Sermon for Sunday, March 30, 2008

WELL, NOW WHAT?

By

Rev. Jerry Herships

Scripture:          John 20:19-31

¹⁹ When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, "Peace be with you." ²⁰ After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. ²¹ Jesus said to them again, "Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you." ²² When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, "Receive the Holy Spirit. ²³ If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained." ²⁴ But Thomas (who was called the Twin), one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. ²⁵ So the other disciples told him, "We have seen the Lord." But he said to them, "Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe." ²⁶ A week later his disciples were again in the house, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were shut, Jesus came and stood among them and said, "Peace be with you." ²⁷ Then he said to Thomas, "Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe." ²⁸ Thomas answered him, "My Lord and my God!" ²⁹ Jesus said to him, "Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe." ³⁰ Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. ³¹ But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.

Well……now what? Big Choir….gone. Head preacher…gone. Sing Sing….gone. Taco Sauce….gone. Now it is just you…..and God…and Ken Goodwin! I guess we get back down to the business of everyday life. In some ways, it can be boring, it can be a let down after all the goings on of the previous days and weeks. Take that feeling and multiply it a 100 fold and you have where the disciples were at a few days after the crucifixion.  Now, I don’t want to get ahead of myself. Before we dive in with both feet into our passage, let’s look a little bit about John in general and get a feel for some of its characteristics.

Now for anyone who has ever read John, it is a bit of a freaky book. The language is different. Some of it is just hard to read. Compared to the other Gospels which are called synoptic, which is a fancy way of saying “one view”, John is very different. It was written last and the language is very different. Now I don’t know where all of you are in your Bible smarts. I am sure there are a few of you that could probably school me on a thing or two. Some of the things I think about when I think about Jesus and the Bible are stories like, Jesus being born in Bethlehem, The Virgin Mary, all of his parables, The Last Supper. To me these are the things I think about when I think about Jesus and the Bible. Here is the rub: none of these things happened in The Gospel of John!  None of them!

WHAT IS IN JOHN?

John does all kinds of different things. Some of Jesus’ most famous and impressive miracles… (if you are impressed by those sorts of things) are there. Turning the water into wine.  I was a bartender for over 10 years, I remember thinking, “THAT would have been a handy miracle when I was getting slammed.” Healing the lame man by the pool, making the man who was blind from birth see again…oh yea and RAISING A GUY FROM THE DEAD! That strikes me as something that would stick out. I would think that would make the cut! All of these are in John but NOT in the other Gospels. In John, there are not as MANY miracles but the miracles Jesus does perform are pretty cool. In John, it is about quality, not quantity.

MUMS THE WORD VS. TELL EVERYONE!

One of the things where John is A LOT different is how public his miracles or “signs” are. In the other Gospels, Jesus keeps saying, “mums the word” (granted, I’m paraphrasing). He doesn’t want anyone to know. In John, it seems like that is THE WHOLE POINT! Many scholars believe this was the whole point of the signs…so people would know who Jesus is by the Signs that point the way. Now I know at least someone is going, “Great. Well that is really cool for them…but hello, couple of thousand years later? How do I believe?” The answer is that is why the author of John put pen to paper in the first place (actually, it was not a Bic and a notebook but you get the idea). John wrote these stories down so that those that weren’t there (i.e. you and me) might also believe.

WHAT’S THE POINT?

And this is one of the points I want to make here today as we talk about the story in the Bible. What can this story tell us and teach us about our relationship to God? For me, I think every time we hear about this book or read this book we need to ask ourselves—does this help us get closer in relationship with God and does it help us to be happier, more peaceful, more loving and compassionate people? Because to be honest, unless this happens…they are just cool stories. All these things are just magic tricks.

Now I have preached on this passage before. Last time, we focused on Thomas…or as we like to call him, “Doubting Thomas”, one of Jesus’ closest friends. We won’t focus on Thomas this time. Although it bears repeating the idea of what doubt is….and isn’t.  I think God can handle our questioning. I don’t think that bothers God. God is too big to be bothered by that. When Jesus says to Thomas, “do not doubt but believe” what he is actually telling Thomas is to not be afraid. Do not worry. Have no fear. The section we are reading today begins that way. Verse 19 tells us that the disciples were afraid of the religious authorities. YA THINK!?!? They just watched the authority’s torture and kill their leader. I think it would take quite a bit to get me to calm down! I think that might rattle my convictions. We have said it before…we’ll say it again. The Bible says, “Do Not Fear” 365 times. It is clearly a message that should be a take away.  If you have something going on in your life that has gotten you to the end of your rope, don’t worry, don’t be afraid. That is the ONE thing God DOESN’T want for you. Do I think it is going to be easy…NOT! I had this worry and fear creep up this week when I took my car in to the shop… (shop story) But don’t worry, don’t be afraid.  Moving on…

Let’s get to the part I want to focus on…Jesus appearing to the Disciples. One thing I learned while working on this sermon is the fact that even though the scripture says the disciples were there, the original Greek tells us that the verse was using the general term “disciples”. While the “disciples” were likely there, this group of people probably was more than just the core group that we see in the synoptic gospels. The group gathered in the room represented the faith community in general, not just the leadership. This is huge, because as we know, Jesus is granting peace to all the community. ALL the community is being told to continue the work that Jesus has done. Not just the big shots. Not just the ones that are up in front of the group.  Not just his inner circle. It would be the difference between Jesus showing up at our staff meeting and Jesus showing up Sunday morning at our 9:40 service. ALL people of the faith community. So what does he do? He tells them,” As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”  Bob. Dolores. Sally. Josh. Jay. He wants these followers to continue to do the work he had done...including forgiveness of sins. THAT’S pretty cool…so what exactly does that mean? What it doesn’t mean is that we go “Poof” and bad stuff goes away. The forgiveness of sins must be understood as the mission of continuing Jesus’ work in the world. And it is not just church leadership. It is the entire faith community.

