TRUSTING GOD WITH OUR WHOLE HEARTS

A Sermon for the Fifth Sunday in Lent, YEAR B
March 29, 2009        

By Pastor Laura Gentry

Jeremiah 31:31-34

The French daredevil, Jean Francois Gravelet, known by his stage name as the Great Charles Blondin, born 1824, is remembered as one of the greatest tightrope walkers of all time. To bring his story to life, let’s use our imaginations this morning and pretend we are the crowd watching one of the Great Blondin’s many death defying performances.

I’ll need my assistants to come forward. They will flash one of three signs at you and you’ll need to make that sound. So let’s practice. First, there is the cheer sign. Whenever you see this, I want you to cheer excitedly. Let’s try it! (CHEER). Secondly, there is a sigh sign. Whenever you see this, I want you to sigh like are so relieved. Let’s try it! (SIGH). Now he’ll be going across the Niagara Falls, which makes a pretty loud gushing sound. So whenever you see the gush sign, you’ll need to attempt to make this sound and if you can’t, then just say “gush” loudly. Let’s try it! (GUSH). Okay, I think you are totally ready for this.

Now picture it. We are now transported to a hundred years ago—to the time before extreme sports were invented. No one was jumping off bridges with rubber band around their waist. Reality shows with people eating worms were not on the air. Demolition derbies were yet a reality. And since there was Vince McMahon hadn’t built the world wrestling entertainment up to what it is today, people were not accustomed to seeing guys get hit over the head with folding chairs. Nope. The main excitement in entertainment of this era is the Great Blondin—he is adored by people all over the world. And here we are watching him make his grand entrance!

So when he enters, the crowd cheers! (CHEER) Blondin swishes in and says, “If it is a rope and it is high up, I will walk on it!”

A young lady runs up to him and begs him for his autograph. A gentleman, Blondin signs her paper with a flourish. The girl grabs the paper, holds it tightly, swooningly.  The crowds continue to bombard him with adoration. (CHEER)

You see, we are here at Niagra Falls. We are sitting next to the American Falls at Prospect Park in the United States. The water is gushing over the falls—150,000 gallon of water flower over these falls every second! And the water drops 176 feet to the churning waters below, creating immense mist! Can you hear the rushing water? (GUSH)

Oh, what a dangerous place this is! But look, 160 feet above the top of these falls, there is a tightrope strung across it—from here in the US, all the way over the the Canadian side: 1100 feet. How could anyone attempt such a feet? If he falls, he will surely die. Can the Great Blondin really survive such a walk? “This is the longest walk I have ever attempted,” Blondin says to the reporters.

But look, there he goes. The Great Blondin is walking across. Yes, look at that. The crowd is silent as he carefully makes his way over! All you can hear is the gushing of the deadly falls beneath. (GUSH) And now, he takes his last step onto the Canadian side! (SIGH) The crowd goes wild! Blondin has done it! He’s really done it. (CHEER)

And that’s not all. What is he doing? He’s climbing into a potato sack. and look! He’s coming back this way. He can’t even see out of that sack and his legs might get tangled. The crowd is quiet again. Nothing but the water’s gush. (GUSH) Carefully, the Great Blondin, looking like a wiggling sack, gets all the way back to this side! (SIGH) Incredible! The crowds go crazy. (CHEER)

Blondin continues to amaze the crowds. He crosses again and again. (GUSH) One time, he even cooks a meal on the rope with a portable cooker and lowers it to the people on the Maid of the Mist boat below! (CHEER)

“Do you believe in the Great Blondin?” a reporter asks a member of the audience.

“Oh yes, I believe in him.” he replies. “He’s amazing! He can do anything.”

Oh but wait! The Great Blondin is going to try yet another trick. This time, he’s walking across the gorge pushing a wheelbarrow with a two hundred pound weight inside. (GUSH) This is too much to bear! The women begin to faint from the sight of such danger, men avert their eyes. The Great Blondin must be out of his mind!

As he’s crossing, the reporter turns to an onlooker and asks: “Do you think the Great Blondin can get across with the wheelbarrow and all that weight?”

“Of course! No doubt! He's  the greatest tightrope walker in the world!” replies a young lady.

“Of course!” declares another. “He’s walked that tightrope every single way. There is nothing he can’t do! I trust him entirely.”

And then, Blondin steps onto the safe land of the United States. (SIGHS) Wow! The crowd is louder than it’s ever been before. (CHEER) What an outstanding feet! This is entertainment at its best.

