A Finger Pointing to the Moon (Trinity Sunday)

The regard the church has for the Trinity can be seen in where it puts the lone day it dedicates to it every year.  It’s one of those “afterthought” days, slid in between a pretty major feast day—Pentecost—and the long, hard slog of Ordinary Time, which ends with another afterthought day—Christ the King Sunday—which we hurry through to get to Advent so we can try not to sing Christmas carols until December 25.

Biblical scholars, even New Testament ones, have little patience with the doctrine, at times seeming downright snooty about it.  Francis Watson says his colleagues have no great love for the doctrine of the Trinity and think It should be left to “church historians and systematic theologians,” having no place in their field.  Ouch!  Lions and tigers and systematic theologians, oh my!

Of course, one of the reasons they feel that way is that the Trinity isn’t in the Bible, not as such, anyway.  The word isn't there, and neither is the concept of which we sang this morning: God in three persons, Blessed Trinity.  It is pretty clear that to the synoptic Gospel writers—Matthew, Mark and Luke—as well as the Apostle Paul, Jesus was just who they said: the Son of God, not God’s own self.  Only in John do we get a slight movement toward some kind of identity of Jesus with God the Father, and then it's tentative at best.

Back in Seminary—I almost wrote “cemetery,” was that a Freudian slip, or what?—back in seminary I knew a guy I’ll call “Dan.”  I’ll call him that because (a) that was his name and (b) I can’t remember any more of it.  Anyway, Dan was a high muckety-muck in the Church of God of Morrow, Georgia, and like most Church-of-Godders, he didn’t believe in the Trinity, and for the usual reason: it's not in Holy Scripture.  And Dan would get incensed, simply incensed when some uppity theology professor or another would imply he wasn’t a Christian because of it.  And at the time, I would commiserate with him, because I have a strong anti-authoritarian streak and don’t like being told what to believe and half-way agreed with him at the time.  I thought the Trinity was a polite way of talking about God, Christ, and the Holy Spirit without sounding like those nasty polytheists.

Well, sorry Dan, wherever you are and whatever your last name is, I have turned around on that. Not on whether I think you're a Christian or not--that's not up to me (or those uppity theology professors, for that matter) to say.  But I have recently done a 180 on the value of the Trinity, and have come to believe that it's the most important concept—and perhaps symbol—in Christianity.  And my turn-around came about quite by accident, beginning perhaps  a year ago when I picked up a book by Father Richard Rohr, the founder and dean of the Living School of Contemplation and Action I’ll be starting in the Fall.  And though his book wasn’t about the Trinity per se, he did say some startling things about it.  More importantly, though, he pointed me to other peoples’ works that were concerned with it.  And lo, the reading of Richard Rohr begat the reading of Cynthia Bourgeault—another teacher at the Living School—which begat the plowing through of Raimon Panikkar, who bounced me back to Bourgeualt, the further reading of whom begat a study of the work of George Gurdjieff and Jacob Boehme, and you get the picture.

And to make a long story short, and because the sermon’s supposed to be about the Trinity, and not me, I have gained a new appreciation of the Trinitarian notion—notice I don’t say “doctrine”—and beginning today, and over the next couple of Sundays, I’ll try to give you a sense of what I’ve learned. Who knows, maybe I’ll follow it up with a Sunday school course or something.

This week, I’m going to say a little about where the doctrine (and this time I do mean doctrine, as in the orthodox doctrine) came from.  Next week, God willing and the creek don’t rise, we’ll talk further about the official doctrine, including some problems with it, and then the final week we’ll explore some of the truly revolutionary thinking being done on the topic by modern day theologians and, yes, biblical scholars.

And the thing to remember is that while the Trinity as such isn’t in the Bible, its components are.  Probably the most well-known instance, where they’ll all together, is in what we call the great commission: “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of Holy Spirit.”  In fact, the Bible can be viewed as a record of human interaction with the divine, in three persons: the Father/Creator, the Son/Redeemer and the Holy Spirit/Sustainer.  Note that though it is not my habit to speak of God on exclusively male terms (my preaching teacher Anna Carter Florence would wring my neck if I did), it is difficult to speak of the formal doctrine of the Trinity without calling God “father.”  You can speak of the Mother or Parent, and be just as correct, and I’m warning you now, sometimes I will.

Anyway.  You can say that the New Testament contains the framework for the Trinity, and early on the first theologians of the Church cottoned onto that fact.  There were theologians in the East, who did their theologizing in Greek—the New Testament’s original language—and theologians in the West, who worked in Latin.  And each “school” of theology had their own notions of what the Trinity is all about.  In the East, it began about the turn of the first century, with the bishop Clement of Rome, who wrote that Christ is God the creator’s agent for redemption, the Spirit is Christ's gift for reconciliation and insight, and that a peaceful church is the fruit of Christ's work.  Christ addresses us through the Spirit, who reveals that Christ is the pre-existent Word, and it was thus Christ speaking in the Spirit all along, even in Old Testament times.  This view didn’t develop in a vacuum, however: it was in response to a crisis in governance in the Important Corinthian church, just as had much of Paul’s theology fifty years before.

Another crisis ignited at the church at Philadelphia (not a church in Pennsylvania): they seemed to have a problem with the nascent church hierarchy of bishop, priest and deacon. This prompted another bishop-theologian, Ignatius of Antioch, to develop another Trinitarian formula: Bishops are icons of God the Father; priests are like Christ; deacons are the angels present in the churches. The threefold ministry is described as a living sign of the Trinity present in the mysteries of communion and baptism. Therefore, according to this theology, the Philadelphian church should obey the (earthly) hierarchy that is the icon of the heavenly harmony of God himself.

