June 13, 2004
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Is
there anything in your experience that helps you understand what it feels like
to be attacked but for what you believe? Have you ever felt persecuted for the
way you vote, or the way you dress, or for what you drive, or for where you
worship? If
you do, you understand what Peter is trying to do when he writes two letters to
the church. One source says, “for reasons that were presumably too well known
to require explanation, Christians suffered at the hands of outsiders. The
nature of that suffering is likewise uncertain, beyond the references to verbal
harassment and various trials” (Texts
for Preaching – Year A. Louisville: Westminster/John Knox Press. 1995,
p.305). The
issue was not that the government ordered followers of Jesus to be persecuted,
that day would come, but not yet. The issue was that people just picked on the
church because they were different. They helped each other in times of need;
they prayed regularly for the church and for the world; they shared their time,
their talents, and their treasure. Even more, they believed that everyone was
worthy of the love and redemption of Jesus Christ. Who in the world wants to
live around people like that? Let’s force them out of our neighborhood. So
they said, “there are those followers of Jesus Christ, let’s not shop in
their stores”. “She is a believer in this man Jesus, let’s break her water
jars”. “Hey you Christians, go back to wherever it is you came from!”
Peter is writing to people facing persecution, so that they might be encouraged.
They need a word of encouragement. Already
he has written to them about suffering, about bearing up under pressure and
maltreatment for doing what is right. Our self-preserving culture tells us that
if we are living under threat for what we believed and for whom we worship, the
easy thing to do would be to run and hide (the early church did often meet in
secret), and admit nothing to no one. Downplay Jesus, just say that you know who
he is, but he really has no bearing on my life. I don’t really worship with
them; I just like the music.
Just suffer in silence. That would be the way to avoid trouble. But
we are bi-cultural people.
We live in the culture of the “protect yourself at all costs” world
and in the world of faith where risks in difficult times are sometimes required.
So we recall the witness of the American civil-rights movement in which lives
were risked, and sometimes lost to make a better life for us all. Peter
says to that church and to this one, stay faithful in these hard times, now is
not the time to downplay your faith or fall apart. This is precisely the time to
stay together, and to work together for the sake of Jesus Christ and his church.
Stay united spiritually, care for each other, always find those points of
connection that show that you understand what brothers and sisters in the faith
are going through day by day. Love one another with humility and with all your
hearts. Don’t seek to avenge those who abuse you, but bless them. Lift them
up, help them to find the sacredness in their lives.
Surely,
Peter understands that words of blessing for one who speaks badly about us, acts
badly toward us will cause others to see us as weak, it will make us look as
though we believe that we deserve to be abused. But might we not think of
blessing in another way?
Can we see blessing in the face of being besieged as the ability to love
ourselves enough not to be abused, and to love our abusers enough not to let
them do us harm? Blessing says I will act toward you with integrity, with
justice, and accountability. We need not hate anyone, though the temptation may
be great, but vengeance is not our job, it belongs to God. Be encouraged by
knowing that when we act with blessing, we will be blessed by the God. We
rely on the blessings of God because the answer to Peter’s question, “who
will harm us if we do good with eagerness” is this: a whole host of people
will be happy to do us harm. Who will harm us for doing good things in the name
of our God? People who mistake faith and kindness for superstition and weakness
will; the ones who if they know nothing else about Jesus, know that he said,
“blessed are the peacemakers” (Matthew
5.9) will jump on every circumstance of some
Christians respond to things with anger and violence by denouncing the entire
faith. So all of Christianity is indicted by clergy scandals and intense
disagreements among church people. “Look at all of those hypocrites who are
supposed to be peaceful. They are all a bunch of hypocrites. Who will harm us?
Those who believe that our desire that every person live in dignity and respect
is naďve will do all they can to hurt the church and its members. Peter
says do good anyway. So we not only feed the hungry, but ask why in the richest
nation in the world, people are hungry at all. We not only visit the sick and
imprisoned but ask if we are doing all that we can to make sure that fairness
and true justice are values we cherish and practice. All the while, people are
helped because we are discovering how to turn our faith into action, and Jesus
Christ is praised. There
is blessing in persistence, in acting out of a sense of who we are as God’s
people. We have said here that we are the good news of Jesus Christ, and that we
will witness, love, and serve from our doorsteps to the ends of the earth.
Part of our service, part of the way we show our love, part of the way we
witness to the world, is by refusing to be intimidated by them. Who is them
anyway? They are the ones who believe that we cannot, will not, should not even
try to transform and rebuild this congregation. Why shouldn’t we? Does it
matter, do we really care what people who do not want the best for us think? Do
we want to take on the fear and doubt of people who have no faith in us, or
respect for us? No, we do not. Do not fear what they fear, or be intimidated.
