Sermons at St. John's Presbyterian Church

The Spirit of God in the Human Face

Transcribed from the sermon preached February 18, 2007

The Reverend Max Lynn, Pastor

Scripture Readings: Ex 34:29-35 2 Cor 3:12-4:2 Luke: 28-36

Free from the burden of sin and the law by the Grace of God through Jesus, we experience hope for the future and joy in the present.  The result of this freedom, this hope and joy, is a face that shines. There is nothing that separates us from God.  By the Spirit of Christ, we are filled with God.  There is nothing institutional about this. When this transfiguration happens, it doesn't mean we must throw up a building or even a cross.  The priest, the minister is not necessarily closer to God than anyone else.  In fact, we should expect to experience the Spirit personally, to be lifted up with the joy of knowing God. 

This is not to say that if you don’t feel shiny, that God is not with you.  There tends to be two opposing caricatures of Christians in popular media.  There are the Christians who are pious, sacrificing of worldly pleasures and boring, or Christians who are so shiny and happy that it makes you want to gag.  Most Christians I associate with have had a gradual progression of faith, with one or several moments when they felt like God was especially present to them.  It is a maturing in faith. As Paul says, the spirit makes us more and more like our glorious Lord. But certainly the “born again” experience, the radical aha, life transforming switch is an important part of the Churches message.  It can be especially important for addicts and people who have gone through extremely difficult experiences in their lives to know that the grace of God can change the course of our life and give us freedom and joy right now.  Jim Angel, my minister when I was a child wrote, “There is no Easter without faith, no love without risk, no God to believe in without some grand daring leap of the soul.”  When we finally make the leap, and find ourselves flying instead of falling to our death, the feeling can be ecstatic.  But a common mistake is to think that the ecstasy of the initial change will stay the same forever.  It is a bit like thinking that in a good marriage the feeling of love we have during the honeymoon can never be doubted and must stay the same forever.  New Christians may not understand that while God frees us from the past with forgiveness, past personal patterns are not totally erased, and the world does not stop throwing us difficulties.  In faith as in marriage, there are folks for whom you get the sense they are trying too hard to make everything look great; their shininess looks fake, contrived. 

However, there is an authentic shine. The Spirit can change our perspective from which we view our experience.  The Spirit can show us the finite nature of the tough stuff the world throws at us, and the finite significance of our sin. It helps us focus on the good of God rather than the bad of the world and ourselves.  It helps us recognize the blessings we already have. This can be especially helpful in our society, which is driven by increasing our wants and needs. Someone has said, instead of being thankful when their cups runneth over, too many people pray for a bigger cup.  Thy grace is sufficient for today is one of the simple great messages that help us to shine. 

While grace will give us eyes to see the blessings we have now, it also gives us a purpose beyond our own selves.  The Spirit of grace roots us to the past, and drives us toward the future.  This connection, gives us power to withstand and stand against suffering and injustice in the present.  The Spirit is not just an opiate that convinces us to view the world and our lot without criticism.  Note that the first time Moses went up the mountain to meet God and came down with a shiny face, he headed back to Egypt to liberate the slaves.  By uniting with Moses and Elijah, Jesus is connected to a liberator, a lawgiver, and a prophet.  The Spirit filled prophet heals and demands justice.  So we, filled with the Spirit of God by the grace of Christ, are to do the same.  Dan Migliore, professor of theology at Princeton writes, “The love of God the Creator and Provider is at work not only where life is sustained and enhanced, but also where all that jeopardizes life and its fulfillment is resisted and set under judgment… It works both in our patience and our impatience and courageous resistance to evil.          "

We are drawn to the shine in heroic people, and they inspire us to hope and dream.  And then there is the shine that is more personal, more basic, but no less of the Spirit. This is much more common, a shine I see in many of you quite often when you are doing simple day to day tasks. On the heroic side, I think of taking a youth group to go see Nelson Mandela at the LA Coliseum after he was released from prison.  Mandela wasn’t the best speaker or the most entertaining act. In fact he looked a little tired.  But his radiance obviously came from something more than being at his optimum physically.  Years later a mother of one of the boys I took to see Mandela told me that that trip had been a transformation point in her son's life.