Are you beginning to see a pattern here?  One more example:  it’s  toward the end of the second century, and although Christianity has been around for over a century, it has just now become big enough to draw the attention of the religious intellectuals of the day: Jewish sages and religious philosophers. And the problem is, whereas these groups are steeped in dialectical discourse, in the arguments using the logic of philosophical thought, Christian theologians by and large are not.  Thus, in the words of historian and theologian John McGuckin, the Christians in the cities of the Empire, where inter-religious discourse is a daily event, were sitting ducks. As a reaction to this, a new group of theologians arose which tried to put their faith in terms the philosophical crowd could get behind.  Specifically, they tried to explain, using the methods of the Greco-Roman perennial philosophy, how they could claim to be continuing the Jewish monotheism while worshiping Christ as God.  Thus, Trinitarian theology became couched in the language and metaphysics of Neoplatonism, substantialism and all, and the road to Trinitarian orthodoxy was born.

I hope you can see where I’m going with this . . . Advancements, or perhaps better, changes in our understanding of the makeup of God were driven by circumstances. Problems in church governance, both internal and external, and a need to keep up with the intellectual big boys shaped the development of theology.  I dare say that it's always that way: as the faith spread, it had to move beyond its New Testament foundations to confront new situations and cultures. Feminist theology is a reaction to the patriarchal nature of orthodox Christianity.  Liberation theology is a reaction to oppressive Latin-American governments, and the Belhar Confession, recently ratified by our denomination, arose in response to Apartheid.

Ok . . . one more dead theologian, then no more, I promise.  But this guy was a biggie, and much of what followed until the Trinity was calcified in its present form, was clarification and reaction to his work.  His name was Origen, and he spent the first half of his life in Alexandria, the second half being chased around the Mediterranean by some bishop he’d angered or another.  Origen was a towering figure in early theology, having his hand in just about everything.  But his work on the Trinity was arguably the most influential.   For him, it was one of the key issues in all theology.  He called our faith “a triple woven rope from which the whole Church hangs and by which it is sustained.”  “There are three hypostases,” he writes, “three concrete beings: the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Only the Father is Unbegotten.”  Only the Father is pre-existent, unborn . . . Finally, while, the Father, the Son, and the Spirit are different realities of God, they “are one in terms of like- mindedness, and harmony, and identity of will.”

And there you have it: the basic outline of how the Trinity stands today, at least in terms of Orthodox doctrine.  Three hypostases, three concrete beings, one singleness of mind.  The only thing lacking was the final piece: the homoousian of the God-head, that the Father and Son and Holy Spirit were of one substance, but this was a biggie, and its development and debate, within Origen’s framework, occupied most of the next century, leading up to the Council of Nicea, from whence sprung the Nicene Creed, and the second ecumenical  Council at Constantinople, which confirmed the full divinity of the Holy Spirit.  From that point on, with minor harmonic differences in emphasis, the Trinity has remained static.

Until recently, that is, when there has been a major revival of theological work on it.  And why?  Because of the same old same old: things have changed, and the old doctrines and ways of doing business are not adequate any more.  Theology develops not in a vacuum, but in response to real things going on in the real world, and—finally—the Trinity is catching up.  We will have more to say about these exciting, meaningful developments in the third part of this sermon series.

But for now, you might be asking what difference any of this makes in our lives, as either members of the body of Christ or as members of the human race as a whole.  What possible consequence can the relationships within the God-head have on how we live?  Well, as you might have figured out, I believe a lot.  Because how we view the divine determines how we view one another. . . are we intimately connected to one another in reality, or are we isolated, alone, apart?  If God is three in one, if the very nature of God is relationship, how can we be otherwise?

Our notion of the divine affects our dealings with other cultures as well . . . Christians are increasingly bumping up against other cultures, other faiths that are older than our own by centuries.  Can the Trinity—three in one, relationship flowing like living water between its members—be a basis for understanding between Eastern faiths, like Hinduism for instance, built upon it’s own Trinity of Gods?

Finally, what does the Trinity have to say about our own nature as children of God through Jesus Christ?  After all, it was the words of Jesus that set all this off . . . I in you and you in me . . . What is done by me is done by the father . . . The father and I are one.  How do we, as individuals with the divine spark within, relate those parts of us, how do we access and use our own “inner Trinity” to enrich ourselves and the lives of those we love?

Sisters and brothers, I believe that these questions are vital to the survival of our faith in this new millennium.  I believe that a revitalized notion of the Trinity will be foundational to this enterprise; I hope you stick around for the next couple of weeks as I try to explore why.  I say these things in the name of God the one who creates us, God the one who redeems us, and God the one who sustains us, Amen.

Bone to Bone (Ezekiel 37:1 14)

Today we celebrate the coming of the Spirit of God . . . over in John, it comes as Christ breathes on them, it comes light as a lover’s caress, almost whispered in the dark stillness . . . in John it’s literally Christ’s breath, his animating spirit . . . the Spirit animates, it en-livens, it makes alive . . . According to Luke – who wrote Acts – it comes as dancing flame, blue-flickering wildfire that cannot be tamed . . . but my favorite New Testament text the Spirit is when Jesus is instructing Nicodemus – who’s come to him in the dark – and he says “the wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes.”  And of course it’s a play on words . . . the Greek for wind – pneuma – is the same as for Spirit . . . the Spirit blows where it chooses, when it chooses, even in the middle of an oh-so-solemn reading of the Scripture, you cannot tell where it’s going to go, where it’s going to blow . . . and we are at it’s mercy, whether we know it or not, and we cannot tell where it will take us . . .