“The Lord is my light and my salvation. Whom shall I fear. The Lord is the
stronghold of my life, of whom shall I be afraid?” (Psalm
27). I
found it interesting to learn that “the injunction to ‘not fear what they
fear’ represents an insightful reading of the nature of idolatry. Idolatry is
not only worship of the wrong god, but also it is fear of the wrong power. It is
to give the non-gods the power that should belong only to God – to frighten
us, to make us awe-struck. The antidote to false worship is right worship:
‘But in your hearts, set apart Christ as Lord.’ Paul reminds us that
‘whatever does not proceed from faith is sin’ (Romans
14.23 NRSV). In the context of I Peter, all
action that is based on fear of powers less than God is also sin. “Excessive
nationalism may be the other source of excessive fear of others. Egotism is the
game we play to fend off the fear of our own insignificance. The need constantly
to assert the superiority of one race or one faith or one way of living poorly
masquerades our fear of others – that thy may take away what we hold most
dear, that what they hold dear is better than what we have” (New
Interpreter’s Bible, v 7. Nashville: Abingdon, 1998, p.296-297). For
Christians, the source of courage and hope is that we know and hold as holy and
sacred that Jesus Christ is Lord, and because we do, and because he is, we will
be called to always – constantly, be ready – know and be prepared to make
our defense – to offer why, to anyone who demands from you – they will want
to know, an accounting for the hope that is in you. Our
call is from the God who loves and creates, the Christ who redeems, and the Holy
Spirit that sustains and covers us. Tough times will come to us, and when they
do, it will not be true for us that when the going gets tough, the tough go
shopping. Nor is it true that when the going gets tough the tough get going
aimlessly. Instead we get in touch with the source of our faith and hope. We
know from our own experience that people need hope, they need deep conviction,
and faith in the future. For what do you hope? We have high hopes for our
families, for our neighborhoods, our families, our friends, ourselves, and for
our congregation. We have been surrounded in recent weeks by the hopes we hold
for this congregation. On May 23 we named these hopes. We
hope for: a nursery filled with children, excitement, a fifty member chalice
choir, and a fifty member youth choir. Someone wants the choir to sing, “A
Quiet Place”. We hope for: ministries to address the needs of the men of this
congregation now and in the years to come, for there to be love, and tithers,
and peace in this place.
There is great hope for the presence in Jesus Christ to shine on us, for
more community involvement, humility, faith, hope and patience. We hope for
evangelism, for a fresh anointing of God’s grace, for more upbeat music,
comfort in being a witness for God, and for open communication. And
there were three more hopes, each of which was shared several times. We said
over and over that we hope for growth in the Holy Spirit here, we hope for more
members here, and we hope for prosperity, more money, and financial stability.
Our hope is about growth and transformation. It is about growing closer to God
and Jesus Christ, it is about attracting and nurturing new members and those who
have been here a while. Our hope is about having the resources in people and in
money to do the ministries we are called to do. That
is what we hope for. The question for us is do we trust God to work in us to
bring it to reality? Do we believe that God will help us achieve our hope, that
God will answer our prayers and provide what we need to make our hopes become
acts of ministry?
Will we open our hearts to receive them? Since our answer is yes, as our
hopes are realized, we will remember to thank God for every good and perfect
gift, and for every realized hope. As
we see growth and transformation here, many will celebrate, but some will not.
They won’t like our diversity, they will not understand how we can bring
different elements together in one worship service, or why we have the audacity
to believe that God speaks to us and leads us. Let’s tell them that God speaks
here because there is faith and hope here, and we trust that God is here too. Let’s
tell them that we will trust God and the instincts that God has given us to
plant and build anyway. Let’s put to shame anyone who says we can’t by
proving that we can. Might
we have to bear with some things we would rather not in the meantime? Probably.
But we have a model for how to endure. Christ believed that no one was outside
the reach or love of God. He suffered a rigged trial, a painful and humiliating
death, and in the end forgave those who caused his suffering. Some were brought
to shame, others were led to repentance, we are brought to salvation. We have
through our
baptism known what it is to die and rise with him, and we hope in the one whom
God raised, who raises us in hope. As
we move in hope, as we realize full pews, and more beautiful voices in our
choir, as the spirit moves among us, as we reach out to and are joined by
others, as we transform our hopes in to action and ministry, we will be blessed
and the words of the Psalm we heard today will be true for us, God’s steadfast
and abundant love will lead us to worship and to work and to know the blessings
of God now and forever. There is hope in us, now is the time for us to act with
bold faith and living hope. Thanks
be to God.
Amen. Dr.
LaTaunya M. Bynum |
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Broad
Street Christian Church
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