Sermon: Now What? (2017)

Delivered at Trinity United Methodist Church in Fountain Inn, South Carolina on May 28, 2017, Ascension Sunday

I share these thoughts hoping they are of help to someone else.

Comments are always welcomed.

If you find these thoughts helpful, please share.

Now What?

Audio Version

So when [Jesus and his disciples] had come together, they asked him, “Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?”  He replied, “It is not for you to know the times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority.  But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”  When he had said this, as they were watching, he was lifted up, and a cloud took Him out of their sight.  While he was going and they were gazing up toward heaven, suddenly two men in white robes stood by them.  They said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up toward heaven? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.”

Then they returned to Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet, which is near Jerusalem, a sabbath day’s journey away.  When they had entered the city, they went to the room upstairs where they were staying, Peter, and John, and James, and Andrew, Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew, James son of Alphaeus, and Simon the Zealot, and Judas son of James.  All these were constantly devoting themselves to prayer, together with certain women, including Mary the mother of Jesus, as well as his brothers.

Acts 1:6-14 (NRSV)

Give me a revelation

Show me what to do

'Cause I've been trying to find my way

I haven't got a clue

Tell me, should I stay here?

Or do I need to move?

Give me a revelation

I've got nothing without You

From “Revelation” by Third Day

After I accepted my first job as a professional computer programmer, I started returning to my alma mater every now and then for long walks around campus.  The beautifully cultivated grounds of the university were the perfect place for me to sort through my thoughts.  On one Sunday evening, as I followed the paths around campus, I realized that I was feeling a bit lost – not lost on campus but lost in life.  Within the last few months, I had completed both of the life goals my parents had set for me.  I had graduated from college with a bachelors degree, and I had landed a full-time professional job.  I had accomplished everything for which I had spent my whole life preparing.  My life's work was complete.

My thoughts and my feelings that evening boiled down to a single question:

Now what?

---

Jesus and His disciples were gathered at the Mount of Olives, not far from Jerusalem.  The Disciples, perhaps still under the impression that Jesus was the political leader who would liberate their people from the Roman occupation, asked if He would soon restore autonomy to Israel.  Jesus told them that such matters were none of their concern and then said, “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”  He suddenly began to rise from the ground and float into the sky, and then, as the Disciples were watching, He disappeared into the clouds.

For the Disciples, life had been nothing short of an emotional roller coaster ride as of late.  They had been called away from their previous careers as fisherman, tax collectors, and militant political activists to become students of the traveling teacher and healer known as Jesus of Nazareth.  They followed Him on His journeys, listening to Him proclaim the coming of the Kingdom of God, watching Him clash with the religious elite, and pondering His teachings and parables.  They watched with wonder as He healed the sick, befriended outcasts, worked miracles, and brought peace to the disturbed.  They began to think that maybe this Jesus was the Messiah, the long-awaited leader who would finally drive their oppressors out of the land and usher in the prophesied age of peace and prosperity.

Full of anticipation, the Disciples followed Jesus into the capital city of Jerusalem.  They watched Him ride into town on a donkey, like a king during peacetime, to the joyous shouts of the crowds.¹  They watched Him throw the merchants out of the temple in protest of the corruption of the religious establishment.²  Then, one fateful night, the Disciples' hopes and dreams were shattered when Jesus surrendered to a violent mob.  Jesus was taken before the temple court and then to the Roman governor who sentenced Him to die by crucifixion.  He was mocked, beaten, and nailed to a cross.  He died in agony, and His body was sealed in a tomb.³

Two days later, the Disciples received reports that several people had seen Jesus alive and well.  Suddenly, Jesus appeared in their midst and said, “Peace be with you.”⁴  For forty more days, the Disciples continued to learn from Him.⁵  Their hope was restored.  Jesus had been raised from the dead, and everything could go back to the way it was before those horrific days in Jerusalem.  Not even a brutal execution could stop Jesus.  Surely the defeat of the Romans and the restoration of Israel was at hand!

And then...

all of a sudden...

Jesus was gone.

We have no way of knowing exactly what the Disciples were thinking at that moment, but I cannot help but think that, as they stared up at the clouds into which their Teacher and Messiah had just vanished, one of them asked, “Now what?”

Now what? is a question familiar to all of us, a question we find ourselves asking at various times in our lives.  It is the type of question we ask when what was is no longer what is and while we still aren't quite sure what will be.  It is the type of question we ask when, like the Disciples, we step into a liminal space, a state of transition not unlike the interlude between one act of a play and the next.

