noticed and affirmed. Then, at fifty-five, when the children are in college and expenses are high, suddenly he is laid off. The company to which he was so loyal has abandoned him. Then, despite the fact he has an unblemished record, it takes a long time to find a new job. It doesn’t take a week, or month, or quarter, or even a year. It takes a year and a half, and in that time, almost all the family savings are gone. His new job pays less than the old job.

We all go through times when we pray for good things, and pray with good intentions, but God seems silent. Today, we are talking about what is sometimes called the “Dark Night of the Soul”—times when we feel abandoned by God.

The Last Week of Jesus.

For the past several weeks, we have been reading and thinking about the last twenty-four hours of Jesus’ life. During that time, Jesus experienced some of the worst things that can happen to a human being. He was betrayed. He was disappointed. He was treated unfairly. He was mocked, ridiculed, and physically tortured. Finally, he was crucified. He was on that cross in deep pain for six long hours. Today, we pick up at Matthew chapter 27, verse 45:

From noon until three in the afternoon darkness came over all the land. About three in the afternoon Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eli, Eli, lemasabachthani?” (which means “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”). When some of those standing there heard this, they said, “He’s calling Elijah.” Immediately one of them ran and got a sponge. He filled it with wine vinegar, put it on a staff, and offered it to Jesus to drink. The rest said, “Now leave him alone. Let’s see if Elijah comes to save him.” And when Jesus had cried out again in a loud voice, he gave up his spirit. At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook, the rocks split and the tombs broke open. The bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. They came out of the tombs after Jesus’ resurrection and went into the holy city and appeared to many people. When the centurion and those with him who were guarding Jesus saw the earthquake and all that had happened, they were terrified, and exclaimed, “Surely he was the Son of God!” Many women were there, watching from a distance. They had followed Jesus from Galilee to care for his needs.  Among them were Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James and Joseph and the mother of Zebedee’s sons (Matthew 27:45-56).

God of Life: As we contemplate the death of Jesus, we know that there are other deaths we endure, sometimes with the feeling that we are abandoned by you. Come this morning so that we can begin to understand your presence even in your absence. Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of all of our hearts be acceptable in you sight. Amen.

The Forsaken Messiah.

On the Thursday night before Passover, Jesus was arrested. He was first taken to the home of Annas, the former High Priest and “Kingmaker” of the Jewish priestly class (John 18:22). After an interview, he was taken to the home of Caiaphas (v. 14). There, he was subjected to a trial (Matt. 26:57-67). The Sanhedrin, or a kind of “Executive Committee” of the Sanhedrin, agreed he should be executed. At dawn, they met again briefly and formally convicted him of blasphemy (27:1). He was then sent to Pilate, who conducted yet another trial (v. 11).

Although Pilate was aware that Jesus was not guilty of a crime warranting death, the frenzy of the crowd and danger of a riot persuaded him that he would have to release Barabbas, a dangerous criminal, and execute Jesus (vv. 12-26). Pilate washed his hands of the entire affair and turned Jesus over to be flogged and crucified. After the flogging, he was taken to Golgotha, “the Place of the Skull,” to be crucified with two common criminals. A sign was put over him, “Jesus, the King of the Jews.” The criminals, the onlookers, and the leaders of the people mocked him.

The crucifixion began about 9:00 in the morning (Mark 15:25). About noon, darkness filled the earth. At about the ninth hour, or about 3:00 in the afternoon, Jesus cried out Eloi, Eloi, Lama Sabbachthani, or “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46). This is a direct quote from Psalm 22:1. Psalm 22, which I cannot read to you this morning, contains many verses that reflect what Jesus suffered. It reflects that scorn he endured from the crowd (Psalm 22; 6). It reflects the taunting he endured (v. 8). It reflects the opposition he endured from those in power (v. 13). It reflects the pain of the crucifixion (v. 14-15; 16). It reflects even the soldiers gambling for his clothing (v. 18).

Psalm 22 is a Psalm of dereliction, which begins with a sense of God’s absence and ends with a prayer of faith and assurance. What is going on here? Some people focus on the sense of absence Jesus felt. Part of Jesus’ enduring the depth of human suffering, and especially the suffering that comes from sin and alienation from God, creation, and others, is suffering the absence of God.

The Dark Night of the Soul.

This week, I had to reacquaint myself with one of my least favorite subjects in theology. Many years ago, the Carmelite brother, St. John of the Cross, coined the phrase, “the Dark Night of the Soul”. The Dark Night of the Soul is a time of spiritual dryness when God seems absent. It can come upon us for a variety of reasons. Generally however it occurs at times when we no longer experience God in ways we once did.

A Dark Night of the Soul  can be accompanied by time of disappointment, or unanswered prayers, or physical illness, or old age, or any time we feel spiritual activities or practices that gave our life meaning and purpose have failed us. When God seems absent, our lives begin to lose meaning and purpose, which can be frightful and leave us filled with doubt.

The Dark Night of the Soul is a kind of death. It is a death of an old way of relating to God, while God prepares us for something new. The great spiritual masters speak of this Dark Night as God’s presence in God’s absence. That is exactly what Jesus was experiencing on the cross.

Jesus had experienced and uninterrupted fellowship with God the Father Almighty. Now, so that human beings might be restored to fellowship with God, the Son of God, the Word made flesh, had to endure the absence of God. This was a real and true withdrawal of God from the person of the Son. It involved a real and true suffering of Jesus, which is why Jesus cried out, “My God, My God why have you forsaken me?” (Matt. 27:46).

While it is true that Jesus had to endure this for our salvation, it did not make it any easier. In the same way, when we experience times of dryness, of waiting, of unanswered prayers, of pain, of the absence of God, we are being prepared for a deeper fellowship with God. Sometimes, God has to take away things that gave our lives meaning and purpose in order for us to find our meaning and purpose in God. This is the spiritual reality behind a Dark Night of the Soul.

The Victory Cry of Jesus.

As I mentioned earlier, Psalm 22 begins with a cry of dereliction, but ends with a cry of faith. The psalmist cries out for God to deliver him and then breaks out into a song of praise as he promises to praise God’s name among God’s people (Psalm 22:19-28). It ends with these words:

All the ends of the earth  will remember and turn to the Lord,
and all the families of the nation will bow down before him,
for dominion belongs to the Lord and he rules over the nations. All the rich of the earth will feast and worship; all who go down to the dust will kneel before him– those who cannot keep themselves alive. Posterity will serve him; future generations will be told about the Lord. They will proclaim his righteousness, declaring to a people yet unborn:  He has done it! (Psalm 22:27-31).

In other words, what began as a cry of agony and abandonment, ends with a cry of faith and victory.

We are told that, in the ninth hour, just after Jesus uttered words of dereliction, he gave a great shout and died (v. 50; see also, Mark 15:37, Luke 23: 46). John identifies the shout as, “It is finished” (John 19:20). To us, this may seem to be a shout of desperation, as if he were saying, “My life is finished.” The word in Greek and in Aramaic has a somewhat different connotation. “It is finished,” means, “It is accomplished” or “It is completed.” In other words, Jesus had finished the task for which he came. It is as if he had just passed the finish line in a race, lifted his arms, and cried out, “I’m done!!” [1]

Jesus, like us, endured a dark night of the soul. And, like Jesus, our dark nights will not last forever, either. There will be a cry of victory in our lives as there was in Jesus’ life. The cry of victory, in this world or the next, is the result of having endured the Dark Night, learned its lessons, died to self, and experienced a new relationship with the Living God..

Our Victory Cry.

When I was in Brownsville, there was a man in the congregation who used to fix the sound system. He was in his 70’s when I arrived. He had retired from a position at the local bank. During his retirement, he was never in really good physical condition. In particular, his lungs were weak. One day, Walter had a major stroke. I was called to the hospital. When I walked in the room, a doctor and nurses were surrounding Walter. He was writhing on the bed. The stroke had destroyed his mental capacity, and he was struggling against approaching death. It was a pretty horrible scene.

After a time, the doctors brought me closer to the bed so that I could pray for him. I prayed a short prayer similar to one I’ve prayed with some of you. Because of his condition, I prayed both for his healing and, if he could not be healed, for Jesus to be with him. I don’t think the doctors believed that Walter could understand a word I was saying. However, all of a sudden, he lifted his hands and he began to close his fist and open first with two fingers and then with three. After a couple of times I recognized that Walter was giving me the number, 23. He was signaling me that his mind was not going and he was repeating over and over again, “Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will fear no evil, for thou art with me. Thy rod and Thy staff, they comfort me” (Psalm 23:4).

There are times when we face great difficulties. There are times when God seems to be absent. There are times when our prayers are not answered. It is the testimony of Jesus, and of all the great saints of history, that God can be hidden from us, but he is present to us even when he seems absent from us. Jesus can sympathize with us during these times because he too faced a time when God seemed distant. While the primary meaning of Jesus death on the cross involves our salvation, it also means that God can and does suffer all that we suffer and is with us in all that we suffer until that day when we can also cry out in victory, “It is finished.”

This series has been an attempt to show that the Christian life involves living through the same experiences that God lived through for and with us in the Life and Death of Jesus. It has not been an easy or pleasant series. Next week, we will celebrate Easter with joy–the joy we have because we know that betrayal, disappointment, injustice, suffering, and abandonment do not and will not have the lats word. The last word is our assurance of life because of Easter and what Easter means.

Copyright 2016, G. Christopher Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

[1] See, William Barclay, “The Gospel According to Matthew” in Volume 2, The Daily Bible Study Series Rev. Ed. (Philadelphia, PA: Westminster Press, 1975), 369-370.

Kathy and I are working on a new Salt & Light Chapter. Therefore, since I have been working on it, this week I thought that I would share it with you. As always, any comments are welcome and appreciated, especially proofing comments.

LEARNING TO BE WISE

Once we come to believe in God, we begin a journey that will last the rest of our lives. From the day we become a disciple of Christ, we begin a journey of becoming like Christ, of learning to conduct ourselves as Jesus did. And, in becoming more like Jesus, we become more like God because Jesus Christ reveals what God is like.

When the apostles thought about Christ they came to a surprising conclusion: The Jewish Rabbi, Jesus bar Joseph, who was crucified under Pontius Pilate and died a terrible death was in fact the Word (Logos), or divine reason of God made flesh—God in human form (John 1:1). This wisdom of God was not what the Jews expected. It was not merely a vindication of traditional wisdom. Instead it was a mysterious wisdom (Colossians 2:2-3). In the end, the wisdom of God was revealed in the life, teachings, sacrificial death, and resurrection of Jesus.

The Jews were familiar with the idea that, if one lived in conformity with the laws of God, one would become wise and righteous and be blessed by God. The Psalmists sang songs of this wisdom. In fact, the very first Psalm was an ode to the blessings of wisdom in following the law:

Blessed is the one
who does not walk in step with the wicked
or stand in the way that sinners take
or sit in the company of mockers,
but whose delight is in the law of the Lord,
and who meditates on his law day and night.
That person is like a tree planted by streams of water,
which yields its fruit in season
and whose leaf does not wither—
whatever they do prospers.
Not so the wicked! They are like chaff
that the wind blows away.
Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment,
nor sinners in the assembly of the righteous.
For the Lord watches over the way of the righteous,
but the way of the wicked leads to destruction.

Books like Proverbs set out this expectation in detail. Once a person had faith in God, they had grasped the first principle of wisdom. A deep respect for God (“the fear of the Lord”) opened up a way of life that issued in wisdom.

My son, do not forget my teaching,
    but keep my commands in your heart,
for they will prolong your life many years
    and bring you peace and prosperity.
Let love and faithfulness never leave you;
    bind them around your neck,
    write them on the tablet of your heart.
Then you will win favor and a good name
    in the sight of God and man.
Trust in the Lord with all your heart
    and lean not on your own understanding;
in all your ways submit to him,
    and he will make your paths straight.[a]
Do not be wise in your own eyes;
    fear the Lord and shun evil (Proverbs 3:1-7).

Prophets, like Isaiah, confirmed that to live according to God’s law, or torah, brought blessings, but to disregard the law was foolish and brought with it pain, failure, and defeat.

Jesus, when he was on earth, told his disciples that he was greater than Solomon, meaning this wisdom was greater, and more important than the wisdom taught by the wise men of Israel (Matthew 12:42; Luke 11:31). Paul saw that this promise of jesus was true. There was in Christ a deep wisdom, beyond human wisdom. In First Corinthians he put it this way:

For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe. Jews demand signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength (I Cor. 1:21-24).

In Christ, wisdom and love came together in a perfection of both. There was no love greater than the love Christ showed on the Cross and no wisdom greater than the wisdom of God in Christ. For Paul, Christians should live wisely—and that wisdom was fully seen in Christ.

Almost every letter Paul writes begins by talking about Jesus and ends by talking about how we ought to live because of who God is and what God has done for us in Christ. In Ephesians 5, for example, Paul says, Be very careful, then, how you live–not as unwise but as wise,… (Ephesians 5:15). Just before this admonition, Paul speaks of the very same things that the wisdom writers spoke of: the need for personal morality, love, etc. Here is the entire passage:

For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light (for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth) and find out what pleases the Lord. Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them. It is shameful even to mention what the disobedient do in secret. But everything exposed by the light becomes visible—and everything that is illuminated becomes a light. 14 This is why it is said:
“Wake up, sleeper,
rise from the dead,
and Christ will shine on you.”
Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is. Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one another with psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit. Sing and make music from your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ (Eph. 5:8-20).

Questions for Reflection

1. Paul begins by suggesting that we should try to live as children of light (often used as a symbol for wisdom). What does it mean to you to live in the light? What qualities do “Light filled people” have?

2.  Paul then tells us to avoid the “fruitless deeds of darkness.” in your opinion, was kind of deeds are “deeds of darkness”?
What are some specific behaviors that Paul seems to think are deeds of darkness, not fitting for Christians to practice?

 

Questions for Practical Application

1. In what areas of your life do you detect a kind of darkness that needs to be healed?

2. How do you think you are doing in some specific areas:

Your willingness to respect (fear) and obey God”

 

Your willingness to work hard”
Your ability to hold your tongue and speak wisely?

 

Your ability to show respect for yourself, others, and especially to behave well with members of the opposite sex?

 

Your ability to avoid excessive alcohol and drugs?

 

Your desire to become wiser and more loving day-by-day:

 

3. What is the one area in which you would like to change the most?

 

 

Salt and Light is a twenty-four week discipling program with three parts: Becoming a Christian, Being a Christian, and Leading others to Christ. It is broken into three eight week segments. A new version will be ready by the fall of 2016.

Copyright 2016, Chris and Kathy Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

This week, the blog is from Matthew 27:11-26. This blog differs considerably from the sermon containing much information that it was not possible to include in a sermon. It is a bit headier than normal, but it deals with what I believe to be a critical problem in our society–the loss of faith in justice. I have tried to keep the most abstract portions of the argument to footnotes.

Years ago, I represented a company in connection with the sale of some assets. The transaction was not a success. Eventually, there was a lawsuit. My deposition was taken, a large number of documents were produced, and eventually I was called to testify. While I was on the witness stand, I was shown a piece of paper. It was in my handwriting and it contained a series of calculations showing that we owed the plaintiffs a substantial amount of money. I had no memory of this document, but it was in my handwriting. I’m afraid I looked like a fool on the witness stand.

During lunch break, while the lawyers prepared for the afternoon, I wandered around the conference room looking at boxes and boxes of legal documents. I saw one file in which there was a document that was not in order. I reached down to straighten the file, picked up the document, and to my surprise it was the very document I had been questioned about that morning. There was, however, a slight difference. The document I’d been shown had one column showing what we owed the plaintiffs. The actual document had two columns reflecting the fact that they owed us substantially more money than we owed them. I don’t know when I have ever been more furious. The simple fact is that the lawyers that copied, cut, and pasted the original document into a new form treated me unjustly.

There are all kinds of injustices in life. Older siblings are blamed for younger siblings misdeeds. Younger siblings mistreated by elder brothers and sisters. Parents sometimes misjudge the actions of a child and punish them unjustly. Children have false memories and misjudge the actions of their parents. Men can be unjust to women, and women to men. The rich can take advantage of the poo, and the poor can take advantage of the rich. The powerful can take advantage of the weak. The world is filled with injustice of many kinds.

Jesus in the Dock.

Jesus was no stranger to injustice. During the last day of his life, Jesus was treated unjustly. When arrested, Jesus was first brought before a former High Priest, Annas (John 18:12-13). Then, he was taken to the house of Caiaphas, the current High Priest, who together with at least a part of the Sanhedrin tried him in the middle of the night (Matthew 26:57). This was contrary to Jewish practice. [1]

It is evident from Matthew that Caiaphas had no real interest in understanding Jesus or his mission. His interrogation was focused  on finding a way to have Jesus killed. Because the Jews could not execute Jesus without the approval of Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor, early in the morning the Sanhedrin met again to formally vote and transfer Jesus to Pilate (Matthew 27:1). It was at this point the Judas realized what he had done, attempted to give back the blood money, and committed suicide (27:2-10).

Our text for this blog picks up at Matthew 27:11:

Meanwhile Jesus stood before the governor, and the governor asked him, “Are you the king of the Jews?” “You have said so,” Jesus replied. When he was accused by the chief priests and the elders, he gave no answer. Then Pilate asked him, “Don’t you hear the testimony they are bringing against you?” But Jesus made no reply, not even to a single charge—to the great amazement of the governor. Now it was the governor’s custom at the festival to release a prisoner chosen by the crowd. At that time they had a well-known prisoner whose name was Jesus Barabbas. So when the crowd had gathered, Pilate asked them, “Which one do you want me to release to you: Jesus Barabbas, or Jesus who is called the Messiah?”  For he knew it was out of self-interest that they had handed Jesus over to him. While Pilate was sitting on the judge’s seat, his wife sent him this message: “Don’t have anything to do with that innocent man, for I have suffered a great deal today in a dream because of him.” But the chief priests and the elders persuaded the crowd to ask for Barabbas and to have Jesus executed. “Which of the two do you want me to release to you?” asked the governor. “Barabbas,” they answered. “What shall I do, then, with Jesus who is called the Messiah?” Pilate asked. They all answered, “Crucify him!” “Why? What crime has he committed?” asked Pilate. But they shouted all the louder, “Crucify him!” When Pilate saw that he was getting nowhere, but that instead an uproar was starting, he took water and washed his hands in front of the crowd. “I am innocent of this man’s blood,” he said. “It is your responsibility!” All the people answered, “His blood is on us and on our children!” Then he released Barabbas to them. But he had Jesus flogged, and handed him over to be crucified (Matthew 27: 11-26).

Justice and Injustice.

The first thing I would like to do is clarify the idea of justice. Justice, in its simplest form, involves treating people fairly. Justice is getting what you deserve. On a deeper level, however, justice has two aspects:

1. First, there is what we might call procedural justice. The notion of procedural justice is that people are all treated the same and in a fair manner when they are being tried for some offense. Our court system was designed to provide procedures that ensure that those who are subject to trial get a fair one.
2. There is a second implication of justice, which is that people actually receive what they deserve. This notion of justice is sometimes called “equity” or substantive justice. The notion is that there is more to justice than fair procedure. People need to receive the punishment or absence of punishment to which they are entitled.

I’m afraid that the notion of justice is in deep trouble in our society. Many years ago, Justice Holmes wrote, “The first requirement of a sound body of law is, that it should correspond with the actual feelings and demands of the community, whether right or wrong.”  [2] Since his day, our law has become increasingly a war for majority control based upon the assumption that whatever the majority wants defines justice for the moment. Justice has become whatever the Congress passes, the President approves, and a majority of the Supreme Court upholds. Nothing could be more wrongheaded. This notion of justice, useful as it may seem, can too easily become manipulation by elites or mob rule. In our time, this has produced a legal system in which justice is defined as whoever wins a legal dispute or policy debate, however they win.

In a democracy, this idea of justice leads to the of manipulation of public opinion to find support for polices elites and others desire to enact. We see this from both sides of the political spectrum, from legislators and judges of conservative and liberal leanings. There is little concern to find a just and fair resolution of public debates. The emphasis is on finding the support to win. This leads, and has led, to the kind of negative, attack politics that characterizes the current election. This inevitably leads to an unjust society.

Jesus and Injustice.

During the last day of his life, Jesus was faced with people who believed that justice was whatever was in their best interests at the moment. Both the High Priests and Pontius Pilate were driven by expediency. By the time Jesus was arrested, his preaching, teaching, miracles, and mighty deeds had caused many people to believe that he might be the Messiah. This was dangerous as far as many important people were concerned. In particular, the Pharisees, Sadducees, priests, teachers of the law, and elders of the people, those in power, were threatened by his teaching. They didn’t understand what Jesus was about, but they feared him and what he might mean for them.