Now the Great Blondin turns and looks at us and says, “Would anyone like to go across with me? Climb right upon my back.”

From the back of the crowd you can hear comments such as “What an honor! What a privilege! Wouldn’t that be neat?”

“Let me repeat,” Says Blondin dramatically, “I am looking for a volunteer to be the first person in history to go across Niagra Falls in a tightrope walker’s back. Say, you look like a brave fellow, how about you?”

“I wouldn't want to risk it.  My family might think I was irresponsible.” says the man as he turns and runs away.

Blondin looks at another fellow who says: “Well, sir, I'm honored by your request but I, uh, I, uh, . . . I . . . Oh yes, I have to go get something out of my car.” He jumps into his car and peels away.

“I do not understand,” Blondin continues. “ How about you, miss?”

“Oh, Great Blondin, you're my hero!” she sighs.

“Then you'll come with me?”

“But, but . . . I'm scared of heights . . . I couldn't .” And she faints into his arms.

Finally, with no one agreeing to put their lives on the line, his own manager, Harry Colcord, agrees to be the one to go across the falls on Blondin’s back. Slowly they make their way over the falls, each step wobbly and difficult. The water rushes madly below (GUSH) as the crowd watches intently until at last, they reach the other side safely. (SIGH) Incredible! The crowd jumps to their feet and cheers as loudly as they can. (CHEER) Indeed, we’ve never seen anything so amazing in all our lives!

But what if the Great Blondin had asked YOU to go across the gorge on his back? It’s one thing to say you believe in his talents as a tightrope walker and quite another to actually put your life in his hands. It takes courage to do what Harry did, to literally put yourself in someone else’s hands.

You know, it’s just like believing in God.  It is pretty easy to say, “Oh yes, I am a believer” and yet another to believe in God so much that you put your life in his hands—to trust your Lord entirely. Martin Luther once said, “The only saving faith is that which casts itself on God for life or death.” Do we trust God that much?

In our scripture lesson from Jeremiah today, the prophet speaks to the people of God who have been devastated by the siege of their country and their subsequent exile. “The days are surely coming,” he tells them as he speaks the word of the Lord. “The days are surely coming when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant that I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt--a covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, says the LORD. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people."

Despite their sin and unworthiness, God is announcing a new beginning for the people. God is renewing the covenant, the promise of love and commitment. God is going to do a new thing for these broken and and lost people—”I will be their God and they shall be my people,” the prophet declares. But how?

Well, the former law, which God had given Moses was written on tablets of stone. And the people rebelled against it, refusing to follow this law. Now, God proposes to write the law within them. “I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts.”

This is language of the heart. It implies a marvelous intimacy between Creator and the creation. It is not about some big rule-making God thundering down judgment from the sky. This is about God seeking to enter the very hearts and minds of his people, to transform them lovingly from within. The sin written in their hearts will be replaced by God’s liberating law.

“No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, ‘Know the LORD,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the LORD; for I will forgive their iniquity, and remember their sin no more.”

Having experienced grace, God’s people will live in it. They won’t have to tell each other to know the Lord because they WILL. They will know God in their heart of hearts. They will trust God with their very lives.

Jesus adds further punch to this message by saying in the gospel of John: “Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life.” God wants us to absolutely surrender ourselves to God’s care.

The story of the Great Blondin reminds us that living out our belief in someone is difficult, it takes more than just lip service, it takes great courage. Living out our faith can be equally hard. God asks everything. But it is worth it, for faith offers eternal life.

This morning, we are going to be conducting an order for healing in worship. All of you will be invited to come forward to receive a word of blessing and prayer, if you wish. There will be an anointing with oil and the physical gesture of the laying on of hands. These are signs to tell us again that we are sealed by the Holy Spirit and marked with the cross of Christ.

God promises us wholeness and peace and as a joyful response to this covenant, we cling to God in faith. As we continue our Lenten journey, may we know God, may we trust God to heal us and care for all our needs, and may we trust God with our whole hearts. Amen.

REJOICE IN GOD'S LOVE

A Sermon for the 4th Sunday in Lent, Year B
by Pastor Laura Gentry

Numbers 21:4-9 • John 3:14-21

Today is already the fourth Sunday in Lent. And it actually has a name. It is called Laetare. This term comes from the Latin word “rejoice.” So we are right smack dab in the middle of the somber season of Lent and yet the word that describes this day is rejoice. Does that make any sense to you?