The Disciples could not rightfully be called “disciples” any longer, for the teacher they had been shadowing was gone.  They had graduated from discipleship, whether they were ready or not.  No longer were they called to be disciples – people who follow – but rather apostles – people who are sent out on a mission.  Jesus had called them to take His message of hope further and further outward, as if in an ever-widening circle,⁶ from the city of Jerusalem, to the surrounding region of Judea, to the neighboring region of Samaria, and ultimately throughout the world...

but not yet.

Not long before this, when Jesus and the Disciples were gathered together for a meal, Jesus instructed the Disciples to remain in Jerusalem until a certain promise of God had been fulfilled.  Something had to happen first before the Disciples could set out on their mission.  Jesus told them that they would be “baptized by the Holy Spirit” and that this baptism, whatever it was, would empower them to do what they had been called to do.⁷  Until that time, they were to stand in the threshold between discipleship and apostleship, waiting.

Like the men formerly known as disciples, we all go through times of transition, waiting, and uncertainty in our lives, times when we ask Now what?

When I accepted my first job after graduation, I left a part of my life behind me and stepped into a liminal space of my own.  I turned the page on the story that had been written for me, and what I found staring back at me was a blank page.  I had met the goals my parents had set for me, so their expectations could no longer be my guide.  I had to start living my own life.  Whatever I wanted out of life, I knew I wouldn't find it in my job, for I worked in the gambling industry, which isn't exactly known for making the world a better place.  So began my search for meaning and purpose in life.

While the Disciples were still staring at the clouds, two men dressed in white – presumably angels – appeared and said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up toward heaven?  This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw Him go into heaven.”  (Apparently, in their neck of the woods, it's an everyday occurrence to see someone levitating to the sky and disappearing into the clouds.)  When we step into times of waiting, as the Disciples did when Jesus ascended, we might not know what to do with ourselves.  Standing around with our heads in the clouds is not an option, for there is always work to do.

In The Screwtape Letters, C.S. Lewis notes that we are often tempted to live either in the past through nostalgia or in the future through expectation or anxiety.  The truth of the matter is that the past is frozen in time while the future is ever in flux.  All we really have is the present moment, the only point in time that actually touches Eternity.  That said, we only need to concern ourselves with the duties, trials, and graces of the present, as we commend both the past and the future into God's hands.  We should only concern ourselves with the parts of the future that require our immediate preparation.⁸

If you find yourself in a time of waiting or in a time of change, I cannot tell you that better days are on the way, nor can I tell you that worse days lie ahead.  What I can tell you with relative certainty is that the next days are coming and that the next days will bring with them work that must be done.⁹  We spend our first decades of life preparing for the rest of our lives, and we spend much of the rest of our lives preparing for the weeks, days, and hours ahead of us.

The Disciples did not know what lay ahead of them.  What they did know is that what once was twelve was now eleven.  They were down a man, because one of them literally sold Jesus out and then, realizing the disastrous consequences of his actions, gave up on himself.  For the Disciples, the duties of the present moment included the selection of a twelfth.  They discerned that the twelfth must have been a dedicated follower of Jesus from the very beginning of His ministry to the present day.  They narrowed their selection pool down to two candidates and then cast lots, praying that God's will would be done.  The lot fell on a man named Matthias, and he was chosen to become the twelfth apostle.¹⁰

In the book Jesus Is Better than You Imagined, writer Jonathan Merritt confesses that, like many people, he is “impatient by nature.”  Though he always considered waiting to be excruciating, over time he came to understand something important about times of waiting.¹¹  He writes,
Periods of waiting are not passive, hands-in-pocket interims.  Rather they are times in life when God is preparing us for a spiritual upgrade.  Maybe that is why [Jesus] has made two millennia of His postmortem disciples wait for Him to return.  Jesus knows that waiting doesn't mean wasting.  It means God is working.¹²
We might not always know what to do during times of waiting, but we can be confident that God is already at work.

It is worth noting that the Disciples did one other thing while they waited for the promise of God to be fulfilled: they “constantly devot[ed] themselves to prayer.”  Though we often think of prayer as asking God to do for us what we cannot do for ourselves, there is so much more to prayer than simply asking God to do our bidding.  Prayer opens us up to the presence of God and to the creative work God is already doing all around us.¹³  The Disciples knew that they were called to share Christ's message with the world, but they also knew that their time had not yet come.  They had been instructed by Jesus to remain in Jerusalem and wait until the coming of the Holy Spirit.  Their time of waiting has been called “a significant pause between the mighty acts of God, a pause in which the church's task is to wait and pray.”¹⁴

The Disciples didn't always fully understand the things Jesus said, so I would wager a guess that they didn't quite know what to expect in the days ahead.  They needed direction from God, and they needed to be open to what God was doing.