The Jewish leaders were particularly concerned that, if Jesus were to lead an uprising, the Romans would send in an army and destroy their lives and their positions of influence. In John, Caiaphas, the high priest, says “…it is better for you that one man die for the people than that the whole nation perish” (John 11:57). By this, Caiaphas meant that, if Jesus were to lead an uprising, successful or not, it would mean the end of the way of life to which they were all accustomed. It would be the end of their power and affluence. It was better for Jesus to die.

When Jesus was arrested, he was eventually brought before Caiaphas. Initially, Caiaphas tried to find witnesses who would testify to some misdeed that would justify putting him to death (Matt. 26:57-63). They brought a false and ridiculous charge based upon Jesus’ prophecy that, if he were killed, he would rebuild the temple of his own body in three days (John 2:29). When this failed, Caiaphas took another tact. He asked Jesus under oath if he was the Messiah, the Son of God (Matt. 26:63). Jesus answered in the affirmative, but also in such a way as to indicate that his kingdom was a heavenly kingdom from which he would come in the future (v. 64). [3] This claim contained nothing that would cause Jesus to be put to death.

Jesus, on the face of it, does not threaten a rebellion. He describes a Messiah and a Kingdom of God much different than Jewish expectations. As I was reading this week, I noticed that Caiaphas did not even try to find out what Jesus meant. Instead, Caiaphas immediately said there was no need for any other witnesses. He simply concludes that Jesus is worthy of death (v. 65-66). In this trial, there was not even an attempt at justice.

Early in the morning, the Sanhedrin met again and confirmed that Jesus must die, sending him to Pilate for his verdict (Matt. 27:1). [4] Jesus was then brought before Pilate (v. 11). Pilate, as a Roman governor, had no interest in Jewish religious disputes, such as who was or was not the Messiah of Israel or what it meant to be the Messiah. The question for Pilate was whether or not Jesus believed that he was a king who would lead an uprising against Rome and establish his own kingdom (v. 11). Pilate almost immediately realized that Jesus is innocent of any crime deserving death. In a private audience Jesus revealed that his kingdom is not of this world; it is a kingdom of truth (John 18:30). Once again, having an otherworldly kingdom of truth was not a crime under Roman law.

At this point, Pilate knew Jesus was an innocent man. He wanted to release him. Nevertheless, after a brief interlude where Jesus was sent to King Herod for questioning (Luke 24:6), Herod found himself backed into a corner. He attempted to release Jesus by giving the Jews a choice between the release of Jesus and the release of a notorious criminal called Barabbas (Matt. 27:16-17). The crowd, being incited by the leaders of the people, repeatedly choose Barabbas. Pilate, warned by his wife to have nothing to do with this innocent man, desperately looked for a way out of the situation (vv. 15-19). Nevertheless, the crowd continueed to ask for Barabbas.

In the end, Pilate delivered Jesus over to be crucified, washing his hands of the entire situation (vv. 20-26). Pilate at least tried to give Jesus justice, but he did not have the moral fiber to deliver him from his accusers.  His interest in justice collapsed in the face of injustice.

So there you have it: the Pharisees, Sadducees, priests, teachers of the law, and other leaders of the people condemned Jesus out of fear, envy and a desire for their own advantage. Pilate condemned him for personal advantage. Both knew they had condemned an innocent man.

A Christian Response to Injustice.

The story of Jesus’ unjust trial has been played out many times in history. In the last century, various regimes have conducted so-called “Show Trials” to convict innocent people they felt were dangers to the ruling elites. Hitler did it. Mussolini did it. Stalin did it. Mao Tse Tung did it.  All the evil dictators of history have done it. In Nazi Germany, Martin Neimoller, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and others were persecuted by the Nazi regime for their Christian faith and opposition to Nazi policies. One of my favorite Bonhoeffer quotes is, “Silence in the face of evil is evil itself.” [5] Martin Neimoller, a German pastor, put it this way:

“First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out because I was not a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me and there was no one left to speak for me. [6]

I am afraid that the kind of injustice that has occurred elsewhere can occur here in our land. Many people have noted that Germany was the most advanced nation in Europe when it fell victim to Hitler. In our own time, certain aspects of a nihilistic postmodernism and an excessive pragmatism have left many people without any faith in the existence of justice. Commentators have noted that the press, the media, and the politicians of our nation seem to have learned more from Joseph Goebbels and the Nazi propaganda machine than from Jesus. Increasingly, the media, Congress, the Courts and other institutions of society are used manipulatively to gain and maintain power. [7]

The great philosopher of science and defender of freedom, Michael Polanyi, says this about our society:

“A new destructive skepticism is linked here to a new passionate social conscience; and utter disbelief in the spirit of man is coupled with extravagant moral demands. We see at work here the form of action which is already dealt so many shattering blows to the modern world: the chisel of skepticism driven by the hammer of social passion. [8]

Polanyi goes on to say, “Savagery is always there lurking among us, but it can break loose on a grand scale only when rebellious moral passions first break up the controls of civilization.” [9]

The greatest threat to our society, and to the freedom we enjoy, including religious freedom, is the way in which our culture disbelieves in the reality of justice and truth. Paradoxically, the human soul cannot live without a desire for justice and truth. Cut off from faith in the reality of truth and justice, human beings become vulnerable to a demonic desire for justice that destroys justice in the search for a perfect society. In Soviet Russia and Communist China, the world saw the brutality that is possible when people seek a moral ideal without the constraints of the deep and abiding morality and faith. It is only when the life of every individual is as valuable as my notion of the perfect society that freedom and respect for people can flourish in the midst of the search for a better world.

A Ministry of Love and Forgiveness.

There is nothing more needed in our culture than for Christians to embrace the need for truth and justice, and our belief in its reality. [10] We need to believe we are called to seek justice, wherever that search leads us. In the Old Testament, lone of the great complaints of the prophets was against the injustice of Jewish society before the Babylonian captivity. The prophet Isaiah put it this way:

Surely the arm of the Lord is not too short to save, nor his ear too dull to hear. But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you,  so that he will not hear. For your hands are stained with blood, your fingers with guilt. Your lips have spoken falsely, and your tongue mutters wicked things.  No one calls for justice; no one pleads a case with integrity. They rely on empty arguments, they utter lies; they conceive trouble and give birth to evil. They hatch the eggs of vipers and spin a spider’s web. Whoever eats their eggs will die, and when one is broken, an adder is hatched. Their cobwebs are useless for clothing;   they cannot cover themselves with what they make. Their deeds are evil deeds, and acts of violence are in their hands. Their feet rush into sin; are swift to shed innocent blood. They pursue evil schemes; acts of violence mark their ways. The way of peace they do not know; there is no justice in their paths. They have turned them into crooked roads; no one who walks along them will know peace. So justice is far from us, and righteousness does not reach us. We look for light, but all is darkness; for brightness, but we walk in deep shadows. Like the blind we grope along the wall,  feeling our way like people without eyes. At midday we stumble as if it were twilight;  among the strong, we are like the dead. We all growl like bears; we moan mournfully like doves. We look for justice, but find none;   for deliverance, but it is far away (Isaiah 59:1-11).

The society Isaiah pictures is frighteningly like our society. Having lost our commitment to the reality of justice and truth and to the transcendent moral and ethical principles upon which our nation is based, we have lost the capacity to seek justice in any but a formal way. More than that, we have become subject to view our own prejudices and desires as a substitute for the search for justice for all.

Our deliverance will not come unless we recommit ourselves to the principles and moral commitments that allowed us to become free in the first place. As the embodiment of truth, as the one who came to establish a kingdom of truth, Jesus is for Christians the best way to explore the way to that truth and justice we believe to be written into the very fabric of the universe God created. As the wisdom of God incarnate, the very Word of God, he is able to deliver us from our addiction to power and our fears of what we might give up were justice to come among us.

Of course all deliverance requires a deliverer, one who can deliver us from our self-seeking and propensity for injustice. We need a savior, a deliverer. What happened to Jesus was not fair, not just, not equitable, not deserved. Jesus had the power of God and might have lashed out against those who unfairly judged him. Instead, he said “Father forgive them for they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34). He showed loving forgiveness, even in the face of injustice. He did not destroy injustice by an act of violence; he overcame it by Truth showing its reality in Divine Love.

We are called to show this same love in our own culture as we seek to heal its deep spiritual and moral wounds—and there is no wound deeper than the loss of faith in the reality of justice as something outside of our own desires or ideologies.

It is true, as Bonhoeffer noted, that those who act unjustly need to be exposed and called to account. It is also true that there has to be an end to the anger injustice creates. If we cannot release our anger in the service of truth and love, we are doomed to live in a state of brokenness ourselves—a brokenness from which Christ died on a cross to deliver us. Amen.

Copyright 2016, G. Christopher Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

[1] This is one of those times where it is impossible to give credit to every source. I have looked at several books, including: James Stalker, The Trial and Death of Jesus (Grand Rapids, Zondervan, 1983) and Dale Foreman, Crucify Him: A Lawyer Looks at the Trial of Jesus (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1990), among other works and commentaries.

[2] This is a quote from Oliver Wendell Holmes in his book, The Common Law. Unfortunately, I could not find another equally troubling quote defining justice is whatever the majority wants bad enough to force its will on society. https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/tag/jurisprudence (downloaded March 3, 2016). Holmes was a proponent of what is sometimes called “Legal Realism” and “Legal Positivism.” These scholars and judges were and are entranced with the idea that, in a free society, justice is defined as the majority of those in power define it. There is good in legal realism and positivism. However, in its simplistic form it can mean the end of justice, as it becomes simply a word we apply to the winner in a legal contest.

[3] There is no reason to believe that claiming to be the Messiah was of itself grounds for anyone to fear Jesus or have him put to death. Caiaphas’ questions disclose that he was subject to the common belief that the messiah would be a military leader who would lead an uprising. Claiming to be a Son of God would lead a Roman governor to put a claimant to death. Trying to lead a rebellion would. This is was what Caiaphas was after. Caiaphas never asks what kind of Messiah Jesus claims to be. He assumes he knows. See footnote 1 above for the sources of my study for this part of the blog.

[4] Scholars do not agree as to how to construe the trial. It seems possible that earlier, only a small number of the Sanhedrin had met; now the entire Sanhedrin was meeting to condemn Jesus. Of course, it is possible that they did not want to be accused by Pilate of holding an illegal night trial so they met again to pass final sentence on Jesus.

[5]www.azquotes.com/picture-quotes/quote-silence-in-the-face-of-evil-is-evil-itself-dietrich-bonhoeffer-87-28-79.jpg (Downloaded March 3, 2016).

[6] The quotation stems from Niemöller’s lectures during the early postwar period. See, www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007392 (downloaded March 3, 2016).

[7] This week, I received a frightening and intriguing article about a study done concerning the way search engines can be and are used in our society to manipulate public opinion, particularly during election years. One party will be characterized as “concerned” while another will be characterized as “angry.” On a number of levels, this kind of manipulation occurs because people have ceased to believe in truth. They believe only in power. In the past, a candidate who was a great natural athlete was characterized as clumsy. In another race a candidate with an MBA from Harvard was characterized as intellectually weak, while a candidate who left school was characterized as intellectually gifted. The cases of media manipulation are so large that no article could possibly contain them all.

[8] Michael Polanyi, Logic of Liberty (Indianapolis, IN: Liberty Fund, 1951), 5.

[9] Id, at 5.

[10] One helpful insight of modern quantum physics is that there are many different levels and kinds of reality. At the deepest quantum level the universe seems to dissolve into an immaterial potentiality that we can examine, and the character of our examination influences the reality we observe.  In my view, justice is “real,” and the search for justice proves its reality as justice continues to reveal itself as we seek the transcendent ideal of justice in our lives and politics. The reality of a thing is not a quality of materiality or its ability to be perceived by a detached observer, but of its potential power to act upon us for good or for evil. In the case of justice, the search for justice disciplines our human prejudices as we seek a transcendent good which reveals itself to us as we submit to its reality in the search for it. (This note is a refection based upon Michael Polanyi, Science, Faith and Society (Chicago,IL: University of Chicago Press, 1964), wherein Polanyi constructs a realistic defense of the search for truth and universal values, and Ian Barbor, Religion in an Age of Science (San Francisco, CA: Harper SanFrancisco, 1990), 97-101. and Personal Knowledge: Towards a Post-Critical Philosophy (University of Chicago Press, 1958).) Polanyi, who was a doctor and chemist, also speaks of “levels of meaning,” each level dependent upon but also free and emergent as respect to lower levels of reality. Justice is proved real in the search for it by those who believe in its existence and its capacity to reveal itself to human beings who properly seek it with faith that it will continue to bear fruit and reveal itself in the future. This is the same spirit in which scientists seek truth in the invisible and immaterial subatomic world. The great physicist David Bohm speaks of the unfolding of layers of implicate order, including implicate orders of meaning present even at the the subatomic level. These levels of meaning disclose themselves as they are unfolded into reality. See, David Bohm, Wholeness and Implicate Order (London, ENG: Routledge Publishing, 1980).

As we read Matthew 26:36-46, we can see Jesus dealing with disappointment. Just like Jesus, we will deal with disappointment in our lives. How we deal with disappointment is important in our walk with Christ. In this blog we look at how to deal with disappointment with wisdom and love.

We are in the third week of this series on God as our Deliverer taken from the last part of Matthew. We began with a general idea of God in Christ by the power of the Spirit as our D
eliverer. Last week, we talked about how the life of Jesus reflects deliverance from betrayal. This week, we are going to talk about deliverance from disappointment.

We can all think if times when we have been disappointed with another person. In the Wednesday night Bible study this week, I asked the group to close their eyes and think of an instance when they had been disappointed by another person. Every single person immediately smiled! Disappointment is a part of the human condition. Sooner or later we are all going to be disappointed and we are all going to disappoint another person.

Since it’s a political year, I thought I would begin with a story without mentioning a person or political party. Some time ago, I voted for someone in an election. I felt extremely good about my vote. I felt this person was honorable, experienced, and wise. As time went on, I began to change my mind and began to believe I had been mistaken about this person. in other words, I was disappointed in my vote and in the person for whom I voted. Even to this very day, I’m occasionally angry about that vote.

There are few human emotions more common or more discouraging than feelings of disappointment. One movie scene I have watched over and over again in more than one movie has a workaholic parent promise a child that he or she will be at a soccer game or other sports activity. When game time comes, the parent is missing. The camera always focuses on the child’s face—and the look of disappointment. Disappointment is a strong and moving emotion. It can scar us for life if we do not learn how to deal with it.

A Moment of Disappointment.

On the night Jesus was betrayed, three important episodes occurred: First, Jesus met with his disciples for a final Passover dinner, during which Jesus acknowledged that he would be betrayed by Judas (Matt. 26:25). Later, Jesus let the disciples know that they would all desert him (v. 31). When Peter assured Jesus that he would never desert Jesus even if everyone else did (33), Jesus responded that Peter would desert him before the rooster crowed in the dawn (v. 34). Finally, when Jesus stopped to pray in the Garden of Gethsemane. He asked his disciples to pray with him (v. 36). In each of these instances, Jesus might have been disappointed and discouraged by the behavior of others.

Our text this morning is from Matthew 26. Hear the word of God as comes to us from the Gospel according to Matthew:

Then Jesus went with his disciples to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to them, “Sit here while I go over there and pray.” He took Peter and the two sons of Zebedee along with him, and he began to be sorrowful and troubled. Then he said to them, “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me.” Going a little farther, he fell with his face to the ground and prayed, “My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will.” Then he returned to his disciples and found them sleeping. “Couldn’t you men keep watch with me for one hour?” he asked Peter. “Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.” He went away a second time and prayed, “My Father, if it is not possible for this cup to be taken away unless I drink it, may your will be done.” When he came back, he again found them sleeping, because their eyes were heavy. So he left them and went away once more and prayed the third time, saying the same thing. Then he returned to the disciples and said to them, “Are you still sleeping and resting? Look, the hour has come, and the Son of Man is delivered into the hands of sinners. Rise! Let us go! Here comes my betrayer!” (Matthew 26:36-46).

Let us Pray: Faithful God: you are the only one who will not disappoint us, and you are the only one who can teach us how to avoid disappointment. Please share with us your wisdom and your love. Amen

What is Disappointment?

Disappointment is a sadness, anxiety, or displeasure when a person, persons, or situation does not fulfill our expectations, hopes or dreams. I have already given a couple of examples. If a politician does not live up to our expectation of what kind of person he or she will be as a leader, we are disappointed. If a parent does not live up to our expectations, we are disappointed. If a child does not live up to our expectations, we are disappointed. If God does not live up to our expectations, we are disappointed. This last kind of disappointment can be the most devastating kind of disappointment of all, if we do not learn how to deal with it. Philip Yancy, years ago wrote a book called, Disappointment with God. We can actually desert God because God does not do what we expect God to do.

Here is how one psychologist described the feeling of being disappointed:

When sadness is triggered, a heavy emptiness or longing is felt because your brain‘s appraisal system has determined that you have experienced a lasting loss. You may want to have someone or something that is unattainable or to bring back what was lost, even if what caused your sadness has to do with finally recognizing something that you had subsequently denied. Sadness is a painful emotion of disconnection from someone or something that you value or had wanted to value…..Sadness helps you to remember, rather than forget, what it is or was that you desired. … Thus, the emotion of sadness attempts to assist you by giving you an opportunity to consider the impact of your loss and the necessity of revising your objectives and strategies for the future. One study found that sadness tends to decrease one’s confidence in first impressions (Schwartz, 1990). Another found that the experience of sadness leads one to struggle with the painful, existential question of “Who am I?” (Henretty, Levitt, & Mathews, 2008). If sadness can help you to remember and accept reality, achieve insight that can realign your goals, alert you to be cautious before making decisions, and create an opportunity for you to observe yourself, then perhaps its adaptive purpose is evident: like all emotions, sadness, in spite of how it makes you feel, is simply trying to protect you. Disappointment is a profound way in which sadness is experienced. In any case, disappointment is the experience of sadness involving unfulfilled hopes or expectations. When you consider what might have been, in contrast to what exists in the present, you may experience disappointment. [1]

Not surprisingly, disappointment can impact us for years after our disappointment. One reason for Christians to learn to deal with disappointment and its pain in our lives is that not doing so can actually harm us and those we love.

The Big Requirement.

Not everyone agrees with this, but I think generally disappointment requires that we have a personal relationship that causes our disappointment. Even though an institution or event causes a disappointment, there is normally a person or persons behind that event. In other words, disappointment is  a relational emotion. We are disappointed because we are in relationship with other persons who fail  to meet our expectations. Once in a while you see on the Internet or on a poster words to the effect of: “If you want to avoid disappointment, don’t expect anything from other people.” The problem with this advice is that only a person without deep relationships can avoid the disappointment that inevitably comes from human relationships. Such a person would not be fully human. If we want to experience the joys of human life, we run the inevitable risk of disappointment.

We do have reasonable expectations of friends, spouses, parents, children, bosses, employees, leaders, followers, neighbors, and fellow church members, even of God. These expectations are part of our relationship with that person. Friends, spouses, parents, children, bosses, employees, followers, neighbors, church members, all have expectations of performance and loyalty of care and concern—we all have many expectations. Sometimes people, even God, can fail to meet our expectations.

The book of Job is one long examination of the Jewish expectation that wisdom and righteousness would be rewarded with blessing. The wise men of Israel knew, of course, that this does not always happen, and Job examines that problem. I have known people to become deeply disappointed with God and lose their faith, I myself have experienced the deep disappointment that comes when we cannot figure out why God permits a situation to exist or continue. In the end, we all expect God to do many things that, in his Divine Wisdom and Love, he does not do. We have to learn to live with this aspect of God’s Divine Personhood.

Two Kinds of Expectations and Disappointments,

At this point, I need to introduce an important distinction: We can have two kinds of expectations and two kinds of disappointments. We can have warranted (justified) expectations, and we can have unwarranted (unjustified) expectations. Therefore, we can have justified and unjustified disappointments!

For example, I may expect Kathy to always have dinner ready when I get home, despite the fact she has no idea when I will arrive and never arrive at the same time two nights in a row. Furthermore, I may never inform her of my plans. If I expect Kathy to have dinner ready at any moment just in case I arrive home at any given moment, I have an unwarranted expectation! If I expect a child with average athletic abilities to play college football, I have an unwarranted expectation. If I expect God to answer all my selfish prayers, I have an unwarranted expectation.

