Nehemiah 2:1-8, Acts 2:42-47, June 28, 2020, Sermon

“Welcome Back” 

by Pastor Randy Butler  

I once read about a farmer, who found a magical flute. Hoping to charm his hens into laying extra eggs, he played the flute to them all day, but at nightfall there were no more eggs than usual. Later, when asked if he’d had any success, the farmer replied, “I sure did. It wasn’t much of a day for egg-laying, but it was a great day for music.”

It takes that kind of optimism and creative thinking, that kind of outlook to make sense out of our current situation. We last worshipped together, in person, in this space on March 15th. That is fifteen Sundays ago, about three and a half months since COVID-19 brought the world to a screeching halt. It seems like ages ago now, early/mid March, as it began to dawn on us that life would not continue as normal. I remember I had two lunch appointments that week. I was looking forward to meeting more people in the community and our congregation, and both dates had to be cancelled, and almost everything since. Things have changed dramatically.

Yet there have been opportunities as well. I talked to one person last week who said that their home has never looked better because of all the house projects they have completed since having to stay home so much. And though we have been isolated, with the help of technology we have had more contact with people than we might have otherwise. I recently had a great conversation with a good high school friend who I hadn’t talked with in thirty-nine years. That conversation might not have taken place without COVID-19 rearranging the way I started thinking about some of my relationships and friendships. Some have taken up new hobbies and practices. Some have become experts at Jigsaw puzzles. “It wasn’t much of a day for egg laying, but it was a great day for music.” It has been hard, but we have seen some good things come from this pandemic.

In our text from the Old Testament we read from the story of Nehemiah. The book of Nehemiah in spite of a name that sounds like so many of the prophetic books – Jeremiah, Zechariah, Zephaniah, is actually one of the Old Testament historical books. It covers the history of the return of Jewish exiles from Babylon, at that time part of the Persian Empire, to their homeland in Judah near Jerusalem. It is an inspiring story of courage, and return, and restoration and keeping hope alive during exile. And in our text we read about the man Nehemiah, a Jewish man who is a member of the court of the Persian King Artaxerxes, who has heard news about his homeland and the state of affairs there. The Jerusalem temple is in ruins, the walls of the city are crumbling and there is chaos. And hearing this news puts a vision in Nehemiah’s heart to go home and return to Jerusalem to rebuild its walls.

Now his initial response to the news is sadness. In the previous chapter we are told that Nehemiah wept and mourned for days when he heard the news about his homeland. In our text when Nehemiah enters the king’s presence, the king takes note of Nehemiah’s sadness. The king asks Nehemiah what’s wrong and it just comes pouring out – his love for his homeland and desire to return and rebuild.

One of the reactions to our current worldwide situation is for good reason, sadness. Sadness at the loss of so many lives. Sadness at the loss of income for so many business owners and companies. Sadness at so much unemployment. Sadness at the isolation many are experiencing. Sadness that we just can’t pick up where we left off; long scheduled events cancelled. I was struck by sadness as I drove down Main Street on a beautiful summer morning this week, and saw that so many stores remain closed. I saw and felt the hesitation and uncertainty in the air. As the summer visitor and tourist season begins it just doesn’t feel very active. And it is sad. The loss of what we have known grieves and saddens us. If what you may have been feeling is a loss of energy and life – well maybe it is sadness, and it is OK because it is a sad time. And Nehemiah gives full vent to his sadness. He doesn’t hide it, the king can even see it. He wears it on his sleeve.

But he does not let the sadness deter him from acting on his vision. The king grants Nehemiah his desire and Nehemiah begins to make preparations. He sets dates, asks for provisions and for letters of authority to be sent and given to him so that he can go to work on the city wall of Jerusalem. The most spiritual vision still takes planning and working out the details. Preacher Haddon Robinson once said that leadership requires a vision as great as God and as specific as a zip code. Specific details matter.

We have had to consider a lot of details as we return to in-person worship. I am grateful to the Worship Committee and to the Session for doing this hard work. How many bottles of sanitizer should we have? How can we arrange the sanctuary for physical distancing? Where will we put the offering plates? How will we have communion? Should we provide masks? Should we have bulletins? Will we continue to transmit the service online? We have looked at every detail of our interaction on Sunday mornings. And we hope that you feel safe and loved.