It seems a bit odd since this is a season of penitence and sacrifice. It is a season so serious that we don’t even get to sing our alleluia verses. Yet in the ancient church, the prayers for this day always began with the word rejoice. Why? Because we have now passed the halfway point. Lent is more than half done and we are well on our way to the great joy of Easter. And today’s scripture lessons are filled with joy as well.

It begins with the story from the Exodus where the people of God begin to get grumbly. They are on a journey to the promised land but they seem to have forgotten about the greatness of this destination. All they can see now is the present discomforts. They are in the middle of the wilderness and the food is awful. So they get mad at Moses. Never mind the fact that he led them out of slavery and he has helped them find water, manna and has even argued with God on their behalf. Still, they feel sorry for themselves and he’s the most convenient one to blame. “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness?” They ask Moses.

God does not appreciate their ingratitude and so poisonous serpents show up and start biting and killing the Israelites. So where is the joy in this story? It sounds like a horror movie. In a 1999 poll, 40% of Americans listed snakes as that thing in life that they feared most. Snakes beat out speaking in public and spiders. Now we have to deal with a snake story in the bible? It seems too awful.

It certainly reflects our human nature to want to fuss about things. We often grow impatient with God and feel that our wilderness experiences are lasting too long. We grumble and complain and embrace negativity instead of hope.

But back to the Exodus. Despite the fact that the people brought the snake problem on themselves by their negativity and ingratitude, God proves to be merciful. The people acknowledge their sin and ask for help. So God instructs Moses to make a bronze sculpture of one of the very serpents that had bitten them and mount it on a pole. Then, whenever someone is bitten, they simply look up to the serpent and they are healed. This is a great grace given freely to these unworthy wanderers.

Then, in the gospel lesson from John, we come in at the middle of a conversation that Jesus is having with a religious leader named Nicodemus. Jesus is trying to get through to this man that God is offering a new covenant through him. He says, “And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.” You see he is making reference to the story we just heard. In the same way that God provided healing for the people through the serpent sculpture, God was now providing healing for all through Jesus who would be soon be dying for all on the cross. This cross is not just for the “insiders” who already have a relationship with God, but for all.

Then, comes John 3:16, the verse that everyone knows. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.” It is known as the gospel in a nutshell. You see it written on the scoreboard and baseball games, on billboards and bumper stickers. I once saw a man holding a sign with this verse as he was protesting a concert of the Rolling Stones. It made me laugh to see him using it as a condemnation of those awful people going to see a rock band. I laughed because that is exactly the opposite point this scripture passage is making.

Look at the very next verse. Jesus says, “Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.” The message is that the cross is lifted up to liberate people, to draw them to God with the cords not of guilt and condemnation but of unconditional love.

For we are the all the ones who chose darkness over light. We are the ones, like the Israelites, who like to complain even while we are on the road to freedom. Even when we don’t want to be this way, we end up being this way. Paul understood this internal wrestling when he wrote: “For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do” (Romans 7:19-21) And it is not just the sins we commit that is the problem, but the sinners that we are at our very core.

Yet Paul also understands that while our nature is sinful, God’s nature is one of love and grace. “Where sin increased,” he writes in Romans 5:20, “grace overflowed all the more.”

Out of God's unsurpassing love for us, Christ is lifted up on the cross. And this love is for the whole cosmos. The author of John’s gospel wants to make this abundantly clear. Love is the theme that dominates the whole book. We hear that God is love (1 Jn. 4:8), that the relationship between Jesus and his father is love (Jn. 15:9-10; 17:23), and that the nature of discipleship is love (Jn. 13:34-35; 15:12-14).

This love of God is all in all. That is why they call John 3:16 the gospel in a nutshell: For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. This is the reason we can rejoice today, even as our Lenten journey continues.

God woos us into a relationship through love and grace. In the book Surprised by Joy, the famous theologian C.S. Lewis claims that he came into Christianity kicking and screaming. He says that as a young man he was “very angry with God for not existing.” He had no intention of embracing faith in an unseen God. But the love of God drew him in against his own will. Of the night he accepted Christ, he writes this:

You must picture me alone in that room in Magdalen, night after night, feeling, whenever my mind lifted even for a second from my work, the steady, unrelenting approach of Him whom I so earnestly desired not to meet. That which I greatly feared had at last come upon me. In the Trinity Term of 1929 I gave in, and admitted that God was God, and knelt and prayed: perhaps, that night, the most dejected and reluctant convert in all England.

