June 17, 2001
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Galatians 2.15-21 Today we will hear part two of the sermon series on Christian basics. Last week the question for us was who is Christ? We answer that He is the Christ, the Son of the living God. We have continued to answer that question as we heard some of the songs we learned in Vacation Bible School. Who is the Rock? He is the Rock! We heard it in the response to the question I asked at the beginning of our service. It is a lesson I hope our children never unlearn, that nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing will ever separate us from the love of God. The answer to who Christ is begs another question. Once we know, how do
we respond? Each of us will answer that question from ourselves, but there are
some things on which we can agree. We can acknowledge Jesus as God’s Messiah,
the one who offered himself to the world. We can act faithfully, demonstrating our loyalty and devotion to him. We can accept some responsibility for sharing the good news. That is what
happened here this past week when men, women, and teenagers worked with the
children at Vacation Bible School. They made sure that children got from
learning activity to learning activity, that there were lessons and crafts to be
prepared, and snacks to consume. People who organized things before the week
began and who worked behind the scenes during the week shared the good news, it
was shared as adults talked in their class about their faith and their dreams
for this congregation. We shared the good news with parents and grandparents who
entrusted their children to us for the week. We share the good news wherever and whenever we respond to human need,
offer friendship and hospitality, make this place a house of welcome and a place
of hope and joy where we will do our part in telling the good news of Jesus
Christ. As we respond to the good news working in us, it helps us to realize that
we are not left to our own devises. We have models of response. Think of the
people in your life that have been instrumental to your spiritual growth. There
are teachers in church school and in public and private school, preachers, and
counselors, there is that person who invited you to church for the first time,
and who helped you find your way as one of God’s daughters or sons. I am grateful for my parents, Charley and Alvah, my first models of
Christian response and for teachers and mentors along the way. They helped me to
name my faith, and to develop it and nurture it. They challenged it, and
stretched and affirmed it. They responded to the good news in them in the same
way we are called to share the good news in us, by knowing it is so good, that
it simply has to be shared. But we say, isn’t my relationship with Jesus and the way I
respond to it a purely private matter, between God, Jesus, and me? No. Private
implies an exclusive relationship, like we would find in a club or some other
private organization where only members
are allowed, and one can only become a member if they are invited and sponsored
by another member, and then keep all the proceedings secret. And that’s all OK
so long as no harm is advocated for non-members. Our faith responses are not private. They are personal. My sisters and I
all like buying clothes. But our tastes in clothes are different, they are
personal, they are not private. It is the same with our response to our faith,
and to Jesus Christ. How we respond will affect each of us differently according
to our needs, our personalities, and our interests. What kind of response is
required? You decide. It can run
the gamut from inviting friends and neighbors to church, or cutting the grass of
a neighbor who is not able to do it themselves. It may mean visiting the
homebound, or praying with a stranger who senses your willingness to do so. For some of us, the correct response is to
participate with Trinity House, and BREAD. It is the work and ministry of
Christian Women’s Fellowship, and the Men of Broad Street. It’s Miracle Day.
It is phone calls, cards, notes, offering a ride, offering respite to someone
who is the primary caregiver and just needs a break. Let your imagination soar
as you imagine all of the ways to respond personally to Jesus Christ. If we need older more biblical models, we need only look at the witness
of our two lessons today. Paul responds to Christ in him by declaring his independence from the
law. You remember from his biographical remarks last week how important the law
of Moses was to him. He was educated in it, zealous in its defense, and
passionate in its proclamation. Yet he let it go in order to take on the grace
of Jesus Christ. Because he now knows that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the
Living God, he knows that everything is different. Old boundaries that used to
separate those inside from those outside are gone. In Galatia the issue was
whether circumcision would be required of Gentile men who joined the Jewish sect
called Christianity. Paul says no. As we will hear next week, it’s not a
matter of which men have been circumcised. It is about who responds to Christ by
offering himself or herself for baptism, and then what difference it makes when
people whom the culture says are so different, are in fact brought together in
baptism. Paul is an emotional man who has a dramatic conversion story. His
response to Christ was hard won. But once his mind was made up, there was no
going back. John tells us that Nicodemus took a bit longer to know how to respond to
Christ. He had some questions to ask. His is not a very dramatic story, but it
is satisfying to him and to those who relate to him. He comes to Jesus because he has heard that Jesus is a great teacher and
he wants to see him for himself. But, he has a problem. He does not want anyone
to know that he is talking to Jesus so he comes by night when shadows are all
about the area. Do you know anyone
like that? They are curious about what is going on but they do not want to be
seen looking? The popular expression for such secretive behavior is that
Nicodemus came to Jesus on the “down-low”. He did not want to be seen
talking to Jesus, but he wanted his curiosity satisfied. He was a seeker who was
being led to respond to Jesus but he was not yet ready to be seen with Jesus. He
comes, and meets Jesus in the home of a mutual friend after dark, or in the park
by the statue and the shadows, or in the back booth in a restaurant. Wherever
they met, it was dark enough for Nick to feel safe. But Christianity is not about feeling safe and staying in the shadows. It
is about trusting God and in being faithful. Jesus says, “It’s OK that you
believe me to be a good teacher. I appreciate the affirmation that only someone
sent by God can do the things that I do. But there are some things you need to
understand, Nicodemus in order to fully appreciate what I do, and who I am so
that you can respond in absolute faithfulness. If you really want to respond to
me, come into the light.” How do we do that? We do it by taking on a new
self-understanding. “It is no longer I who lives, but it is Christ who lives
in me.” Once Christ lives in us, once the one who gave himself for us is given
a top place in our lives, we will be able to recognize some things.