We have had to consider state protocols and governors orders just like Nehemiah did. We work within the framework given to us by federal, state and local laws. And though it is hard at times, and we may disagree, we do our best to abide. We are subject to dates and phases of reopening, number of nearby coronavirus cases. My own state of Washington has now required that masks be worn in public. So I will wear a mask in Washington when I go home for a couple of days. I am wearing my mask more and more in Baker City too. The Church of Jesus Christ is accountable only to God ultimately, but we operate within structures and governments given to us by God, and we are accountable to them too. A church is part of a larger community and is called upon to live responsibly within that larger community for the common good of the community.

And so we regather today. But it still feels little less than ideal. We can’t sing, there won’t be any fellowship hall gathering - this morning anyway. Some prefer to stay home for now, which we understand and respect. Besides, we’ve gotten used to this new Sunday morning schedule. I read a recent churchgoers email to their pastor. It said something like this: “Thank you for your concern during the virus. We are doing OK, though. We get up on Sunday mornings, make some coffee, sit on the couch in our jammies with our laptop computers and turn on the worship service. And when we want we can even hit mute. So we are good here.”

The church described in the text we read from the book of Acts seems to be the ideal church. Everybody is devoted and passionate about God in their life. They listen to sermons and teaching, they eat and fellowship together, they pray and take communion regularly. They even share their possessions in common, and everybody admires them for their Christ-like devotion. This seems almost unattainable to us today. So it is a relief to know that when we get to the letters of the Apostle Paul he spends much of his time addressing small-minded arguments, doctrinal disputes, and good old garden variety sin right there in the church in all it’s splendor. Aside from this ideal snapshot given to us by Luke in the book of Acts there never has been from the earliest days a perfect church.

The church is undergoing massive change, especially congregations like Presbyterians. Transformations that were already underway have perhaps been accelerated by the upheavals brought on by the COVID crisis. The church has been changing now for decades. We hope to discuss this more in the weeks ahead when we get to our Mission Study conversations. But we are still the Body of Christ. We are still an outpost of the Kingdom of God at the corner of Fourth and Washington in Baker City. And God is still present in the community through us, incarnate, embodied through us here at this location, and in each of your lives where you go in Baker.

I still believe deeply in the church, imperfect as it is. It was God through the church that saved my life when I was around twenty-one years old. God saved me through the ministry of the church. And the church will always be that fellowship that extends love and grace to people in need in the community and in the world. It will always be a place to call our home.

I once heard about a girl who got lost when she was about seven years old. She ran up and down the streets of the big town where they lived, but she couldn’t find a single landmark. She was frightened. Finally a kind policeman stopped to help her. He put her in the passenger seat of his car, and they drove around until she finally saw her church. She pointed it out to the policeman, and then she told him very clearly, “You can let me out now. This is my church, and I can always find my way home from here.”

For 136 years our church has been a landmark in the community, a place where people have found their way home to God, to one another and to themselves. It is not perfect. It is not always full, and the future is not at all clear. But it is still the church that God loves and uses and makes a home for the world. God always has and it seems always will have a church. It is good to be part of the church today with you. Amen.         

                                  

Romans 6:1-11, June 21, 2020, Sermon

"Death and Resurrection"

by Pastor Randy Butler 

I think I have told you before about my favorite books when I was a boy. They were a series of children’s history books whose titles all began with “We Were There…” And they portrayed children about my age who were there at the important events in American history. “We Were There at the Battle of Gettysburg,” We Were There at the Boston Tea Party,” “We Were There at the Normandy Invasion.” There was even one called, “We Were There on the Oregon Trail.” And what I loved about these books is that I felt like I was indeed there at these important events. I was drawn into the stories, the events and the famous people involved. I was with them and they were with me; I participated in those events.