 

The spirit of God – the hand of God on earth – comes upon me, and drops me into a church downtown . . . and I am shadowy, wraithlike, floating . . . and below me there’s a meeting – I love a good meeting – and I glide above bored faces, and hover unseen over the chancel, slowly twisting in the spirit-wind . . . I ruffle the moderator’s hair, and tickle the back of his neck, and in the incandescent hum, in the powerpoint-projected, florescent crackle, voices lift in song and words float toward the rafters . . . there is much politicking, but all have come together on this night, and a leader is elected and the people shout amen . . . and the bones rattle and hum in the air-conditioned pall.

I am wrenched up through the roof and slammed by the sun . . . arms and legs splayed, transfixed by the light  . . . then slip-slide through divine fingers and back down into a meeting room’s dim chill, into the midst of a floor-fight, mouths flapping with no sound, hands waving in agitated flutter . . . and I wonder: “What issue drives this debate?”  And as I get closer I begin to get it, I begin to hear snatches of conversation . . . “gay marriage”, “ordination standards”, “Belhar Confession” . . . and I am reminded of another assembly, another year . . . The issues are the same, or they seem that way, they are all blurring together in my mind . . .

 

Then I am moving once more, horizontal this time, and the posturing figures fade translucent and I slip through them like smoke, and the thought comes to me, as if there is some voice that fills me with whispery certainty . . . power and control . . .  power and control . . . power and control . . . and the bones bake in the sun, and crackle under foot, and they do not move. 

 

Faster and faster I go, out of the convention-center gleam, over the river and through the woods, past stick-ball-hoop-shooters and knotted gang-bangers, through flyspeck tenement walls . . . I’m hurtling inches above the ground now, up a row-house stoop and through dim-roach halls to where small children huddle, awaiting their mother’s return . . . the icebox is empty, it has been since last night, but the children wait patiently in the television flicker, there among the crackling, bleached out bones.

 

The hand of God drops me amongst the bones, I am surrounded by them, covered in bone-dust, and they clank and clatter and rustle, and God asks me: O Mortal . . . can these bones live? And the bones stir, and settle back, and their stink is acrid in the nostrils.  And I answer: Only you know, Lord . . .

 

And God says Prophesy to the bones . . .  and I do.  I talk of feeding the hungry.  And God says Prophesy to the bones . . .  and I talk about Justice and Love.  And God says Prophesy to the bones . . . and I talk about reconciliation.  And God says Prophesy to the bones . . .  and I sing Amazing Grace.

And the bones rustle and shake, and tumble and form, and slickly white sinews capture them, and draw them together.  Committees!  Mission boards!  Sessions!  Oily, shiny muscles weave and dance up the shins.  Skin crinkles over the hands and feet.  Presbyteries!  Seminaries!  Permanent judicial committees!  Hair sprouts thick on the head and lips curl invitingly, and I say, look how nice it is and look how smooth the skin, how sleek the sides, how tall the steeples, they reach to the sky.  They are mighty fortresses to our God! Bulwarks never failing! And look how we pack the people in, people just like us, and seat them and feed them and talk with them, and drink coffee with them, and we do fellowship real well and the body lays there, silent and beautiful.  And I say to God – Look at the beautiful body, the body of Christ, look at the skin and the sinews, how the muscles bulge, and how thick the hair is.  See – it’s a beautiful body!  We have conjured up coverings for the bones, and they are beautiful.  Choirs, progressive dinners and good, solid preaching! Youth ministry, Christian Ed, and summer camps.  A fine, gorgeous body!

 

And yet there is no quickening, no trembling in passion or fear.  It is quiet, and the Nations ignore it, and laugh at it, and they do nothing, and it is no-longer listened-to in the corridors of power, Even though we are good republicans and good democrats, and vote on election day.  The Nations ignore us, we have no effect, and the body doesn’t move.  It doesn’t shake, rattle or roll.

 

And God says prophesy to the breath.  And I reply “say what?” “Prophesy to the breath, O mortal.” “You don’t mean like those Pentecostals, do you God? Nothing they do is in keeping with good order.  They fall down to the floor, and are flung to the four winds, and faint dead away.  I think they are drunk on new wine.” And God says “call out to the breath, O mortal, and say to the breath: ‘come from the earth, the sky and from all directions.  Come upon the dead, and quicken them.’” And so I call on the spirit . . .  and it comes! And fires dance around the body, and over our heads, but for the longest time, nothing happens.

And then its chest heaves up in a small, shuddering, breath, and a finger quivers like in a Frankenstein movie! And I shout it’s alive, it’s alive, and it staggers to its feet, and the Spirit fills the body, and powers it, and all can understand.  And each hears in their own tongue – Africans, Asians, and Europeans; parliaments, kings and presidents; Baptists, Methodists, and even Presbyterians – all listen and do and are God’s mighty deeds of power.  And nothing can stop the spirit-filled Body, and nothing can stand before the mighty breath of God.

Sisters and brothers, theologies come and theologies go . . . study-papers are written, denominations split like overripe melons, squabbles break out like pox upon the land . . .but the Spirit is among us.  It is the breath of God, that blew across the waters at creation, that divided the sea against the Pharaoh, that danced in tongues of fire around the apostles’ heads.