Like the Disciples, I too sought direction from God.  Specifically, I sought a new direction that would guide me to what I would not find in my job.  This search drove me to try new things.  I became more involved in the Church; I tried my hand at preaching and teaching Sunday school; and I discovered the joy of writing.  Amid my search, there were even some times of persistent prayer and waiting.  In my search for meaning, I found meaning in the search itself, and I have found meaning in the work the search has brought into my life.  I lost my first programming job a little less than two years after I accepted it.  Three months later, I started a new job at a local technical college, where I have been working for over seven years.  This job is a better fit for me than the first, but, to this day, I am still searching.

For the Disciples, the intermission between discipleship and apostleship lasted for a mere ten days.  On a feast day called Pentecost, something amazing happened – but that is a story for another day.  Seasons of waiting can last for weeks, months, or even years.  Sometimes the space between what was and what will be seems less like an intermission and more like a desolate wasteland.  Sometimes we ask Now what? when the journey of life has taken us into the proverbial wilderness.  I am referring to that seemingly endless season of spiritual dryness when we feel far from anything familiar and when we are once again trying to figure out who we are and where we belong in the world.

The wilderness experience takes its name from the journey of the ancient Israelites.  For forty years, the people of Israel trudged through the desert, from the day God parted the Red Sea, rescuing them from slavery, to the day God parted the Jordan River, ushering them into the Promised Land.  In the wilderness, the Israelites experienced freedom, and they also faced great difficulty.  In the wilderness, they received instruction from God, and they also contended with God.  In the wilderness, they progressed toward their destination at times, and they also wandered at times.  The wilderness is the place where anything can happen, yet it is also the place where it often seems that nothing is happening.

Lauren Winner, in her memoir Still: Notes on a Midfaith Crisis, reflects on entering the “middle” of her spiritual life, which she describes as “a vague in-between, after the intensity of conversion and before the calm wisdom of cronehood,” and she ponders the various “middles” of life.  She notes that the word middle is often associated with things that aren't particularly good – middle school and the Middle Ages, for example – but she also notes that not all “middles” in life are necessarily bad.  In chess, the middle game is what brings out a player's strategic thinking and creativity, for it is the part of the game in which anything can happen.  Middlestead is an old word that describes the threshing floor of a barn, the place where the wheat is separated from the chaff.  Winner concludes that, for her, spiritual midlife will be a time of winnowing.¹⁵

Last year, my own journey started to feel a bit like a wilderness.  I had left the church I attended for the first thirty-one years of my life, and I came to realize that the church I had started attending afterward was not a good fit for me.  To make matters even more difficult, the Bible study group that had been my community for five years had dissolved, despite my efforts to keep it going.  I had stepped into uncharted territory, and I often felt like I was spinning my wheels.  This feeling did not last forever.  I have found a church where I believe I will grow spiritually, and my service to the Church at large is keeping me busy once again.

The wilderness experience seems dry and desolate, but it can actually be a blessing in disguise.  The wilderness might be the place where we are unknowingly prepared for whatever comes next in our lives.  It might also a place for some much needed winnowing.  We discover who we really are when we're stripped of everything we're not.  Bane or blessing, the wilderness experience is not something we can escape: it is something we must endure.  When the journey through the wilderness became difficult, the ancient Israelites began to think that they were better off as slaves and were tempted to turn back, but the only way out of the wilderness is through it.  As we journey through the wilderness, God is with us every step of the way to lead us and provide for us, in the same way that God was with the Israelites, but we must have faith.

Sometimes we find ourselves in the wilderness after a change in life, but sometimes we end up in the wilderness after a failure of some sort.  Sometimes we ask Now what? when we have screwed up so badly that we feel that there is no point in trying to carry on as if nothing happened.  We stand in the wilderness between our failure and whatever comes next, unsure if we should hope for a rebound or just give up on whatever we had started.  I think that, after Jesus' resurrection, one of the Disciples might have found himself in such a place.