Well the Apostle Paul in our text this morning from Romans wants us to know that we were there, that we are there, involved with, participating, in the life and death and resurrection, even the ascension of Jesus, and the coming of the Holy Spirit. We are intimately connected with these events. It is not just something that happened back then. As they happened to Jesus they happen to us. It is not just something that happens outside, it happens inside us, and in our lives. One of our great forefathers, John Calvin, once wrote, “As long as Christ remains outside us and we are separated from him, all that he has suffered and done for the salvation of the human race remains useless and of no value to us.” And that is the very thing that Paul wants to overcome – our sense of Christ outside, Christ back then, Christ over there or out there.

That is why he often uses the phrase “in Christ.” It means that Christ is in us and we are in Christ. We are united with Christ, connected with Christ, as a branch to a vine. Martin Luther once wrote, “You are so cemented to Christ that He and you are as one person, which cannot be separated but remains attached to him forever.” His wife Katharina put it more simply on her deathbed, “I will stick to Christ as a burr to a cloth.”

Now we are saying that we participate in Christ, that we are connected to Christ, Christ in us, we ourselves in Christ. What exactly are we participating in, what exactly are we connected with? Well in this section of his letter to the Romans Paul is making his argument about salvation for all people through the amazing grace of God in Christ, forgiveness of sins and the hope of new life in Christ. He says that nothing can overcome this grace, and at one point he even says that “where sin increased, grace abounded all the more.”

So in our passage Paul answers the question that is bound to come up: “Well if grace abounds all the more in the presence of sin, shouldn’t we just go on sinning so that we might receive even more grace?” “Shouldn’t we just continue in sin in order that grace may abound?” Paul answers, “Nice try, but by no means. How can we who died to sin go on living in it?” And then he goes on to connect us with Christ’s death and resurrection.

So what exactly do we participate in? We participate in Christ’s death and resurrection. “Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? Therefore we have been buried with him by baptism into death, so that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the father, so we too might walk in newness of life.” We were there. Christ’s death and resurrection didn’t just happen back then. They are happening to us today. We have died, we are dying, and we are living again. This is why Paul says elsewhere, “I have been crucified with Christ, and it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me.” Paul by his own life is inviting us to live as little Christ’s today, because Christ is living as us and in us. We are invited to see our lives and our world in the mysterious pattern of Christ’s death and resurrection. It is that mystery of death and resurrection and ascension and Spirit that makes sense of our own lives and our world.

We can see and live this pattern in our social lives, our personal lives and our church lives. We can see it happening in our national life. The events surrounding COVID-19 are a kind of crucifixion of our hopes and dreams for the present, certainly for those who have died and their loved ones, and all of us who have suffered the isolation and uncertainty and fear of these days. And yet we live in hopes of resurrection and renewal and what Paul calls simply newness of life.

And perhaps the issues we face as a result of the unjust deaths of black Americans are an ongoing dying to the sin of racism in our country. We seem to be still paying for the sin of slavery. We are still dying again and again. But maybe because of recent events we will finally see clearly and change. We white Americans must take a long hard look at the privileges we have that those of other races simply do not share in our nation. We are no longer a white Christian nation. And maybe that bothers some, but we need to get over it. And we must die to that position and privilege; consider ourselves dead to sin and alive to God on this issue of race in our country.

We live out the pattern of death and resurrection in our personal lives as well. A short time after we moved to Seattle we got a dog. And the woman who gave us the dog called us a Disneyland family. I think she thought that we were the perfect family – husband, wife, two children, nice Christians. Well it didn’t take long for us to discover that we were not at all the perfect Disneyland family. And we, all of us in our family, have had to die to the hopes and dreams and expectations we had as a family. I have suffered more with and in my family than I have suffered for anything in life. And sometimes I feel as though I myself have been hanging right there on the cross. I am experiencing, and I know you have too, the death and the life of Christ.

We see this mystery of crucifixion and resurrection at work in our church too. In the decades after World War II Protestant churches thrived. Churches in denominations like ours – the Presbyterians, Lutherans, Methodists and others were once referred to as the mainline churches. And now we feel as though we have been sidelined. Our numbers are declining, our children have left and we feel the crucifixion of our dreams and hopes for our church. And yet we hope for new life and resurrection.

