Be the light

 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning. 3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it- John 1:1-5 NIV. 

  Last night as I left work to go to a Christmas Eve service, the night just seemed a little darker and it was almost soul crushing.  Maybe because it was a lack of sun the last several days or being exhausted from work being so busy the last few days or any other number of reasons. This week seemed a little darker from a highschool acquaintance dying because of health issues or parents losing their elementary age daughter to cancer three days before Christmas. So what is our response in a season that is usually filled with joy and happiness comes at us hard and in ways that are dark, dirty and soul crushing.

  Here are some random thoughts to when we are in a soul crushing season. The first thought is that it a season, and don’t let it become a lifestyle. It’s realizing and even embracing the suck, but at some point we need to heal and grow from the situation. We won’t be the same but hopefully we will come out more mature and we won’t let the suck run our lives and live rent free in our head. 

  My second thought is Jesus is eternal and a part of the Trinity. I feel that the first three verses harken back to the Creation Story. There are plenty of theological implications but the ones I want to focus on on is this, creation and creativity are apart of Gods nature. The other aspect is that because the Trinity is relational and The Trinity created all things so the could share the relationship they have with each other with their creation. Not only that but we are to share that community with each other. So when we are going through the suck or through that soul piercing darkness, we are not to to it alone but we are to find that group of people who love God to walk along with you. 

  My third thought is that when we are in said darknesss, it’s time for some self examination. Is God trying to get our attention or are there things that we are doing that we shouldn’t be and are there things that we aren’t doing that we should be? Even though God may be distant, continue to seek His face.  even if we pull a Job and demand and get our day in court with God, we still need to be willing to listen and obey. 

  My final thought is this, further up in the Gospel in John, Jesus makes the claim that He is the light of the world. The good thing about Jesus being the light is that not only darkness can not over come it, but Jesus light exposes all truth and intention. God also calls us to be a light in a dark world filled with hurt, disappointment and sin. God called us to be a lighted candle. By ourselves we don’t light up much of a dark room, but when joined together with other candles the space lights up and the darkness disappears

Taking up my cross

 The Apostle Paul tells the Curch in Corinth that the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved, it is the power of God. There are two big thoughts that caught my attention. The first one is that salvation is a continuous process. There is a point that salvation is instantaneous, where we are covered by the blood of Christ and we enter into the family of God. Where salvation becomes continuous or a process is when we grow in grace. At our initial salvation experience, we get all of God, the continuous part is where God gets all of us. Call it maturing, becoming a living sacrifice, sanctification, or any other term, it is where we grow up and give our lives completely over to God. It is making God the Lord of every part of our life. 

  The second part is that the American church has glamorized the cross. We have turned into beautiful jewelry and artwork. The Romans had it as a brutal killing machine. The cross is a brutal way to go benevause not only do you suffocate to death, but you also drown in your own fluids. What makes it so brutal is that death is not instantaneous, but it takes several hours to accomplish.  The Romans were such good killing machines in the first century that they had crosses lined up and down the roads with people suffocating to death on them. So when Jesus tells His Disciples to pick up their cross and follow Him. I’m sure they felt like they were punched in the gut because they had a visual reminder on a consistent basis of what it means to pick up their cross, because it led to a brutal death.

  Jesus did pick up His cross and it led to being beaten, mocked and death. This is where the power of God comes in, because of Jesus obedience, God raised Him from the death three days later. If we are to be obedient to God and follow Him with our cross, we will be humiliated, beaten and maybe even die for our faith. But God is there for us and will sustain us along with walking along side of us and ahead of us. One day we will be with Him face to face for eternity.

  So what does it mean to pick up or cross to follow God. The basic answer is being a growing Christian and being in relationship with Him. There is also the things that God has called specifically to do. It’s often hard, our actions and motives will be questioned and there is a chance thy we will be alienated by those we hold dear to our hearts. This process will help us to see what is important and it is allowing God to sanctify us. The other part is that picking up our cross requires total abandonment. It is something we can not half ass. God does dot require apart of us but all of us every day.The cool part is that we get to rely on God more and that He will be made known to all the world. Here are my two questions:

  Have we beautified to where it has lost all its power and authority?

  What cross is God calling for us to pick up and to follow Him?