In the Gospel of John, we read that, one night, Peter made an announcement to the other Disciples.  He said, "I'm going fishing."  A number of the others decided to go with him.¹⁶  There are numerous theories regarding why Peter decided to go fishing that night.  When I look at this story in light of my own, I cannot help but wonder if maybe Peter was turning in his resignation as a disciple, having decided to return to his past life as a fisherman.  Shortly before Jesus was arrested, Peter declared in his bravado that he was willing to lay down his life for Him.¹⁷  Hours later, while Jesus stood trial before the high priest, Peter denied three times that he even knew Him.¹⁸  For some reason, Jesus had named him Peter, meaning “rock.”¹⁹  Some rock he turned out to be!

After a night spent not catching fish, Peter and the others saw a man on the beach.  He called out to them and told them to try throwing out their net from the right side of the boat.  When they were unable to haul in the massive catch of fish, they immediately knew the man was Jesus.²⁰  In another Gospel, we read that, when Jesus first called Peter to leave behind his boat and his nets to start fishing for people as His disciple, He did so with a miraculous catch of fish.²¹  When Peter was apparently tempted to give up on his calling, Jesus called him back with the very same miracle.  Three times Peter had denied knowing Jesus; three times Jesus asked Peter, “Do you love me?” and three times Jesus said to him, “Feed my sheep.”²²

I originally started preaching because, in my search for meaning in life, I wondered if my calling was in the ministry.  A few years later, I came to the realization that I have a tendency to bail out on people when I feel that they want too much from me.  I figured that there was no point in pursuing a future in the ministry if I wasn't going to minister to people.  Over time, I came to realize that all of us who follow Jesus Christ – both laity and clergy – are called to be ministers to each other and to the world, and, Like Peter, I came to realize that failure is not an excuse to throw in the towel.  At times, we might be tempted to abandon our calling as followers of Christ, but graciously Christ keeps calling us back.

We all go through times of uncertainty when we ask Now what?  When we're stuck the threshold between the past and the future, unsure of what to expect, we must not keep our heads in the clouds, for there is always work to be done in the present.  When we're trudging through our own personal wilderness, all we can do is to keep on trudging.  When we're reeling from failure, we must not throw in the towel.  Wherever we happen to be, we are invited to seek direction from God in prayer and to trust in God to guide us, for God is never far away.

Thanks be to God.


Notes:

1. Luke 19:29-40
2. Luke 19:45-46
3. Luke 22:47-23:56
4. Luke 24:1-43
5. Acts 1:3
6. William Barclay.  The Daily Study Bible Series: The Acts of the Apostles, Revised Edition.  1976, The Westminster Press.  p. 12
7. Acts 1:4-5
8. C.S. Lewis.  The Screwtape Letters.  ch. 15
9. Kent Dobson.  “When: 2.”  Mars Hill Bible Church podcast, 03/16/2014.
10. Acts 1:15-26
11. Jonathan Merritt.  Jesus Is Better than You Imagined.  2014, Faith Words.  p. 103
12. Merritt, p. 108
13. Rob Bell.  NOOMA Open | 019.  2008, Zondervan/Flannel.
14. William H. Willimon.  Acts (Interpretation: A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching)  1988, John Knox Press.  p. 20
15. Lauren Winner.  Still: Notes on a Midfaith Crisis.  2012, Harper One.  pp. 60-62
16. John 21:3
17. John 13:37
18. John 18:12-27
19. John 1:42
20. John 21:1-14
21. Luke 5:1-11
22. John 21:15-19

The Ascension was painted by David Teniers the Younger in the mid 1600s and is based on a drawing by Leandro Bassano.  The photograph of my feet was taken by me at my alma mater.  The photograph of the desert canyon was taken by Bob Miles of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and has been released into the public domain.

Perspective: When the Path Becomes Treacherous

I share these thoughts hoping they are of help to someone else.

Comments are always welcomed.

If you find these thoughts helpful, please share.

When the Path Becomes Treacherous

But I say to you that listen, Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you.

Luke 6:27-28 (NRSV)

You know the effort I have given

And You know exactly what it cost

And though my innocence was taken

Not everything is lost

From "Your Love" by Brandon Heath

In Jesus, we are offered a path to follow in life, a path of love and service, but nobody ever said that it is an easy or safe path to follow.  For a path of love, it can become surprisingly treacherous at times.

St. Luke, the storyteller who is known primarily for writing the Gospel that bears his name, wrote a second work known as the Acts of the Apostles.  While Luke's Gospel tells us the story of Jesus, Acts serves as a sequel, telling us the story of some of the people who followed in Jesus' footsteps.  In this latter work, we read about an exemplary follower of Jesus named Stephen.