Paul says that if we have died with Christ we believe we shall also live with him. So we live through crucifixions and resurrections throughout our lives. They go together – crucifixion and resurrection. But we have to go through the crucifixion to make it to the resurrection. We have to die to sin to be alive to God. We have to die to the past in order to be alive to God. The pattern we have explored also extends to Christ’s ascension and to the coming of the Holy Spirit. Just as the disciples had to let go of Jesus they knew, as he ascended to heaven, so we have to let go of what we often know about life and God. It is only then that the Holy Spirit comes in power. That is when Jesus said, “It is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper/Spirit will not come to you, but if I go, I will send him to you.” The event of Pentecost in the New Testament, the powerful coming of the Holy Spirit only comes after Jesus ascends.

What else in our lives might we need to let go, even die to, so that we can experience newness of life, and receive all that the Holy Spirit has for us? Christ’s death and resurrection is our death and resurrection too. Amen.

Matthew 9:35-10:8, June 14, 2020, Sermon

The Kingdom of God is at Hand

by Pastor Randy Butler

I have told you before about the cabin that our extended family shares in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Nearby there runs a mountain stream fed by snows from the peaks above near Donner Summit known for its heavy winters. And my favorite thing was to swim and fish in that crystal clear, cold mountain river water.

As I was learning to fish as a boy I often grew frustrated. My friends were catching fish and I wasn’t. And so I began to watch Mr. Ely. He was a great fisherman. He always caught fish, almost anywhere on the stream. He would even put two flies on his line, and sometimes even caught two fish at the same time. He was like a fishing god in my eyes. So I started watching him and asking questions.

One day we were down at what we called the Old Pool. Some were swimming but I was fishing. I stood at one end of the pool casting and flailing about with no success. And Mr. Ely stepped up on the rock next to me. He said, “Try it like this,” and showed me his casting technique. And then he said, “Cast your fly right over there,” and pointed to the water running by a rock. And I did. And I caught a fish. And I caught another, and another. And that’s all it took. For the next several summers I hopped rocks and waded up and down that river fishing my heart out, often not making it back to the cabin until after dark. And it was because I started watching Mr. Ely, and how he did it. And it was because Mr. Ely said, “Try it like this," and showed me how. And I did and it worked.

I think what Jesus is saying to the disciples is, “Try it like this. We’ve been together for awhile now. You’ve watched me, I’ve been teaching you. Now it’s your turn. I’ve been showing you how now do it the same way I’ve been doing it. And I will be with you.”

The disciples have indeed been with him, listening to him, watching him, amazed at him, often mystified by him. And they have heard him say often, in fact it seems to be his primary message – “The Kingdom of Heaven is near,” or in other places “the Kingdom of God is near,” same thing. And they have begun to learn what that means.

Now the idea of Kingdom isn’t something we modern Americans share with the ancient world. It is not a political structure we understand very well. We don’t live in a kingdom, we aren’t subjects of a king. But let’s explore this a bit, because don’t we all have our own little kingdoms, our spheres of influence where what we say goes?

Presbyterian Pastor John Ortberg says our kingdom is the range of our effective will. Our kingdom is where our will is the way. We establish our kingdoms early in life. The first time we say, “You’re not the boss of me,” we are establishing our rule, our reign. When a child sits in the back of the car with her brother, and says, “That is your side and this is my side,” and draws an imaginary line down the seat, she is establishing the boundaries of her fiefdom, where her will prevails. So we know about kingdoms and thrones and power.

The kingdom of God is where God’s effective will prevails. Where God’s will is the way. And when Jesus says, “The kingdom of God is near,” he is inviting us to transfer our allegiance, our will, our citizenship to God’s kingdom and God’s will and ways. In fact, in our most well-known prayer we ask, “Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” We are asking that the kingdom of God will become a reality in our lives today in this world, just like it is in the eternal and heavenly realm.

