Word of Life Church Podcast

<p>Because we’ve not understood the Ascension of Christ, we’ve also not understood the Book of Revelation. We’ve thought Revelation is primarily a prediction about future events, when it’s primarily a prophetic description of the ascended Christ.</p>

<p>If Jesus Christ is Lord over the principalities (the power structures of this age), then don’t put any faith in the political, economic, and military powers of this age. Pledge your allegiance to Christ alone and put all your faith for salvation in him. It’s not Wall Street or the White House or the Pentagon who is going to save us, but Jesus Christ — the one who conquered Sin and Satan, Death and Hell, and who now fills all things everywhere with himself.</p>

<p>Following Jesus is to learn what it means to live life to the fullest. In doing so, we have to learn to trust the ways of Jesus. We have to learn to entrust the whole of our life, our ways of thinking and being, to the Master of Life, Jesus - that we may become like Jesus. This process of becoming is not void of struggle, pitfalls, and failures. The story of Peter reminds us of a God who heals, restores, and always invites us to stay on the journey of following him - despite our struggle.</p>

<p>Christianity is not primarily a set of beliefs, even though the work of theology is massively important for the church. Christianity is not primarily a personal relationship with God, even if personal faith and responsibility are required. Christianity is not primarily a religion, even though the liturgies that shape the worship and work of the church are indispensable. Christianity is primarily a way, that is, a way of living shaped around the death and resurrection of Jesus. We all want the life Jesus offers, but to be a disciple means we confess the truth of Jesus and walk in the way of Jesus. The Jesus truth plus the Jesus way equals the Jesus life.</p>

<p>"By his wounds you have been healed" is a poetic contemplation of Saint Peter on the cross of Christ, and it is one of the most sublime passages in all of the New Testament. As a meditation on the meaning of the cross it is far superior to the formulaic and often ugly “atonement theories” that later crept into the church. Quite simply, Peter sees the cross as the wound that heals the world.</p>

<p>We behold in the Eucharistic mystery the sacred mystery that after Easter Christ is with us in another form, in the blessed and broken bread. This is the point of the dramatic gesture at the climactic moment in the Emmaus road story: Jesus is present as bread on the table! Of course, this is a very different presence than what was anticipated by either the Emmaus road disciples or the heirs of Christendom.</p>

<p>On the cross Jesus shed his precious blood to expose, condemn, forgive, and ultimately ransom us from our soul-destroying “rat race”—the insane pursuit of wealth and power, or what Peter calls, “the futile way of life inherited from our ancestors.”</p>

<p>"We are all Thomas now." These words echo throughout our current secular age. Everything is questioned. Everything is doubted. In response to this seemingly dark reality, we can choose to retreat into a closed off life of certainty or open to the endless possibilities of an enchanted world. A world where Christ fills all things. In an age of doubt, we find the doubter's doubt is faith. This sermon explores the tension we feel as people of faith in a secular age.</p>

<p>Jesus appearing in a locked room, speaking peace, and sending his disciples into the world with a commission to forgive, should speak powerfully to a traumatized post 9-11 church that is afraid, angry, and retreating into ever smaller locked rooms of security obsessed ideologies.</p>

<p>What’s Happened To You?<br><br>The Call<br> <br>What's happened to you?<br>You used to be so shy<br>You used to hang your head down<br>You wouldn't look in my eyes<br>Did you some great vision<br>Did you finally break through<br>Did you shake the foundations<br>What's happened to you?<br> <br>What's happened to you?<br>You used to look so tired<br>Now there's a spring in your step<br>And your words are on fire<br>Did you hear some great secret<br>Did the words ring of truth<br>Did you rise from the ashes<br>What's happened to you?<br> <br>Where the four winds meet<br>The world is so still<br>The waves are not pounding<br>And the hungry are filled<br>Our shadows have crossed here<br>Where the sun touched the ground<br>The gathered are singing<br>what a beautiful sound<br> What's happened to you?<br>You used to be so unkind<br>You used to curse at this poor world<br>So what changed your mind<br>What stirred such compassion<br>Is a mystery to me<br>I don't know what's happened<br>Oh, but I like what I see</p>

<p>Jesus entered into Death by death in order to fill Death with himself; so that now to enter into Death is to encounter Christ.</p>