Be the Light

  

 In John 1, the Apostle John talks about how Jesus was with God the Father and how He became man to dwell among His creation. Verses 4-5 caught my eye because it goes;

In Him was life and the light was the light of all people. The light shines into the darkness and the darkness did not overcome it. John 1:4-5 NRSV 

   Throughout the Bible and especially in John’s writings, there is this connection between truth and light.  If we are to be in the light or Gods presence, we need to not only know the truth but put it into practice. This passage makes several things clear. The first one is we can’t have truth withou being in the light. In essence, we can not have one with out the other. The second one is that Truth is not subjective. Ultimate truth is the same a century ago, today and forever in the future. This means that Truth is the same in every culture and not based on current fads, feelings or the weather, because those can change on a dime and God and His truth doesn’t. This is what makes Gods truth absolute. For those who have a hard time with absolute truth, how do you deal with gravity. We are going to have gravity no matter if we are in Australia or Northern Minnesota. No matter how well we transfers gravity, airplanes still have to come back to earth. As much as we can go on about truth, absolutes and God being the ultimate light, how do we put it into practice

  In Matthew 5, Jesus tells us that we are the light of the world, and it means several things. The first one is that if we are to be in the light, we can not continuously live in sin or disobedience to God and His commands. When we continuously live in sin, without seeking repentance or to change, it means that we are living in the dark and do not know God or His grace. This means we care about our own motives and desires more than Gods. It means that it is am about me . 

Secondly, since God is calling us to be the light of the world, it means that we are His representatives to a world that is hurting, lost and even in chaos. How many of us gone walking at night without a flashlight? When we do this, we can not see where we are going and we are liable to get lost, trip, fall and get hurt. When we are in the dark we have a hard time seeing the path and our judgement is distorted. When we are light of the world we are lighting others people’s path and showing them true reality and not something that is distorted.

In essence, when we are being the lighthouse and God is the lamp, we re providing a warning during a storm or rough seas and we often point people to safety which is Gods love and grace. So here is a question, what is the pint of a lighthouse when the sun is out and the waters are calm? God calls us to be a lighthouse or the light of the world because the world is a dark place filled with chaos due to sin and stupidity. Being the light brings peace, understanding and discernment, all we need to do is trust God and walk in light and goodness while sharing it with others

Who is my Neighbor

 25 On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. “Teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

26 “What is written in the Law?” he replied. “How do you read it?”

27 He answered, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’[a]; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’[b]”

28 “You have answered correctly,” Jesus replied. “Do this and you will live.”

29 But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”

30 In reply Jesus said: “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he was attacked by robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. 31 A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. 32 So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33 But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him. 34 He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, brought him to an inn and took care of him. 35 The next day he took out two denarii[c] and gave them to the innkeeper. ‘Look after him,’ he said, ‘and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.’

36 “Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?”

37 The expert in the law replied, “The one who had mercy on him.”

Jesus told him, “Go and do likewise.”

Luke 10:25-37 NIV

  Within every book, movie or television show, there is what I call the “oh poop moment.” In essence it is the climax of the story.  This is where everything has either fallen apart, or where the characters ask the probing questions.  The only way the story can move forward and end is for the characters to take action toresolve the situation and for the questions to be answered even if we don’t like the end result or the answer to our questions. Even this passage has the oh poop moment and it is in the form of a question.  We will get to that moment, but we need to lay some groundwork.  

  Within the four Gospels, people often come up to Jesus to ask Him question.  A majority of those questions is either where Jeus doesn’t answer those question or he answers those questions in the form of another question.  He is challenging the people He interacts with to use the brains they have.  He is also challenging their presuppositions by using the phrase “you have heard,” or “it has been said.” While the High Priest are trying to trap Him into a corner, Jesus was smart enough to realize this, so He is challenging their thoughts and cultural norms.  

 

  These questions that people are asking are really disguised as the crowds asking not what I need to be in right relationship, but what must I do to be moral?  When we re more concerned with being moral instead of being in right relationship, we are more about following rules and what we need to do.  When we are more concerned about following rules, its more about what I need to do.  It is self focused and we tend to make up more rules as we go along to make ourselves look more holy than what we are.  Rule following is more about looking the part instead of being the part.  The two questions that get asked in our passage today go hand in hand.  In all reality these two questions are like PB&J, we really can’t have one without the other.  How we see and treat others is an open window to the world to let them see how our relationship; with God is going. 

  How dos our view of eternity will shape how we view and do life.  If we think that there is a heaven or afterlife, we live our life accordingly.  If we view that there is nothing after this life, we will live our life accordingly.  So my question, does our actions match up with what we say and believe?  If not, what needs to change? 