The spirit is among us, it goes where it chooses, after all . . . and can you hear it?  It's out there, playing in the parking-lot, whispering through the neighborhood-trees.  It’s in here, swirling around the organ-bench, flitting around the pews, powering down the aisles.  Calvin says it binds us to Christ, and we are certainly bound and not only to Christ, but to each other, and to all of creation.  But it’s a funny kind of binding, isn’t it?  It’s a binding that is not . . . binding.  It’s playful and loose-fitting . . . It comforts and empowers and assures us that we’re not alone.  With it, we’re God’s agents on earth; without it we are nothing but bleached, crumbling, dried-out, bones.  Amen.

 

Times and Periods (Acts 1:1-11)

Whenever I think of Jesus ascending on a cloud, I picture a stately progression, like a really slow elevator, or maybe a ship sailing up into the sky, Jesus looking back at the disciples onshore, giving a little wave—maybe like the Queen—or just letting his gaze rest upon them one more time. It wasn’t at all like the ascension of Elijah, who was jolted off the ground by a whirlwind . . . it was majestic, regal, lordly, wholly befitting the newly-installed King of Heaven. No out-of-control, in-the-grip-of-forces-beyond-him craziness for Jesus. No sir! God transported God’s son – as gently as cut-glass crystal, or the most delicate Fabergé egg. And it took time – Jesus’ follower stood there, watching him go . . . they probably got cricks in their necks as he got higher and higher, and I wonder if it sunk in that he was really gone? Maybe not . . . if I were the disciples, I wouldn’t be sure of anything anymore. After all, he’d been crucified and killed, but he’d appeared to them anyway, against all hope, where they were gathered for supper. Maybe he wasn’t gone for good this time either, maybe somebody would run into him like they did that time on the Emmaus Road.

Luke told that story in his previous book, which we call the Gospel of Luke, and he also mentioned the ascension, and so here he’s recapping that Gospel to remind his reader – one Theophilus – of where he left off. His gospel was written to Theophilus too, and all we know about him is his name, and we can’t even be sure of that – it could have been written to those in general who love God, because that’s what it means: Theo (God), philus (lover) – God-lover.  And I like to think it was written to you and me – we love God, don’t we?

Anyway, he gives us a summary of what happened in the last book – he says he “wrote about all that Jesus did and taught from the beginning until the day when he was taken up to heaven.”  Now we know that Luke didn’t write about all that Jesus did and taught, but we can forgive him the hype . . . he was just following a convention of Greek rhetoric that calls for amplification to emphasize the importance of a topic. And Luke knew that Jesus’ actions and teachings were of paramount importance to his followers, and actually the whole world . . . But in addition to his teachings and actions, Jesus gave instructions through the Holy Spirit to his chosen apostles, and this foreshadows the actions of the apostles and later converts, who spread the gospel through the power of the Holy Spirit, which – according to Luke – will be given to them in just a few days.

And further, Luke says, he proved himself alive by “many convincing proofs,” and in Greek that’s a technical term for an argument that can’t be refuted, that leads inevitably to one conclusion, and that’s the resurrection. For Luke, the resurrection has been proven beyond doubt, or he wouldn’t have use that technical term.  But when he was ready to go, he told them not to leave town, but to wait there for the promise of God, which is the Holy Spirit. “For John,” he says, “baptized with water but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.”

In response, they ask him a question: “Is this the time when you will restore the Kingdom to Israel?” And it’s a natural question – Luke seemed to believe that the Spirit’s coming would signal the Kingdom’s, and it was also believed that the kingdom of Israel would be restored when that happens. And Jesus doesn’t deny Israel’s restoration, or the Kingdom’s coming . . . he just says it’s not for them to know when.  It’s not for them to understand when the end times are to be, just as, presumably, it’s not for us to know it either.

Basically, Jesus tells the apostles that it’s none of their business when it’s going to happen, all they need to know is when they get the Spirit, they’ll be his witnesses to the ends of the earth. Never mind that man behind the curtain, he does his job, you do yours. And note that he doesn’t say “if you choose to, you can be witnesses” or “if you feel like it,” or “when you’re not busy doing something else” – he says that the Holy Spirit will come . . . and you’ll be witnesses. Period. End-of-story. Now obviously, this goes against our precious American values – free will and free choice and all that . . . and maybe he is just making a prediction. Maybe he’s just telling them how it’s going to be, what’s going to happen to them. It surely foreshadows the witnessing of the first Christians; after all, that’s what Acts is all about. But I think it also closes off the possibilities . . . what if we have no choice, what if we are witnesses whether we like it or not? What if just receiving the Holy Spirit makes us witnesses? If whenever we’re driving in our car, yelling at the slow diver ahead of us, or telling one of those little white lies that seem to get out of hand, or whenever we snub somebody who asks us for help, what if whenever we do these things, we are witnessing to the Gospel? Makes me shudder to think about it . . . I had a pastor one time who wouldn’t put a Christian bumper sticker on his car because he didn’t want to embarrass Jesus, and that’s stopped me every time I thought about doing the same thing. What Would Jesus Do? Well, he wouldn’t cut some poor slob off coming out of Micky D’s, that’s for sure.

The Holy Spirit cuts both ways, I think . . . it gives us the power to proclaim the Gospel, to do marvelous things in God’s name, but it changes us at the same time . . . we’re no longer the same, we’re different whether we like it or not, whether anyone knows we’re Christian or not, we’re witnesses . . .