<p>The principalities and powers assert the right to wield violence because they claim to be wise and just. But the crucifixion of Jesus reveals the awful truth, and puts the principalities and powers to shame. We shroud our violence in the myth of justice, but in our violence we are neither wise nor just. What we are, is capable of the greatest crime: the murder of the innocent Son of God. At Golgotha we recoil in horror at our violence and stagger away saying, what have we done? Because even if we are not personal participants in violence, most of us have too often placed our faith in institutions of collective violence. But on Good Friday the truth comes out…and we beat our breasts in sorrow.</p>

<p>Lift up your heads, O gates;<br>lift them high, O everlasting doors;<br>and the King of glory shall come in.<br>“Who is this King of glory?”<br>“The LORD, strong and mighty,<br>the LORD, mighty in battle.”<br>Lift up your heads, O gates;<br>lift them high, O everlasting doors;<br>“Who is this King of glory?”<br>“The LORD of hosts,<br>he is the King of glory”<br><br>(Psalm 24:7–10)</p>

<p>To read the Bible in such a way that's it’s not a sprawling mass of contradictions we have to center our reading at some stationary, unmoving point. That is, we have to find the place to stand in this thousand page epic of redemption where we say, “It's from this vantage point that I’ll read and interpret the rest of Scripture.<br><br>It’s not Leviticus with its prohibition against eating shellfish and other obsolete laws.<br><br>It’s not Joshua’s conquest of Canaan with its troubling genocidal violence.<br><br>It’s not even Paul’s technical theology of justification that we’re so prone to misread and misunderstand.<br><br>It’s certainly not the Book of Revelation with its wild (and often inscrutable!) metaphors.<br><br>Center your reading of the sacred text in the Gospels…with Jesus…on the cross…as he forgives his murderers. Luke 23:34 ("Father, forgive them") is the Pole Star around which the rest of scriptural constellations rotate and are interpreted.</p>

<p>The story of Lazarus abides among us as a story of enduring hope despite all odds. When all seems lost, when all hope has faded, we remember the story of Lazarus. Because Jesus is the resurrection and the life, no one — no matter how mired in sin and death, in sorrow and despair — is a lost cause.</p>

<p>Economic self-interest is the single greatest obstacle to participating in the kingdom of God.<br><br>Jesus doesn’t teach Marxist economics.<br>Jesus doesn’t teach Capitalist economics.<br>Jesus teaches Love economics.<br><br>We’ve been scripted to believe that life is a competition of acquisition. But that is a lie. Life is not a game; life is a gift. The purpose of life is not to win; the purpose of life is to learn to love well.</p>

<p>Jesus has healed the blind man and it was a scandal. There should have been a party, but instead there was an investigation. The Pharisees were all upset about this and they launched a criminal investigation. Jesus shows them what true judgment looks like. To their surprise, it wasn’t fault-finding or pointing the finger of accusation. The judgment of Jesus is not a judgment of condemnation, but a judgment of light, exposing things for what they are in order to set things right.</p>

<p>The life of faith is a life of trust. When Jesus <br>invites us on the journey of following him with these words, "Come follow me" he is saying to us "Come trust me." What does it look like to answer that call? What happens if we struggle to answer that call? This sermon explores these topics and more as we dive into the call to trust.</p>

<p>"Things fall apart; the center cannot hold." Nothing of this world can resist the inevitable entropy of life and death. Only that which is eternal can be the center that holds so that things don’t fall apart. Which just another way of saying only God can occupy the orbital center of our life.<br><br>Christ is before all things,<br>And in him all things hold together.<br>–Colossians 1:17</p>

<p>Saint Patrick’s Breastplate<br><br>Christ, be with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me,<br>Christ in me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me,<br>Christ on my right, Christ on my left, Christ where I lie,<br>Christ where I sit, Christ where I arise,<br>Christ in the heart of everyone who thinks of me,<br>Christ in the mouth of every man who speaks of me,<br>Christ in every eye that sees me, Christ in every ear that hears me.<br>Salvation is of the Lord.<br>Salvation is of the Christ.<br>May your salvation, O Lord, be ever with us.</p>