When we first read about Stephen, he is chosen along with six others to ensure that the needy among the community of faith receive the food they need.  Luke describes him as "a man full of faith and the Holy Spirit" who "did great wonders and signs among the people."  Because Stephen stands out from the crowd, he draws some unwanted attention from people who not only disagree with what he says but resent him for the gifts he has been given.  They take him before the religious leaders on trumped-up charges and bring forward some false witnesses who lie about him.¹

Does any of this sound familiar?

To show us how closely Stephen is following Jesus, Luke calls to mind several landmarks from Jesus' journey.

When the religious leaders hear the charges against Stephen, they look at him and see "that his face [is] like the face of an angel."²  In the Gospel, we read that, one day, Jesus hikes up a mountain with three of His closest disciples.  While Jesus is praying, His disciples look at Him and see that He has taken on a radiant, heavenly appearance.³

Stephen, instead of trying to defend himself against the false accusations, delivers a sermon that leaves the religious leaders grinding their teeth.⁴  In the Gospel, we read that, Jesus returns to His hometown toward the beginning of His public ministry.  At the synagogue, He delivers a sermon that enrages the congregation to they point that they drag Him out of town and attempt to throw Him off a cliff.⁵

While the religious leaders are seething, Stephen looks up, watches the heavens open, and sees Jesus standing at the right-hand side of God, and he tells the religious leaders what he sees.⁶  In the Gospel, we read that, after Jesus is baptized, the heavens open.  The Holy Spirit descends upon Jesus as a dove, and a Voice from heaven speaks.⁷

Enraged by what Stephen has said, the religious leaders cover their ears, start screaming, drag him out of town, and beat him to death with rocks.⁸

God has blessed each of us with gifts with which we can be a blessing to the world.  When you realize what you were put on this world to do and pursue it with all your heart, you will stand out from the crowd.  When you are making a difference in the world around you, people will take notice, but not all of the attention you receive will necessarily be good.  Some people will admire you, but others will resent you for your gifts.  Some who feel that they have something to lose might even perceive you as a threat and respond with hostility.

One thing that stands out to me about Luke's Gospel is that, when Jesus is crucified, He does not die defeated.  In Matthew and Mark's accounts, Jesus cries out, just before breathing His last breath, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"⁹  According to the Gospel of Luke, Jesus says some very different things on the cross.  First, He prays on behalf of His killers, "Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing."¹⁰  When one of the criminals who is crucified with Jesus asks Him to remember him, Jesus says, "Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise."¹¹  And, before Jesus breathes His last breath, He prays, "Father, into your hands I commend my spirit."¹²  Jesus is not at all alienated from His Father, and His spirit, unlike His body, remains unbroken.

In the Acts of the Apostles, while Stephen is being stoned to death, he echoes what Jesus says on the cross.  When the religious leaders begin pelting him with rocks, he commends his life into Christs's hands, praying, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit."  With his last breath, he asks God to forgive his killers, praying, "Lord, do not hold this sin against them."¹³

St. Stephen has followed the path of Christ all the way to the bitter end, and, like Jesus, he dies undefeated.

The path Christ calls us to follow has the potential to become treacherous, but following this path requires us to love those whom we might consider our enemies and to pray for those who would do us harm.¹⁴  When we pursue our calling in life, we can expect to experience some resistance, but this must not stop us.  St. Paul suggests that, when all else is lost, we can hold on to three things: faith, hope, and love.¹⁵  When we suffer for doing what is right, we can hold on to the faith that our suffering will not be in vain, the hope that others will benefit because of our efforts, and a love for all people.  The life, death, and resurrection of Christ shows us that love is stronger than death.


Notes:

1. Acts 6:1-14 (NRSV)
2. Acts 6:15 (NRSV)
3. Luke 9:28-29
4. Acts 7:1-54
5. Luke 4:16-30
6. Acts 7:55-56
7. Luke 3:21-22
8. Acts 7:57-58
9. Matthew 27:46, Mark 15:34
10. Luke 23:33-34 (NRSV)
11. Luke 23:39-43 (NRSV)
12. Luke 23:46 (NRSV)
13. Acts 7:59-60 (NRSV)
14. See also "Thin Ice and the Spear" by Shane Hipps.  Mars Hill Bible Church podcast, 11/29/2011.
15. 1 Corinthians 13:13

Stoning of Saint Stephen was painted by Paolo Uccello around 1435.