  I think that God ask questions so that we can think on a deeper level and to challenge our way of thinking.  Sometimes God ask questions because we often don’t know what we know, and the questions allow those answers to come to the top.  It also allows room for the Holy Spirit to move and for us to recognize His movement and leading in our lives. Lets dive into the first question of “what must I do to receive eternal life?” I love Jesusresponse because He ask not only what the Law says, but how does that person interpret the Law? If you were a good practicing Jew, you followed the Law to the T and don’t even think about deviating from it.  In the time of Jesus the Law was not only the Ten Commandments and other things found in the first five books of the Old Testament, but the Jews added over six hundred rules to live by.  They thought that following the rules would make them right with God and keep Him happy.   They added all the rules, because they thought they thought by following them, it would keep them out of trouble and God wouldn’t have to punish them by sending them off into captivity.  Jesus knew that the person who asked this question knew the Law and what it has said, so this is why Jesus asked the person why his interpretation o the law was.  I think Jesus was getting at two main points, and the first one is what good is knowing the Law or in our case the Bible, if we don’t put it into practice.  The second one is, that the crux of the Law is to love God with everything we have and to love our neighbor as ourselves.  When the person in our story ask the question in our story ask who is our neighbor, it was really trying to justify how they were living.  How often do we ask questions not so much to learn but to justify our thoughts and or actions.  Often we ask questions not to learn or to grow, but to try and cleanse our conscience and to justify our actions.  In essence we don’t want to change and we are hoping that Jesus rubber stamps our lifestyle. 

  Another question that I have is that what does it mean to love God with everything we have and to love our neighbor as ourselves? Could it mean that we worship God with everything we have and to love and treat our neighbors the way we want to be loved and treated?  Another aspect of loving our neighbor is that we see ourselves and others as God sees us and living and leaning into that.  

  Now lets take a look at the story of the Good Samaritan. In essence this is the climax of the story by the question of “who is my neighbor?  Only one person out of the three people in the story made the right call.   Even though the Levite and the Priest had decent intentions, but they were to busy following the letter of the law instead of the spirit of the law.  They didn’t want to defile themselves and make them void of worship and entering the Temple because they were defialed according to the Law.  

    Following the Law was essential to being Jewish.  Not only did they follow the Ten Commandments, but they also had over six hundred rules of what they could and could not do or eat, and how they worshipped.  The Jews were more concerned about following rule than on relationship.  It is the mindset of just tell me what to do and not to do and we will be good.  This makes ones relationship with God boring, cold and one sided.  

    This is what makes the first question important.  The question is “what must I do to receive eternal life?”  The lawyer is asking for some magical potion to receive eternal life.  I love Jesusresponse and to paraphrase it, “you already know answer to this question so why are you asking me.” How often do we ask questions that all ready know the answer to. I think that this question is more about doing and not being.  How often do we view our relationship with God as a check list. It is about doing or saying certain things and avoiding saying or doing certain things.  Jesus response to the lawyer is that he already the things he needed to do.  Jesus also implying that there are more to receiving eternal life than just what we do or not do.   Jesus makes the statement that our relationship is more about being than doing.  The who we are means that we are more concerned about loving God with everything we have and loving our neighbor as ourselves.  This means that we are more concerned with growing our relationship with God  and others instead of doing the bare minimum 

  There is a reason that the third person in Jesus parable is a Samaritan.  The Samaritans were considered a bunch of half breeds and were not well liked by the Jewish people. The Samaritans worship in one place and the Jews worship in another.   When the Jewish people were traveling, they would purposely avoid the Samaria region, even it added days to their trip.  Just think of the person you dislike or even hate  the most in you life.  Not only do you avoid them at all cost, but you down grade and bash them every time possible.  The Samaritan not only stopped by to check on the injured traveler, but he bandaged him up and brought him to a place where he could heal.  The most amazing thing is that the Samaritan not only paid for the persons treatment to get better, but he didn’t expect anything in return.  How different would our life be if we did things because God told us to and the only reward we get is God whispering in our ear good job. Here is my question that I think Jesus was getting at is how do we treat and interact with the people we interact with on a daily basis.  

  If we are really concerned with loving God with everything we had and loving our neighbor as ourselves, we have to change how we define who are neighbor is.  Our neighbor is more than just the people we live next to or even the people we are in relationship with.  Jesus makes the implication that how we treat everyone we run into and interact with on a daily basis is our neighbor.  

 There is this concept that we may not always be able to pick our family, or friends but we do a really good job at picking our enemies.  We may or may not have a good reason to disagree with someone, but when it turns into hate, that is when we have a problem.  How many of us have an issue with either a person or a group of people and the issue is either exaggerated or we completely forgot the real reason we have an issue with the person.  When we have disagreements and or hatred fester, the person no longer is our neighbor but becomes our enemy.  When this happens, we care less about showing Gods grace and growing in grace and holiness, but we care more about being right and even vindicated.  When we are on the war path towards vindication, we care more about looking holy than being holy.  