So that’s the message – it is Jesus’ message and it is our message. Jesus is saying, “Try it like this. Try asking people about their loyalties and allegiances and commitments and norms and values, their wills, and then point to my loyalties and allegiances and commitments and norms and values, God’s will. And invite them to consider a change of citizenship. You’ve seen what God’s kingdom is all about through me, now it’s your turn to invite others as I‘ve invited you – to give up their control and their kingdom and turn it over to God’s kingdom and will. Do it like that.”

Now Jesus wants them to do more than talk, he wants them and he wants us to act and behave in the same way he has. He has been curing diseases and healing sickness, and he invites them to do the same. They are given authority over unclean spirits and sickness.

But again we are in uncertain territory here. We can’t imagine what that would mean for us. We don’t see ourselves as faith healers. Still when we dig a little deeper we can see the sickness of our time. We know what it is about our lives and times that sicken us. It sickens us to death to see that knee on the neck of George Floyd that kills him, and we are sick to see the unclean spirit that seizes a mob and leads to looting and violence. We see every day the sickness of our political environment. We know the physical but also mental illness of those in our communities, even in our own families. So we know sickness. But how can we be agents of healing?

One of the ways we do that is to call it out, name it, and continue to expose the sickness we see in our society. Certainly racism is a sickness of the soul. And Americans continue to pay the price of our country being founded upon the backs of African American slaves. Slavery remains the cancer that eats still at the soul of our nation, the disease that still needs healing. So, the protests that we see when they are not violent are a way of moving toward healing. Because healing must begin with exposing and exorcising the demons that continue to haunt us. Those loyal to the Kingdom that Jesus proclaims will align ourselves with the values he holds – the love he showed, and the compassion he had for all people.

Now Jesus did all this by going about in the cities and villages of Israel/Palestine. And he sends his followers to do the same, to go about the cities and villages, to visit in homes, talk to people, touch people, draw close to them. But this is not a time for going about is it? Many of us have cancelled vacations, postponed travel plans, and because of COVID-19 we are staying closer to home than ever before in our lives. So right now we cannot really go about as Jesus went about or as his disciples went about in their day.

I find this text on being with and around others very challenging for our time right now in the middle of a virus which has led to radical social distancing, which keeps us at such arm’s length. I try to remind people as I visit that I have been going back and forth between Baker and Spokane, and if they are uncomfortable with my visit because of exposure to the virus that is just OK and fine.

It is a strange time to be a church, when we cannot really be together. It is a strange time for those who want to respond to Jesus’ sending us to go about in our cities and our villages to share the good news of the kingdom and to be part of the healing of our lives and nation.

So what might we do? Well, we can embrace new technologies. Those of us who have not been raised on modern communication technologies have a hard time learning them. But they are becoming indispensable ways of staying connected. If you are not comfortable with email and Facebook and other social media, it is not too late to learn. But use the old technology too, namely the phone. I have used my smart phone more as a real phone than ever before. I have spent more time talking on the phone than I have in years. So keep calling each other, stay in touch. Your phone call may encourage someone who feels isolated and alone. In that sense your phone call can raise the dead, by bringing hope and life to someone who is in despair. Call each other, when appropriate, visit. You and I can cure the sick by simply calling, those who are sick to death of this isolation. Our call might even help cure the physically sick by discovering in a call that someone needs to get to the doctor or the hospital.

I have referred to fishing this morning, and that is an appropriate analogy. Jesus uses it elsewhere. But the picture he uses in this sending text is that of the field and the harvest. Many of you know the world of the field and harvest better than I do. But you don’t have to be a farmer to understand what Jesus is talking about when he says, “The harvest is plentiful but laborers are few. Therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.” You and I are those laborers friends, in our own church, in the Baker community and beyond. Let us continue our ministry of good news and healing in the name of the Lord of the harvest. Amen.

Matthew 28:16-20, June 7, 2020, Sermon

"Go Make Disciples"

Pastor Randy Butler

This passage is known famously as the Great Commission. In it Jesus commissions his followers to go and make disciples, baptizing and teaching them. It is a short but powerful mission statement and applies to any congregation today as well.

