Jeremy filled in for Matt on piano at today's service. Towards the end of the service we also wished Pastor Ray and Eric Godspeed as they travel to Colorado for their wedding and honeymoon. We celebrated and said good luck at a potluck later in the evening.
When Pastor Ray preached on the Gospel verses today it was obvious that he was caught up in the profound message contained in Jesus' words. What is profound here is also easy to misunderstand.
Today's gospel is Jesus answering Judas (not Iscariot) who said to him, “Lord, how is it that you will reveal yourself to us, and not to the world?” In the previous verses Jesus said to Phillip, “Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me?"
We find it hard to know Jesus and he articulates in this Gospel passage one aspect of what we find so difficult..Jesus promises "Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives."
We want peace the way we think the world can give us peace. We want security. We want Jesus to have taught us everything. We do not want continued lessons by the Holy Advocate. Our hearts are troubled and we are afraid and worried when we are not certain what is ahead of us and we construct our lives to give us the illusion that we can control what is in our future.
This Gospel, this sermon and the words of Jesus were personally meaningful for me today. Last week my position was eliminated by the company and what I will be doing in the future is now uncertain. Having one, presumed future changed without you challenges a feeling of security. My heart is anxious. I am afraid. I do not have the peace I enjoyed earlier last week.
This highlights for me what Jesus is promising. He says "I do not give to you as the world gives." I will state right here that I need the peace the world gives. I will need the illusion that I can plan and control my future. That is the way we all live our lives but Jesus is offering us a different kind of peace. The profound peace he offers is not taken away when we allow the Holy Advocate to teach us and we are reminded of what Jesus said.
Coincidentally, yesterday in the Facebook group A Year of Contemplating the Word (this group is reading through the Bible in a year), we read a contemplation, as we ended our Mark readings, a Bonhoeffer observation that God is weak and powerless in the world. This weakness and powerlessness, he contended, was the only way in which God is with us. This dovetails into today's message for me and captures a central truth about what Jesus made manifest in his life to me. He also observed that we sometimes live our lives as if God did not exist and this appears to be the nature God has given us.
We long for the powerful God in our lives We want to put our faith in a God that helps solve life's problems. To put our faith in a weak and helpless God is not sensible. For Christians, however, there is a paradox to God's power. Jesus is the son of God and an extension of God's heart. Jesus did not come into this world as a powerful figure. He consistently avoided powerful positions during his time on earth. He would not become king to directly impact changes that could materially affect life's circumstances. He resisted this when the devil tempted him.
His physical life did not end powerfully, Finally he was not revealed as the world-conquering Messiah Peter first imagined him to be. Instead he lived his life as a wisdom teacher and as a suffering servant.
What Jesus conveyed with the words in this Gospel passage are so profound that it brought tears to Pastor Ray's eyes as he preached. I understood and related with those tears. Many times I have been brought to tears in public when I revealed something close and deep to the heart. Many times what I am speaking to is about brokenness in the world.
When we act as the body of Christ we are not acting from the strength of the world. We do not act from the illusory peace that the world gives us from the power that bestows in our lives but, rather, from the peace Jesus gives us to walk along side and help others when we see Jesus in both those who are being helped and those who are helping.At one point Pastor Ray's sermon turned to Shane Claiborne and he quoted a story Claiborne told in his book The Irresistible Revolution. As he tended to someone in a hospital in India they both recognized Christ in one another. Seeing Christ's body in those around us is a powerful vision to cling to.
“Mother Theresa always said, "Calcuttas are everywhere if only we have eyes to see. Find your Calcutta.”
― Shane Claiborne, The Irresistible Revolution: Living as an Ordinary Radical
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