Sermon: The Way of Love

Delivered at Slater United Methodist Church in Slater-Marietta, South Carolina on May 14, 2017, the Fifth Sunday of Easter

I share these thoughts hoping they are of help to someone else.

Comments are always welcomed.

If you find these thoughts helpful, please share.

The Way of Love

Audio Version

[Jesus said,] “Do not let your hearts be troubled.  Believe in God, believe also in me.  In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places.  If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?  And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also.  And you know the way to the place where I am going.”  Thomas said to him, “Lord, we do not know where you are going.  How can we know the way?”  Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through me.  If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.”

Philip said to him, “Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.”  Jesus said to him, “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?  The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own; but the Father who dwells in me does his works.  Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; but if you do not, then believe me because of the works themselves.  Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father.  I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son.  If in my name you ask me for anything, I will do it.

John 14:1-14 (NRSV)

Love is right here

Love is alive

Love is the way

The truth, the life

From “Love Never Fails” by Brandon Heath

In 2002, pop psychologist Philip McGraw, known to the world as Dr. Phil, became the host of his own television show.  Not long afterward, late-night talk show host David Letterman introduced a new segment on his show, titled “Dr. Phil's Words of Wisdom.”  Each of these segments featured a short clip from Dr. Phil's show played out of context for comedic effect.  One such segment that has stuck in my memory featured a clip in which Dr. Phil said, “Sometimes it's hard to see your own face without a mirror.”  On its own, such a quote might have us sarcastically thinking, “Really?  I had no idea I needed a mirror to see my own face.”  Dr. Phil might have actually made a valuable point by saying what he said – perhaps something about how we cannot always trust our perceptions of ourselves – but his point is lost to us if do not know the context.

When a person's words are quoted with no regard to the context in which the person said what she said, we might not fully understand what she was actually saying.  Bible verses are no exception.

---

We are nearing the end of Eastertide, the season on the Church calendar when we remember the time Jesus spent with the Disciples after He was resurrected from the dead.  As we look ahead, we remember that it was only a matter of time before Jesus would leave the Disciples once again and return to His Father.  With that in mind, we return to a section of the Gospel of John known to some as the Farewell Discourse, in which we hear what Jesus says to the Disciples shortly before He is betrayed and arrested.

When one of the Disciples mysteriously walks out during dinner, Jesus makes a startling revelation to the other Disciples.  He says, “Little children, I am with you only a little longer.  You will look for me; and as I said to the Jews so now I say to you, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come.’”¹  The disciple Peter asks Jesus where He is going, and Jesus replies that He is going to where they cannot yet follow but that they will join Him there someday.²  Jesus then says to them,
Do not let your hearts be troubled.  Believe in God, believe also in me.  In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places.  If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?  And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also.

The Disciples have probably heard words like these at some point in their lives.  In fact, it is likely that at least some of them have even said such words to someone.  They are the type of words that, in their culture, a young man might say to his beloved when she has accepted his marriage proposal.  At an engagement celebration, which took place after a marriage had already been arranged, the man offered the woman a glass of wine as a symbol of his marriage proposal.  If she drank the glass of wine, thereby accepting his proposal, he would tell her that his father's house has a lot of room and that he is going to prepare a place for her there.  The groom would then begin building an addition to his family's house, while his bride learned about caring for a household.  When the groom finished building a place where he and his bride could live together and start a family, he returned to his bride to take her home with him, and the marriage officially began.  The houses of large families had, to use Jesus' words, “many dwelling places.”³

Using betrothal language, Jesus is telling the Disciples that He will soon return to His Father to prepare a place for those who would join Him.  In the same way that a lover brought his beloved into his father's household, Jesus is bringing His followers into the family of God.⁴

Jesus, having told the Disciples that they will someday join Him, reassures them that they already know the way to where He is going.  The disciple Thomas then asks, “Lord, we do not know where you are going.  How can we know the way?”  Jesus replies, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through me.”  Scholar William Barclay suggests that, with this grand statement, “Jesus took three of the great basic conceptions of Judaism, and made the tremendous claim that in him all three found their full realization.”  Jesus embodied the way the people of Israel were called to follow, the truth they sought from God, and the abundant life they all desired.⁵

Sadly, we don't always treat Jesus' profound statement with the reverence it deserves.  It is often used out of context, with no regard to the conversation Jesus is having with the Disciples or even the question Jesus addresses with it.  Many Christians quote this saying in reference to people who follow other religions, as if to say, with an air of superiority, “We're in, and they're out.  Don't like it?  Too bad!”  Many quote this saying to communicate to the world that we Christians have all the answers and that anyone who wants to get on God's good side had better listen to us and do what we say.