First, we
can recognize the need to begin life again. In some churches what
Jesus describes to Nicodemus as being born from above is called being born
again, and too often it is used to separate rather than to unite because it is
mistaken it with attaining spiritual superiority. Would you call yourself a
born-again Christian? No? Well, too bad. I’ll pray for your continued
enlightenment. What Jesus is talking about is new life, a new attitude, a new
perspective that comes when the breath of God, the Holy Spirit moves in you, and
the waters of baptism rush over you. It’s not that we have never lived, it is
that we have never lived like this before. Jesus is describing life that is
entrusted to God completely. Be born from above, let the love and hope of God
rush over you like the spray of water off the ocean. Use that new life to
nurture new Christians, and to encourage people who have been on this journey a
long time because we all need some refreshment, some new wind every now and
then. Let the breath of God blow through you, remember your baptism, look
forward to it if it has not come yet, and see what new thing God will do in you. Second,
recognize what you already know. In one
of my favorite scenes from the movie, “Driving Miss Daisy”, the family
matriarch is at a point of exasperation with someone, and she expresses her
displeasure by intimating that might better be kept quiet. “I know what I
know.” She says. Then she goes on to say, “and I know what else I know.”
Jesus is surprised that Nicodemus, a teacher of the law, a religious man does
not yet know some things. That got me thinking about what we know, and what else
we know. I pray that we know here that it really is more than a newly learned
chant, but that nothing separates us from the love of God in Jesus Christ, and
that the children here are blessed by adults who love Jesus and who love them. I
pray that the adults know how blessed we are to have children, active children
who love this church enough to invite their friends to come too. They are a gift
to be cherished. Do we know that our faith enables us to stand and to take a stand for
justice, and for compassion, and for tradition, and for innovation, and that by
faith we can balance it all? Do we know that we are called to be the best, to be
all that God has created us to be, and that we are called to seek excellence in
all that we do? And there is this. Can we know when Jesus says as Moses lifted up a snake in the wilderness,
so will he be lifted up, that he is talking about the cross on which he will
give up his own life, and win for our lives eternity? I hope we can because when
we do, we are led to the third
recognition. That is, we recognize the power of the cross. One of the earliest
scripture verses some of us learned, was John 3.16. It is the basis for so much
of our faith, God gave his Son so that we might have eternal life. It was a gift
of grace. God did not send Jesus, witness the crucifixion, defy the crucifixion
with the resurrection, and establish the church in the name of the risen Christ
so that we would be condemned by it. We do not have to live as condemned people
always reminding ourselves, or allowing others to remind us of how bad, how
awful, how sinful we are. Sometimes I think we have put all of our shortcomings
on a videocassette, and that we play over and over again the things we regret,
the word we might have said, but didn’t, the action we took, when perhaps
another choice is better. We keep hitting rewind, and replaying our errors over
and over again when in fact what we are called to do by a forgiving and gracious
God is to fast forward into the life that is waiting for us. “Forgetting what
is past, I press on”, Paul writes to the Philippians. There is a life for us
that holds us accountable, but does not only count our misdeeds against us. We
are also a forgiven people, who know the salvation of God. Celebrate it. Four, we can
recognize the opportunity we have to turn on the lights. What is
happening here is worthy of being seen. Jesus talked about people who loved the
darkness more than the light. But we are walking in the light of God. There is
nothing to hide, no need to be secretive or ashamed. Instead, let’s turn the
light of God in this church and the light of our ministry as brightly as we can
stand it, so that others may see the hope that is happening here, and find their
place among us. We can come not on
the down-low, but on the high-up, we can exalt Jesus, praise Jesus, and give
priority to Jesus in our lives. Finally, when we respond, we become models and mentors for the next
generation. We will be able to take a familiar lesson like John 3.16 and let it
grow in us as we grow in faith. We can savor the experience of God responding
back to us. Watch
as God awards our faith with salvation, as God accepts our willingness to lead a
new life with new opportunities, and as God acknowledges that we know how wide
and deep is our relationship with God. Such knowledge allows us to offer
ourselves in outreach, service, toward justice, full of hope, and healing. As
God through Jesus Christ loves us, so we are called to love others. Grow
strong as God increases the bond that lets us know that we belong to God, and
God belongs to us, and feel God’s attention as we give our life to Christ who
has already given his life for us. Because Christ lives in us, we can respond in
joy to him. And when we respond, he will welcome us, and lead us to the places
we need to be. God has promised, and the promises of God can be trusted
absolutely. Thanks be to God. Amen.
Dr.
LaTaunya M. Bynum |
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Broad
Street Christian Church
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