This leads me to a conclusion we all need to remember: When we are disappointed, the first questions we should ask ourselves are, (i) “Why?” and (ii) “Am I justified in feeling disappointed?” If the answer is that I have an unjustified or unwarranted expectation, then my disappointment is not the other person’s fault. It’s my fault, and I need to do with myself! This is especially true of God, where our human expectations are almost always finite, limited, and self-centered. As Job finally concludes, we human beings are simply too limited to understand or appreciate all that God allows or does in our lives. Sometimes, all we have to rely upon is our faith that God loves us and the hope that comes from that faith. We also have the example of Jesus, who after all, was “A man of suffering, acquainted with grief” (Isaiah 53:3).

Jesus and Disappointment.

Every part of the last night of Jesus’s life was disappointing. Judas should have been a loyal to Jesus, but Judas disappointed Jesus. Peter and the other disciples should not have deserted Jesus, but they did. The disciples ought to have stayed awake, waited, and prayed for one hour, but they did not. In the case of Peter, he was the leader of the disciples. He had a responsibility to set a good example. He failed.

In each of these cases, Jesus had a reasonable expectation! He was the Son of God and their leader. He had a right to expect their loyalty, their diligence, and their prayers. Jesus’ expectations were completely reasonable, and any disappointment he felt was fully justified. We can even tell that Jesus was disappointed. The phrase, “Could you not watch with me one hour?” (v. 40), expresses his disappointment.

When we are disappointed, it’s a good thing to remember that Jesus was disappointed too. In Hebrews, there is a phrase that reads, “He was tempted in all ways as we are” (Hebrews 4:15). This phrase is a reminder that Jesus experienced the human condition. He experienced every emotion, every trial, every disappointment, every hardship, and every experience, we will ever experience. He suffered as we suffer. He even suffered the disappointment of human failure and prayers not answered as he desired in his humanity.

If we look closely at how Jesus dealt with his disappointment; we can learn some things.

• First, Jesus understands. He understands Judas. He understands Peter. He understands the disciples. He recognizes the human condition. Often, we base our expectations on a misunderstanding of what human beings are capable of achieving. My mother expected me to make my bed, but sometimes I disappointed her. Children are capable of cleaning up their rooms or making their beds, but they are not capable of doing it every day without error.
• Second, Jesus communicates his expectations and his disappointment. The phrase, “Could you not watch with me for one hour?” expresses exactly what Jesus felt. Often, we do not communicate our disappointment and allow our pain and anger to fester. Early in our marriage, being a good husband, I told Kathy how much I liked boiled chicken. She responded by cooking a lot of broiled chicken. Unfortunately, I was just being nice. I really am not that fond of broiled chicken. She was shocked when I finally told her that I didn’t like boiled chicken all that much. Since that time, we only have one chicken once in a while, and I’ve come to like it. People cannot meet our reasonable expectations if we never communicate to them what they are. Once again, we should be careful about communicating unreasonable expectations.
• Third, Jesus tries to help the disciples meet his expectations. At one point, Jesus looks at Peter and says, “The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak” (v. 41). Jesus knew that the disciples had just consumed a large Passover dinner. He knew they had had a glass of wine or two. He knew they were sleepy. Therefore, he understood they needed to exercise self-control. He knew it wouldn’t be easy to stay awake and pray. So he encouraged them, voicing his understanding of their situation to help them.
• Fourth, Jesus did not get angry. He didn’t say, “Okay, I’m dying for the rest of the world but not for you guys. You don’t deserve it.” He doesn’t say, “The soldiers are here, and if you guys had not slept God would save me!” He simply said, “Rise let us go!” (v. 46). Jesus does not play the blame game.
• Finally, Jesus did the right thing. Even though the disciples disappointed him, he continued on his divine mission to save the world and them. When we’re disappointed, it’s important for us to remember that the fact that another person has failed us does not give us the right to fail them. In fact, when another person fails us and we continue to love them and do what is best by them, we are doing exactly what Jesus would do.

Conclusion.

Jesus could not avoid being disappointed with others, and neither can we. It is part of the human condition. What we can do is deal with disappointment with the same wisdom and love Jesus did. This means recognizing the fact of human frailty, not having unrealistic expectations, and dealing with disappointment with the same wisdom and love that Jesus did. In the end, this is not possible without the Spirit of God working in our lives to give us that wisdom and love and empower us to move forward.

Copyright 2016, G. Christopher Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

[1] Mary C. Lamb, PhD, “Expectation, Disappointment, and Sadness” in Psychology Today, www. psychologytoday.com/blog/intense-emotions-and-strong-feelings/201111/expectation-disappointment-and-sadness (Posted November 20, 2011).

This week, our focus is on Matthew 26:1-5; 14-18 and the character of Betrayal and restoration.

Kathy and I have become occasional, and in Kathy’s case, reluctant, watchers of the television show, “Agents of Shield.” [1] It currently appears that Agent Ward has betrayed his colleagues, and especially “Skye,” who is emotionally attached to him and to whom he is also emotionally attached. It turns out that Agent Ward is not really a loyal agent of Shield; he has betrayed Shield, his team, and his love, having been an agent of the enemy, Hydra, all along. In addition,

A scene in which Skye confronts Agent Ward mesmerized me. She was really mad. Her love for Grant Ward has turned to disgust at who Ward really is and what Ward has done. She turns him into the police, she berates him publically, and she finally reveals that she would rather die than give Ward what he wants from her. The actress who plays Skye does a wonderful job of portraying the anger and fury one feels at betrayal.

Today, we are visiting about the subject of betrayal, forgiveness, restoration, and the life of wisdom and love. Betrayal is a feature of fallen human existence. Everyone to some degree feels betrayed by someone during the course of life. Lovers, spouses, business partners, friends, fellow church members, sooner or later all feel betrayed to some degree at some point in life. Worse, we all betray someone who is entitled to our trust to one degree or another at some point in life. It can be a big betrayal, or as small as disclosing some trivial secret. Therefore, we need to understand how to be delivered from betrayal.

This week, I wrote a  meditation for Facebook and to be included  in the bulletin that says, “There is no worse experience than the experience of being betrayed. The experience of being betrayed is unbelievably painful–and so is the shame and guilt of being a betrayer. The betrayed needs to be delivered from the anger that comes from being betrayed, and the betrayer needs to be delivered from the shame and guilt of betrayal. Judas dies because he cannot escape his guilt. Peter is restored because he can accept forgiveness and change.” This points out an interesting fact: Everyone involved in a betrayal needs a kind of deliverance.

Text and Prayer.

Briefly, our  occurs on Wednesday of Holy Week. Jesus has entered the city of Jerusalem. He has confronted the priests, Pharisees and Sadduces. He has cleansed the temple. The leaders of the people have had enough and are looking for ways to get rid of  him. Just before today’s text, Jesus has made his prophesy of the end of the Jewish Temple and of the Final Judgment. You can imagine the fear and anger of the religious leaders. Jesus has now finished his active ministry. All that is left is his betrayal, arrest, trials, suffering, and death. This is how Matthew describes what comes next:

When Jesus had finished saying all these things, he said to his disciples, “As you know, the Passover is two days away—and the Son of Man will be handed over to be crucified.” Then the chief priests and the elders of the people assembled in the palace of the high priest, whose name was Caiaphas, and they schemed to arrest Jesus secretly and kill him. “But not during the festival,” they said, “or there may be a riot among the people.”

 While Jesus was in Bethany in the home of Simon the Leper, a woman came to him with an alabaster jar of very expensive perfume, which she poured on his head as he was reclining at the table. When the disciples saw this, they were indignant. “Why this waste?” they asked. “This perfume could have been sold at a high price and the money given to the poor.” Aware of this, Jesus said to them, “Why are you bothering this woman? She has done a beautiful thing to me. The poor you will always have with you, but you will not always have me. When she poured this perfume on my body, she did it to prepare me for burial. Truly I tell you, wherever this gospel is preached throughout the world, what she has done will also be told, in memory of her.”  

Then one of the Twelve—the one called Judas Iscariot—went to the chief priests and asked, “What are you willing to give me if I deliver him over to you?” So they counted out for him thirty pieces of silver. From then on Judas watched for an opportunity to hand him over (Matthew 26:1-16).

Prayer: Faithful God: You are eternally faithful to yourself, to your promises, to your creation, and to your people. We, however, are not always faithful to you, to creation, or to other people. Forgive us. Come and allow us to sense your presence and your healing power in our meditation. In Jesus Name, Amen.

The Character of Betrayal.

There is no sadder figure in American history than the figure of Benedict Arnold. Arnold was a brave, skilled military leader, pershps the best combat general serving under General Washington. Washington respected and admired Arnold.
Unfortunately, Arnold could be abrasive and made enemies in the Revolutionary Army. Other men were promoted above him. He began to be resentful. In addition, he lived beyond his means and engaged in practices that the Continental Congress found objectionable. He was court marshaled. Even then, Washington protected him and gave him a very mild reprimand. He wanted to save a good general’s career. Unfortunately, Arnold had married an English sympathizer, who led him into treason. He proposed handing over West Point, where he was in command, to the British. When the plot was uncovered, Arnold fled to the enemy lines and went on to lead British troops in Virginia and Connecticut. He later moved to England, though he never received all of what he’d been promised by the British. He died in London, in relative obscurity. Today, to call a person a Benedict Arnold is to call that person a traitor.

What makes people so deeply hate a betrayer? I think it is the fact that betrayal involves a breach of trust personally, publically, financially or otherwise. We can only be betrayed by people with whom we are friends, partners, spouses, lovers, fellow soldiers, etc. Those who can betray us owe us a duty of loyalty. We are relational people. We need relationships; however, we can be hurt in relationships. Because vulnerability is a part of any deep relationship, betrayal is especially terrible.

When a spouse, partner, or public servant betrays our trust, it strikes at our sense of security in a deep and terrible way. We are filled with a kind of fear and horror that we can be so vulnerable.  The result for the betrayer is either shame or a slow journey into a deep lack of character. A betrayer cannot be trusted by anyone. The result of any betrayal is deep anger and pain among all those involved, and especially for the one betrayed.

Judas the Betrayer.

With this background, let’s look at the man we call Judas Iscariot. Judas was one of the original Twelve Disciples. He must have had a good mind and some kind of financial expertise, because he was made the treasurer of the Twelve and was responsible for the common purse they kept. He was with Jesus  from the beginning of his ministry. He heard Jesus’ powerful teachings. He witnessed Jesus’ many  healings and mighty deeds of power. He saw demons cast out. He experienced Jesus’ prayer life and love for people. Judas is a reminder that going to church, being surrounded by Christian brothers and sisters, participating in Christian activities, and even experiencing the blessings of the Christian life, does not guarantee faith nor does it guarantee we will not betray Christ and our faith.

Everywhere Judas is mentioned in the Bible, he is spoken of in a negative way. How could Judas have betrayed Jesus? Judas, like us, probably didn’t set out to become evil. John indicates that he was greedy and took money from the common purse (John 12:6). I imagine it began innocently.
He would take a few shekels into a city to buy food and forget to put the change back in the common purse. Off on an errand, he bought a few personal items without reimbursing the little group of disciples. Gradually, ever so gradually, Judas began to lose his moral bearings. He first became a thief, and then became a betrayer.

Like the other disciples, Judas expected Jesus to be a messianic King. He expected Jesus to overthrow Roman rule and reestablish the kingdom of Israel. He expected to be part of the leadership of a kingdom that would never end—at least not in his lifetime. As Jesus moved closer and closer to Jerusalem and to that last Passover, Judas, like the other disciples, was probably disturbed by Jesus’s prophecies that he would be betrayed and die a terrible death. As Holy Week went on, Judas could see that the religious leaders and powerful people were lining up support to get rid of Jesus. I suspect Judas did not want to die.

Knowing that someone was going to betray Jesus, and that sooner or later Jesus and his followers were going to come to a bad end, Judas decided that those who came to a bad end would not include him. Eventually, he went to see the religious leaders and cut a deal with them—Jesus for safety and thirty pieces of silver (Matt. 26:15). At that moment, Judas walked over a line. He might have just quit and gone home. He might have stood up and spoken against what Jesus was doing. Those would have been honorable courses of action. Betraying Jesus was an act of moral cowardice.

Judas’ life is a reminder to all of us. Very few people set out to betray a spouse, or lover, or a friend, or a business partner. It happens slowly, one compromise at a time. There is a kind of slow moral slide. A lunch that should have been avoided, a deal that should never have been done, a present that should never have been accepted, a word that should never have been spoken. That is how betrayal begins. Then, one day, we’ve done something and become someone we never intended to do or become.

Judas, Jesus and Peter.

It appears that Jesus knew he was going to be betrayed and that Judas was the betrayer. The New Testament clearly records that Jesus identified Judas as his betrayer, and that Judas left the meal before it was over (Matt. 26:23-25; John 13:18-30). We know this to be true because Judas had to go to the high priests home and get the military officials who would actually arrest Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane (Matt. 26:47-50; Mark 14:43-44; Luke 22:47-48; John 18:1-4). Confronted by Jesus and his understanding of what he was about, Judas walked over the boundary line between good and evil, became a true servant of evil, and betrayed the Messiah.

There was another person present that night who would betray Jesus. We are going to hear his story in a few weeks when we talk about disappointment. Peter was there when Jesus prophesied that all the disciples would desert him and he would die abandoned and alone. Filled with pride, Peter told Jesus that he would not desert the Messiah even if everyone else did so (Matt. 26:33). Jesus knew otherwise. He told Peter that, before the rooster crowed in the next day’s dawn, he would betray Jesus (v. 34). Sure enough, that evening, filled with terror, Peter denied the Lord three times.

The Bible tells us that, after Jesus was betrayed, Judas regretted what he had done. Apparently, he tried to give the thirty pieces of silver he had received back to the High Priest and Sanhedrin. When they refused to take the money back, Judas committed suicide (Matt. 27:3-5). In Mark’s rendition of the first Easter, the Angels tell the women to go tell the disciples, and Peter, to meet him in Galilee (Mark 16:7). Peter, you see had abandoned Christ.  He was a deserter, no longer a disciple. Nevertheless, at the end of John, we see Peter speaking of his leadership with the risen Lord (John 22:15-19). 

Both Judas and Peter were betrayers of the trust Jesus placed in them. Both owed him loyalty and were unfaithful. Why did Judas commit suicide and Peter become the chief of the apostles? I think the answer is this: Judas, filled with pride, shame, and guilt, could not go to the Lord and asked for forgiveness and be restored. Peter repented of what he had done, accepted his guilt and shame, asked for forgiveness, and was restored. The big difference between Judas and Peter is not what they did, but how they reacted to the love of God.

Everyone Needs Deliverance from the Deliverer.

Everyone needs deliverance from betrayal and its consequences. There are people whose lives are ruined because of a betrayal. Some of these people are the betrayer who never repents and turns his or her life around. Others are the betrayed who never release the anger and pain and whose lives are twisted by desire for revenge. Both betrayers and the betrayed need their own deliverance.

Wednesday evening someone shared with our group the following story. A loved one was betrayed by someone who could not overcome an addiction. The loved one ultimately died. It was a young, tragic, and unnecessary death. Naturally, the family had a hard time forgiving the one who betrayed their daughter. The person who was an addict ultimately became sober and embarked on a new life. The parents, however, still had to cope with the loss of a daughter. One day, in a conversation, the addict said that, “The one thing he could do was to provide a sober parent for their child.” In that moment, a healing began. I want to share with you just a little bit of an email I received this week:

“Then I told our Bible study what you said to me, something I’ll never forget that a changed me. You told me that the one thing you COULD do for [our daughter] was to be a sober dad for [our granddaughter], that you being [her] dad was the one thing she wanted more than anything, which was so true. That stuck with me from that moment forward. It was a beautiful thing to say & gave me a lot of comfort. Then we were able to spend Christmas together and talk about things regarding …. I’ll be honest, at first I had to pray every day for God to change my heart so I would love you & care about you, that I would let go to all that stuff in the past between you & [our daughter]. And God did – and you did. I’m so grateful that [we] are working together to parent [our granddaughter] and to raise her. I never would have thought. I didn’t know you well and didn’t understand how deeply devoted you are to [her] and that you did love [our daughter] … I wanted you to know how I feel and how grateful I am for everything that is happening…. “ [2]

I wanted to share this with you for a reason. The healing that began on the phone call did not make what happened any less tragic. It did not excuse past behavior. It opened up the potential for a new future.

Our deliverance does not eliminate the past or all the consequences of the past. It does not eliminate the need to change or make amends. Instead, it provides a point for a new beginning. It provides a way to healing and wholeness again for both the betrayed and the betrayer, so we can experience that healing and wholeness in this life as far as possible and not be trapped in the past and its pain.

The spouse that cannot forgive a betrayal, the parent or child who cannot forgive a past betrayal, the business partner who cannot forgive a past betrayal becomes trapped in the past they cannot forgive. Such persons need a healing.

The person who betrayed that person, if they cannot repent and turn their life around, and accept the forgiveness of God, becomes trapped in the past as well. Like Judas, they commit a kind of emotional suicide, and morally,  spiritually and emotionally hang themselves on the rope of their past betrayal.  It is only when a betrayer (and we) repent, forgive, accept forgiveness, and make amends for the past  that we receive the healing and  new life that Christ offers us.

Amen

Copyright 2016, G. Christopher Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

[1] See, Marvel: Agents of Shield: Season 1, (ABC Studios, Marvel Studios, 2013-2016).

[2] Personal Email, February 18, 2016. Used by Permission.

Those who love military history may remember an event known as, “The Great Raid.” [1] God is involved in a great rescue operation. He wants to deliver us from our captivities. He wants us to join him in his Kingdom of Light to which he draws us by his love. Happy Valentines Day!

In January 1945,121 volunteer U.S. Army Rangers, with a few “Alamo Scouts”  and  Filipino freedom fighters, conducted a rescue mission to save more than 500 allied survivors of the Bataan Death March. Early in World War II, the Bataan Peninsula fell to the Japanese. About 500 American and Allied soldiers were eventually sent to the Cabanatuan prison camp. The conditions in the camp were terrible. There was disease, malnourishment, brutality, and torture. By early 1945, it was clear that the Japanese were losing the war, and the Philippines were certain to be conquered by American forces. The Japanese High Command ordered that the prisoners be killed if there was a danger of their liberation. After an early atrocity at another camp, the Allied High Command determined to rescue these prisoners. I don’t have time to tell the entire story. However, on January 30, 1945, 513 prisoners were rescued. I do want to mention that Lt. Col. Henry Mucci was in overall command; and Capt. Robert Prince led the raid.

During the raid, many prisoners could hardly believe they were being rescued. One prisoner resisted even when he was told the rescuers were Americans. The prisoner, who had not seen an American uniform since 1941, said, “No Yank ever wore a uniform like that!” One prisoner said the following: “I think I was the first American out of the prison camp. First thing I knew I was standing outside with a big yank. His name was Capt. Prince of Seattle Washington, and the first thing I did was grab the captain and hug and kiss him right there.” You see, after so many years in a living hell, he had been rescued, and he was thankful for his deliverance!

Prayers for a New Church

The letter of Paul to the Colossians is one of the letters called “Prison Epistles.” Somewhere around the year 60 A.D., while Paul was in prison in Rome, he wrote a letter to the church at Colossae, a small city in what we know today as Turkey. The little church had some problems, and so Paul set out to write them a letter. Paul begins his letter by thanking the Colossians for the faith, hope, and love they are sharing throughout the world (Col. 1:3-7). Then, he prays that they will receive spiritual wisdom (v. 9), that they will live a life worthy of Christ (10), and that they will have the strength that only the Holy Spirit can give so that they might be empowered to live the Christian life in difficult circumstances (v. 11).

Our text picks up as Paul is giving thanks for the Colossians:

For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you. We continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all the wisdom and understanding that the Spirit gives, so that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, and giving joyful thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of his holy people in the kingdom of light. For he has delivered us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins (Colossians 1:9-14).

Let us Pray: O God, our Deliverer: this Lenten season we pray that you would come by the power of your Holy Spirit that each one of us might experience your saving grace in the new and precious way. In Jesus Name, Amen

The Gospel of Deliverance.

Sometimes, we have too small a view of our salvation. We reduce the gospel to a way to experience heaven when we die. Unfortunately, this is not what Jesus or the apostles meant by Good News. Did you notice that, in what I read to you a few moments ago, Paul tells the Colossians that they have become citizens of the “kingdom of light,” having been rescued from the kingdom of darkness (Col. 1:12-13). It is as if the Colossians had been trapped in a dark world in which there was no light. God by his mercy has rescued or delivered them from their dungeon and brought them into the Kingdom of Christ—a heavenly kingdom—a kingdom described by John as being like the city as beautiful as a bride descending to dwell in among men (Rev. 21:1-3; 22:1-5).