It is our mission statement, even though these are difficult times and we may not be the perfect church. Matthew says that the eleven disciples went to Galilee as Jesus had commanded them. Not twelve, just eleven. Jesus had specifically chosen twelve, Matthew tells us that earlier in his gospel. But Judas betrayed Jesus and he is gone now so they are down to eleven. And in that day, as in ours, eleven doesn’t quite get us there. We buy eggs by the dozen – twelve, not eleven. The carton would be less than full if there were only eleven. There were twelve tribes in Israel, not eleven. Nobody says the eleven tribes of Israel. It is the twelve tribes of Israel. Twelve is complete, eleven is less than complete. So it is really a less than complete group that goes to Galilee. And yet Jesus meets with them. And he meets with us, commissions us, incomplete and imperfect though we may be.

We hold our session meetings and other meetings by video conferencing these days. That is an imperfect way to communicate. Sometimes you see but can’t hear people, other times you hear but can’t see them. Often they just disappear. We speak over each other. And not all can participate – we are an incomplete, imperfect church and community leaders, and yet Jesus meets with us.

When the disciples saw him, Matthew says that they worshipped him, though some doubted, emphasizing again that this is not a perfectly faithful and firmly convinced group of eleven. They vacillate. They come to Galilee less than complete and when they arrive some of them have their doubts. In fact it may be that they all have doubts. The original language is not entirely clear. Maybe they all worship and all had doubts, maybe some had doubts. In any case Jesus meets with this group. And that is reassuring. We are worshipping and doubting followers. Dale Bruner says that disciples live between worship and doubt, and on any given day we toggle back and forth between the two. And yet Jesus meets us. In fact, Matthew says that Jesus came to the disciples. Bruner uses an even stronger translation – He stepped forward to them. Though we are doubting and imperfect Jesus steps forward to meet us. He doesn’t step away at the first sign of our imperfection or doubt. He steps up, steps forward to meet us and speak.

And he affirms his authority right up front. “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me,” says Jesus. That’s quite a claim. And he’s either right, or he is delusional. The bible concludes of course that he is right. Ephesians 1:22 says, “God put all things under Jesus’ feet and made him head over all things.”

His sovereign authority rules over all our fears my friends. The Lord who loves you and draws close to you, is saying “all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.” We live in fearful and uncertain times; fear of COVID-19, fear of economic collapse, fears about our family, our health our nation and world. Fear about the widespread unrest that is happening in our country. Perhaps this morning we recall that all those who claim authority in our day – kings, queens, prime ministers, governors and even presidents – all are subject to a higher authority, to the one who says, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.”

So Jesus establishes his commanding authority, now he gives the mission: “Go therefore, and make disciples, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey all that I have commanded you.” Matthew’s sentence structure is revealing. We have four commands: go, make disciples, baptize, teach. But only one of these is the primary command and imperative. Make disciples, all the other three are subordinate to that command. In the original language it reads like this: “going therefore, make disciples, baptizing and teaching. Going, baptizing and teaching are the way we make disciples. Going, baptizing and teaching are the way we fulfill the primary mission of making disciples.

But “make disciples” is the main thing here. Make disciples. His primary aim is that we produce other followers. Other students, it is kind of a school word. His command is to do what he has been doing all these last three years or so with his disciples. Teach them, go places with them, hang out with them. Go to weddings with them, go to dinner with them. Model a prophetic life, a life of service. Teach by example. In other words, this is making disciples by living with, not just teaching at them.

This afternoon Baker City High School will hold its graduation – it will be a drive thru graduation. Students will drive through the bus lane to receive their diplomas. Congratulations to students who are going to school in these strange ways and times. And what creativity on the part of the school administrators and faculty to celebrate our graduating seniors under such strange circumstances.

The best teachers know and understand that teaching is more that transferring from their brains to their students’ brains. They know that it has to do with modeling leadership and behaviors, communicating a sense of enthusiasm about their subject, arousing curiosity. Adapting to what life brings, and helping shape students’ character.