As God offered healing to the Isrealites, God offers healing to all in Christ. The word “healing” comes from the same root as “wholeness” and “wellness” and they all refer to being “full” or “complete.” When we look at our own lives, we know that we are broken. Like Humpty Dumpty, all the king’s horses and all the king’s men cannot put us together again because we are just the broken by our own sinfulness and the sinfulness of the world that has run us over time and time again. Yet, Jesus comes to us in our broken state and offers healing and wholeness because of God’s great love for us. We are called to faith in Christ who heals us.

The theologian Paul Tillich wrote: “Faith is being seized by a power that is greater than we are...one that transforms us and heals us...Surrender to that power is called faith.” We are not required to heal ourselves, but simply to surrender to the Savior who can.

And so today, we hear again that powerful message of grace. Nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. We are saved by grace through faith in him and set free to do the good things God has planned for our lives. That is why it is Laetare—a day of rejoicing. We rejoice in God's love. Let us surrender to this power called faith that we may have eternal life. Amen.

OVERTURNING OUR TABLES

A Sermon for the Third Sunday in Lent, Year B
by Pastor Laura Gentry

John 2:13-22

Now I don’t know if you can believe this or not, but when I was a kid, I was—well, let’s just say I was prone to outbursts. My sister was the reason for it, of course. She could set me off in an instant. And I found great satisfaction in using drama do deal with the anger she could so easily rouse in me. I would stomp around or slam doors or pretend to sing opera at the top of my lungs in vehement protest.

And so when I was introduced to today’s gospel lesson in Sunday school, I took great interest. How exciting, I thought, Jesus has a temper just like mine. He can throw an even bigger fit than even I can. Why, I have never even dreamed of turning over a table or getting out a whip. So if our Savior can get away with this kind of angry behavior, shouldn’t I? My mother didn’t buy this argument. And you shouldn’t either if your kid tries to pitch this idea to you.

There is a lot going on in this story and we have to consider all the facts if we are to understand it. First of all, there was a system of commerce in the Temple in Jesus’ time that is a bit confusing for us. You see, once a year, Jewish men would have to pay a temple tax. But this tax could not be paid with the Roman or Greek coins used in regular commerce—it had to be paid with special temple coins. Now how do you get your hands on such coins? You would have to exchange them. To make it convenient for people, the temple authorities set up money changing booths in the temple courtyard. It wasn’t a very fair exchange, however. The fee for the exchange was sometimes as much as the exchange—thus, doubling the cost.

On top of that, animals were offered for sacrifice at Passover. These animals had to be without blemish according to the Jewish laws. If you brought your own animal to sacrifice, it had to be inspected by the authorities to see whether it would qualify as perfectly suitable for sacrifice. Almost none ever qualified, as you might expect. It was easiest, then, to just buy a pre-approved animal in the temple court. These animals went for substantially higher prices than they could be purchased elsewhere. Sometimes it was several times the cost.

This scene is depicted very dramatically in the musical Jesus Christ Superstar. In the 1973 film of it, they show the temple filled not only with ancient items for sale but modern things too, like a rack of postcards, a rack of mirrors, guns, hand grenades and the like. Jesus approaches them and it looks like he’s blown a gasket. He throws over the tables and drives the market people and their animals out. His high pitched singing wails: “My temple should be a house of prayer! But you have made it a den of thieves!” Then he screams in full voice: “Get out! Get out!” The merchants and shoppers all flee the scene and there is nothing but an eerie silence.

John tells us that it causes great chaos when Jesus does this. Even the disciples are stunned, confused and amazed at what has happened before their eyes.

This confusion seems to grow when Jesus says: "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up." That makes no sense to them. The Temple had been under reconstruction for 46 years . How in the world could it be rebuilt in 3 days? It was physically impossible.

As with so many things, the disciples only figure it out later—after the resurrection has made it clear. The temple Jesus was talking about was his body, not the stones of this magnificent building. He was foretelling his own resurrection.

But why does Jesus choose to cause such a scene in order to talk about his resurrection? Well, it seems he understands what the temple authorities are doing with their temple marketing. They are intentionally overcharging and taking advantage of the poorest of people. It is clearly a misuse of their spiritual authority. Injustice in God’s name doesn’t sit well with Jesus.