And as the disciples look upward, as they watch in awe as he dwindles to the size of a speck in their eyes, they just stare and stare, as if there's something about his dwindling figure that’ll tell them when he’s coming back.  They keep looking up, long after he’s disappeared into the morning glare, and that’s why they don’t notice the people standing with them until one of them clears his throat  “Ahem!” And they jump, they’re so startled—Peter even drops his bag—and behold! There’s a couple of guys in white robes standing next to them, and they all know what that means.  White robes, sudden appearances, miraculous events . . . they’re angels, that’s what they are, and the apostles –  and Luke’s reader Theophilus – can’t help but think back on the last time men in dazzling robes had appeared. It was at the tomb, to the women who’d come early on Easter morning, and that time they’d asked a question too . . . why do you seek the living among the dead?  Why are you looking for the living God in a graveyard?

Now, here they were again, Jesus was gone again, and they were asking questions, again – “Men of Galilee,” they say, “why do you stand looking up toward heaven?” And it’s the same kind of question they asked the women at the tomb – once again, they were looking for Jesus in the wrong place! We disciples seem to have a habit of doing that . . .

And then the angels continue: “This Jesus, who’s been taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go.” And the apostles are reassured that just like that other time when he came back from the grave, he will come again. But they get the rebuke, as well, especially remembering what Jesus had just said . . . Why are you looking up into heaven? It is not for you to know the times and seasons of God’s appointed hour . . . he will return, just like he left, right back here to good old Earth, so get on with it already, get on with the job of being witnesses for God.

And they did – they got on with it. The whole book of Acts tells us about it, about the carrying of the Gospel to the four corners of the earth.  We follow Peter as he preaches the good news, we see the Pharisee Saul become evangelist Paul, we see Ananias and Sapphira, and Phillip, and the early church’s struggles to live out Jesus teachings . . . and we see the dark side, too, as Stephen – full of the Holy Ghost – is stoned to death by an angry crowd, and we see the persecution grow, until in the end, as Paul reaches Rome, it’s bittersweet, because we know he’ll be killed there by the Emperor Nero . . . this witnessing business has it’s ups and downs, and it’s no wonder we’ve made an English verb for sacrificial death –  martyr – from martyros, the Greek word for witness.

And so the temptation is always there for us to keep our eyes on the prize, to keep them on heaven . . . early Christians looked forward to the next life because their earthly one was so miserable, and the thought of heaven as a reward sustained and comforted generations. When Christianity became the official Roman religion, and persecution stopped, focus on the hereafter was still encouraged, promoted, even, because it kept them under control, down on the farm, snugly at the bottom of the hierarchy . . . with their eyes on the next world, they didn’t worry so much about inequities in this one . . . it was no accident that the Church hierarchy was often from the upper class . . .

And so, over the centuries, Christian thought and preaching, at least at the lay level, became focused sharply on the question of salvation . . . are you or are you not saved?  And if you aren’t, how can you be? And if you think you are, then how do you know for sure? If you have to somehow accept Christ, how can you be certain you are sincere when you do it? Were you sincere when you did?  Better do it again, just to make sure . . . And on and on and on . . . until pretty soon, proclaiming the Good News becomes synonymous with saving souls, and the number of notches on your belt, the number of souls in your bag, became the sum total of your witness. I can see it now . . . St. Peter at the pearly gates, grading on the stair-step method.  He throws your bag o’ souls on the scale – weighing’s faster than counting, you know, souls average 10.3 ounces – and if it’s not heavy enough, back you go . . .

But Jesus defined the Good News by what he did here on earth, what he taught and what he preached and the signs he did. And although he spoke about the kingdom of heaven, it was, after all, going to be realized on earth, and he spent much more time telling us how to live and how to be with one another, how to cooperate with God in bringing that just time to fruition. He redefined community and taught us who are our neighbors and how to depend on God, and not on ourselves. All stuff about our earthly existence, never mind some heavenly one.

And so it’s no accident that here on the border between Jesus’ ministry and ours, after the triumph of Easter, and “Christ the Lord has Risen Today!” and we’re flush with victory and we’ve watched Jesus float upward on that cloud, on the Glory Train into heaven, we get a reality check in this passage. We get some wiseacre angels, standing on good old terra firma, asking some very pointed questions. Why are we gazing up into heaven? Don’t we know that this Jesus who has been taken away will come back here again? Don’t we realize that this Kingdom will be on Earth?   Amen
  

Friendly Questions (John 15:9-17)

      Time to put on the old Gospel reading glasses again.  Maybe you don’t remember them, so I’ll refresh your memory   They're multi-focal, kind of like these, but instead of varying strength of vision, they vary in their interpretive focus.  We need ‘em because the gospels were written almost 2,000 years ago, under very different circumstances from those in which we live.  In first-century Palestine, the world was viewed very differently from today.  Even though people breathed like we do, loved like we do and died like we do, the interpretation of these human invariants, as theologian Raimon Panikkar calls them, the way they'd were viewed, is very different from today.  And this isn’t just a temporal, historical phenomenon: human invariants like death and reasoning and breathing and sleeping are interpreted very differently in different cultures.  This is why people in South America, for instance, read the gospels very differently from how we do.   In fact, it’s a form of cultural imperialism that we assume that everybody thinks alike, for instance, when from culture to culture, it just isn’t so.

Anyway.  Today we're going to explore our little slice of John using three interpretive strengths, even though we know that the gospel reading glasses are continuously variable, like these, because there are a great many perspectives, east and west, north and south, 13^th century England and 17^th century China, from which they have been read over the millennia. But we’ll stick to just three, cause that can be confusing enough.