<p>The dark night when Nicodemus came to Jesus reflected the dark night of his own soul. For a long time Nicodemus had lived in the sunny land of a Pharisee’s certitude. Nicodemus had it all figured out. He had all the answers. He was the Bible Answer Man. But then along came Jesus and suddenly his equations no longer added up. Jesus was an untrained, self-made rabbi from Galilee who was not a Pharisee — and yet God was obviously with him. All of this created deep theological cognitive dissonance for Nicodemus.<br><br>Jesus was the monkey wrench in Nicodemus’ theological system.<br>Jesus was the pebble in the shoe of Nicodemus’ certitude.<br>Jesus was the solar eclipse that suddenly cast a shadow of doubt into Nicodemus' soul.</p>

<p>We live in an unprecedented time of the exponential growth of human knowledge. Some have suggested that knowledge in some sectors is doubling every 12 months. This does not necessarily mean that we are getting smarter, because knowledge is not the same thing as wisdom. For Christians, Jesus is for us the wisdom of God. In Christ we learn Wisdom begins with the fear of the Lord and it is curated in the halls of patient reflection. We will learn and grow in wisdom either by listening to wise people or by suffering through our own failure.</p>

<p>Because Jesus prevailed over the devil in his wilderness temptation, and remained true to the Father’s will all the way to the cross, the world now has a saving alternative to the death dealing ways of Pharaoh and Caesar. Because Jesus was formed in the Scriptures and not the dominant script of idolatry and injustice, we can be formed in the Word of Christ and overcome the devil. As the Apostle John said, “The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil.”</p>

<p>As I call Christians to the practices of radical forgiveness and nonviolent peacemaking that Jesus embodied and most clearly sets forth in the Sermon on the Mount, I often encounter Christians using Romans 13 as a kind of rebuttal. Their argument goes something like this:<br><br>“God has ordained the government and has given it the sword to execute vengeance; therefore we cannot be opposed to war because Romans 13 sanctions ‘Just War.’”<br><br>But this is an egregious misinterpretation and misapplication of what Paul is talking about.</p>

<p>On Mount Sinai we only see the back of God; so assumptions are made and at the bottom of the mountain people are executed in the name of holiness, justice, etc. But on Mount Tabor we finally see the face of God in Christ, and at the bottom of the mountain people are healed and set free from their demons. On Mount Tabor the Theology of Terror (back of God theology) is excelled by the Theology of Love (face of God theology).</p>

<p>“It is simply out of the question that God ‘helps’ the Germans or the French or the English. God does not even ‘help’ us Swiss. God helps justice and love. God helps the kingdom of heaven, and that exists across all national boundaries. The foolish mixing of patriotism, war enthusiasm, and Christian faith could one day lead to the bitterest disappointment. We will not join in drinking this intoxicating potion. We want to look steadfastly and unwaveringly to God, who loves everyone equally and who is above all the nations.” –Karl Barth, 1914</p>

<p>If God reveals himself to us as I WILL BE WHAT I WILL BE, it seems to indicate there is to be a "divine unfolding" over time. How we first know God will not be how we will know God as we stay on the journey. This doesn’t mean God is changing. God is immutable. God does not mutate. God does not change. But from our perspective it may certainly appear that God is <a href="http://changing.This" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">changing.This</a> is the divine unfolding.</p>

<p>We share this planet with seven and half billion other people. What are they for? Are they mere “extras” in a movie called "ME"? Are they resources to be used in the advancement of our selfish agendas? Are they objects to be analyzed, categorized, and utilized according to how they benefit us? Of course not! That approach to the worth and purpose of people is entirely antichrist! People are bearers of the divine image, and as such they are to be unconditionally loved and respected, always accorded justice, and given proper dignity as an expression of our love for God. To mistreat, use, and abuse other people is an insult to God. It's a kind of blasphemy.</p>

<p>We need holy places to help cultivate our sense of the sacred. By spending time in places connected with sacred history or set aside for worship we develop a capacity to see the glory of God in every bush. This is holy ground. But the deeper truth is that every step we take is on holy ground. It's all holy. There are no non-sacred places, only sacred places and desecrated places. But it’s specific “holy places” that lead the way to seeing all places as holy. It's the practices of prayer, pilgrimage, and contemplation that help alert us to the fact that we live our lives on holy ground.</p>