It could also be related to the Ten Commandments that we’ve just heard again in our first lesson for today. Could it be that Jesus’ anger is not just about the fact that they’re overcharging for the merchandise, but the fact that this institution—the Temple—is failing to promote the worship of God and instead turning people's attention elsewhere? This is a violation of the first commandment: "You shall have no other gods before me." Because this word is translated as "before" it may lead people to think you should put God first and everything else second. But the heart of the meaning is really that you should put God first and nothing else second. God should be our all and all.

Jesus is angry that the church of his day is getting people caught up in commercialism. The frenzy of the Temple’s looks just like the world’s marketplace. This is pulling their focus away from true worship. God is not just another product to buy. God is God and demands absolute loyalty.

Today this is still a problem. Perhaps if Jesus came into our modern context to do a little temple cleaning, he'd find more abuses that needed changing. No, we’re not selling calves and pigeons in the fellowship hall but we do fun the risk of taking our eyes off God. We cannot let other loyalties interfere with our devotion to God—our nation is not more important than God, our denomination is not more important than God, even our congregation is not more important than God. To forget this is idolatry. We can never substitute devotion to an institution for devotion to God. Institutions can provide good guidance, but they are not always right. No, not even our denomination is always right. As much as we may love it, we have to remember this.

There may be yet another reason for Jesus' outburst, however. In Mark's version of this story, Jesus notes that the temple is a "house of prayer for all nations." The Jews also had laws about who could and could not enter the inner part of the temple. The outer court, in which this incident occurred, was the only place non-Jews could be. It was the place where even Gentiles could come in order to approach God. Now that the outer court has become so cluttered with business transactions, it is not a suitable place for prayer and worship. Therefore, Gentiles are no longer able to worship God in the temple. It has become exclusive. Perhaps Jesus was crying out against this kind of selfish hoarding of God's grace and mercy, of shutting God away from the people who needed him desperately. Again, we can see this offense alive and well today as Christians draw lines of "saved" and "unsaved" when that judgment is for God alone to make. We see houses of prayer becoming exclusive clubs that purposefully keep outsiders out.

But perhaps there is still a deeper reason why Jesus braided together a whip to drive away the merchants of the temple. Perhaps he is trying to drive home the point that animal sacrifices are no longer relevant. The prophets had already been telling them this for years. Hosea said of the people: “They love sacrifice; they sacrifice flesh and eat it; but the Lord has no delight in them.” Somehow the people felt that God worked like a cosmic vending machine: put your animal sacrifices in and out pops a blessing from God—an even exchange. People are thinking they can balance the scales with the God who had created them, who had delivered them from Egypt. But the reality is that they owe God so much more than a few burnt offerings here and there and an annual temple tax could buy. In fact, they have no hope of keeping the law and there is virtually nothing they can do on their own to make themselves right with God. They are enslaved by their sin and will always fall short of the glory of God. And there they are in the temple courts, brazenly believing they can win God's favor and perhaps even make God owe them blessings by following the religious sacrificial customs. And into their self-righteous faces, Jesus jumps in with a big "NO!" They just can’t save themselves—not with all the flawless animals in the world. They need a Savior and the one that shocked them by driving them from the temple is the very same one who will soon surprise them again by taking on that role himself and making the ultimate sacrifice for them. That’s why he’s on about rebuilding the Temple in 3 days. It is all about the salvation he will offer through his resurrection.

Christianity not about balancing the books, you see. We don’t come to church to get bonus points with God—it doesn’t work that way. I remember when I was a child at Christmas time. I wanted to get my parents presents, but since I had no income of my own, they would slip me some cash to get them presents. I’d pridefully ride my bike over to the dime store and pick out some marvelous treasures for them, like cheap after shave my father probably still hasn’t used up. I’d make my purchases, hustle home, wrap them up (sometimes Mom would even do that for me while not peeking at her gift, of course) and I would joyfully present them to my parents on Christmas eve. They’d open them and receive them with grateful hearts. But I wasn’t giving them anything they hadn’t already given me. I could never out-give them—I simply didn’t have the means. I was ever-indebted to them. Yet as loving parents, they didn’t mind—they were just happy that I loved them in return.

Our relationship with God is similar. Everything we have is God’s. We cannot out give God. And all the sacrifices we offer are like the petty gifts I would give my parents for Christmas—that I had purchased with their money. We must come to realize that we are indeed debtors to God—we cannot impress or control God with our devotion.