The first perspective, or context, is within the storyline within which Jesus spoke these words: the city of Jerusalem in about the year 30.  Jesus is speaking to his disciples in the upper room just days before he is to die on the cross.  And as you probably noticed, the passage is actually a continuation of the vine metaphor we explored last week.  Remember?  Jesus is the vine and we—individuals, congregations—are the branches, and we are thus connected to Jesus, and each other, and supported and nourished through Jesus . . . and through each other.  But in our passage, he introduces a new topic; up until now, the topic has been connection and through it, fruit.  We are to abide in Jesus—tap into that connection, use it—and in that manner  we will produce fruit, and that to the glory of God.

But now he talks of love (and could he be implying that that’s what travels through the stem and branches, that’s what nourishes us in our endeavor to produce fruit?).  He says “As God has loved me, so I love you; abide in my love.”  And the thing is, the Greek we translate as “as” (kathos) can mean “in the same way,” like “In the same way as God loved me . . .” or it can mean because, as in “because God has loved me, so I have loved you.”  Jesus can love us precisely because the divine first loved him. And we are to abide in that love, just as we are to abide in Jesus.  In fact, we can say, I think, that we can love because Christ has loved us, and that further, abiding in Jesus is identical to abiding in his love.

And right here, he says the first strange thing: “I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete,” and my first question is: how can he talk about joy at a time like this?  They’re in the upper room, he has just told them he was leaving, and in just a few short days he would be brutally nailed to a tree.  Where is the joy in that?  And further, what would the disciples think when he said that?  They might not have believed he was going to be killed, but they sure knew he was leaving . . . Thomas had even questioned him about it.  You say that we know where you’re going, but we don’t even know the way.  They were upset, missing him already . . . how could he speak of joy?

Fast forward some sixty or seventy years . . . A man we know as John sits down to write for his congregation; one day it will be called a gospel, but for now it's just a book, or a letter.  His congregation has grown increasingly anxious: persecution has increased of late, not primarily from the Romans, for whom Christianity is still illegal, but from their fellow Jews.  Only recently, wording had been added to the synagogue liturgy that discouraged them from participating in worship.  They had never imagined they might not be welcome in their own faith; as far as they are concerned, they are still good Jews, albeit Jews who declare Jesus Messiah.  Now, it is becoming increasingly clear that remaining a sect within Rabbinic Judaism will not be in the cards, and they are feeling increasingly isolated and ostracized.

To try to explain who Jesus was, and why he was deserving of their worship, John writes of Jesus’ ministry: changing the water into wine.  Offering a woman living water.  Raising a man from the dead.  All of these acts are read aloud in John’s congregations, either by John himself or a follower, and when they reach the description of the last supper, they lean forward on the crude benches and strain to see and hear the reader in the dim firelight, and when he speaks of keeping his commandments and abiding in his love, how do they experience it?  Do they feel a little less alone, do they feel comforted by that love, by that joy—Christ’s love, Christ’s joy—even in the face of the growing estrangement?  Do they begin to experience that joy, even when their religious family is rejecting them?

Nineteen hundred years later, we’re at the end of the Christian era, the end of Christian influence, Christian hegemony in Western society.  Starting in 313, when Constantine legalized the faith, Christianity became increasingly complex, increasingly rule-bound.  With the rise of the orthodoxy, what you believed—how orthodox it was, how much it adhered to accepted doctrine—became more important than that you believed.  The Reformation complicated things, making possible a whole passel of sects—we call them denominations—each with their own set of rules and regulations.  Wars were fought: Catholics against Protestants.  Protestants versus other Protestants.  And they’re still being fought, in the name of the Prince of Peace.

Every couple of years or so, Hanover Seminary does a survey of American churches.  In the one they did several years back, they asked one basic question: is your church growing, staying the same or in decline?  Then they asked a bunch of simple, yes or no questions about the style of worship, what they did during worship, and the like.  The results were interesting: in general, churches with contemporary worship were holding there own or growing. One question asked whether they used drums in the service; churches that answered “yes” were generally growing.  But do you know what the question with the best correlation with thriving churches was?  Do you experience joy in worship. Do you experience joy.  Churches that answered “yes” to this one question were almost all doing well.  Congregations that experienced Christ’s joy in them, whose joy was complete, were thriving, they’d managed to overcome the oppressive, rule-clogged, do-this-but-whatever-you-do-don’t-do-that culture of modern Christian practice.  And I have to ask: do you feel joy when you come to worship?

Well.  Let’s press on.  After wishing the disciples his joy, Jesus repeats the commandment he’d given them earlier in the evening: “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.”  Once again, he tightens the association with the abundant Christian life with love, specifically loving one another within the Christian community.  Love is the glue that holds the whole enterprise together, and if they love one another, they will abide in that love, and their joy will be complete.  And to elaborate his point, he uses himself and his upcoming crucifixion as an example:  “No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.”

Notice that he introduces another word here: friend.  And what stuns the disciples there in the semi-dark, is that Jesus develops this notion and names them his friend!  “I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from God.” And in the culture of the day, a friend is an exalted status, it’s not a word that’s bandied about.  In Greek, it is philos, and carries the weight of equality, not hierarchy; it is much more than an acquaintance, it connotes a beloved, honored status.  And the disciples in the upper room that evening gape in wonder: they had followed Jesus as servant to master, it is the rule in these matters, and to be called friend . . . Jesus is redefining their relationship, doing away with the old model of master and servant, sage to acolyte . . . he calls them friend . . .