While it true that there is exclusive language in Jesus' statement, Jesus does not say what He says in order to exclude people.  Consider the context.  Jesus and the Disciples are not engaging in a debate about which systems of faith and belief are valid.  The Disciples have just learned that their Teacher and Leader is leaving them, and naturally they are anxious about carrying on without Him.  They are concerned that they will not be able to go to where He is going without anyone to show them the way.  Jesus tells the Disciples that He is “the way, and the truth, and the life” and that nobody can go to the Father except through Him to reassure them that they already know the way to His Father.⁶  After all, they have been shadowing Jesus for the last three years, all the while learning all about the way, the truth, and the life He embodies.

Jesus says that He is “the way” to God.  The Greek word translated into English as “the way” is hodos, which could alternately be translated as “road,” “journey,” “course of conduct,” or “manner of thinking.”⁷  This word can be found numerous times throughout the Gospels.  For example, when some people approach Jesus with a question, suggesting that He teaches “the way of God in accordance with truth,” the word for “the way” is hodos.⁸  When Jesus says, in the Parable of the Sower, that some of the farmer's seeds “fell on the path,” the word for “the path” is also hodos.⁹  When we read that Mary and Joseph traveled “a day's journey” before realizing that they had left a twelve-year-old Jesus in Jerusalem, the word for “journey” is, again, hodos.¹⁰

Often Christianity is presented as something that primarily concerns things in our heads, specifically our doctrines and our beliefs.  The Way of which Jesus speaks is not merely a set of propositions to believe but a path to follow in life.  It involves not only what we believe about Jesus but also how we walk in light of what we believe.  When Jesus says, “Believe in me,” He is not calling us to simply believe certain things about Him but to believe in Him enough to actually follow in His footsteps.

When Jesus first reveals to the Disciples that He will soon leave them, He gives them some parting instructions.  He says,
I give you a new commandment, that you love one another.  Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.  By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.¹¹
Earlier that evening, in the middle of dinner, Jesus left His seat at the table, removed His outer robe, tied a towel around himself, filled a basin with water, and washed the Disciples' feet, like a lowly servant.¹²  It is while this action is still fresh in the minds of the Disciples that Jesus says to them, “Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.”  The way Jesus embodied in His life is the way of humble, self-sacrificial love, and to follow the way He calls us to follow is to love as He loved.

Jesus says that it is by the way we love that people will know whether or not we really are His disciples: it is by our love that we show the world that we are following the Way.  As a certain song reminds us, “They'll know we are Christians by our love.”¹³  We Christians have the ultimate example of self-giving love, but, sadly we are not always known as exemplars in following this example.  Mohandas Gandhi, who lived and died fighting for equality in India through nonviolent activism, reportedly said,
I know of no one who has done more for humanity than Jesus.  In fact, there is nothing wrong with Christianity...  The trouble is with you Christians.  You do not begin to live up to your own teachings.¹⁴
If we Christians, who have the audacity to bear the name of Christ, are called to reflect His love to the world, then we cannot simply ignore the world's critiques of us.

I will readily admit that not all paths lead to God.  In the Book of Proverbs, we read, “There is a way that seems right to a person, but its end is the way to death.”¹⁵  The way of love is the only way to God.  As St. John writes in one of his epistles,
Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God.  Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love...  If we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is perfected in us.¹⁶
Ultimately, what we claim to believe about Jesus matters very little.  If we are not striving to live lives of love as Jesus lived, then we are not following the Way.  In the unforgettable words of St. Paul,
If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.  And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.  If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.¹⁷

Christ calls us to reflect His love to the world, but when we twist Jesus' words in order to place ourselves above others, we undermine our calling.  Instead of showing the world the love of Christ, we broadcast to the world things that have nothing to do with love.  Christ is the only way to God, but who are we to think that our way is the only way to Christ?¹⁸  Who are we to act as gatekeepers to the one who existed before all things and who, from the very beginning of time, has held all things together?¹⁹  Christ is bigger than all of us.

Jesus says to the Disciples, “If you know me, you will know my Father also.  From now on you do know him and have seen him.”  The disciple Philip then says, “Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.”  If there were, in Jesus' day and time, as many competing conceptions of God as there are in our day, then we cannot blame Philip from making his request.  Jesus replies,
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?
John begins his Gospel by telling us that the Word of God became flesh and dwelt among us in Jesus Christ.²⁰  Through His life, we see that our God is a God of love, peace, mercy, and grace.