Jesus has overturned the tables of the law because what he wants from us is faith. Martin Luther said, “True faith in Christ is a treasure beyond comparison which brings with it complete salvation and saves us all from evil...What person is there whose heart, upon hearing this, will not rejoice to its depth, and when receiving such comfort will not grow tender so that they will love Christ as they never could by means of any law or works?”

In this Gospel scene, Jesus may appear to have an anger management problem. He may look altogether unloving, but he is acting this way because he is showing us that God desires a whole new relationship with us, one of unbelievable love and tenderness. He wants us to stop striving to obey on our own and impress him and to accept the free gift of grace in Jesus Christ—to really accept it. And having been infused with this marvelous grace, we will desire live according to God’s will in response to this good news.

WHAT DOES IT TAKE TO FOLLOW JESUS?

A sermon for the second Sunday of Lent (year B)

Pastor Laura Gentry

Mark 8:31-38

There is a story from the life of Paul that reminds me of today’s Gospel text. Paul is in a big hurry to get to Jerusalem by the day of Pentecost. When their ship lands in Caesarea, a prophet warns him that the Holy Spirit told him that if Paul goes to Jerusalem, he will be bound and handed over to the Gentile authorities. So what do Paul’s friends do? Of course, they try to convince him not to go. He is their companion and leader, they don’t want him to meet with a terrible fate. So—in tears—they beg him to stay.

Paul gets absolutely incensed by their plea. “Why are you weeping and breaking my heart?” he replies. “I am ready not only to be bound, but also to die in Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus” (Acts 21:8–12). And sure enough, about a week after they land in Jerusalem Paul is arrested. It eventually leads to his death—just as his friends so dreadfully feared.

But what would Jesus have had him do? Should Paul have hidden out and not traveled to Jerusalem for Pentecost in order to avoid those wicked conspirators? Would he have been better able to proclaim the gospel if he’d been able to stay alive? I mean, wasn’t Paul just throwing his life away?

In today’s gospel, Jesus quizzes his disciples about his identity. “Who do people say that I am?”

They have answers ready for him: John the Baptist, Elijah, one of the prophets.

Jesus, then, presses them about their personal understanding of his identity. “But who do YOU say that I am?” he asks.

Peter answers him boldly, “You are the Messiah.”

Jesus sternly orders them to keep this a secret for now. Then he launches into a whole speech about how he must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.

Now this bad news just doesn’t sit well with Peter. So he pulls Jesus aside and rebukes him.

Now this rebuking doesn’t sit well with Jesus. We’ve got a real conflict bubbling up here and it results in an explosive statement by Jesus that shocks us all. “Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.”

Satan? I mean, come on, isn’t that a little bit strong for your right hand man? But that’s what Jesus says. Satan. Peter is setting his mind on human things instead of the divine things despite all Jesus has taught him.

Then comes an even bigger bomb. Jesus turns to the whole group of disciples—and to us as well as we read these pages of scripture—and says quite plainly: “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.”

This is a famous passage of scripture, one that many Christians can recite by heart. But whatever does it mean?

If read out of context and with our modern western understandings, Jesus words can be understood as a glorification of suffering, as a strong encouragement to become a victim. In this way of interpreting it would follow that I should deny myself—that is, sacrifice myself, wipe out any real sense that I have of myself, my individual personality and embrace the cross—which undoubtedly means suffering. To be Jesus’ follower, then, I should stop being me and throw myself into a life of miserable suffering.

Now this is a dangerous road to go down. Many women have failed to develop their own identities because of this interpretation. They have hidden their talents and strengths in order to embrace suffering that could be alleviated because that’s what they thought Jesus wanted. And so they stayed in abusive situations when they should have found a way to freedom. Other marginalized groups have gone with this interpretation and believed they should stay in their low stations, never challenging the powers that cause them to suffer. More than anything, they want to follow Jesus and so they go on suffering.

Is that what God wants? It is important, especially when we look at the strong statements of scripture, to look at it in the literary context of the whole scripture and in the cultural context into which it was actually spoken.

Since we really want to know what Jesus means, we must first take up the question of the literary context. Let’s think about Mark’s gospel as a whole. Mark does not glorify either self-sacrifice or suffering. In fact, Jesus in this gospel does just the opposite—he announces to all the kingdom of God. And in order to make this message clear, he alleviates suffering and empowers others to do the same. He is ever about the good news that God’s kingdom—God’s rule—is breaking in on our fallen world. This rule brings with it great joy, healing, feasting and the end of suffering.