<p>The most embarrassing moments in church history are when the church sold its soul for political power. Whenever the church reaches for the sword of Caesar, it lets go of the cross of Christ. We don’t have to change the world, we only have to be that part of the world already changed by Christ. But this requires that we be genuine Jesus people.</p>

<p>The story of Jacob at Jabbok is one of the richest mines for spiritual gems in all Scripture. It’s the first place where we are specifically told of someone who saw the face of God. It’s also the origin of the name Israel—a name that becomes synonymous with God’s people.</p>

<p>The spirit of the age blesses the cocky and self-confident—<br>But Jesus blesses the poor in spirit.<br><br>The spirit of the age blesses those who are shallow and thus happy all the time—<br>But Jesus blesses those who have the capacity to mourn deeply.<br><br>The spirit of the age blesses the power-hungry who want to run the world—<br>But Jesus blesses the meek who are willing to trust God.<br><br>The spirit of the age blesses the privilege-protectors—<br>But Jesus blesses the justice-seekers.<br><br>The spirit of the age blesses those who think justice is retribution and revenge—<br>Jesus blesses the merciful instead.<br><br>The spirit of the age blesses the clever ones who come up with the best schemes—<br>Jesus blesses the pure-hearted who have no schemes.<br><br>The spirit of the age blesses those who are great at waging war—<br>Jesus blesses those who have the patience to work for peace.<br><br>The spirit of the age blesses those who fight for might—<br>Jesus blesses those who suffer for what is right.</p>

<p>To be a Christian, to be a disciple of Jesus, to participate in the Revolutionary Kingdom of Christ, is to be a follower of the Lamb—the Lamb who takes away the sin of the world. But what does this mean?<br>___________<br><br>Here is the text to the prayer of St. Francis...<br><br>Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace.<br>Where there is hatred, let me sow love;<br>where there is injury, pardon;<br>where there is doubt, faith;<br>where there is despair, hope;<br>where there is darkness, light;<br>where there is sadness, joy.<br><br>O, Divine Master,<br>grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;<br>to be understood as to understand;<br>to be loved as to love;<br>For it is in giving that we receive;<br>it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;<br>it is in dying that we are born again to eternal life.<br>Amen.</p>

<p>In the bleak landscape of death's darkness, the light of life comes as a shocking surprise. Our world is well-acquainted with the ugly reality of death and sin. This is why the life and resurrection of Jesus become the most shocking moments in human history, present, and future. Love, incarnate and resurrected, shocked the world and overcame death. As followers of a beautiful savior, how might we live faithful lives reflecting the shocking beauty of Christ?</p>

<p>Baptism has become a portal out of this old broken-down world and into God’s world of new creation, an escape hatch out of the kingdom of empire, power, idolatry, and injustice and into the kingdom of love. Jesus was baptized to fulfill God's plan to rescue the world. All those who follow Jesus through the waters of baptism can enter his revolutionary kingdom.</p>

<p>The light of Jesus reveals the obstacles, the clutter, the junk, and the unnecessary complexities in our lives. God knows we need things. We need hings to wear, things to eat, things to live in, things to drive, but the light Jesus shines on all these things is the truth that life is not found in pursuit of things. Life is found in pursuit of the kingdom. The way of Jesus is the way of kingdom-minded simplicity.</p>

<p>Pagan astrologers read it in the stars — a new king of the Jews had been born. And so the magi came from the Orient bearing their gifts and accidentally got tangled up with the current King of the Jews — a debauched and murderous megalomaniac named Herod who decades earlier had been made an imperial client king by the Roman Senate. Not long after that the death squads were breaking down doors and killing baby boys in Bethlehem. An angel got Mary and Joseph and the baby king out of town in the nick of time. And so the Holy Family became refugees seeking asylum in a foreign country in order to escape a violent regime in their homeland. If this all sounds very political, you’re right, it was…and it still is.</p>

<p>"You know what happens when a portrait that has been painted on a panel becomes obliterated through external stains. The artist does not throw away the panel, but the subject of the portrait has to come and sit for it again, and then the likeness is re-drawn on the same material. Even so was it with the All-holy Son of God. He, the Image of the Father, came and dwelt in our midst in order that He might renew mankind made after Himself."<br><br>–Athanasius of Alexandria (296-373), On The Incarnation</p>