The British scholar, N. T. Wright, has written a new book entitled, “Simply Good News: Why the Gospel is News and What Makes It Good.” [2] In his book, Wright emphasizes that the Good News is not just about getting forgiven for being a sinner and going to heaven when we die. The Good News is that a New King has come to establish a New Kingdom, and we are called to give up our citizenship in our earthy kingdoms of darkness and become citizens of this New Kingdom. Jesus was not killed by the Romans for claiming to be God; he was killed by the Romans for claiming to be a king (See, Matthew 27:37; Mark 15:17-18).

Wright describes what Jesus was about as follows:

“Jesus wasn’t content to leave existing structures in place and start of a nice, quiet unobtrusive movement somewhere else. He didn’t want the rest of the world to go on with its idea of kingship while he started a sect, a separatist movement that wouldn’t challenge that notion. That might have been the effect of allowing human rulers to keep the word “king” while choosing a different slogan altogether. What he was doing was far more radical. Not only was Jesus plugging into the ancient scriptural promises that spoke of God coming back at last to be king of his people and the whole world. He was insisting that this kingdom of God, this new reality, the heart of his good news, was a different sort of rule based upon a different sort of power. And that it was designed to challenge the present powers of the world with a new kingship that would trump theirs altogether.” [3]

Like all kingdoms, Jesus did not expect his kingdom to be established without trouble. This is why Jesus foresaw his death (Matt. 26:2). The struggle for the Kingdom  is also reflected in Paul’s letter to Ephesians when he says:

Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people (Ephesians 6:10-18).

The rulers of the people and Pontius Pilate did not understand exactly what Jesus was about; they could not understand the true nature of the Kingdom of Heaven. However, they correctly understood that Jesus intended to found a Kingdom that would eventually supplant or at least threaten their kingdoms. Religious leaders, for religious reasons, and political leaders for political reasons couldn’t really tolerate his claim of Jesus. And that’s why he was crucified. The rulers of this world, the powers and principalities, also resist our entry into God’s Kingdom of Light and our spiritual growth after we enter God’s kingdom.

What does this mean for us? It means that right now, today, we are called to follow a new king. We are called to resist our culture, our natural impulses, our friends, and/or impulses when they would lead us into a kingdom of darkness instead of the kingdom of light. We are not just called to be saved; we are called to be changed and to change. We care called to become new people fit to inhabit a New Kingdom of Light and Love.

The First Conquest: the Conquest of Self.

As Paul lets us know in Colossians, the first step in becoming citizens of the Kingdom of God is to be delivered by Grace from the Kingdom of Darkness (Col. 1:13). [4] The word “deliverance” has gotten a bad name among Christians because some people, when they talk about deliverance, only want to talk about demons. The word “deliverance” is used over and over again in the Old Testament and in the New Testament. The words used for “salvation” or “rescue” in Hebrew and Greek can, and often are, translated “deliver”. [5] The word used in Colossians also carries the connotation of been moved to another situation or place.

In the Old and New Testaments, God is often seen rescuing his people. God delivers the Jews from captivity in Egypt and delivering them into the Promised Land. God rescued David from the hands of his enemies and delivered the Kingdom into his hands. God rescued the Jews from captivity in Babylon and delivered them home to the Promised Land. In the same way, in the New Testament God rescued Jesus from the grave restoring him to an eternal life. God delivers those who are sick from their diseases to health. God delivers the demon possessed from their demons to sanity. God is a God of deliverance, which means that God is in the business of moving people and nations from one state to a better state!

The delivering power of God means that we can and should pray to God for deliverance—to be rescued from our captivity to dark powers in and around us and delivered to a better state! We should pray to God to be delivered from our captivity to our secret sins, to our character flaws, to our brokenness, and to our unwillingness to change. Wednesday night, we had an Ash Wednesday service, during which we talked about the meaning of Lent and the meaning of the ashes. The ashes remind us that we are finite, mortal, flawed, sinners in need of salvation and a Savior. The good news we celebrate is that Christ is a conqueror who can deliver us.

Coming into the Kingdom.

Several months ago, I used an illustration that we have been learning in Salt & Light. [6] Imagine a throne. The throne symbolizes your life. In the beginning, most of us want to sit on the throne of our lives. We make mistakes, we betray others, we commit injustices, we do immoral things, we hurt ourselves, and we suffer. Then, imagine a second throne. You’re still on the throne, but somewhere sitting at your feet there is God. God is there to help you manage your life when you get into trouble. Most Christians spend most of their lives in exactly this situation. Finally, imagine Christ on the throne of your life and you sitting at Christ’s feet. Now, you are part of God’s kingdom, filled with the wisdom and love of God, you live in fellowship with God, the world, and others. You are in a better place.

A week or two ago, I came up with another illustration. Since it’s Valentine’s Day, I think it’s a good day to share with you. Imagine a huge heart.  Inside of that heart, there are three interlocking circles representing the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit bound together in eternal, unending, self-giving love. Imagine yourself far away from that heart. This is life lived without any relationship to God. Then, imagine yourself right at the edge of the heart with, perhaps, one arm kind of holding the heart in case you need it. That’s most of us: we want to be near God, we want to be able to touch the heart of God when we really need to, but we don’t want to get too close. Finally, imagine yourself being drawn inside the heart until you are surrounded by the love of God. Imagine your entire personality being permeated and changed by that transforming love. That’s what being in the kingdom of God means. [7]  To be in God’s Kingdom is to be drawn into the place of deep love and peace we have always dreamed of experiencing.

Response to Grace.

If we truly understand what God has done for us in Christ and what God wants for us, we will be overcome by the love of God. I hate to use two military illustrations in one sermon; however, as we celebrate Christ as deliverer, I think the movie, Saving Private Ryan has an important message. [8] If you remember, at the very beginning of the movie an old man is walking down the rows of a cemetery in Normandy, France. He finally finds one grave. He stands there, and then collapses in tears. The man is James Francis Ryan. In the movie, Capt. John H Miller, played by Tom Hanks, and a small squad of men are asked to rescue the last surviving son of a woman who is already lost three children in the Second World War. Capt. Miller is not particularly anxious to set out on this mission, but he goes, and in the end saves Private Ryan. During the final moments of the rescue operation, Miller is killed. In his last moments, Miller asks Ryan to earn his rescue.

God has decided to mount a rescue operation. He has decided to deliver us from our sin, from our brokenness, from our poor thinking and foolishness, and from all of our brokenness into his Kingdom. In order to do this, he had no choice but to send his Son, his Only Son, his Beloved Son. It so happens, that his son, like Captain Miller was killed in the operation. That’s how much God loves us.

Now, we have a choice. We can deny the whole story and live on the basis of our own desires. We can just fondly remember what Jesus did on the cross, only really responding when we are in trouble. Or, we can allow ourselves to be drawn into the heart of God, trusting that the same God who sent his Only Begotten Son to give us eternal life can be trusted to save us from ourselves and deliver us to a much better place.  God can be trusted to rescue us from whatever keeps us from experiencing the joy of his Kingdom of Love and to deliver us into that place where we can experience the life of which we have always dreamed.

Amen

Copyright 2016, G. Christopher Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

[1] You can learn more about the Great Raid at wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Raid. The quote below is from an interview with Captain Prince in his 85^th year, as he remembered the raid. Several movies have been made about the raid, including one called, “The Great Raid.” Captain Prince was 25 when he led the raid.

[2] N. T. Wright, Simply Good News: Why the Gospel is News and What Makes It Good (New York, NY: HarperOne, a division of Harper Collins, 2015). In this section, I am drawing heavily on this book.

[3] Id, at 63.

[4] As I point out below, the word translated “rescue” in Colossians can be and is sometimes translated “deliver” in the King James, Revised Standard, New King James, and other versions.

[5] There are several words used in the Old Testament for “deliver.” God is often characterized as the deliver of his people (See, Psalm 91 for example). In the New Testament, there are also several words translated as “deliver,” which can be used for both physical and spiritual deliverance. “Sozo,” which means “save” can also mean “rescue” or “deliver.” In Colossians1:13, “errusato” means rescue or deliver by moving from one place or condition (dominion of darkness) to another (the kingdom of light).

[6] For those who have missed it, Kathy and I are writing a new discipleship curriculum we call “Salt & Light. Last spring, we had a preliminary class. This year, we have a draft curriculum and are going through it with three different groups at Advent Presbyterian Church. We hope to complete the writing portion of the curriculum before the fall of 2016.

[7] In the Greek, there is a form called, “the spherical dative.” This tense is used when, for example, Paul speaks of “being in Christ.” The notion of the spherical dative is one of being surrounded by, in the sphere of the power of, the object. By the power of God’s Grace, which is his self-giving love,  a Christian should be drawn ever deeper into the sphere of the power of God, surrounded by the wisdom and love of God.

[8] Saving Private Ryan, wr. Robert Rodat, dir. Steven Spielberg, starring Tom Hanks, Matt Damon, and Tom Sizemore. (Amblin Entertainment, Dreamworks, 1998). The movie is based on a true story from the Second World War. The Niland brothers were four siblings from New York. Although two brothers survived the war, there was a time when the Allied Command believed only one brother had survived the war. They therefore had what they assumed was the final surviving son, Fritz, sent home.Bob Niland was killed at D-Day. Preston Niland was also killed on D-Day. The final brother, Edmund, was missing and presumed dead, but was in a Japanese prisoner of war camp.

As we end this five week look at the Great Commission and its implications for our discipleship, we are focused on prayer and preparation for the future. It will help if you read Acts 1 either before or after the blog.

Just about twenty-six years ago, Kathy and I were at an awkward stage of our marriage. When we married, I was a lawyer. For many years, we thought, argued, and prayed about going to seminary. However, the circumstances and time never seemed right. Then, in mid-January 1990, Kathy announced that she was ready to go to seminary and thought now might be the time. There were obstacles, like winding down a business, and selling a house, but we were pretty sure it was the right thing to do.

You can’t just decide to go to seminary and go when you have a business, children, a house, debts, and other obligations. Therefore, we were not finished praying and preparing for what was to come next. In fact, we entered a period of six months of extreme prayer and a lot of preparation! Life did not stand still because we had made a decision. We still had four children, family, a church, and other obligations.

As I remember, it began kind of slowly as we told a few friends and family about our decision. However, it got really busy really fast. We began praying about where to go to seminary. Over the next four months or so we visited seminaries, and applied to seminaries and workout financial details. In addition, there were clients to turn over to someone else, and the need to earn a living for the next six months! Our home needed to be sold or leased. We needed a place to live and schools for our children. Finally, it seemed certain that the best alternative was to attend Union Theological Seminary in Richmond Virginia. Seven months after we began, we left Houston for seminary.

Today, we are talking about the disciples and how they faced the interlude between the time that they received the Great Commission and the time they actually began accomplishing it. Our goal is to understand how we can wisely and productively use the “in-between times of life” while we are waiting for what comes next.

Commissioned to Wait.

Luke begins Acts by advising us that in the Gospel of Luke he told the story of what Jesus began to do before he ascended into heaven (Acts 1:1-2). In Acts, Luke tells the story of what Jesus continued to do through the disciples and the church after he ascended into heaven. Luke begins by briefly reviewing what Jesus did during the forty days between the time he rose from the dead and ascended to heaven. This time was spent assuring the disciples that he was alive and teaching them what they would need to know to be witnesses of the resurrection (vv. 3-6).

On one occasion, he told them to stay in Jerusalem and wait for the gift God had promised them: that the Father was going to send the Holy Spirit (vv. 4-5). The disciples, still believing that Jesus might create a physical new Kingdom, asked him if this was the time when God would restore Israel (v. 6). Jesus replied with these words:

“It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:7-9).

Luke goes on to tell us that, after he said this, Jesus was taken up before their eyes (Acts 1:9). Now, the disciples had received both the promise of the Holy Spirit and their commission to witness to what God had done in Jesus Christ. Still, there was waiting, praying, and preparation ahead of them.

Let’s Pray: God of power and might: we ask that you would come upon us this morning with the power of your Holy Spirit that we might deeply understand the importance of our cooperation in receiving your grace. Enlighten us, Change our hearts and conform our wills to Your Divine Will. In Jesus name, Amen.

Background to the Wait.

For the past five eweeks, this blog has been looking at the Great Commission as it appears in Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and now Acts. Our theme has been, “What’s Next?” This is not only the theme for this initial series of blogs this year; it is our theme for the entire year of 2016. We are looking forward to what God is going to do next in our lives, families, neighborhoods, community, churches, and relationships.

Jesus was with his disciples for three years. He preached, taught, healed, cast out demons, and was the undisputed leader of his followers. Naturally, on a purely human level, the disciples relied upon the physical, human presence of Jesus. That’s why they were so fearful and confused when he died. They had been followers; now they had to learn to be leaders.

If Jesus had risen from the dead, stayed one day, and ascended into heaven, I honestly doubt the Christian faith would have made it. It’s a human tendency after a miracle to begin to explain it away in our minds. It’s natural to begin to wonder if you have misunderstood. It is natural to say, “I must have been dreaming; God would never do anything like this!” Therefore, Jesus took forty days to be with his disciples, assure them that he was alive, teach them the final lessons they would need to be his witnesses, and prepare them for the future.

The disciples, as they left the mount of the Ascension and returned to Jerusalem, were entering their final time of preparation. Soon, they would go into the entire would sharing the Gospel. Now, however, they must wait just a little while longer, putting to work what Jesus had taught them, and waiting for the gift of the Spirit.

It would be nice if the time between the promises of God and the fulfillment of those promises were instantaneous. However, it is rarely the case. There is always a time between our assurance that God has a future for us and the time in which we are actually empowered to enter that future. The big question then is, “What shall we do while we wait?” It is important how we spend out time as we wait for what comes next. We need to learn to wisely spend our time as we wait for what comes next.

Praying in the Future.

Luke tells us that the disciples returned to the city of Jerusalem to the Upper Room where they were staying (Luke 1:12-13). They were not alone. Mary Magdalene and the other women who had found the empty tomb, Mary the mother of Jesus, and his family, were also present (vv. 13). They did not, however, just sit around and wait for the Holy Spirit. We are told that they spent their time worshiping in the Temple (Luke 24:53) and praying (Acts 1:14).

God wants many good things for all of us; however, there are things that we could have but will not have unless we pray. Is one of the mysteries of life that God, who already knows what we need before we ask him, still desires us to ask and pray (Matthew 6:8). Because God wants to have a relationship with us, God wants us to communicate with him about our needs. He wants us to open our hearts to his Spirit. Prayer does change things, and one thing it changes is our hearts.

The fact is that our spiritual relationship with God is no different than our physical relationship with friends and family. If we want to have a strong relationship, we have to communicate with our family and friends. Study after study shows that the single biggest problem with human relationships is a failure to communicate. Some of you may remember the movie Cool Hand Luke. Luke repeatedly tries to escape from prison. On the first such occasion, the prison warden others the most famous line in the movie: “What we’ve got here is failure to communicate”. [1] The warden was an evil guy, but he spoke an eternal truth: If we want to enjoy the full future that God desires for us the first thing we have to do is communicate with God and pray. With God and other people, a lot of problems come from a failure to communicate.

Preparing for the Future.

The second thing we have to do is prepare. As Acts tells the story, at one point during the ten day period before Pentecost, Peter stood up and spoke to the apostles. It seems that Peter had been contemplating the teachings of the Old Testament and thinking about what to do next. He concluded that, in the Old Testament, it was prophesied that, when the Messiah came, he would be betrayed (Acts 1:15-20). Peter quotes a number of scriptures in support of his idea. Then, he recommends that a replacement for Judas be elected (vv. 21-22).

You may ask “Why did Peter think this?” In my mind, the best answer is pretty simple: there were twelve tribes of Israel and twelve disciples, one to act as a representative of each tribe. If God was going to reconstitute Israel, as the disciples hoped, it makes sense that there ought to be a full complement of twelve disciples to do the job! [2]

It’s really interesting how exactly the disciples replaced the Judas. It shows their complete reliance upon God. First of all, the disciples accepted the leadership of Peter. They accepted that it was necessary to choose someone who had been with Jesus from the time of John the Baptist until the Ascension. Having accepted Peter’s leadership, two names were proposed to the group, Barsabbas (called Justus) and Matthias. Then, the entire group prayed over the decision. Finally, they cast lots, leaving the final decision to God. Matthias was chosen (vv. 23-26).

This often overlooked passage tells us a lot about what we should be doing while we are waiting for God. There are always practical things we can do to get ready for the blessing God has for us. We can study our Bibles and ponder any biblical teaching we need to know to make a decision. We can think about what exactly we might do to accomplish our goal. And finally, as we make decisions, we can trust God.

Any elder who has participated in a serious decision in our church will tell you that we follow this model in making decisions. When faced with difficult problems we never act quickly. Instead, we pray, sometimes for hours (and sometimes for longer than many of the elders wish)! We also discuss the problem, hoping to come to a solution with which everyone agrees. This isn’t always possible, but it’s always our objective. These practices of praying, meditating, thinking, and preparing as we wait are ones we can all follow in our daily lives as we make decisions and move into the future.

Remembering Whose in Charge.

The story of the ten days between the commissioning of the disciples and the ascension of Jesus into heaven and the coming of the Holy Spirit is a story of obedience. It is a story of the Twelve showing that they were ready to be leaders by putting into practice what they had learned from Jesus. They trusted God. They prayed to God. And then, they prepared for the future as best they knew how.

Lent is a period of time in which we meditate on our brokenness, our sorrow, our shortcomings, even our sinfulness. We don’t meditate on this so that we can feel bad about ourselves. We meditate to prepare for Easter Sunday morning and our celebration of God’s victory over sin and death. I hope that this Lenten season we will all take the opportunity to pray for the forgiveness and healings we need from God and prepare for the future God has in store for us.

We are not finished with 2016 nor are we finished with asking the question, “What’s Next?” Now, however, we are moving into a new part of our journey: For the next several weeks we’re going to ask, “What changes do I need to make to receive the future God has in store for me?” and “How can I become spiritually ready for what comes next?” These too are questions worth asking. The next few blogs will be more painful than those we’ve had recently. They force us to consider who we really are and what needs to change in our lives so that we can experience the Spirit and the power of the resurrection.

Amen.

[1] See, Cool Hand Luke, wr. Donn Pearce and Frank Pierson; dir. Stuart Rosenberg; starring Paul Newman, George Kennedy, and Strother Martin (Jalin Productions, 1967). The sadistic warden, in response to Luke’s escape, speaks the line. Some commentators have seen Luke as a kind of Christ figure and the warden as a kind of devil. However, the quote is true about many human relationships. George Kennedy won an academy award for his acting in the movie and Newman was nominated for an award.

[2] The number twelve is important to the disciples and important in Jewish history. Originally there were twelve tribes of Israel. By Jesus’ day, ten were lost. One expectation was that the Messiah would reconstitute Israel—meaning that the Twelve Tribes would be restored. This is probably one of the expectations that the disciples had of Jesus. It is clear that this expectation continues to be a part of the early church’s hope. In Revelation for example twenty-four elders bow down before God (Revelation 4:10 and before the lamb (Revelation 5:8).

Today, we are looking at Luke 24:36-53. There is a mystical quality to all life transforming experiences. They are not ordinary. We should not, therefore, expect that our experience of the Risen Christ would be on the level of our experience of a Diet Coke. It is deeper, more central to who we are and will be. It is mysterious and sacred–and in being so such an experience is transformative.

 I would like to begin by sharing a story about a young man named, “Frank.” Frank was born into a prosperous, business family. His father dreamed that Frank would be a businessman and take over the family business. As Frank grew up, there was reason to believe that his father’s dreams would come true. Frank was a natural businessman. He was also extremely likable. Frank was kind and gentle with people. There were stories of him chasing down some of his father’s customers just to treat them fairly or give them a gift. Frank’s father did not particularly like the part of Frank he regarded as overly generous; however, he did like Frank’s business skills.

Friends and neighbors used to say that Frank could get away with almost anything because he was so likable. He was also handsome and attractive to the girls. In the end, Frank became something of a party boy. He drank too much, he partied too much, and he spent too much time chasing girls. Along the way, Frank began to dream of glory and decided to be a military person. It’s at this point that Frank’s life began to go astray.

He participated in a small battle, and ended up a prisoner for a year or so. He decided to make the military his career. Along the way to rejoin the army, he had a dream. In his dream, Christ appeared to tell him that he was going in the wrong direction. He returned home feeling foolish. Later, he heard God’s voice tell him to build his church; however, mistakenly he felt it was to rebuild a particular church, and to fund his enterprise he used his father’s money. His angry father disinherited him. Most of the people of his hometown loved him, but they had come to see him as a bit unstable.