A status that John’s congregation remembered with joy and gratitude sixty years later.  As the separation from their earthly friends, grew wider and wider, as their status as second-class citizens increased along with the specter of rising persecution, they were comforted and encouraged . . . they may be increasingly outcasts, outsiders in their own land, within their own religion, but to Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, they were friends.

And now today, the word has lost much if its weight . . . It is used casually in the media, by newscasters and entertainers, who do not know their listeners from Adam’s off ox.  We use it casually, we sing “what a friend we have in Jesus” without understanding the power of the lyrics, the absolutely special relationship that it implies.  For our teacher and sage, our savior and advocate, our joy and comfort, has called us friend.  And it is the final sign of the incarnation, the immanence of our Christ, that he has become not a Lord, not a master, not a holy dictator, but an equal, a beloved, a friend.

Brothers and sisters, friends, ours can be a dour faith, it can be one of rules, one of strictures and structures and hierarchy. Preachers like me emphasize the service we do in Jesus’ name, that we are the hands and feet of Christ on Earth, that we are to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and heal the sick.  And it’s true: these are our tasks.  But in doing so, we often forget the other side of the coin, we forget that we are not just called to work, that we’re not just called to serve, but we are called so that Christ’s joy in us will be complete.  We have been called intimate, we have been called companion, we have been called friend.  And what a friend we have in Jesus.  Amen.

 

Vineyard Rules (John 15:1 - 8)

      In Germany, wine doesn’t come easy . . . even the most southern regions of the country are marginal for wine-making . . . winters are cold and long, and the growing season short and chancy . . . and yet Germany is considered – with France and Italy – as one of the top producers of wine in the world . . . fine German wines are highly prized . . . in particular their reislings and gewertzraminers are unequaled in quality . . . if you go to the Mosel-river region, you’ll see reisling vineyards on the steepest terrain, clinging to precipitous south-facing slopes, right down to the water-line of the river . . . those river-side vineyards are prized because the leaves collect extra sunlight reflected off the water, and in that area, every little bit of solar energy helps.

      As in any vineyard, pruning is vital to train the vines, so that as much of the total leaf area is exposed to sunlight for as much of the day as possible . . . in some vineyards – flat ones, for example – that means training the vines to grow almost like creepers.   , carpeting the ground . . . in others it means a vertical growth pattern, or one that inclines into the sun like a hound leaning gratefully toward a fire.  Soil is just as important as sunlight . . . grape-vines go all flabby and leafy if they’re given too much water, and so the best sites are well-drained, in soils that retain just enough water, but not so much that root-rot settles in . . .

      And I could go on and on, but you’d fall asleep, and you get the point anyway: the metaphor that Jesus uses for Christian existence, Christian life – vitae is Latin for life – is a particularly rich one . . . he identifies himself as the stem, the vine, and God – whom he calls “Father” – is the vine-grower, the viti- the life-culturist.  “I am the true vine,” he says, “and God is the life-grower.”  Christ himself is the stem, the conduit for water and nutrients . . . without the stem, the branches and the leaves can’t grow, they can’t set grapes, they can’t ripen the fruit.  And that’s not all . . . the stem provides the structural integrity for the whole shootin’ match . . . it provides the vital support that makes it possible for God the life-grower to shape and mold the life of the Christian enterprise.

      And now Christ talks about the branches, and we’re used to reading this simply, cleanly, with a clear distinction between the vine – that’s Christ – and the branches – that’s us.  But notice how he talks about the branches . . . he says they are in him, as in a part of him . . . it reminds me a little of Paul’s analogy of Christ as the head of the body, the church, and we as organs within that body . . . there’s an intimacy to the relationship, here, and so when God the viticulturist removes – literally, takes away – the branches that bear no fruit, God is taking away something that is intimately associated with Christ, part of Christ’s own self.

      “You have already been cleansed” Jesus says, “by the word, by the logos, that I have spoken to you  . . .” and though our translation chooses “cleansed,” the Greek is from the same root as pruned, and it’s clear that he is tying the two together . . . it could easily read “Every branch that bears fruit, God cleanses to make more fruit.  You have already been cleansed by the word I have spoken to you.”  This cleansing, this pruning – and could it be what Paul refers to as sanctification? – this sanctifying, this molding is an ongoing process that begins when we hear the word spoken to us, i.e., at conversion.  God the viticulturist is molding us, cleansing us, pruning us so that we bear more and more fruit.

      “Abide in me,” Jesus says, “As I abide in you.”  Stay connected to the life source, you branches, because you cannot bear fruit by yourself, you cannot bear fruit unless you abide in Christ, unless you are joined to Christ himself, the conduit of water and minerals and nutrients.  And it’s good to note that Jesus is talking to disciples here, in the intimate confines of the upper room . . . he’s speaking to folks who are already in the fold, so he’s not talking about conversion here, he’s not saying “abide in me and you’ll be Christians,” he’s talking about the abundant life, bearing fruit . . .

      And what is the fruit of this abundant Christian life?  Though it’s common to read it as evangelical, as in converting the unconverted, it’s certainly more than that . . . fruit of the abundant Christian life is peace, joy and love . . . Paul wrote of these things, saying that “the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.”  Bearing fruit is not limited to making new Christians, but refers as well to living a full, joyful life.