Christian discipleship is about more than information too. As we try to fulfill Jesus’ charge to make disciples we are doing more than getting people into heaven. We are doing more than getting people to believe the right things. We are trying to learn ourselves and then pass on the life and way of Jesus. That’s what eternal life is after all. Jesus says in John 17 that eternal life is to know God and to know himself, Jesus Christ, who God sent. What we believe is important, but the key is to match what we say we believe with how we really live. Nineteenth century Scottish pastor George Macdonald once said “To hold to a doctrine or an opinion with the intellect alone is not to believe it. A man’s real belief is that which he lives by.” So discipleship on the way of Jesus is about a journey, a life, a walk.

John Ortberg tells the story of students in a class on ornithology, the study of birds. The teacher gave the students a pop quiz, and were told they had to identify twenty-five species of birds, but all they had to go on was pictures of birds’ feet. One student snapped under the pressure of such a hard test and refused to take the test. When the teacher told the student he’d flunk and asked him his name, the student rolled up his pants to his knees, pointed at his feet and said, “You tell me!”

Followers of Jesus are known by our feet, not just our heads. By our actions, not just our beliefs. Followers of Jesus are those who hit the road with Jesus, learn from Jesus, grow in relationship with Jesus, apprentice with Jesus. That’s what it means to be a disciple and to make other disciples. That is why we baptize and teach. Making followers and disciples is the main thing.

We can do this in and outside the church. By being ourselves-those whose feet do the talking, we can show what it means in our time to be disciples and followers of Jesus. He is with us through all the ups and downs of our imperfect and incomplete lives. He is with us to the end of time. Amen.

John 20:19-23, May 31, 2020, Sermon

“On a Mission”

Pastor Randy Butler

You and I are on a mission. We are sent by God the Father, commissioned by Jesus the Son, and equipped by the Holy Spirit to be within our families, in our workplaces, among our friends, in our community and in the world as ambassadors, ambassadors for Christ. 

Perhaps you say, “What me, sent? That’s for the serious Christians. God only sends the good ones, the committed ones, the church leaders, the pastors, the missionaries.” Wrong. Any cursory reading of the Bible shows us the kind of people that God chooses to send. At the beginning of the biblical story there is Moses, a murderer hiding out in the desert, until he happens upon a burning bush. And at the other end of the biblical story there is the apostle Paul, also with blood on his hands and hatred in his heart, until he is cold-called on his way to Damascus. And in between these two flawed but towering figures there are all kinds of others who when God calls have said, “Who me? I am the least qualified of all.”

Now, one of the misconceptions we have with this idea of being sent is that we think it means that we need to go somewhere far away to be on a mission, overseas somewhere or something. This thinking too is just plain wrong. In this century there is a growing number of missionaries coming from other countries to the United States, raising the question about just where the mission field is, overseas somewhere or perhaps in our own neighborhood, in our own backyard. We don’t have to go very far at all to be on a mission. And so being sent is not really about where we go, it is about how we go, in what way we live and serve. And we are given some direction about how we go in our passage this morning.

It is resurrection day, the day that Jesus was raised from the dead. John says it is evening on that day, and the doors of the house where the disciples were gathered are closed because they are in fear of the authorities who crucified Jesus and who might also come after them. Now they are tentatively hopeful at the same time. Peter and John have seen the empty tomb, and Mary has seen the risen Jesus and told them all about it. So they are in lockdown, but they are hopeful at the same time. They are like Dr. Fauci who said the other day that he is cautiously optimistic about the development of a vaccine for COVID-19, while the death toll just reached 100,000. Here are the disciples who have seen Jesus crucified, now hoping it might be true that he is alive, all the while making sure the doors are locked.

This is how we are today, afraid and hopeful at the same time. Hopeful that the curve of the spread of virus cases is flattening, but afraid that it could return now or in the fall. So I love it when John tells us that Jesus, the same one who was crucified and buried, comes and stands among them. When they are a crazy mixture of fear and hope Jesus comes and stands among them. When we are a crazy mixture of fear and hope Jesus comes and stands among us too.

He stands in our midst to prepare and send us on a mission. We are men and women with a mission. And what is this mission? Well it is a mission of love, vulnerability and peace. Jesus twice says to them “Peace be with you.” A common Jewish greeting, but filled with rich meaning for them on this day of resurrection. Jesus’ first words after his resurrection are grace, not command, and his first word are peace. His first word is not revenge or war, but peace. And he says, “As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” So we are sent to be bearers of peace.