At this point Frank began to truly and from the heart seek God’s will for his life.  Eventually, St. Francis of Assisi found his destiny to renew the church. [1] Giving up everything for Christ, he spent the rest of his life sharing the gospel in building the Roman Catholic order called the “Franciscans.”

From the Word to Worship

Luke contains a complete account of the resurrection of Jesus and of the events of the first Easter. Early in the morning, Mary Magdalene and the other women went to the tomb. They found the tomb empty, and an angel told them that Jesus was alive. The angel went on to tell them that Moses, the author of the Torah, the Prophets, and other writers of Scripture had foreseen the events of his death and resurrection. Later that day, Jesus appeared on the road to Emmaus, and began to explain to two disciples the meaning of the events they had witnessed in Jerusalem. Once again, Jesus explained that his death and resurrection were a part of God’s plan. The two disciples ran to tell the Twelve, who did not believe their testimony. Then, Jesus appeared among them.

This is how Luke tells the rest of the story:

While they were still talking about this, Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, “Peace be with you.” They were startled and frightened, thinking they saw a ghost. He said to them, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts rise in your minds? Look at my hands and my feet. It is I myself! Touch me and see; a ghost does not have flesh and bones, as you see I have.” When he had said this, he showed them his hands and feet. And while they still did not believe it because of joy and amazement, he asked them, “Do you have anything here to eat?” They gave him a piece of broiled fish, and he took it and ate it in their presence.  He said to them, “This is what I told you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms.” Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures. He told them, “This is what is written: The Messiah will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, and repentance for the forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. I am going to send you what my Father has promised; but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high” (Luke 24:36-53).

Prayer: Come Spirit of the Risen Christ that we too may see you and hear you speaking to us from your Bible. In Your Name we pray, Amen.

The Personal Word.

The story of St. Francis of Assisi is one of the most precious stories in Christian history. Scholars point out that St. Francis was never studious. Of course, growing up in a Catholic country, he went to church. As the son of a well-to-do businessman, he went to school and he learned to read and write. However, Francis never demonstrates a desire for abstract knowledge. He was fundamentally a social and practical person. He wanted to make things happen and enjoy being with people. Francis was what we would call, “a people person.”

I suspect that Peter and the apostles were pretty much like Francis. In fact, I’ll bet they were more like St. Francis than like your pastor. These were fishermen, tax collectors, and small businessmen. Yes, they went to their little synagogue in Capernaum or wherever. Yes, they could read and write. Yes, if they were required to, they could read a bit of a scroll during a worship service, but, they were not scholars.

Their conviction that Christ had risen from the dead was not based upon something they read; t was based upon something they experienced. The Gospels are unanimous that when Jesus was arrested the disciples deserted him. In addition, they were afraid they would be arrested too. When the women came to announce that the tomb was empty, they had a hard time believing it. Peter had a hard time believing it even after seeing the empty tomb (Luke 24:12). The first Easter evening, they gathered together to discuss the day’s events. While they were there, they were confronted by the Living Word of God, the risen Jesus of Nazareth, the Messiah. Even then, they didn’t believe right away. He had to speak with them, show them his wounds, and even eat a little bit of food before they could see that he was indeed risen from the dead.

At the end of Luke, Jesus has ascended to heaven. There is no seeing the physical Jesus anymore. However, we can and do experience the living Christ in our hearts, minds, and spirits. As I mentioned last week, Mark ends by telling us that the disciples went into the entire world and Jesus went with them (Mark 16:20). In other words, Christians have always experienced the presence of the risen Christ. I’m not going to give you my testimony this morning; however, I believed in the risen Christ on the basis of my experience as and before I learned all the Bible and theology I know today. The experience of God is as important today as on the first Easter Sunday. [2]

The Written Word.

This does not mean that the Bible is not important, nor does it mean that we do not need to read our Bible in order to be the disciples God wants us to be. Notice that, immediately after Jesus proves that he is risen, he teaches the disciples from Scripture. In Luke 24:44-45 we read: He said to them, “This is what I told you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms.” Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures. This is the exact same experience the women had and the two disciples on the road to Emmaus had earlier in the day (Luke 24:6-8; 25-27). Their experience needed to be supplemented with knowledge.

As Protestants, we believe that anyone can read Holy Scriptures on their own and grasp its meaning. We live in a country in which there are almost as many Bibles as there are people. However, most people rarely if ever read the Bible. Even fewer actually study the Bible. When Jesus taught the disciples from Moses, the Prophets, and Psalms, he was leading them into the deepest mysteries of Scripture. As Jews, they believed that God would send them a Messiah. However, they did not understand that the Messiah would suffer and die, that he would be a man of sorrows acquainted with grief, that he would be crucified as a criminal and outcast, and that his kingdom would be a kingdom of the Spirit and not an earthly kingdom. Many people have the same misunderstanding today.

There are similarities between contemporary Americans and the ancient Jews. We are an optimistic society. Most of us, even secular people, believe that hard work, healthy habits, and self-sacrifice will lead to a better life. Some people believe that government will create this better life, and some people believe it will be created by private industry, but almost everyone believes in a kind of earthly  kingdom that meets our human expectations and desires. [3]

Just as the Jews were wrong, when we reduce the gospel to a political, social, or personal agenda we are always wrong. In a culture like ours, we need to be prepared to show people the error of expecting God’s kingdom to be just like our kingdom only wealthier, politically stronger, and more defensible. His kingdom is the kind of kingdom only God could create. it is a kingdom that can only created by love.

The Kingdom of God is not just like the best earthly kingdom we can imagine only better. When Jesus appeared before Pontius Pilate, and was accused of opposing Caesar, he replied that his kingdom was not of this world. This doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t try to bring his kingdom into this world; it just means there’s more to God’s kingdom in this world will ever know or experience. The Kingdom Jesus began is a kingdom that can only be built on the foundation of the Gospel and a group of people (us) who are trying to live on the basis of the love and wisdom of God, empowered by the Grace of God shown in Christ.

The Disciples Witness.

After Jesus explained from the Scriptures that God’s Messiah was going to look a lot more like Isaiah’s suffering servant then King David, he told them something else. He told them that they are going to be his witnesses. In other words, they are going to tell the world what they have seen and heard over the past three years. They are going to testify to his teachings, his miracles, his healings, his sufferings, his death, and his resurrection. They are, however, not going to do this right away. Instead, they are to go back into the city of Jerusalem and wait for God’s power, the Holy Spirit, to come upon them. In other words, they are going to wait for what comes next.

In Christian circles, when we use the word “witness,” we often think that we are to tell people about what the Bible says about Jesus. This is only partially true. In trials there are two kinds of witnesses. First, there are “fact witnesses.” These are witnesses that have some direct information about what happened. They may have seen the car wreck or witnessed the robbery. Fact witnesses tell the jury what they saw and heard. Second, there are “expert witnesses.” Expert witnesses  explain something complicated to the jury. For example, a black powder may have been found at the scene of the crime. An expert witness who is a chemist will testify that it was gunpowder. Or, perhaps the defendant claims he or she was insane at the time of the crime. Expert witnesses who are psychologists or psychiatrists will testify concerning whether the person was sane or insane.

When it comes to testifying about Christ, we need to be both kinds of witnesses. We need to be able to say what it is Christ has done in our own lives. On the other hand, all of us some of the time, and some of us even more of the time, need to be expert witnesses. That is to say we need to study our Bibles and know just a little bit, or even a lot, about what the Bible says.

When lawyers choose witnesses, they always ask whether the witness is believable (or credible) and compelling. Believable means that the story the witnesses telling could be true. Compelling is different. Compelling means that there’s something about this person that will persuade the jury. When Jesus says, “Go into the city and wait to be clothed with power,” he’s really saying to them, “You won’t be compelling unless you have the power of my spirit. Therefore, wait for me to come.” When it comes to the Gospel, no one is compelling without the Holy Spirit.

Worship and Waiting.

Our text ends with Jesus ascending into heaven. Then, we are told, ^“Then they worshiped him and returned to Jerusalem with great joy.  And they stayed continually at the temple, praising God” (Luke 24:52-53). What began with a personal encounter with the living God, and was strengthened by studying the word, ends in wonder and in worship. We are told that, while the disciples waited for the power of God to come, they were continually in worship. Worship is not a duty. It is a response to the love, grace, and power of God. When we capture a vision of the Risen Christ, we are empowered, even compelled to worship.

The spirit comes to those who worship God as they wait. Those who fail to be captured by the wonder of Christ will not worship the Risen Lord. Yet, those who do not worship often slowly lose contact with the Risen Lord. This is a mystery.

As we wait for what’s next in our lives, the lives of our families, the life of our church, and the life of our nation, we should think about today’s text. We should wonder at the risen Christ. We should ponder all that he is done for us personally. We should study our Bibles. And perhaps most importantly, we should worship God daily, sometimes here at our church, and sometimes at home. We should wait expectantly for the compelling power of the Holy Spirit to come into our lives.

Amen.

Copyright 2016, G. Christopher Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

[1] This basic story of Francis of Assisi is based upon materials that can easily be found on the Internet and in several biographies of the saint. I’ve changed certain minor details to hide the punch line.

[2] I’ve told many people the following story. Years after I became a Christian I spent a good deal of time with people who did not necessarily believe most of what orthodox Christians believe. It was not my knowledge that enabled me to sustain my faith during that time; it was the experience of answered prayer and fellowship with Christ in the Christian community that sustained my faith. Others have had similar experiences.

[3] This point is made powerfully in lay language in W. T. Wright’s new book, Simply Good News: Why the Gospel is News and What Makes it Good (New York, NY: Harper One, 2015), 109ff. In the modern world, we are all subject to a culturally reinforced worldview that considers progress to be an automatic result of human striving. Recent history casts doubt on this view. What is needed is a new kingdom not the result of human striving and schemes.

As anyone who reads the footnotes to this blog can see, rarely have I struggled and researched a text as diligently as Mark 16:9-20. This is a hard text and controversial in the history of the Church. I could have avoided it in this series on the Great Commission as it appears in the Gospels and in Acts, but I did not want to do this. I think it has something to teach us. Before I begin, I want to repeat a point made in the sermon: The Bible is the Word of God and can be relied upon to teach us about God and about how we should live and worship. God bless. Chris 

Today, we are in the third blog taken from a sermon series concerning the Great Commission as it appears in Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and Acts. Cindy began the Preaching series with a sermon called, “Breathe,” taken from John 20, where Jesus breathes on the disciples, giving them the Holy Spirit, and says: “As the Father has sent me so I send you” (John 20:21). Last week, I preached a sermon from Matthew 28:16-20, where we find the Great Commission in its most common form:

“Therefore, go into all the world making disciples from all nations, baptizing them in the name of the father and the son and the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey all that I have commanded you. And lo, I am with you, even to the ends of the age (Matthew 28:16-20).

Last week, we focused on 2016 as a year in which, like the disciples after the resurrection, we are waiting for what God has for us in the future. We also talked about the importance of worship, discipleship training, and service to others as we wait.

Today, we are talking about healing and wholeness. Let’s face it, we can’t move in to a new, better future unless we change; and to change, we need to experience the power of God.  Scripture promises that, as we go into the future, we will experience the power of the Holy Spirit in our lives and in the lives of others. God promises to be with us, empower us, and protect us on the journey of discipleship and disciple making.

The Great Commission and a Prayer.

Bible Scholar John MacArthur preached through every verse in Holy Scripture. He saved today’s lesson for last, because of its difficulty! [i] If you open your Bible to Mark 16:9 – 20 will probably find it set apart from the rest of the gospel. You may also find a note that says something like, “These verses are not found in the most ancient manuscripts.” Many pastors never teach on this text. When we decided to do a series on the Great Commission, I might have skipped these verses from Mark; however, as I thought about the verses and read them, I felt there was a message for us to hear. Therefore, hear the word of God as it comes to us this morning from Mark 16:9-20:

When Jesus rose early on the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had driven seven demons. She went and told those who had been with him and who were mourning and weeping. When they heard that Jesus was alive and that she had seen him, they did not believe it. Afterward Jesus appeared in a different form to two of them while they were walking in the country. These returned and reported it to the rest; but they did not believe them either. Later Jesus appeared to the Eleven as they were eating; he rebuked them for their lack of faith and their stubborn refusal to believe those who had seen him after he had risen.  He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany those who believe: In my name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well.” After the Lord Jesus had spoken to them, he was taken up into heaven and he sat at the right hand of God. Then the disciples went out and preached everywhere, and the Lord worked with them and confirmed his word by the signs that accompanied it (Mark 16:9-20).

Prayer: Lord God of Scripture, who sent us your Son, Jesus, the Word of God in human form, as we think about this ending of Mark, especially today, please let all that is said and heard be according you to your will. In Jesus name, Amen.

Understanding a Hard Text.

Mark is almost certainly the oldest of our Gospels. [ii] It may even be a translation or transcription of the teachings of St. Peter by John Mark. Much of Mark is incorporated almost verbatim in Matthew and Luke. After Matthew and Luke were written, because of their superior literary qualities, many people preferred them to Mark. [iii] Therefore, Mark fell into disuse. This was before anything like our modern Bible existed. There were various books and letters being passed around in scrolls and codexes. As a result, it is possible that the original ending of Mark was lost. It’s also possible that the ending of Mark was originally just as it ends in Mark 16:8, with the women trembling in fear, astonished by what they had seen, but afraid to tell the apostles. Finally, it is possible that, after Peter was martyred, Mark had to flee and never completed his manuscript. No one knows.

Although Mark 16:9-20 is found in the King James Version and in most older translations, these verses are not found in most of the oldest Greek manuscripts. [iv] This allows me to talk a little bit about the Bible and how it was put together. The earliest Western translation of the Bible is a Roman Catholic translation made by Jerome about the year 382 A.D. Western translations of the Bible from Jerome until modern times were based on this text. Jerome’s text, as revised over the years, is often called the “Received Text.” [v] That text included Mark 16:9-20, although Eusebius (265-340 A.D.) and other ancient writers had their misgivings about its inclusion in the Bible.

When King James of England had the Bible translated into English, the Received Text was the basis for his translation. In modern times, however, many older Greek texts of the Bible have been found. Neither Jerome nor other older translations had access to these texts. Today, most translations, including the NIV and NRSV, are based on the corrected text. In particular, there are two codexes dating from between the year 325 to 350 A.D. called the Codex Sinaiticus and the Codex Vaticanus that do not contain the long ending of Mark. Therefore, today, most translations are based upon a corrected text that does not include Mark 16:9-20 except in footnotes or with qualification. [vi]

In all probability, at some point after Mark was written in the first century A.D., an early transcriber felt the book needed a more complete ending. If you go through Mark 16:9-20 verse by verse what you find is that Mark 9:16-20 summarizes Mary Magdalene telling the apostles of the resurrection, Jesus’s appearance on the walk to Emmaus, his later appearance to the disciples, and his giving of the Great Commission. All of these are found somewhere in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Most of what the author has done is to simply summarize what is found elsewhere in Scripture.

The hardest part of the text has to do with the so-called, “signs and wonders,” especially the handling of serpents and drinking of poison. Many of you know that at the end of Acts, Paul is bitten by a snake and protected by God from the consequences of its poison (Acts 28:1-6). I believe this is the incident being referred to in the handling of serpents. In addition, in the early church, there were stories of Christians drinking poison without harm. [vii] These stories, which date from an early period, are the source of the comment about drinking poison. At this point, I want to conclude by saying that these verses are not telling us what Christians should do or experience in the future as much as they are telling us what in fact Christians experienced in the early church: the protection of God in difficult circumstances.

In summary, we have at the end of Mark is a description of the appearances of Jesus to the disciples, his commission to go into all the world, and an assurance that, if we are faithful to Christ, we will experience the power of the Holy Spirit and God’s protection along the way.

Finally, whenever I teach on a hard text like this, I think it’s important to assure our congregation and readers that these kinds of issues do not impair the authority of Scripture in our lives or church. [viii] The Bible cannot be read without reading any passage in the context of all of the passages that deal with the same subject matter. You have seen how this text is more or less a restatement of teachings found elsewhere in Scripture, or in one case, in early Christian literature. The Bible is without error in all that it teaches us about faith and about how we should believe. [ix] Minor textual problems, and that’s all they are, do not impact our assurance the by the Holy Spirit we know that God is a God of love, that God sent his son to die for our sins, that we have a way of reconnecting with God by the power of the cross, and about the power of the Holy Spirit we can live a new life. The Bible continues to be our inspired guide for faith and for living.

Learning from a Hard Text.

What can we learn from this hard passage of Scripture? This text is not a direction for disciples to handle snakes or drink poison as some sects have done. It is a promise that those who spread the gospel will be protected and their testimony will be confirmed by the power of God. As such, it is an encouragement for the church in every age to experience the power of the Gospel and the protection of God by bolding proclaiming and living out the promise of the resurrection in the power of the Spirit. What this passage asks of us can be summarized as follows:

1. Believers should proclaim the Good News of the risen Christ and the coming of the Kingdom of God into the world accompanied by a call to repentance and new life.
2. Signs of the truth of our message and protection will accompany our faithfulness to the Great Commission from evil.

We know from Acts that the early church experienced the presence and the power of God in the lives of Christians and in the life of the Church (See, Acts 2:42-48). I have been a pastor long enough to have seen the power of God to heal people, physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. Some of you have experienced the ability of God to perform miracles in your own lives. Perhaps more importantly, we have seen the power of God to protect our church, our families and our friends.

Are the Signs and Wonders Today?

On Wednesday evenings, we have a Bible study that examines the text of the next week’s sermon. This past Wednesday night, I told the group the following story: when I was a relatively new pastor in Brownsville, Tennessee, morning I received a call to go to the local hospital. One of my members, an elderly lady in her late 90s, was dying. Her family lived in Dyersburg. They been notified, but it would be sometime before they arrived in the hospital. The staff wanted me to come and pray for her, because they did not think she would live long enough to see her children and grandchildren.

I went over to the hospital and sat for a while, I think until the family came. Before I left, I said a simple prayer thanking God for her life and asking that God would heal her. I happened to know that her goal was to live to be 100 years old, and I ask God to hear that desire of this elderly lady. Then, I went back to the office. That evening, on my way home, I decided to go to the hospital to see if she was still alive because no one had contacted me to tell me that she had died. When I walked in the room, she was sitting up in bed talking to the family. She lived another few months and died just a few days short of her 100th birthday. I can think of a lot of explanations for why this lady recovered, and I imagine antibiotics had something to do with it, however, I believed then and believe now that God answered this prayer. It was a sign to me and to her family of the goodness and love of God.

What is Next?

Over the last few weeks, I’ve had the opportunity to talk to our staff, Bible studies, disciple groups, and leadership groups about our hopes and dreams for the year 2016. Each time, I’ve expressed my hope that at the end of 2016 every member of Advent, our visitors, and others will sense that the Holy Spirit is present among us in a new and special way. It would be a wonderful thing if at the end of this year we can all look back and see healings in our minds, our spirits, our emotions, and even our bodies. It would be a wonderful thing if we all could all look back on 2016 as a year during which we made contact in a new and special way with the living God.

I have been a pastor of Advent for over sixteen years. That’s a long time. It’s long enough to know people pretty well. It’s long enough to know something about their struggles, hopes, and dreams. It’s long enough to know about secret sorrows and unspoken sins. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we all could arrive at December 31, 2016, or the Christmas Eve service a few days earlier, and look back on this year as the year in which we overcame some problems that had been plaguing us for a long time? Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could sense that our families were more whole, our neighborhoods more stable, our community more hopeful, our lives more permeated by the love of God?

I would like to repeat for all of us what I have said often recently: What I would really like to see and pray to see in our church is a great outpouring of the Holy Spirit in 2016. Experiencing the power of the Spirit is more important right now than any program we could begin or any ministry or mission we could undertake. We don’t need new programs; we need  new outpouring of the Spirit of Christ.

Amen.

Copyright 2015, G. Christopher Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

Endnotes:

[i] John McArthur, “The Fitting End to Mark’s Gospel: Mark 16:9-20” (June 5, 2011). You can find this sermon or teaching moment on the Internet. It is well worth listening to whether you agree with McArthur or not. I frequently do not, but he is a great Bible student and teacher. He makes a very impressive defense of Scripture though he does not believe Mark 16:9-20 is in the original text.