Not only Jesus but others who join God's rule also have power over suffering. Jesus sends out the disciples to preach, heal, and exorcise, and they do it successfully! (6:7 -13). Jesus also tells the disciples to trust God's power over nature: he expects them to trust that the storm will not destroy them and to be able themselves to feed thousands with little food (4:35-41; 6:3544; 8:1-10). Once, somebody who hasn’t even met Jesus throws his name around and is able to successfully exorcise in his name! (9:38-39). Throughout Mark’s story, we see signs that the marvelous new reality of God's rule has broken into our world and things are changing for the better.

So when we look carefully at the literary context, we see it does not support the theory that “deny yourself and take up your cross” means that God specifically wants you to suffer for the sake of suffering. Indeed, Jesus’ message is one of liberation from suffering.

But make no mistake, this good news is not good news to everyone. Jesus has made powerful enemies who will soon take his life. He does not want his disciples to be surprised by the fact that following him and proclaiming God’s rule of justice and peace will have its consequences. Keep in mind that John the Baptist has already died for the cause, Jesus is about to die, and most of the disciples will go on to die in the line of duty also. Yes, along with the good news, there comes the reality that persecution will face the followers of Jesus.

Nevertheless, you should not lose heart! That is what he is trying to convey when he tells them they must take up their cross. They must resist the temptation to let go of their mission just because it threatens their safety. Yes, there is the inevitability of persecution. However, the blessings of God's rule are even greater. They far outweigh the suffering to be endured. That’s why they should hang on with everything they’ve got and follow Jesus.

Okay, that may explain the suffering part, but what about the “deny yourself” line? Exactly what is Jesus getting at? Let’s look at the first-century cultural context to get a handle on this question. Most Christians are ill-informed about the vast cultural differences that our modern society has with the ancient Middle East. To our modern ears the command to “deny yourself” sounds like a call to self-sacrifice. Today many do read this way—as a demand to deny your individual self and always put yourself last. But that is not how a person of the first-century would have heard it.

To begin with, their sense of self was so very different from ours. People in Jesus’ time had little, if any, idea of individual identity. Their sense of “self” was completely connected to their family. The question: “Who are you?” was really asking: “Who is your family?” That defines who you are. Families lived and worked together as a solid unit. If you left your family, you would have no identity and probably no means of earning a living. When I finished college, I had the desire to live in Montana. So I simply packed up my car and left—off to make my way in the world as a young adult. That kind of thing would be unheard of in ancient society. But that is precisely what Jesus was calling his followers to do.

In asking them to deny themselves, Jesus was asking them to leave their family unit in order to follow him. At one point in his ministry Jesus says: "'Who are my mother and my brothers?” He looks around at the group gathered and says: “Look, here are my mother and my brothers! For those who do the will of God, they are my brother and sister and mother.'" (Mark 3:33-35). To accept Jesus’ invitation— to leave their own families in order to join Jesus’ family was completely against societal expectations. It was a radical act, an act that threatened the social order of the entire empire. No wonder Jesus and his followers drew such fierce enemies.

Therefore, when read in the context of the first century and the overall message of Mark’s gospel, Mark 8:34 is not a command to suffer and be a victim in general. Not at all! It is an exhortation to remain faithful to Jesus and the liberating kingdom of God even in face of persecution by political authorities. It is an invitation to leave family and other alliances behind and become part of Jesus’ family first and foremost.

The question then remains: what does this mean for us today? We don’t have to stay in our family units to be socially accepted. Like I said, I myself ran off to a far away state to live and my parents did not disown me as they would have in ancient times. In fact, they were quite proud of me. Furthermore, we live in a country that has, as one of it’s pillars, freedom of religion. Here, we can follow Jesus all we want and never get arrested or executed for it.

These things put us in a totally different position from the first generation of disciples. Yet look what they accomplished! They turned from a ragtag group of misfits who were hiding out after the crucifixion of Jesus into zealous evangelists who spread the good news far and wide. Just as Jesus exhorted them, they were not deterred by political persecution or the threat of death. Like the story of Saint Paul I told you at the beginning of the sermon, they marched headlong into danger if it would further the mission. In short, they changed the world. We would never have heard of Jesus and his story of redemption had it not been for their courageous evangelism.

What’s our excuse? To deny ourselves and take up our crosses actually costs far less for us today than it did for the early disciples and yet we seem to follow with far less passion. Oh, we might alienate a friend by taking about faith too much or we might be known as “those” Christians but we honestly don’t have much to lose.