      And we cannot do so without being connected to the source, intimately . . . Jesus’ metaphor of the vine and branches is only just adequate to describe the relationship with him . . . but it hints at it’s fullness in the language of abiding in, as in dwelling within, engulfed by him, surrounded by him, Christ in US. And we in Christ.

      “Those who abide in me and I in them,” Christ says, “bear much fruit.”  Those who are intimately associated with the stem, who are connected to the root and the soil via the umbilical-cord vine, will be abundant in their life, they’ll spread the Gospel faithfully, they’ll lead lives full of love and peace and joy . . . “but whoever does not abide in me is thrown away like a branch and withers; such branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned.”  And I think “Whoa, Nellie!”  Where did that come from?  Here we’ve got this nice little metaphor going, Christ is the vine . . . right, right, I’m down with it . . . we’re the branches . . . that’s cool . . . Christ nourishes us, and feeds us, and keeps us well-hydrated . . . and then Whammo!  Judgment city!  Withering branches!  Burning!  Fire!  And we all know what fire means!

      So … let’s see if we’ve got this straight.  Jesus is the true vine, God is the vineyard owner, and Christians – that’s us! – are the branches.  And if we abide in him, if we have an intimate, personal relationship with Jesus, we’ll bear fruit in the form of converts and a joyful, Christian life.  But if, on the other hand, we don’t do those things, God’ll cut us down, throw us into the fire – otherwise known as Hell or Hades or Cleveland – where we’ll burn for eternity – crackle, crackle, crackle – and the worms will have us for lunch, munch, munch, munch!

      And what we have all of a sudden is every fundamentalist’s dream, every tale told in dark Sunday-school rooms to scare the dickens out of us, to frighten us into submission, to keep us on the straight-and-narrow.  It’s a story about a vengeful God who creates us imperfect and then punishes us for being that way, a God who is love and yet who consigns his beloved creation to hell when they don’t say the right words.  If we Christians don’t connect to Jesus, if we don’t bear fruit, if we don’t make a hundred more little overripe Christian grapes just a-waitin’ to be plucked, God’ll cut us off and consign us to the fires of Hell for all ages to come.  So much for unconditional grace!

      And this reading of the vine and branches seems so inevitable, so logical, and we’re so used to hearing it this way, or some well-meaning preacher preaching around it like the invisible elephant in the refrigerator – you know, the one you can tell is there by the sulfur on its breath – that we never once stop and think that it might not be about God’s wrath at all, that there’s another way to read this passage that is completely consonant with a God of unconditional love, and it begins with the fire . . . we’re so used to equating fire with the wrath of God, with Dante’s whatever-level of Hell, that we can’t see that it’s just a part of the vineyard metaphor.  To paraphrase Freud, sometimes a fire is just a fire.

      And in fact, fire is a normal part of agricultural practice the world over, where refuse is gathered up, thrown on the fire, and burned.  What Jesus is describing here is a natural way of growing grapes . . . every horticulturalist knows that branches no longer connected to the soil through the stem, through the vine, wither and fall off.  The dead branches are gathered up so that they don’t grow pests or parasites that might hurt the living plants, and they’re burned.  The fire doesn’t “punish” those branches put there because they’re already dead!

      It’s important to remember that Jesus is talking to his disciples here, and what he says is absolutely true:  Any Christian entity—whether an individual or an organization—without an intimate, abide-in relationship with the Christ the vine, will wither, its Christian life will be stunted and shriveled, it will not be all it is supposed to be . . .  and as for death, how can we view it as a punishment, we who preach, we who believe in the resurrection?  Eventually, we all die a physical death, all churches have a life-span as well, all wither and are removed from the vine . . . death or dissolution is only an issue if we are afraid of it  . . . and in my best moments, at least, I’m not . . . I will die, you will die, we all will die, and we will all be raised from the dead . . . there is no judgment in this passage, simply a metaphor carried through to its logical ends.

      And speaking of logical ends, the French, those avatars of wine snobbery, have a concept they call terroir . . . and it’s sometimes hard to get your mind around it – and even harder to taste in the wine – but it refers to all the physical and environmental factors – soil, subsoil, temperature, solar energy, water, slope degree, slope aspect – that affect the growing of a grape plant.  It’s akin to the concept of ecosystem, the sum-total of everything in the environment that affects the growth and maturation of that grape plant.

      And when I think of terroir, another piece of the vineyard metaphor comes into focus . . . theologian Paul Tillich called God the ground of all being, and it seems to me that that’s similar to terroir . . . God is our terroir, God is our microclimate, our soil and water and nutrition and sunlight and warmth . . . And it is through Christ that we are connected to this source of all our being, this bountiful supply of all we need to survive, both spiritually and physically.  Christ is the vine, and we are the branches, and God is the ground upon which we grow.

      Wine experts claim to be able to taste terroir.  In two wines of the same year made by the same people exactly the same way, but from vineyards a block away, wine experts can taste the difference, and they attribute it to terroir, to differences in the site upon which they are grown.  And I wonder:  can the world taste the terroir of God in us?  Can they tell that we are nurtured by a different microclimate, in a different soil, under a different sun?  Are we all abiding in Christ, and does Christ abide in all of us, is the connection between him and us strong and deep and wide?  If not, perhaps we should do something about it, perhaps we should examine our spiritual practices – prayer and scripture study and acts of charity and social justice – because these are the building blocks of a strong attachment to Christ’s vine, and through him, to God’s abundance.  And if we do, if we abide in Christ, dwell within him, and he in us, we will bear fruit untold.  Amen.