[ii] The Gospel of Mark has an interesting history. For many years, most people thought that Matthew was the oldest of the gospels. Then, scholars noticed that vast amounts of Mark were included in Matthew and Luke. Therefore, they concluded Mark must be a primary source for Matthew and Luke. There are other reasons to believe this is true, one of which is that Matthew and Luke appear to edit Mark to clean up tis grammar and often simplify, leaving out details they felt unnecessary to their Gospel presentation. The Greek of Matthew and Luke is much better than the Greek of Mark. In the history of the church, Matthew and Luke have been more often used and often the preferred gospels over Mark, which meant that Mark was not used as often, and may have fallen into disuse once Matthew and Luke were available. Nevertheless, Mark is important because it is most probably the oldest Gospel, and seems to have been John Mark’s transcripts of the teachings of the Apostle Peter. Papias, an early church father (70-163 AD), reports that John Mark wrote the gospel from Peter’s teaching and preaching. This might explain its relatively simple Greek: A fisherman from the Galilee may not ever have learned to speak or write Greek in a classical style, even after many years living in the Gentile world. William Barclay, “The Gospel of Mark” in The Daily Bible Study Series Rev. Ed. (Philadelphia, PA: Westminster Press, 1975), 1-9, 369-371. The Greek of Mark may be the Greek of a Jewish fisherman who was never completely fluent in Greek.

[iii] Matthew, Mark, and Luke are the so-called, “Synoptic” (or “See Together” Gospels). They are similar and portray the story of Jesus as a journey from his birth to death in Jerusalem. John is very different and relies on a different literary structure. Because much of Mark is repeated in Matthew and Luke, it is not surprising that they eclipsed Mark once they were written.

[iv] The undisputed portion of Mark ends with these words: “Trembling and bewildered, the women went out and fled from the tomb. They said nothing to anyone, because they were afraid” (Mark 18:8). This verse is followed by two different endings, which are not found in the most ancient manuscripts. Mark 16:9-20 is one. The shorter ending reads, “But they reported briefly to Peter and those with him all that they had been told. And after these things Jesus himself sent out through them, from east to west, the sacred and imperishable proclamation of eternal salvation.” There are basically three possible reasons for the way Mark ends (Mark 16:8). First, the original ending may have been lost as the Gospel was used less often and copied less often in the early church. Second, Peter may have died, and/or Mark been forced to stop writing after verse 8, so that the Gospel never had another ending. There is no way to know which of these is true. Finally, it is possible that Mark deliberately ended his Gospel with the women fearful and silent. Having described the resurrection and the instruction of the angels to go and tell the disciples to meet Jesus in Galilee, he may have simply stopped. There is no way to know; however, I do not find the last explanation convincing. What is known is that the current ending, which occurs in the Latin Text and in the Authorized Version in English (King James), is not in the most ancient manuscripts. Neither the Codex Sinaiticus (circa 350 AD) nor the Codex Vaticanus (circa 325 AD) contain the disputed ending. Without going into too much detail, Mark 16:9-20 are also in a different style and voice and omit words and stylistic preferences that characterize all the rest of Mark. It also contains words and phrases not common in the rest of Mark. It seems to reintroduce Mary Magdalene, as if we have not already heard of her part in the story in 16:1. William Hendrickson, Mark (Grand Rapids, MI: Hendrickson, 1975), 682-693.

[v] Received Text” or Textus Receptus” is the name given to Greek New Testament texts from which the translation of the New Testament into English by William Tyndale and the King James Version were made. Desiderius Erasmus, who we know as “Erasmus,” a Renaissance scholar, created a then new Greek New Testament text in 1516. It was based on the Latin Vulgate and then current Greek texts. It is not precisely the same as the texts primarily used today, though it was the text from which the New King James Version was created. It is my view that the differences among various texts are incidental and do not in any way impact any core Christian belief or practice. I could as easily serve a church that used the New King James Version as one using the New International Version or other modern translation.

[vi] Modern translations are based upon the Nestle Aland corrected Greek translation, Novum Testamentum Graece. The Nestle-Aland text is also the standard for academic work in New Testament studies. This text is periodically updated, and translators normally use the most current update of the corrected text. It is important to note that both conservative and liberal scholars support the Nestle Aland text. It is also important to note that there are scholars who defend the inclusion of Mark 16:9-20 in translations. As I mention above, in my view this academic dispute is immaterial for Christian faith and morals. Finally, it is important to note that it is conservative scholars that place the most impetus in revising the Greek text, since the belief in the literal inerrancy of Scripture is always phrased, “in the original autograph,” in other words, “As originally written in the first Greek text.” Thus, the search for text most like the original is basic to this theory of the authority of Scripture.

[vii] There are old stories in non-Biblical literature alleging that John and others were forced to drink poison, but not harmed. Eusebius recounts that “[Papias] also mentions another miracle relating to Justus, surnamed Barsabas, how he swallowed a deadly poison, and received no harm, on account of the grace of the Lord.” James E. Snapp, Jr. “The Authenticity of Mark 16:9-20” (Unpublished, 2007) found at www.textexcavation.com/snapp/PDF/snappmark.pdf (January 21, 2016) says, “Something similar is related in the career of Moses (Exodus 15:23-25) and in the career of Elisha (Second Kings 4:38-41) which may be significant since, just as Elisha succeeded Elijah who ascended, the believers succeed Jesus who ascended. An overlapping idea is also present in Numbers 5:16-28. But the closest parallel is in the story about Justus (who is mentioned in Acts as taking part in events in the first half of the first century) which was related by Papias.”

[viii] In looking at passages like Mark 16:9-20 believers have an opportunity to think more deeply about what we mean by the “Authority of Scripture.” When the Authorized Version was created, we did not have access to the number of manuscripts of the New Testament we possess today. As archeology began to uncover ancient copies of the Bible, what is called “Lower Textual Criticism” began to develop. The idea was to examine the various texts available and discern the best possible translation from them. Both conservative and liberal scholars practice Lower Textual Criticism. As indicated, the oldest manuscripts do not contain Mark 16:9-20 schweizer-apotheke.de. Therefore, in most modern translations, they are either omitted or placed in brackets. As such, most Biblical scholars to not regard them as authoritative as is the remainder of Mark. As seen above, however, these verses are not contrary to the teachings of Scripture and in fact draw upon Scripture for their teachings. The Gospel of Christ, the reality of the resurrection of Christ, and the commission of the church to share the Gospel, as well as the promise of presence and protection along the way are all contained in these verses. There is nothing contrary to the teachings of Scripture contained in them, provided they are properly understood in the context of the remainder of the Biblical witness. As with many things, it is best not to concentrate on details, but on the great themes of God’s wisdom and love for the world, the salvation offered by Christ, and the power of the Holy Spirit in thinking about hard passages. Scripture is designed to teach us about the nature of God, of humans, and about how we humans ought to behave. Mark 16:9-20 contains nothing contrary to the call to share God’s love with the world in the power of the Spirit and expect God’s presence and protection along the way. While it would be a mistake to base any crucial teaching or activity of the church on Mark 16:9-20, such as mandating the drinking of poison or handling of snakes, it can be used to confirm what we already believe based upon the testimony of Scripture as a whole, such as teaching the power of the Gospel and the protection of God’s people.

[ix] The official statement of the faith of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church, to which our congregation belongs, upholds the Westminster Confession of Faith, which reads in part: “The whole purpose of God about everything pertaining to his own glory and to man’s salvation, faith, and life, is either explicitly stated in the Bible or may be deduced as inevitably and logically following from it. Nothing is at any time to be added to the Bible, either from new revelations of the Spirit, or traditions of men. Nevertheless, we do recognize that the inward illumination of the Spirit of God is necessary for a saving understanding of the things which are revealed in the word.” The Westminster Confession goes on to teach: “The meanings of all the passages in the Bible are not equally obvious, nor is any individual passage equally clear to everyone.15 However, everything which we have to know, believe, and observe in order to be saved is so clearly presented and revealed somewhere in the Bible that the uneducated as well as the educated can sufficiently understand it by the proper use of the ordinary means of grace.” What we have done today is to see how God has worked and how to properly understand a difficult text. To properly understand Holy Scripture, we must allow the Holy Spirit to illumine our understanding, reading the text in context with other relevant passages of Scripture. This is especially true of hard texts. See, Evangelical Presbyterian Church, Governing Documents: Constitution: Volume 2: Westminster Confession of Faith and Catechisms in Modern English (Livonia, MI: Evangelical Presbyterian Church, 2014), Chapter 1: Holy Scripture.

 

 

Dear Reader. This post was supposed to be the post for last week. Unfortunately a minor health issue delayed it one week. I don’t suppose it is too late to make good New Year’s resolutions!!

There are times in life when we wonder, “What’s next?” Do, you remember times in high school or college, when you wondered what your life would be like in a few months. Would you go to college? Graduate school? The military? Work? Many young men and women, when their tour of duty in the military is over, wonder if they will reenlist or go back to civilian life. There are times in anyone’s career when you wonder, What’s next? Will I get a promotion? Stay in my current job? Find a new job? At times human beings wonder, We will I get married? Have a family? Achieve my life goals? One way or another we all ask the question, “What comes next?”

As mentioned above, New Year’s is a time when Americans ask the question, “What comes next?” The notion of New Year’s resolutions is that each year we should try to make our lives better. In order to change, we have to ask, “What comes next?” or perhaps more importantly, “What do I want to come next?” Positive change does not happen automatically. We have to think about how we should change and how we are going to make that change happen.

Over and over again this year, I will return to the theme, “What Comes Next?” 2016 will be a year of change. Election years are always times of potential change, and 2016 is no different. This year, we will all ask the question, “What comes next for our government?” and “Who do I think can best lead us in the right direction?” This Lent, we are going to ask the question, “What do I need to be delivered from in order to receive the blessings Christ has for me?” There will be other posts during the year that focus on some aspect of the theme, “What’s Next?”

All of these posts have in common a theological theme we will touch on today: All positive change begins by asking the Living God to enter our lives by the power of the Holy Spirit, and then trusting God’s Spirit to guide us into the future.

The Great Commission

If our senior year in High School leaves us uncertain about the future, we can only imagine how uncertain the disciples felt about their future as the Gospels reach their conclusion. For three years, the disciples had followed Jesus. Then, in rapid succession, Jesus was arrested, tried, crucified, died, and rose from the dead. We can imagine that the disciples were in a state of shock! Things had happened so quickly. They were trying to acclimate themselves to a new reality.

They now knew that, in some mysterious way, Jesus had conquered death. In addition, they now knew that Jesus’ ministry was not over. He had been appearing to them and teaching them. Then, Jesus told them to meet him in Galilee (28:10). As Matthew tells the story, they met him there and were given a clear understanding of what they were to do next. Not all the disciples completely understood or believed. Some doubted (Matthew 28:17).

Here is how Matthew puts it in his Gospel:

Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” (Matt. 28:16-20).

Prayer: God of Change: As we enter a new year and a new time, we do pray that you would please be with us by the power of your Holy Spirit. Give us the wisdom to discern where you want us to go next and who you want us to be. Perhaps more importantly, give us the power of your Spirit so that we can be the people you call us to be. In Jesus Name, Amen.

How in the World Did I Get Here?

I suppose that most of us remember Judy Garland in her most famous role as Dorothy, a little girl blow by a tornado over the rainbow to the Land of Oz where she meets a wicked witch and a strange and silly wizard. As the movie opens, Dorothy is having problems with her family and with a mean neighbor. She dreams of a better world, and Judy Garland sings the most famous song of her career, Over the Rainbow, which goes in part like this:

Somewhere over the rainbow way up high
There’s a land that you dreamed of once in a lullaby

Somewhere over the rainbow Blue birds fly
And the dreams that you dreamed of really do come true.

Someday I’ll wish upon a star, and wake up where the clouds are far behind me

Where trouble melts like lemon drops
Away above the chimney top—that’s where you’ll find me

Somewhere over the rainbow bluebirds fly
Oh why, oh why can’t I? [1]

Dorothy runs away from home, gets caught in a tornado, and ends up in Oz. After her adventures with the Wicked Witch, she decides she wants to be home in Kansas. We are sometimes like Dorothy. We dream of a new world, a better family life, a different career, basically a life without troubles. We think we get our wish or we begin to, but then, when trouble comes, we wonder how we ended up where we are. We need to be sure we choose wisely when we choose what is coming next. We need God’s wisdom to choose wisely.

Cultural analysts tell us that we are in a period of rapid cultural change. Those of us born before about 1960 can often look around at the world we inhabit and wonder, “How did we get here?” The disciples probably felt like this. After the resurrection they had entered a new and scary world. Their world would never be the same.

Life is Full of Changes

Most people, most of the time, want stability. We all know that history involves changes, that progress involves changes, but we want that change to occur during someone else’s lifetime and at someone else’s expense. I happen to be one of those people. I like stability: old pathways, old homes, old clothes, and old ways of doing things. Change does not come easily for me, but I have learned that we all must be willing to change and follow God into the future.

The disciples could not be faulted for wanting things to stay the same. Now that Jesus had been raised from the dead, why couldn’t he just stay with them, continue doing the teaching, the healing, the dealing with demons, the confronting authorities while they watched and cheered him along? However, the death and resurrection marked a new era in the lives of the disciples (and us). Jesus was (and is) going to be present, but now by the power of the Holy Spirit. From now on, the disciples were going to conduct the mission and ministry of the Jesus. They were going to teach, preach, confront authorities, cast out demons, and make new disciples. Jesus was going to give them the wisdom, love, and power to do this work, but they were going to be on the front lines.

When Jesus met his disciples on the mountain, a new era began. Now the disciples would make disciples. Now the disciples will baptize new believers. Now, the disciples will teach new believers how to behave as Christians. Jesus will be with them as they go, but in a new way. He promises to be with them (and us) always—even to the end of the age. There is a lot in that promise! The promise is not to be with the disciples for a few years while the church gets started. The promise is not to be with the church during good times or bad times. The promise is to be with us always by the power of the Spirit.

Embracing Positive Change

Jesus began his ministry proclaiming the Kingdom of God. He proclaimed that the kingdom of God is near, is present with him, and is coming in the future (Mark 1:13-14; Luke 17:20-21; Matt. 25:31-34; Rev. 22:1-5). The kingdom of God is like a thief in the night (I Thess. 5:2), like a bridegroom delayed to come to find his bride (Matt. 25:1) like a pearl of great price (13:45-46), like a mustard seed (13:31). The Kingdom of God is the place where God rules and where the peace, wholeness, happiness, blessedness and joy that God wants for the entire world and everyone in it is perfectly realized. The kingdom of God is both inside of us and coming into the world around us, because God intends to share his wisdom, love, and peace with everyone.

I don’t know about you, but a good amount of the time it is not clear to me that the kingdom of God is present inside of me. It is easy to see that if the kingdom of God is going to come into the world, I need to change. I need to become more like God the Father, more like Jesus, more filled with the Spirit, more loving, more merciful, more concerned about others, more willing to sacrifice, less self-centered—you get the idea. The kingdom of God involves change; and, we should embrace that change, not fight it.

This does not mean that we Christians should embrace change for change’s sake or changes that are not according to God’s will.  Christians should not just be blown along the path of cultural change following every fad and hoping for the best. There is good and bad change. We still must be wise. We should resist bad change and we should facilitate good change. There is a proverb that says that one of the characteristics of the righteous person is that they resist evil (Prov. 28:4). When change is negative, we don’t need to change.

However, when healthy, moral, and wise change breaks into history, we Christians should be a part of accepting and facilitating positive change. In a new era, in a new time, in a new kind of culture, Christians should be bold in the face of evil and bold in working for the coming of Kingdom of God. This means that we need to equip ourselves to face a new would and to share God’s wisdom and love in that new world.

What Comes Next?

Late in November, we had a staff retreat and discussed what we ought to have as a theme for our church in 2016. After talking about several ideas, the group settled on “What Comes Next?” We are in changing times. We are in a changing city. We are in a changing nation. We are in a changing world, and we must decide how we will live and what we will do in the face of all that change.

There are some constants. We should love the Lord our God with all of our hearts and all of our souls, and all of our minds, and all of our strength. We should love our neighbor as ourselves—the Great Commandment (Matt. 23:36-40). We should go into the entire world and make disciples—the Great Commission (Matt. 28:16-20). However, we need some additional guidance if we are to actually accomplish these things. We have to have a way to practically reach our goals.

Therefore, we have a subtheme for the year, which is a theme we have had for several years. We call it, “Worship Plus Two” or “Worship + Grow + Serve” or “Worship + Grow + Serve = Blessing.” The idea is to focus our energy on being regular in worship, being in one activity that helps us grow as Christians, and serving the Lord in some capacity inside or outside of the local church. For all of us, the answer to the question, “What’s Next?” is that our lives would be a lot better if we worship regularly, grow, and serve in 2016. Worship, growth, and service are a very good answer to the question, “What should I concentrate on in 2016?”

Since the beginning of Christian history, Christians have gathered together on the first day of the week to worship God. Worship is the fundamental act of the Christian community. A Christian who does not attend worship is like a football player who never attends team meetings. There is no way to be a good player and not attend team meetings.

If we are to make disciples, we have to be disciples. None of us, not event the pastors, know all we need to know about the Christian life. All of us need to be formed by discipling opportunities. Therefore, the second thing we should all do is find one way to grow as a disciple, and do it. Join a Bible study. Make a retreat. Attend Sunday School. There are a lot of ways to grow.

Finally, the words of the Great Commission were to “Go” and share the Gospel. Going means serving others in word and deed. It can be within the local church, in a mission, or in community service. The point is to put our faith to work in serving others and sharing God’s love with others.

We do not have to do this alone or under our own power. Jesus is coming along on the journey. He promised to be with us, and he will be. Jesus has promised to be with us to the end of the age. He has promised to be with us whenever two or more of us are together. He has promised to be with us in easy and hard times. He will be with us, an it is his presence that gives us the courage to go into the future in faith and with courage whatever comes next.

[1] There are several versions of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.” Most recently, the Ukulele player, Israel Kamakawaitoole, did a version that has become famous. The lyrics I quoted are basically those Judy Garland made famous, with a few changes. Harold Arien, Composer, E. Y. Harburg, Lyricist, “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” (1939).

Copyright 2016, G. Christopher Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

This week is the last of the “A Disciple Like…”  posts from Matthew 2:1-12. Beginning next week I will be expanding on a theme introduced this week, “What’s Next?” As the wise man says at the end of the post this week, if we come to Christmas, remember and recall the birth of the Babe, and then return to our daily lives unchanged, it is too bad.

It may be a good thing that I have come to visit you just after your Christmas holidays. In my day and time, most people never took a vacation. From the day you were old enough to work until the day you died, you worked. During a substantial part of your American history, it was true of your nation as well. People who are born on farms, and consume almost all of what they grow, work all their lives.

One reason I think you are such lucky people is that you have the freedom to travel. Many of you traveled during the Christmas holidays. You went to the beach or went on a cruise or went to New York City, or went to visit relatives. Hopefully, you had a good time. One reason people travel is to relax.

Some people travel because it’s their business to travel. Such people travel because they have to in order to make a living. This kind of travel is not relaxing. It’s also not very likely to make a big difference in your life. Your pastor, when he was in business, liked to tell his wife that conference rooms in Houston or Dallas, Texas, or New York all look exactly the same. The ham and cheese sandwiches for lunch taste exactly the same.

Finally, there are those who travel to broaden their horizons. In my day, very few people could travel just to learn something new. Fortunately, I was one of those people. My name is “Casper,” and I was one of the Wise Men. I’ve come to tell you about the most amazing journey of my life; and, I’ve had a number of amazing journeys.

In my day, we traveled by foot or by camel. This means that we saw from the ground every foot of ground and every city along our journey’s path. I sometimes think it’s too bad that you modern people can get up in the morning and fly in a day to someplace like the Grand Bahamas. We would have walked down to the Gulf Coast, traveled across the Gulf Coast to Florida, and then taken a boat to the Bahamas. My trip would have taken months or a year. By the time I had returned to Memphis, I would’ve seen and heard a lot more than you ever see or hear on a trip. We had more time to think than you do.

The Biblical Story

Here is my story the way it appears in your Bible:

After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem and asked, “Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.” When King Herod heard this he was disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him. When he had called together all the people’s chief priests and teachers of the law, he asked them where the Messiah was to be born. “In Bethlehem in Judea,” they replied, “for this is what the prophet has written:

“‘But you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah,

    are by no means least among the rulers of Judah;

for out of you will come a ruler

    who will shepherd my people Israel.’”

Then Herod called the Magi secretly and found out from them the exact time the star had appeared. He sent them to Bethlehem and said, “Go and search carefully for the child. As soon as you find him, report to me, so that I too may go and worship him.” After they had heard the king, they went on their way, and the star they had seen when it rose went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw the star, they were overjoyed. On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. And having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route (Matt. 2:1-12).