Do you want to follow Jesus? Then go for it! What does it take? Deny yourself—love Jesus, embrace him as your heart’s heart. He is your family even more than your own family and you owe him not part of all of your allegiance. Take up your cross—whatever it costs you is nothing next to the incomparable riches of following Christ and letting him lead you. If Peter, who was called Satan for his blunder can rise to the task of discipleship, so can you and I. The good news of God’s kingdom must be heard and it’s our job to share it. Amen.

DRIVEN BY THE SPIRIT

A Sermon for the first Sunday of Lent

Pastor Laura Gentry

Mark 1:9-15

A little girl asked her mother, “Mom, where’d I come from?”
“God sent you,” said mom.
“Where did you come from?”
“God sent me.”
“How about Grandpa and Grandma?”
“God sent them.”
“Gee,” said the little girl. “There hasn’t been a normal birth in this family for 150 years!”

In today’s Gospel lesson we have Jesus, the one of extraordinary birth, doing something quite ordinary: he’s going into the wilderness.

In Mark’s Gospel there isn’t a whole lot said about this encounter. We simply read that he is baptized by John in the Jordan and then the Spirit of God drives him out into the wilderness where he is tempted for 40 days.

Now what kind of Spirit is this anyway? While Jesus is still dripping with the waters of baptism, it drives him out into the cruel, harsh wilderness of the Middle Eastern desert? Didn’t that same Spirit look really harmless a moment ago when it decended upon Jesus like a dove as God claimed him as his son? Now the Spirit picks up speed and pushes him like a gust of mighty wind. But we remember that this Spirit is powerful and it can do great things like in the vision Ezekiel has of the Valley of the Dry Bones. There the Spirit lifts dry, lifeless bones and gives them life again. It gives hope to a hopeless nation by promising God’s faithfulness.

Yes, Jesus is driven by the Spirit and now finds himself in the desolate desert with it’s life threatening climate and he is tempted by Satan not just for an afternoon, but for 40 days. Mark doesn’t tell us about the particular temptations Satan offers, as Matthew and Luke do. No, he just tells us that Jesus is there being tested.

Yet he does tell us a couple of very interesting things. First, that Jesus was not alone. He was with the wild beasts. And second that the angels waited on him.

Now this reference to the wild beasts in the wilderness makes us recall the words of the prophet Isaiah when he said: “Behold, I am about to do a new thing...I will make a way in the wilderness...and wild animals will honor me.” (Isaiah 43:19-20) This shows how Jesus is a fulfillment of ancient prophesy.

The aside about the angels is fascinating, isn’t it? They waited upon him—that is, they provided food for him. You can imagine an angel standing there in the desert with a notepad saying, “Okay Jesus, do you want fries with that?” Yes, even the Son with whom God is pleased needs help and is given it. The angels are there carrying him through this wilderness experience, especially as Satan hurls temptations at him. He is protected by these heavenly helpers.

And here we are in the midst of our own 40 day journey through the season of Lent with that same life-giving Spirit driving us. It is an opportunity to think about our own wildernesses. What troubles and temptations do we face? Do our loved ones face? Does our town face? Our country face? Our world face? It is all to easy to feel overwhelmed by all the things we must deal with. Just keeping our head above water is all we can do at times. The wild beasts are ever after us along with the presence of evil.

Nevertheless, we are driven by the Spirit of God. We are empowered by this life-giving Spirit who brings wisdom and wholeness and sends us angels just when we need them. In fact, God uses our wilderness experiences to strengthen and deepen our faith so that we will learn to hold fast to the faith that is within us.

This scripture ends with Jesus on the other side of the wilderness. Having survived these temptations, he rejoins civilization and moves around the Galilee with a powerful call to action. He cries: “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.”

We need to believe the good news. Our wildernesses are deep, complicated and debilitating. We find trouble at every turn, temptations when we least expect them, tests all the time. And so God says we must embrace God’s kingdom, which has come marvelously near us in Jesus Christ. We must repent of our old ways, turn to Christ and live. Really live.

Lent is more than just a time to give up watermelon or water skiing or whatever it is you may have given up. It is more than just a time to attend extra worship services. It is a sacred, 40 day journey that bids us walk with Jesus, to live his way, to repent and believe the good news. The Spirit of God is driving us on to more dedicated discipleship. No matter how many Lents we’ve journeyed through, the call remains as urgent as ever. Let us heed the call today: repent and believe the good news! Amen.