This does bring us to another sticky question. I said the one four letter word you don’t hear much in church. SINS… (I used the plural to make it a four letter word but you get the idea). What is sin? Cue music. (dum, dum, dum). This is a biggie.  We don’t talk about sin much here because well…it can bring up some bad memories. There are churches that LOVE the sin talk. Who’s got a bad memory of preachers talking about sin in church? It was usually, “you are bad!!! Boo to you!!! BAD!” That ain’t us. As the kids would say…that’s not how we roll. It isn’t John’s rolls either. In John, sin is a theological failing NOT a moral or behavioral failing. It is about not knowing or understanding God. It is hard to be in a relationship with someone if you don’t know them. You are usually separate from that person. In John, the sin is the separation. In John, to sin is to be blind to the understanding of God in Jesus. It is our job to do a little show and tell about Jesus. Tell people how Jesus loved and show people how Jesus loved. Not in a, handing-out-pamphlet-on-the-street-corner-with-a-bull-horn sort of way. Yuck!  But thru love and compassion. By loving each other as Jesus loved, the faith community reveals God to the world; by revealing God to the world, the church makes it possible for the world to choose to enter into a relationship with God.  It is by this choosing, that there is the forgiveness of sin. The sin is in the not knowing. Our job is to introduce people to God thru Jesus. We are the match makers. We are like a spiritual eHarmony. We are to create the places where people can see God in the world. As it says in one of the commentaries on this passage, “The faith community’s mission, therefore, is not to be an arbiter of right or wrong, but to bear unceasing witness to the love of God in Jesus.” You forgive sin by being loving and compassionate. Pretty cool huh? Sins got a different feel now.

Let me ask ya something. How we doin’? What do you think our rep is outside these walls? Church of love or church of judgment?  While I think we at St. Andrew are doing o.k….the Methodist Church is losing 1500 members a week! And we are not the only ones. Mainline churches are dropping people like flies. More than a quarter of American adults have left the faith of their childhood for another religion or no religion at all. I spend quite a bit of time in the secular world…let’s just leave it at that…. And we are the minority. What percentage of people in this country do you think go to church on Sunday morning? 80%? 70%? Survey says….made ya look. It’s not up there let me just tell you… 17.3%.  No, I don’t know how you find a .3% person. The point is 4 out of 5 people sleep in on Sunday morning; waking up and reading the paper, have a coffee, go out to brunch and come home and scratching their bellies.  Why aren’t they flocking in?

I was in a conversation a few weeks ago with some folks on staff, I don’t even remember who. And we got to talking about this “bubble” called the church. Dan Kimball is a pastor out in California—out in Santa Cruz. He wrote a book called, They Like Jesus, They Just Don’t Like the Church.” Here is what he says about, “the bubble”:

Before I was on a church staff, I worked in an office with all non-Christians. Working with non-Christians made it easy to have friendships that provided opportunities to hear the hearts, beliefs, and opinions of non-Christians and I would share my views with them because we were friends….but then as my role in the church shifted and I started working with adults more, I got sucked into all these meetings and leading a ministry that catered to those who were already Christians. I lost contact with those outside the church who weren’t Christians…I had become part of the Christian subculture, that strange bubble which little by little sucks you into it.

Woow! That rocked me. Guess which friends of mine I have lost touch with the most since going into the ministry? Friends can only hear, “sorry it is just really busy at the church.” So… many… times. I get the sense that what some of them are thinking is; “now you are too busy to talk to those of us that AREN’T in the church.” Ouch! Here is my question to everyone. How much time do you spend with non-church people? How often do you interact with people that aren’t part of the church? I think this passage today tells us that if we really believe that we are to be Jesus in the world today, out there is where we need to be. That is part of the reason the young adults group, the CORD, does an “on the town night.” It is a chance to have the world and the church collide. Remember, Jesus did not say, “I’ll be in the Temple if you need me.” He didn’t avoid it, but he was out in the world. “As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”  We are called to get out there and love on some folks.

I think the biggest challenge with this is to know the rep we are up against.  Kimball lists in his book the six most common perceptions of the church. I think we are pretty good with most of them. I think the one that every church has to work on is that the church can be judgmental and negative. I will tell you with the folks I run into when I am out and about, the number one thing that they say they have a problem with is how judgmental the church is. I want to say, “not us!” but that just comes off as “me thinketh thou protest too much.” I want to say that but I do sit and think, would everyone in my own family be welcome? How ‘bout yours? I found myself thinking,  “You know I have someone in my family who is an adult dancer. Someone who is homeless, and someone who is a madam. I thought she just ran a health club. I am sure there are an even wider variety of folks in my family but honestly, my family is just now getting around to telling me about some of them.”  I like to think that we aren’t a judgmental bunch, but I have found myself wondering if they were to come out to visit would they feel comfortable in our church. You know, because of “rainbow wig guy” at all the sporting events A LOT of people know John 3:16. The question is how many people know John 3:17? It reads, “Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.” Judgment was never part of the plan. I mean, if Jesus didn’t come to judge, safe to say that gig doesn’t fall on my shoulders. Don’t get me wrong. I think St. Andrew is doing a great job. We are welcoming and I think that is why we are growing so fast while most churches are dying. But I know I have to watch patting myself on the back too much and balance it with the knowledge that there is so much room to grow. Because when we are reaching out the way Jesus asks us to…we will never be bored the week after Easter and we will never be asking ourselves “so…now what?” Amen.

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