Prayer: God of Wisdom, Come to us with your Holy Spirit so that we may become wise in the ways of Jesus, what Paul called “Wise unto salvation.” In. In Jesus name, Amen

 The Story of the Wise Men

As I mentioned a moment ago, my name is “Casper,” and I was one of the Wise Men. [1] Most people think we Wise Men came from the East, somewhere near modern Babylon or Persia. Many scholars believe we were Medes (what have become the modern “Kurds”), because the Medes were a warlike people who, after the Persians defeated them, became scholars and counselors to the Persian kings. They studied the stars just as we Wise Men did. The Greek term is “Magoi” or “Magi,” which has become “magic” in your language. We however were completely opposed to magic. We were mystics, scientists and mathematicians, we studied the stars, and we counseled kings and rulers in the ancient Middle East.

Your tradition holds that there were three of us, Melchior, our leader, who was Persian, Balthazar, who came from Babylon, and myself, Casper, who came from India.  [2] So you see, I came the greatest distance of all to see Jesus. I traveled from India, through what you call “Pakistan” and “Afghanistan,” into Iran (what we called “Persia”), on to Babylon (in what you know as “Iraq”), and then all the way to Jerusalem in Judea. Along the way, Melchior and Balthazar joined me in the journey, for they too had seen the unusual star in the East. [3] Our journey took a long, long time.

When we began our journey, we assumed it would end in Jerusalem. Jerusalem was the capital city of Palestine, the seat of the Jewish King Herod, and the city founded by Israel’s greatest king, David. When we arrived in Jerusalem, we made inquiries concerning the birth of a prince to King Herod (Matt. 2:1). It turned out, however, that Herod had no new child.

When Herod heard that we were asking about a child king of the Jews, he summoned us! I can tell you we were very scared when this happened. Herod had a bad reputation for killing anyone who threatened him. We were afraid that he might even kill us. Nevertheless, he welcomed us as if he were glad to see us. He called a conference to which we were invited. His chief priests, the teachers of the Jewish law, who were expert Bible students, Herod, and the three of us all sat down to discuss our story and its meaning.

You might think everyone knew that the Messiah was going to be born in Bethlehem. Just ask yourself just how much knowledge do most of your presidents have about your Bible? Herod was a king not a scholar. In addition, in our day we didn’t have search engines on computers or libraries full of books indexed by chapter and verse. It took a while, but eventually Herod’s advisors determined that your Old Testament says that the Messiah will be born in Bethlehem in Judea (Matt. 2:3-6; Micah 5:2).

That very evening, we received another request to come and see the King. He asked us when the star appeared, and then requested that we  go to Bethlehem and see if there was a child there meeting the requirements to be a Messiah (Matt. 2:7-8). Finally, he asked that we might report back to him if we found such a child, so that he could come and worship him as well (Matt. 2:8) Quite frankly, we didn’t believe that King Herod had any intention of worshiping anyone but himself.

After meeting with the king, we began our journey towards Bethlehem. The star seemed to move and guide us until it came to rest over a place where we found a woman and a small child (Matt. 2:9). [4] We met the child’s mother, Mary, and bent over looking at the child sitting in her lap. I cannot explain to you what we felt in that instant. We immediately bowed down and worshiped the child. Then, we gave him gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh.

You Christians believe that these gifts were prophetic. Gold is a symbol of wealth and power, for the Messiah was to be a king. Incense is burned in some of your churches even today as a symbol of God. The Messiah was to be the Son of God. Finally, myrrh was a spice used in the ancient world for embalming. It is often a symbol of suffering and affliction. It turned out that the Messiah was a “man of sorrows, acquainted with suffering” (Isaiah 53:3). It’s funny, we might have brought the first two gifts as a part of some kind of a plan; however, that final gift was such that we had no idea what we were doing. It was only years later, after Jesus died on the Cross, that people understood the significance of the myrrh. [5] Jesus we learned was the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world (John 1:29).

We stayed in the little town for a few days. One night, we had a dream that we should not go back to Herod and tell him where the child was (Matt. 2:11). I’ve already told you that Herod had a bad reputation and we were afraid for the child. [6] We didn’t believe that a carpenter, his young wife, and a newborn baby were a big threat to Herod, but Herod might. Finally, our business was not to change the future but to observe, discern, and report. We had no interest in whether Herod the Great or Jesus bar Joseph was the king of Judah, though we hoped that this Jesus would be the long awaited Messiah and the Great King for whom many others and we longed. [7]

Therefore, when the time came for us to leave, we sent no message to Herod and returned home by a way that avoided Jerusalem (Matt. 2:12). I have sometimes regretted this, because Herod became worried about our failure to notify him of the whereabouts of the baby.  Therefore, Herod, because he did not know who the child was, ordered every young male child under two years old in the city of Bethlehem killed (vv. 13-18). [8] If we had just sent a message that the child was not in Bethlehem, we might have saved a few young lives.

What’s Next?

Well, that’s my story, or at least the part of the story that appears in your Bible. There are lots of traditions about we three wise men. One tradition holds that we became Christians, and our bones were eventually taken by Helen, the mother of Constantine the Great, to Constantinople and from there our bones were taken to Milan, Italy, and then to a church in Cologne, Germany, where you can see them today. Another tradition reported by Marco Polo holds that we were buried in Persia. My favorite tradition, about me, is that I returned to India and became a king. I was visited there by Doubting Thomas, who founded the church of India. I was baptized and became a Christian. The question behind all of these legends is a question you need to ask yourselves: were we changed by our visit to see the baby Jesus? [9]

If you’ve traveled, I’m sure you know this: it is easy to go on a trip, see a strange and unusual site, feel that your life ought to be changed, but return home unchanged until the feeling is only a memory. I traveled throughout the ancient world. I saw great poverty and human suffering. But, when I got home, other business was pressing, and I did nothing. I’ve seen great palaces and temples like the palace of Herod and the Temple he built in Jerusalem. They were magnificent. But my life was not changed.

The journeys that really matter in life are not vacations. A week at the beach, a week in the mountains, or week in a cabin doing nothing, rarely fundamentally changes anyone’s life. When vacation is over, we go back to our daily life, doing what we normally do, and occasionally wish we were back at the beach, or in the mountains, or in our little cabin. But we do not really change. The journeys that matter are those that change our lives.

You’ve just finished your Christmas season. In your country, Christmas comes just before New Year’s, when you ponder resolutions about the year to come. I am sure that many of you have already made New Year’s resolutions. (Since ten days have past, I’m sure you’ve already broken some of them!) Your pastors told me that your theme for 2016 is “What is Next?” I can’t tell you what to do because of Christmas and your annual trip to the manger in Bethlehem, but if I were you I think I’d ask myself, “Should I really leave the manger in Bethlehem for another year and not be changed?” and “If I am going to change, how?”

[1] The Greek text uses the term “Magoi.” Historically, the Greek word “Magoi” referred to Median wise men. Although Magi became associated with Zorastrianism, they emerged before that religion was founded. In Latin, the word is “Magus,” from which the English word “Magic” comes. The wise men were not, however, astrologers. I am partially reliant upon William Barclay, “The Gospel of Matthew” in The Daily Bible Study Series, Rev. Ed. (Philadelphia, PA: Westminster Press, 1932, 1975) for this and other of the information contained herein.

[2] There is no assurance there were three wise men. The tradition that there were three relates to the three gifts (Matt. 2:11). In Eastern Orthodoxy, the number is twelve, and art has rendered three, four, eight and twelve. The Bible does not say. The names of the three are also not scriptural. There are variants of these names mentioned in ancient writings—and from the variants some have discerned nationalities. I have arbitrarily chosen a tradition that holds they came from Persia, India, and Babylon. However, because of the connection with the cult of the Magoi, it is likely that they were all Median (Kurds).

[3] The exact explanation for the star is impossible to determine. The best explanation may be that this was not a natural but a supernatural star. Some hold it was a comet, perhaps Halley’s comet. Others hold that it was a conjunction of Saturn and Jupiter. Finally, around 5-2 B.C. “Mesori,” Sirius, the Dog Star, rose with unusual brilliance. “Mesori” means, “Birth of a Prince.” In my view it is interesting to speculate concerning the identity of the star, but we can never really know for sure.

[4] The Bible does not say that Mary and Joseph were in Bethlehem when the Wise Men found the child. It is inferred from the rest of the story. Other suggestions have been made as to where they may have been, but the story indicates Bethlehem, which makes the most sense.

[5] The Biblical text records that the gifts were gold and frankincense and myrrh (Matt 2:11). The three gifts had a spiritual meaning: gold (a symbol of wealth and kingship), frankincense (a symbol of the divine), and myrrh (an embalming oil) as a symbol of death. www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&es_th=1&ie=UTF-8#q=meaning%20of%20gold%20frankincense%20 and %20n myrrh&esth=1 (downloaded January 7, 2016)

[6] My use of the word “might” is probably an understatement. Herod was notoriously cruel and paranoid. He murdered even members of his own family out of the fear that they would supplant him. Although the “Murder of the Innocents” is not mentioned outside of Matthew, it is consistent with all that is known about Herod.

[7] In the ancient would at the time Jesus was born, there were many people who believed in the coming of a great king would bring a Kingdom of Peace in which war and other curses of the Roman world would disappear. It is likely that the Wise Men would have had such hopes. This explains their motivation to make the long trip. It was about more than a Jewish king, but about a universal, King of Kings, which Jesus was.

[8] See note 6 above. This is the slaying of the Innocents recorded in Matthew 2:13-18. Because of the small size of Bethlehem, and the fact that Herod only killed males two and under, it is no surprise that there is no secular record of this event. That Herod had already decided to kill the children of Bethlehem is indicated by his question concerning when the star appeared. He was trying to fix the approximate time of the child’s birth.

[9] Neither the Bible nor secular history contains any clear answer to the question of what happened to the Magi. We have only tradition to go by. One tradition holds that St. Thomas met, converted and baptized them and that they are buried in what is now Iran. I have adapted the ending to give a bit of this information to the congregation and reader.

As we begin a new year, I am publishing a poem I began in 1991 and only completed this last year. A friend who is a poet inspired me to finish what I began long ago. Next week, the subject will be the wise men, so I thought that this post might introduce the subject matter.

Not two weeks ago, we all read these words,

“In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world. (This was the first census that took place while Quirinius was governor of Syria.) And everyone went to their own town to register.  So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David. He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child.  While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son” (Luke 2:1-7).

The poem is a meditation on what might Quirinius have thought if the Wise Men had stopped and visited him first. Happy New Year to all of you!! Chris

When Quirinius Was Governor of Syria

A bright day for traveling, but foreboding warns—

The transit of Magi may be a vile omen.

I sent them on to Herod, confident his fear and paranoia

Will unravel the mystery of a messianic child-king.

 

Octavian: Friendship did not send me here

To oversee an unpopular tax at your empire’s edge,

With Varus barely competent, and Herod “the Great,”

Your lap dog perched upon his throne by a razor’s edge.

 

With no legitimate claim to rule, only convenient friendship,

Force of arms, and a conniving mind, devious and twisted,

A man lacking any genuine principles or honor,

Herod rules because he flatters Rome and enlisted our aid.

 

We can trust Herod no further than our leash extends:

The Arabian revolt, and his actions then, shows

He will honor us, then another, then us again

If it serves his dark purpose or strategy.

 

Nicholas of Alexandria defended his most recent

Scheme—and if death does not interfere,

There will be another duplicity, another scheme,

Intrigue upon intrigue, until he lives no more.

 

Worse, his “people” loath and hate him, for his blood

Is only half Jewish, and that half open to question.

Therefore, this visit of Wise Men sparks my fear

That to overthrow this usurper may be Heaven’s plan.

 

(Not that this would be too cruel a fate—

That this Idumean upstart, a vassal king

Who treats his pigs better than wives or children

Should be replaced is not too terrible a thing.)

 

I warned our “friend” and “king” by a secret message,

Sent with the Star Followers from Chaldea far to the east,

Knowing full well Herod’s mad cruelty

Will cause the death of at least one small child.

 

These Median wanderers and their speculation

Concerning a Jewish King born in the Palestine, the home

Of Rome’s most stiff-necked subjects, easily moved to insurrection

Assures some child will die when Herod hears their reading of the stars.

 

Someday, I fear, Herod’s “friendship” notwithstanding,

We will raze their temple, disbursing Jews among the nations–

These Jews with their One God, making of them and example

Of our powers of domination and willingness to subdue revolt.

 

Octavian: I watch these Wise Men fade into the autumn sun

As I watch my life fade into that autumn which leads

All men to another world, deep beneath earth where Hades

Rules, and we are but slaves and shadows of the night.

 

My heart is desperate within me, and wishes it were not so,

But I see no place for light beyond this darkness we inhabit.

How could any light of Olympus follow this life of maintaining

An empire doomed to fall, only when we cannot know.

 

My career, our friendship, even this empire Rome created

And I serve, is founded on power, deceit, and force of arms.

I am honored for my defeat of the Homonadenses—

A victory no one will recall within a generation of my death.

 

I have served as commander, governor, tutor, counselor,

Friend of Caesar and loyal servant of Rome,

All this is but a cloud, a spider’s web of fate

My glory and honor will last no longer than my life.

 

All this for you, Octavian, Augustus, Son of Caesar (that

Child of ambition that broke our Republic and left

Us with this “empire,” vast, unstable, and expensive,

Certain to doom our ancient character though endless war).

 

Old friend, we are not the powers we think we are,

Only servants, I think, of silent powers of the air,

Powers we believe we control, but which in fact

Control us, and our destinies, and wish us death in the end.

 

No, I cannot write this to you old friend;

It would be my certain death now and not tomorrow.

Yet, how I wish I might write to you this word of my heart

That together we might find our way out of history’s trap.

 

Now, they are gone, these pilgrims, gone to seek a God/Man,

This anointed Messiah for which the Jews so anxiously wait.

Would it be, I wonder, such a bad thing if this King of Kings

Came in fact, and we all gave up our pride and bowed down?

 

Gone our wars, gone intrigue, gone the lies of diplomacy—

All that I have spent my life doing and achieving

Swallowed up in a victory of a King of Peace:

Foolishness, of course, but if true, then what?

Copyright 2015, G. Christopher Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

Notes:

1. I suppose this poem may have been inspired by some memory of T. S. Eliot’s poem, “Journey of the Magi.” It began in a November day of 1991 as I sat in the Union Theological Seminary library studying for final exams. It was cold and the leaves were swirling outside. Suddenly, I was overcome with the transience of empires. The first lines were written that day. About six or so years later, in Brownsville, Tennessee I worked on it again, recognizing that it needed much work. Recently, inspired by a friend, I began again. That day in Richmond, I did some research on the figure Quirinius, who Luke says was governor of Syria, when Jesus was born (Luke 2:1).
2. Pubilius Sulpicius Quirinius (51 B.C.- 21 A.D.) was a friend of Caesar Augustus. Born of an aristocratic family, he was a good administrator and daring military leader. Luke has been questioned as to the veracity of his account because Quirinius did not actually become governor until 6 A.D. However, he held official posts in the region from 10 B.C. until about 7 B.C., which puts him in the region at or about the time of Jesus’ birth. He was an excellent soldier, capable administrator, and friend of Caesar. Census’ were taken about every fourteen years, and scholars believe that one might have been taken in the year 8 B.C.—a time when Quirinius was present. His role during this period was probably that of an extraordinary legetate with Quinctilius Varus as the Governor, who was not as capable as Quirinius. Varus appears in the poem as a figure Quirinius does not think capable. Quirinius ended his political career during the reign of Tiberius and died a trusted advisor and friend to Caesar. I have completely made up the notion that the Wise Men met him in Syria, though the trade routes might have taken them in that way. I have also made up the notion that by this time, Quirinius was a world-weary servant who knows only too well the vagaries of history.
3. Herod the Great (74 B.C.-4 B.C.) was a friend of Octavian and the Roman government, to whom he owed his power. He was capable, brilliant, ambitious, and over time, cruel and mad. The title “Great” comes from his great building projects, which included the Second Temple, Caesarea Maritima, Masada, and Herodium, where he died. Herod was of both Jewish and Idumean descent. Because of this, he had no real claim to the Jewish throne and was hated by the Jews. He was viewed as a half-breed. His cruelty and murder of his wife, mother-in-law, and three sons caused Augustus to famously say, “It is better to be a pig in Herod’s household than a son.” Although Herod was a client king of Rome and generally loyal, he was not above minor challenges to Rome’s authority. One of these minor disloyalties is referenced in the poem.
4. The Magi were probably historically of Median origin. Babylon and the region of Chaldea were famous for its wise men. The Medes were a warlike people, but after their conquest by the Persians, the ceased to have military power, they turned to scholarship and wisdom. Thus, the term “Wise Men” is not entirely without foundation. These Magi studied the stars and believed in the powers of their astrology. They were sought after as advisors.
5. As Rome grew, it became increasingly unstable militarily and economically. The empire founded by Julius Caesar and solidified by Augustus Caesar ended the Roman Republic and the virtues of the early Roman State. It’s stable years did not last for long, and by 64 A.D. when Nero allowed the burning of Rome, it was on a long slide towards is fall, which is ordinarily placed around 410 A.D. The idea of the poem is that Quirinius could already see the problem with the Empire and its likely fall. Historically, this is probably not accurate, but poetically, it is sound. In any case, if he could have seen this future, he would have been correct.

 

I wish everyone who reads my blog a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! Most of the time this blog is dedicated to advancing an understanding of the wisdom and love of God for ordinary life. First John tells us both that “God is Light” and “God is Love”. In Centered Leading/Centered Living, I call these twin qualities,  “Deep Light” and “Deep Love”. God’s wisdom is beyond our created wisdom, and God’s love is beyond any human love. Instead, God’s Divine Love is the deep ground of all truth and truly unselfish, self-giving love. Next year, for at least part of the year, I will be centering attention on this wisdom and love as it might impact our citizenship, at least that is the plan. With that, here is the next installment of the “A Disciple Like….” series. For now, let us listen again to a familiar story of how the Wisdom and Love of God came to dwell with us full of Grace and Truth…..

Good evening. My name is Jacob Ben Jesse. I don’t appear in your Bible, at least by name. However, I was one of the shepherds present on the night the Lord Jesus was born. My story begins in around the year 4 to 6 BC. Way off in Rome, the greatest of the Roman emperors, Caesar Augustus, was the ruler of a vast empire. The village of Bethlehem was a small and insignificant part of that empire, just as my nation, which was known as “Israel,” was also a small part of Augustus’s empire.

Some things never change. You have a saying that, “Nothing is certain except death and taxes.” We’re all going to die someday, and governments never seem to have enough money. As the Roman Empire grew, its need for taxes grew and grew and grew. In my day, just as in your day, many people tried to avoid taxes. I think you have a saying called, “Flying Under the Radar,” and another phrase called, “The Underground Economy.” In my time, a lot of people try to avoid paying taxes.

Eventually, Caesar Augustus declared that the entire Roman Empire would be taxed. In order to be certain that Rome collected all of the money it was entitled to collect, Augustus had a census taken. The idea was that if the tax collectors knew the name of each and every individual and where they lived, they would be able to collect all of the taxes due. Therefore, Caesar decreed that everyone should go to his or her own hometown and register to be taxed (Luke 2:1). [i]

I don’t know whether or not Caesar’s plan was successful, but I can tell you was one of the best things that ever happened in our little city of Bethlehem! Hundreds of people had to come to our town! The inns were filled to the brim. People had to be turned away. Every restaurant was filled. People like my landlord, whose sheep I tended, were able to sell all of the mutton and milk they could produce for weeks and weeks and weeks. I don’t know whether Caesar had all the money he needed, but in our little town of Bethlehem times were really good.

You’ve already heard that on the first Christmas, a man named Joseph and his betrothed wife, Mary, came to our little town so that Joseph, who was of the house and lineage of King David, might be registered in David’s hometown. When they arrived, there was no place for them to stay. One innkeeper, who could see that Mary was about to have a baby, took pity on them and allowed them to stay in a little cave in the side of the hill that he had turned into a kind of barn. It was there in his barn, on a cold winter night, that Jesus was born. [ii]

Here is how Dr. Luke records my story in his gospel:

And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.” Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.” When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let’s go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about.”  So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby, who was lying in the manger. When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child, and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them. But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart. The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told (Luke 2:8-20).

Prayer: God of Wonders: Take us now to the greatest wonder of all, to the night you came to be one of us. Allow us to sense the majesty of your decision to come and take on human flesh, that we might see and know how to live a divine life. Amen.

 The Story of a Shepherd.