We have a tendency to project our personalities, opinions, beliefs, and worldviews onto God.  As the French philosopher Voltaire once mused, “If God has made us in his image, we have returned him the favor.”²¹  At the same time, what we believe about God shapes who we are and what we do.  For example, an angry person who projects his anger onto God and thus ends us worshiping an angry God will become more and more angry.  Likewise, a fearful person who makes God the object of her fear will become all the more fearful.  In this way, we get caught up in a feedback loop in which we reinforce our own attitudes and behaviors.²²  We can break out of this cycle by looking to the One who came into the world to show us what God is like.

Lest we think that Jesus is just someone else projecting His own personality onto God, He goes on to say,
The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own; but the Father who dwells in me does his works.  Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; but if you do not, then believe me because of the works themselves.
In another Gospel, Jesus suggests that we can know who people really are by their fruits, in other words, by whatever they produce with their lives.²³  Jesus does not set himself above this standard, for not only has He talked the talk, He has also walked the walk.  He has walked the very path He calls us to follow.

It is commonly said that Jesus is both fully divine and fully human, a doctrine we do not fully understand.  In Him we see who God is, and in His example we see what humanity is meant to be as creatures who bear God's image – people who love and serve one another.  In this way, Jesus embodies – or perhaps one could say incarnates – “the way, and the truth, and the life.”

Jesus says, “Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father.”  If the Disciples weren't already feeling overwhelmed about carrying on in Jesus' absence, they surely are now.  To the Disciples, whom Jesus calls “little children,” He will later say, “I will not leave you orphaned.”²⁴  He has no intention to leave the Disciples all alone to figure out what it means to follow Him.  They will be sent a Helper who will remind them of what Jesus has already taught them and who will continue to teach them as they strive to follow in His footsteps.²⁵

As Christians, we do not have all the answers, but we do have a path to follow, and, by following this path, we show the world that we serve a God of love.  It is a narrow path that not everyone in the world chooses to follow, but it is the path that leads to life.²⁶  In Terrence Malick's 2011 film The Tree of Life, the mother of the main character says,
The nuns taught us there are two ways through life: the way of nature and the way of grace.  You have to choose which one you’ll follow.  Grace doesn’t try to please itself, accepts being slighted, forgotten, disliked, accepts insults and injuries. Nature only wants to please itself, get others to please it too, likes to lord it over them, to have its own way.  It finds reasons to be unhappy when all the world is shining around it, when love is smiling through all things.  They taught us that no one who loves the way of grace ever comes to a bad end.²⁷

May God give us the strength to choose the path Christ has shown us.

Amen.


Notes:

1. John 13:31-33 (NRSV)
2. John 13:36
3. Rob Bell.  Sex God: Exploring the Endless Connections Between Sexuality and Spirituality.  2008, Zondervan.  pp. 169-171
4. Adam Hamilton.  John: The Gospel of Light and Life.  2015, Abingdon Press.  ch. 4
5. William Barclay.  The New Daily Study Bible: The Gospel of John, Volume Two.  2001, Saint Andrew Press.  pp. 183-185
6. Bo Sanders, Tripp Fuller, et al.  “The John 14:6 Challenge Edition!!!”  Homebrewed Christianity's Theology Nerd Throwdown, 11/14/2012.
7. Blue Letter Bible: hodos
8. Mark 12:14
9. Matthew 13:4
10. Luke 2:44
11. John 13:34-35 (NRSV)
12. John 13:3-5 (NRSV)
13. From the song of the same title by Peter Scholtes
14. Wikiquote: Mahatma Gandhi
15. Proverbs 14:12 (NRSV)
16. 1 John 4:7-8, 12 (NRSV)
17. 1 Corinthians 13:1-3 (NRSV)
18. J.R.D. Kirk.  “The Stone Lives.”  Homebrewed Christianity's LectioCast, 05/08/2017.
19. Colossians 1:17
20. John 1:14
21. Wikiquote: Voltaire
22. Rob Bell.  Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived.  2011, HarperOne.  pp. 182-184
23. Matthew 7:15-20
24. John 14:18 (NRSV)
25. John 14:26
26. Matthew 7:13-14
27. IMDb: The Tree of Life (2011)

Jesus Washing Peter's Feet was painted by Ford Madox Brown in the 1850s.