Jesus also stands in their midst with his wounds still visible. John says that he showed them his hands and feet, and when the disciples presumably saw the wounds where nails had been driven just days before, they knew it was indeed Jesus who they had seen crucified, now alive again. Now strangely we are told that he just came and stood among them. John doesn’t say that he morphed through the door or squeezed like a ghost under the crack in the door. He doesn’t go there, he doesn’t speculate. But the doors are locked, and Jesus gets inside somehow. So we know that he is transformed in some way. There is no doubt who it is – he is recognizable. But he is different. And so the disciples can’t miss that the wounds which killed him are still visible, yet he is alive.

His wounds haven’t disappeared, they have been transformed. He is alive now but his wounds are still visible. His body still bears the marks. Yet he has overcome the wounds. Reminds me of the Apostle Paul’s words in 2 Corinthians 4, “We are afflicted in every way but not crushed; perplexed but not driven to despair; persecuted but not forsaken; struck down but not destroyed, always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may be made visible in our body.”

“As the Father has sent me so I send you.” Just as Jesus is sent to be wounded and yet alive, so we are sent as those wounded and yet still alive. The world doesn’t need, our friends don’t need, our neighbors don’t need perfect Christians who have no problems who have no wounds. They need followers of Jesus who will be vulnerable and authentic in their wounds and their life. The world has had enough of hypocritical perfect Christians.

People want desperately to know if there is a way for their imperfect wounded lives to find hope and peace and joy. We can share that with them if we are honest and vulnerable and open with them about our failures and losses, our wounds. We are sent as wounded healers, the title of one of Henri Nouwen’s first books. Nouwen says in our own wounded-ness we can become a source of life for others. Now this doesn’t mean that we are always talking about our problems, letting ourselves emotionally bleed publicly. It simply means that we go the way of Jesus, who was alive yet didn’t hide his wounds.

We are also sent on a mission with authority. It is quite stunning really that Jesus sends the disciples with the authority to forgive and retain the sins of others. “If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them, if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.” Whatever else this all means exactly we can say this much: The first disciples are sent with authority to speak to the deepest issues of human beings, that is the sin that separates us from God and from one another.

In our time we would rather avoid terms like sin. We aren’t entirely comfortable talking about morality or sin in ourselves or anyone else. We prefer the language of therapy, sickness, addiction. But here the charge is for all disciples, not just the first apostles but all of us to name sin, offer forgiveness in Christ, and when necessary, name God’s judgement of sin. Sin remains the deepest issue that faces human beings. We are brilliant in our ability to deny, avoid and rationalize our pride and superiority and position, our actions and behaviors. Someone said the human heart is the most fiercely guarded piece of ground in the universe. And on occasion its walls must be breached. Amazingly, all of us are charged with this work. “As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”

Finally though we are sent on our mission equipped with the Holy Spirit. We are not left alone. Jesus says to the fearful yet hopeful disciples, “Peace be with you,” and then he breathes on them and says, “Receive the Holy Spirit.” This is for everyone, all of us. Dale Bruner says that the only way the disciples could have missed this gift would have been by ducking when Jesus breathed on them. This of course was before everyone was wearing masks. So the breathed in Holy Spirit is as much ours as our breath. God through the Holy Spirit is closer to us than our own breath.

So we are empowered for mission by the Holy Spirit, to be authentic and vulnerable witnesses to God as we have come to know him through Jesus Christ, God’s Son. Sent to speak truth as we understand it with clarity and humility. We have been deputized as Christ’s ambassadors wherever we find ourselves.

I was reading a movie review once, I don’t even remember the movie being reviewed, but I remember the reviewer’s opinion. He said, “The movie makes a lot of noise, but leaves no echo.” Some films are like that. You watch them and forget them. A lot of action films are like that – they make a lot of noise but leave not echo. You forget them the moment you turn it off. We need more than a lot of noisy action in our lives. We want our lives to leave an echo, to have some memorable impact on others. A life sent by Jesus has that impact. Let us go in his name. Amen.