Well as I said, my name is Jacob, and I was a shepherd boy in Bethlehem the night Jesus was born. As a boy, I was proud of being shepherd in Bethlehem. Actually, as a little boy I didn’t just dream of being a shepherd; I dreamt of being a shepherd who became a king! Every little boy in my village knew the story of King David. Just like your little boys play cowboys and Indians or soldiers, we played being King David! Our favorite story was about the time he took his slingshot and defeated the giant Goliath (I Sam. 17:1-58). We practiced for hours and hours slinging rocks at trees and boulders and wild animals, hoping we would grow up to be just like David.

Like my friends, however, I did not grow up to be a king. I grew up to be a shepherd. You would think that in my day being a shepherd would be an honored profession. After all, our great ancestor, Abraham, was a shepherd. His sons and their children: Isaac, Jacob, Jacob’s twelve sons, and all those who went into captivity in Egypt, were shepherds. However, in my time people looked down on shepherds as common working people. That is too bad.

Perhaps it was in Egypt when being a shepherd fell into disrepute. You see, the Egyptians did not like the smell of sheep. (Many people in your society today have the same experience.) Therefore, no Egyptian wanted to be a shepherd. One reason the Egyptians allowed my family to settle there during a great famine was that we were shepherds and could meet their need for mutton, goat’s milk, and wool.  I think perhaps that old Egyptian prejudice wore off on my people over the 400 years they were in captivity.

When we returned to the Promised Land, and after we captured it, the great warriors and lords of my people divided the land of Israel among themselves and became farmers, what you could call “Landed Gentry.” Over the years, they too began looking down upon shepherds. By the time Jesus was born, mostly, we shepherds didn’t own the land nor did we own the sheep. We tended sheep for a landlord.

Nevertheless, my job was not unimportant. Today, there are not many wild animals in the land of Israel. In my day there were lions, bears, wolves, and wild dogs. All of them preyed upon sheep. Our job was to watch over the sheep and to be sure that they were safe. In addition, because sheep are not very bright, we were responsible to move the sheep safely from place to place so they could eat fresh grass. Finally, sheep are domesticated animals, and they sensed that we cared about them. [iii]

Your pastor once worked for a farmer way down in Texas on the weekends. The man who owned the property, and the hired men, actually named the cows and sheep and could tell them by sight! We shepherds could do the same thing in my day. Like any good shepherd, we knew our sheep. The Lord Jesus was not a shepherd, at least not a professional shepherd. He was the Good Shepherd who takes care of his flock (John 10:1-16). Perhaps he learned what it meant to be a Good Shepherd by watching shepherds just like me.

One night, as we were watching our sheep, singing songs together, and telling stories, the most amazing thing you can imagine happened (Luke 2:8-20). It was one of those beautiful dark, dark nights in which the sky is perfectly clear. The moon had not risen, but the stars shone in the sky like tinkling white Christmas tree lights in your day. In my day and time we thought of the stars as being alive. (In fact, we thought of them as angels.)

We were sitting looking at the sky when all of a sudden it was as if the sky opened and one of the stars came to us as an angel of the Lord (v. 9). Naturally, just like everyone else who sees an angel, we were afraid. But the angel said to us, “Do not be afraid, for I bring you good news of great joy that will be for the world. Today in the city of David a savior is been born. He is Christ, the LORD” (v. 10-11). [iv] The angel then told us that, if we were to go into the town of Bethlehem, we would find a baby lying in a manger, which would be a sign that the Messiah had come (v. 12).

Suddenly, it was as if the sky was torn apart again, and heaven itself came to earth! A great company of angels suddenly appeared praising God and singing, “Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace among those upon whom his favor rests” (v. 13-14).

Just as Mary and Joseph were obedient to the message they received from an angel, so were we shepherds. We decided to go off to Bethlehem and find this manger and see for ourselves whether what the angel had said was true (v. 15). When we arrived at the little cave in Bethlehem where Jesus was born, we saw a child lying in a manger just as we were told (v. 16). Immediately, we began to go throughout the village of Bethlehem and spread the Good News about this child (v. 17). Everyone who heard us was amazed. No one expected such news to be communicated through a bunch of shepherds! I don’t know why, because David was Shepherd, and a Prophet, and a King—just like the man Jesus of Nazareth. Who better to reveal to people the Son of David and Good Shepherd than a group of Shepherds?

Being a Disciple Like the Shepherds Today.

When our night of excitement was over, we returned home giving glory to God for all that we had seen and heard (v. 20). In fact, for the rest of my life I was willing to tell everyone I met about this boy, Jesus of Nazareth, whom an angel proclaim to be God’s Good News to us and to the entire world. I understand that almost no Christians in your society ever share that Good News with their friends. I know that a lot of years have passed, but people in your day, I think, have the same kinds of problems people had in my day. They need to hear the Good News just as much as we did.

There are still uncaring emperors far away in Rome, or whatever you call your capital city. I am sure there are still taxes, and they are still too high. There are certainly still evil people like my nation’s king at the time, Herod the Great, who care about nothing but money and power. There are still people who grow up in dysfunctional families. There are still people who are deeply disturbed and even mad. There are still criminals and highway robbers. There still wars and rumors of wars. I think people in your day need to know about this Son of David, who is a Wonderful Counselor, the Mighty God, the Prince of Peace just as much as we did (Isaiah 9:6-70).

That first Christmas, we didn’t go home and pour ourselves a glass of wine, eat too much, and open presents. Instead, we shared the Good News that Christ, the Messiah, the Anointed One of God had come! I was young that night, so I lived to see that boy Jesus do miracles, teach with the power of God, cast out demons, be rejected by his own people, die a terrible death, and rise from the dead. All that I’ve seen in all that I know has not changed what I know and believe: One night more than 2000 years ago I went and saw a baby in a manger, and it changed my life forever.

Amen

Copyright 2015, G. Christopher Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

[i] Critical scholars have sometimes doubted Luke’s account. This is another instance when careful study and giving Luke a bit of grace shows he is accurately recording the facts as he knew them. First of all, while no record exists of this particular census/registration, there are Roman records of censuses taken in the way Luke records. While Quirinius was the legal governor somewhat later than the Luke indicates, he was in the region at a time when a son of Caesar was governor. History indicates that Quirinius, a friend of Augustus, successful soldier, and good administrator, was present and probably “governed,” meaning he did the day-to-day work. Later, he was appointed governor after Herod’s son, Archelaeus, was removed. Likely as not, Caesar appointed Quirinius because he was experienced in the job and understood Jewish politics from his earlier stint in Syria. http://www.biblehistory.net/newsletter/quirinius.htm (downloaded December 21, 2015). See also, William Barclay, “Luke’ in The Daily Bible Study Series Rev. Ed. (Philadelphia, PA: Westminster Press, 1975), 20-21.

[ii] Once again, there is no historical information to put the time of Jesus’ actual birth in winter, though as I noted in an earlier sermon, taking the stories of Elizabeth and Mary together, a winter birth is not impossible. Christmas was first celebrated on December 25 in 336 A.D., a long time after Jesus was born. Pope Julius I officially set December 25th as the date for Christmas. There was a winter holiday celebrated during this period of time, and many people think that this winter solstice celebration is the cause of the date. The Jewish festival, Hanukkah, also occurs at this time of year. No one can know for sure, and the Bible does not say. It is not important. What is important is who the man Jesus was and what he did and taught.

[iii] See, “Shepherds” in Nelson’s New Illustrated Bible Dictionary Ronald F. Youngblood, ed. (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 1986, 1995), 1164-1165). When I was young, I had a good friend who kept sheep near Cisco, Texas. He was a wonderful person. His hired men often named the animals and recognized them by sight. I could never accomplish this feat.

[iv] This phrase would be “Messiah God” in Hebrew. The term “Christ” is the Greek term for “Messiah,” or “Anointed One,” in Hebrew. The two accounts, Mary’s in Luke and Joseph’s in Matthew are remarkably similar in their common details. Both agree that the boy was to be named “Jesus,” would be a savior, and would be known as the “Son of God.” (For a human being “Son of God” and “God with us” have similar meanings.)

Good morning! My name is Joseph. I was the husband of Mary and the earthly father of our Lord Jesus Christ. It is not surprising that my story was left until the last Sunday before Christmas. Scholars know more about many other characters in the Bible than about me. There are even people, like Herod the Great, who plays a part in my story, about whom we know a great deal more because they are historical figures. There are only a few references to me in the Bible. In my opinion, that is as it should be, for I am one of those people who are satisfied to work behind the scenes.

I was a carpenter (Matthew 13:33; Mark 6:3). [i] The first chapter of Matthew is written to show that Jesus was descended from Abraham, and thus a true Jew, and from David, our greatest king. I am the last person mentioned in that genealogy. It is from my line that Jesus was legally qualified to be the Messiah. [ii]

David lived 1000 years before my time. He had thousands of descendants, many of them more prominent than me. The fact that I lived in Nazareth in Galilee, far from Jerusalem, the center of Jewish culture, indicates that I was of an obscure branch of David’s the line. So many years had passed, and there were so many descendants of David, that, although my family was proud of its history, no one expected anything special to come from me or almost any other member of my family. We were a bit like Americans who can trace their family history to someone like Abraham Lincoln or George Washington. It was a matter of family pride, but most family members did not behave anything like David, just like most people descendent of your great families don’t necessarily continue on their values, their character, or their strengths.

The Situation.

Here is the way my story is told by the apostle Matthew:

This is how the birth of Jesus the Messiah came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be pregnant through the Holy Spirit. Because Joseph her husband was faithful to the law, and yet did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly. But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.” All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: “The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel” (which means “God with us”). When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife (Matthew 1:18-24).

Prayer: Eternal God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, please come today that we might learn from the example of Joseph to be better disciples of you today and every day of our lives. In the Name of the Word Made Flesh we pray, Amen.

A Kind Reaction

In order to understand my story you need to know something about my world. In your day, couples marry for love. In my time, marriages were arranged. Generally speaking, the parents of a young man approached the parents of young woman and contracted for a marriage. If a man were older, and perhaps married before, he might contract for a bride himself. A contract was reached specifying a dowry price to be paid to the woman’s parents, among other matters. Sometimes, it took as long as seven years for a husband to earn enough money to pay the dowry and marry his wife. As many of you may remember, in the Old Testament, Jacob worked seven years to marry Rachel (Gen. 29:20)!

Most young people had marriages contracted long before they actually married. Men in my culture waited to marry until they could pay the dowry and support a wife. Most women in my time were contracted to be married about the time they were able to have children. In other words, they were quite young—in their teens. Once a marriage was contracted, the couple was “Betrothed.” [iii] This could last a long time.

I was, therefore, considerably older than Mary. [iv] Before we could be married I had to save enough money to have the right to marry her. Now here’s a funny fact about our system: once a marriage contract was signed, the couple was actually legally married. If a couple were to begin living together during this period, the husband had no right of divorce. However, if a husband found a character defect in his wife during the period of betrothal, he could divorce her (Exodus 22:13-19).

This is the exact situation I faced. During our time of betrothal, Mary came and told me she was pregnant. She explained that she had been faithful to me; however, an angel had appeared to her and explained that she was to have a child by the power of the Holy Spirit who would be the Messiah of Israel (Matthew 1:18; Luke 1:35). What the angels said, had come true!

Being a practical man, I didn’t believe a word she said. As a devout Jew, what my people called “a righteous man,” I knew my rights under the Law of Moses. I had the right to divorce Mary. Nevertheless, I loved Mary and did not want to publicly humiliate her. I wanted a divorce, but I did not want to hurt Mary (Matt. 1:19).

Supernatural Intervention.

I have always thought of myself as a kind man and a careful thinker. I don’t make decisions easily. Most of the time, I pray long and hard before doing anything that I think might hurt another person. Day after day, night after night, over and over again, I went over in my mind my options until I finally decided that I would “put her away privately” (v. 19). That is a fancy way of saying that I decided to divorce her without publically disclosing her infidelity. I didn’t want to be married to Mary; but I didn’t want to hurt her.

One night, as on so many nights, I fell asleep pondering the problem. That night I had a dream in which an angel of the Lord appeared and told me that I should not be afraid to take Mary as my wife because her story was true. The angel told me that Mary was carrying a child by the power of the Holy Spirit (v. 20). I was to name the child “Jesus,” which, as you learned last week, is the Greek term for “Joshua” which means “God our Savior” (v. 21-22). In addition, the angel told me that this was happening to fulfill a prophecy, and that my son was to be known as “Immanuel,” which in my language means “God with Us” (v. 22-23). In other words the angel told me almost exactly what the angel told Mary: our son was to be the Savior of Israel and God present in our history—the Son of God (Luke 1:35).

Mary had spoken the truth: Our child was conceived of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, I did not divorce her. Instead, I brought Mary home as my wife (v 24-25). As I look back upon my life, I realize that from my very birth God had been acting to do something special. Mary was the virgin who would conceive and bear a deliverer for my people (Isaiah 7:14). Jesus, my son, was to be the fulfillment of all the prophecies and promises of a coming Messiah.

The Rest of My Story.

In due course, I had to go to Bethlehem to register to pay my taxes to Caesar. Because of the rumors surrounding Mary, I took her with me. It was in Bethlehem, the home of King David, that our son was born (Luke 2:1-7). This also fulfilled a prophesy of our prophet Micah (Micah 5:2). You will hear that story later on this week. Next Sunday, you’ll hear the story of how we presented our child to be circumcised after he was born (Luke 2:21-39). Right now, I want to continue with the way Matthew tells the story.

The birth of Jesus was not the only time the Lord spoke to me. I had several visions that impacted my life and the life of Jesus. One day, three Wise Men appeared where we were living. They had seen a special star, a star associated with the birth of the King of the Jews (Matt. 2:1) and gone to Jerusalem to see King Herod, but he had no new child. His advisors had told Herod and the Wise Men that a King of the Jews, the Messiah, was to be born in Bethlehem in Judea (vv. 2-10). After bowing before Jesus and giving him gifts, the Wise Men returned home.

When the Wise Men told me they had visited King Herod, my blood ran cold. I knew Herod would certainly try to kill anyone he felt might threaten his kingship. It wouldn’t matter that I was an obscure carpenter married a common country girl. The Wise Men were also concerned: They had a dream in which they were told not to return through Jerusalem, but instead to go home by “another route” (v. 12). [v]

After they were gone as I worried and wondered what to do, once again, an angel of the Lord appeared to me. This time I was told to take Jesus and Mary to Egypt (v. 13). I was obedient to the angel, and for some years we lived in Egypt (v. 14). It is a good thing too, because Herod killed all the children of Bethlehem around my son’s age (vv. 16-18). [vi] This event is known to you as the “Slaughter of the Innocents,” one of Herod’s worst crimes.

Then, after Herod died, an angel appeared and told me to go back to Israel (v. 20). My intention was to take my son, who was to be known as the “Son of David,” to Judea, King David’s homeland. However, I was warned by God in a dream not to go there because Herod’s son was ruler in Judea—and just as mad as Herod himself and just as likely to harm Jesus. Therefore, we went to Nazareth in Galilee (vv. 22). This also fulfilled a prophesy of the Old Testament. [vii]

When Jesus was twelve years old, we took him up to the Temple in Jerusalem, as was our custom (Luke 2:41-42). Jerusalem is a crowded and busy place during festival times. Mary and I had already left Jerusalem when we discovered he was not with our traveling party (v. 43). We thought he was with relatives, but he was not.

It took us three whole days to find him! We were frantic. When we found him he was in the temple courts talking with the teachers of the law. When we rebuked him, he looked puzzled as if we should know that he should be in the Temple. To be quite frank, we thought our son was going to be some kind of the king, and we didn’t expect to find in the Temple courts talking with the religious leaders of our people. When we complained about his behavior, he looked at us with puzzlement and said something like, “Did you not expect to find me in my father’s house?” (v. 49). Actually, we did not expect to find him in the Temple. We expected to find him running around in the streets playing! When we brought him home once again he was our son, Jesus, a person everyone loved and respected because he was such a fine boy (v. 52).

The Measure of the Man.

I did not live to see my son’s public career as a teacher, Rabbi, healer, and Messiah. I died before my son. Frankly, I’m glad I was spared seeing his final moments. While alive, I early on realized that my first job was to be a father to Jesus. Jesus worked beside me from the time he was able. He ran errands. He did odd jobs. He grew up strong. I like to think that in watching me, and how I treated other people, he learned to be honest, straightforward, kind, and gentle. I hope I modeled for him a kind of discipleship that is diligent, kind, and honest.

That is not so say that I was not religious. My dreams show that I had a mystical bent even though I was a practical person. I was diligent to dedicate Jesus, to take him to the synagogue, to attend religious festivals in Jerusalem, and to model for Jesus what it meant to truly worship the God of Israel. I prayed often in front of my son, and he knew what it was to be a man of prayer. I read the Law of Moses, and I taught it to my son. In fact, I think that this is the most important contribution I made to his life.

I hope as you think about me you’ll remember me as a simple, good, thoughtful, ordinary man trying to raise a family and provide for them. I hope you will remember that I was first and foremost a workingman, but that I did not ignore spiritual things. Most of all, I hope you will remember that I was obedient to God when he spoke to me. Not all disciples are called to be pastors and prophets. In fact, most people are called to be an everyday disciple just like me.

Amen

Copyright 2015, G. Christopher Scruggs

[i] In Jesus’s time, this could mean that Joseph was a workman who built homes, framing and acting as a stonemason, or, perhaps I owned my own business and had a small carpenter’s shop. The Bible doesn’t say.

[ii] Under Jewish law, inheritance was through the father. Thus, Jesus’ legal claim to the Messiah and King of Israel was through his father’s line, even though he was not the biological son of Joseph. Under Roman law, this was similar. For example, Caesar Augustus (born “Gaius Octavius”) was the heir of Julius Caesar. Although he was not his son Augustus was made heir to Caesar under Roman law. Augustus was the Son of Julius Caesar’s sister. Like Julius Caesar adopted Octavius, Joseph adopted Jesus as his son, making Jesus, technically, only the adopted son of David.

[iii] Most marriages in Biblical times were arranged between the parents of the bride and groom. In fact, on occasion the bride and groom might not even know one another. A betrothal could occur at any time, even years before the marriage, since the bride and groom would have to be of marital age before the actual marriage could occur. Betrothal occurred once a marriage contract was signed. In this contract, among other matters, a dowry would be agreed upon. This amount would have to be paid by the groom or the groom’s family to the bride’s parents. Once the betrothal contract was signed, the bride and groom were legally married and only death or divorce could end the marriage. When the dowry was paid, the groom would come and consummate the marriage in the bride’s home. A special cloth would provide proof that the bride was a virgin. If she was not, the groom did not have to accept the bride and could divorce her. After consummation, the bride was then taken to the wedding feast, and the couple celebrated their marriage. The bride’s parents kept the “proof of virginity” in case of a later dispute.

[iv] Scripture does not say whether Joseph was older than Mary. It is an inference both from Jewish marriage customs (grooms were almost always older than brides) and from the fact that Joseph is not mentioned in the Gospels after the events of Luke 2:41-52. When Mary and Jesus’ sisters and brothers come to see Jesus in the Gospels, Joseph is not mentioned (Matthew 12:46-50). The theory that Joseph had died by the time Jesus was an adult is given further credibility by the fact that Jesus, when He was on the cross, made arrangements for His mother to be cared for by the apostle John (John 19:26-27). Joseph must have been dead by the time of the crucifixion, or Jesus would never have committed Mary to John.

[v] Most scholars believe that the Wise Men were from what is today Iraq. In my view, the Wise Men probably took a northern route from what is today Iraq through northern Syria, then down to Jerusalem and then south to Bethlehem. In the ancient world, this route through the “Fertile Crescent” was the most traveled trade route From Mesopotamia to the Holy Land. I think going home, in order to bypass Jerusalem, they the southern route from Bethlehem to the Jordan River (Jericho) then north up the Jordan Valley to Syria, and back into Mesopotamia.

[vi] What is known as the “Slaughter of the Innocents” is recorded in Matthew 2:16-18). This event is only mentioned in Matthew; however, Bethlehem was so small that the murder of a few children under two years old is unlikely to have caused much contemporary comment. Herod was guilty of worse crimes.

[vii] There is no specific Old Testament prophecy that is fulfilled. This may refer to the use of the term “Branch” (“Nazor” in Hebrew). If so, then it fulfills Isaiah 11:1. It might also be that this refers to Jesus being a Nazarite, who abstains from drinking wine and cutting his hair, though I think this unlikely. See, The Harper Collins Study Bible (San Francisco, CA: HarperCollins, 1993), note on Matthew 2:23b.