<p>"You know what happens when a portrait that has been painted on a panel becomes obliterated through external stains. The artist does not throw away the panel, but the subject of the portrait has to come and sit for it again, and then the likeness is re-drawn on the same material. Even so was it with the All-holy Son of God. He, the Image of the Father, came and dwelt in our midst in order that He might renew mankind made after Himself."<br><br>–Athanasius of Alexandria (296-373), On The Incarnation</p>

<p>Isaiah anticipates a time when the earth will be arid and lifeless, and the people will be blind, deaf, and disabled. The land will be burning and the people will be blind to the problem, deaf to the word of God, and unable to do anything about it. The spiritual aridity of the people is reflected in a once lush land turning into a scorching desert. But in his Messianic poem of hope, Isaiah says something will happen that will change everything: The desert land will blossom and broken lives will be healed. What will cause there to be streams in the desert and for the lame to leap like a deer? God will come!</p>

<p>Waiting on God is an acknowledgement that we are not in charge of our own spiritual formation. Through healthy practices of spiritual formation we regularly present ourselves before God. What happens there will happen in God’s own time or Godspeed.</p>

<p>If we see Jesus in Isaiah's prophecy of a king whose reign causes the lion to lie down with the lamb—and we do!—it means that we cannot reduce Jesus to the “personal savior” of our “private soul.” Jesus may indeed personally save our soul, but he’s also the righteous king who brings justice to the poor and challenges the systems of oppression presided over by the principalities and powers.</p>

<p>“How can we live in the midst of a world marked by fear, hatred, and violence, and not be destroyed by it?”<br><br>“To live in the world without belonging to the world summarizes the essence of the spiritual life.”<br><br>“Our true house is not the house of fear, in which the powers of hatred and violence rule, but the house of love, where God resides.”<br><br>“Through the spiritual life we gradually move from the house of fear to the house of love.”<br><br>(Henri Nouwen, Behold the Beauty of the Lord.)</p>

<p>Under the inspiration of the Spirit of the Lord Isaiah re-imagined the world…<br><br>A world where swords become plowshares and spears become pruning hooks.<br><br>A world where weapons of war becomes instruments of agriculture.<br><br>A world where people seek to make the world a garden and not a battleground.<br><br>A world where tanks are turned into tractors and missile silos become grain silos.</p>

<p>The kingdom of God does not come by the sword, it comes by the cross.<br>The kingdom of God does not come by killing, it comes by dying.<br>The kingdom of God does not come with vengeance, it comes with forgiveness.<br><br>If it comes by the sword (by some dude on a horse), it’s not the kingdom of God.<br>If it comes by killing (the way of Cain), it’s not the kingdom of God.<br>If it comes with vengeance (the way of the Beast), it’s not the kingdom of God.<br><br>By the way of the cross…<br>By self-sacrifice, by co-suffering love, and by radical forgiveness…<br>Is how the kingdom of God comes.<br>And it comes no other way.<br><br>If we lose sight of this, we will be blind to the kingdom of God. And if we’re blind to the kingdom of God, we will mistake something else as the kingdom of God.</p>

<p>"By his wounds you are healed." This is a deep and holy mystery, but it lies at the heart of what happened at the cross. Jesus took a world of suffering and sorrow into himself, so that we could be healed. When we lay our wounds upon the wounds of Christ it does not multiply woundedness, it initiates healing.</p>

<p>To follow Jesus and the way he taught, especially when living in a military-economic superpower, is to be radically counter-cultural. The ways and values of superpowers are the very opposite of the ways and values commanded by Jesus. To live out the Sermon on the Mount in the context of empire will cause you to be viewed as a freak -- a Jesus freak. The Jesus way, when truly lived, has always been viewed with suspicion by people in power. As the Apostle Paul said to the Roman governor, "I admit that I follow the Way which they call a cult."</p>

<p>Whatever it means for the world to be saved, God does not do it through the conventional means of power (politics, weapons, wars), but though the unconventional means of utter powerlessness—through the crucifixion of a Galilean Jew. Thus the kind of power Christians are to aspire to is cruciform in nature</p>