  Lets put a wrap on the climax of the story and give it some sort of ending.  You might be thinking to yourself that you don’t know your neighbor for several reasons.  It could be either that you don’t work anymore and you don’t get out much.  So therefore your interactions with people is limited.  Or how about all the people you have known have either moved away or have died and passed on.  The third option is that you are a hermit and you just don’t like to be around people or because you feel unwanted like that Samaritan.  I think in order to be a good neighbor, we need to do two things.  The first thing is that we need to see people how Jesus sees people.  No matter what they have done, they are loved beyond comprehension and that God doesn’t want them to continue to struggle through life.  The other thing is that other people are just like us, who is in desperate need of grace.  

  How many of us have been stranded on the side of the road with a vehicle broken down and no cell phone service and someone stop by to give us aide.  Or how about we get to the checkout at the store and we don’t have enough money and someone comes along and helps us by paying our bill.  I will be honest, being a good neighbor, it is going to cost us something, and its probably going to cost us something great.  It could be as simple as building a relationship with that person everyone else loathes.  I have a coworker when you mention their name, everyone does an eye roll and sighs.  I think we all wish this person had better social skills and that they  could read the room better/  What would it be like if someone build a genuine relationship with this person/ This is often will make us uncomfortable, and it is often that those situations or people who make us uncomfortable or drives us crazy is who God is calling us to be their neighbor.  This is where loving God with everything we have and loving our neighbors as ourselves. When we love others as ourselves, it is a window that everyone can look into on how our relationship with God is going.   This sermon can be broken down into Micah 6:8 of doing justice, loving mercy and walking humbly with our God.  In essence loving God with everything we have means that having justice, mercy and humility means that we are wrapped up into being obedient to God and His plan for our lives and showing that grace to others.

  Last year I was coming back from my sisters house and I gotten a flat tire.  So I pulled over and I was struggling to get the tire off, and some random guy stopped by and helped me change my tire.  He could of drove by and continued on his way, but he chose to be neighborly.  I have no idea of what this guysrelationship with God is like, but when we love our neighbor like help change a tire, it is a way to show Gods love to others but it is another way we can worship God. 

  I remember when I was in college, I was working out collecting trash from the outside trash cans.  I saw an acquaintance sitting next to the water fountain and I could tell she was having a rough day.  I sat down and asked her how she was doing and she gave me a pat answer and my response was asking her what the tears were for.  The tears starting flowing and she talked about how she was stressed with wedding planning and the end of the semester coming up.  I gave here some encouragement an we went along our ways.  A few days later I was in the student center with a few friends and we were minding our own business and she came up running and gave me a giant hug.  She said thank you for being a listening year and that it made here day better.  When we are sensitive to Gods Spirit, we see more of these moments and are able to be the hands and feet of Jesus. The whole crux of this message is this, “go and do likewise”.  So how do w move from knowing facts about God to living out His truth and from appearing to be holy and righteous to actually being holy and righteous?  Just remember when we do this, it will cost us something great and are we comfortable with paying that price?E

Shock and Awe

 I think we have lost the space in our lives for shock and awe. What I mean by this is that we have become so hardened that we are only shocked by things that are truly evil and that is even a sometimes. How often do we go to our favorite news source and just keep scrolling past the news from the destruction that was left behind from hurricanes, to mass shootings, to serious pandemics and we just chalk it up to another day of either being alive or the news only reporting the bad stuff. The worst part is how often do we blame other role or politicians for the mess we are in while becoming more cynical. I don’t think we should stick our heads in the sand with these issues and we need to take responsibility for our part, but I do think that we need to be in awe of beauty and greatness from time to time.

  The musician Prince as a line in his song Let’s go Crazy that goes “dearly beloved we are gathered to get through this thing called life.” Gathering together in person is so important. Through this we van realize that people are more than just things to argue with and call names. It’s bout sharing the good stuff of life along with the struggles. Also how much better does the food and drink taste when done with people.

  Another thing that we can do is remember Gods goodness and greatness.  How often do we get rolling so hard that we often think that it’s about me or a particular event. When I’ve done this I have had a boss tell me to slow down and breath. In essence it’s hitting that reset button and realizing that it’s not about me and it is putting God back on His throne and readjusting our plan, purpose and action. 

  

  The last step can be found in Psalm 46:10 of being still and knowing that God is God. How often do we just stop tp be in each other’s or Gods presence with no agenda. Not only do we need to develop a comfort with silence, but also discernment to what the Holy Sirit is doing and leading. This is where we get our awe and sense of amazement back and we don’t become so bitter. As I’m writing this at a local coffee shop there were two guys working on something and one of the guys took off his ball cap so they could pray. Not only this practicing being in awe and valuing relationship, but it’s being sensitive to the Spirit and acting on it.

  One last thing let’s be like the people in the picture and stopping what they are doing and being present. Being present in the moment and not worrying about the future is the quickest way to regain our shock and awe. After all tomorrow has its own issues to deal with