Another time I saw a the Spirit shine from my children when they shared about their trip to the beach with nine “Lost boys of Sudan.”  The church in Salinas had arranged to give 75 backpacks to Catholic Charities.  The packs were full of items one might need upon arriving to this country with nothing.  Soap, toothbrush, coins for laundry, etc… The boys from Sudan came down to Salinas to pick up the backpacks, to worship and sing.  After church a big group took them to the ocean.  The Sudanese boys had never seen the ocean.  So, immediately upon arrival at the beach, they ran into the water fully clothed.  A horse and rider came along, and the boys, unaware of the nuances of social etiquette and capitalist respect for private property, ran with joy toward the horse and convinced the owner to let them ride.

As we grow up, we learn to be cool, to not show our feelings and emotions, to restrain ourselves until we discern the social atmosphere, the unwritten laws we are supposed to obey.  But these guys were oblivious to these norms and laws, so they let their joy and curiosity run free, and it was contagious.  My boys glowed with joy as they told the story; so much so that I am certain divine spirit was involved.

I felt the same hope and joy once when, for a memorial service, I took a woman’s ashes out to distribute at sea on my surfboard.  At first I almost panicked as the ashes flowed around me.  I said a little prayer, and began to get this vision of our eternal connection with all of life.  I recall Martin Luther who said, “The world tells me ‘in the midst of life I am going to die.’  The Gospel tells me, ‘in the midst of death, I live.’”   

Another memorable time the spirit showed on the face of Katie. Katie was a typical suburbanite eighth grader.  She, along with five of her girlfriends, was excited and frightened over the upcoming backpacking trip.  Most upsetting to these young women was the lack of make-up and blow dryer to make themselves acceptably presentable and beautiful.  They went back and forth on whether or not even to go.  Katie was the most frightened.  Pretty, but the low girl on the totem pole of the popular girls, she worked hard to look the part.

For the first two days you would have thought I had brought them on this trip for torture, a medieval form of priestly imposed penitence.  I suppose in a way, that wouldn’t be far off mark.  Within the first mile of the hike 9 of 12 kids were ready to hang me.  The entire next day the kids whined and griped about everything, no toilet, no fast food, no video games, walkmans or TV.   Katie offered up self-depreciating comments before anyone else could.  How ugly and dirty she felt.  By the evening they were tired and grumpy, and on each other's nerves, on my nerves.

The third morning was flat out gorgeous:  A warm fire, white puffy clouds floating across the blue sky, reflecting off the crystal clear lake, a light breeze singing through the pines.  The kids began to settle into the freedom they were afforded.  Several of them, including Katie, hiked the ridge behind our camp.  In the afternoon we swam and lay on rocks in the sun.  Before sunset the girls went to bathe.  Katie came back and sat next to the fire; quiet, relaxed, unselfconscious, smiling, radiant.  Someone mentioned how radiant Katie looked.  She smiled, a genuine smile, and said, “I feel great.”  No makeup, no blow drier, just a blessed part of God’s Creation.  Katie had literally been to the mountaintop. I believe she met God there, experienced the grace of Jesus. But there was no need to put up a stone monument or a cross. The commemorating mark is in her heart and mine.  I believe, finally free from the social laws and norms dictating how a young lady should look and act, Katie experienced illuminating grace.  That trip changed her life.  Not that she never used makeup or a blow drier again, but she gained a confidence and joy that was more than skin deep.

In Christ, we no longer must be sheltered from God by a mediator, by a priest or veil or by make-up.  While our religious and social rules and norms may have a place and a purpose, by the grace of God they are no longer our focus and they no longer condemn us. Instead, we have free access to the Spirit, the source of grace and life.  That Spirit within us, fills our heart with joy and hope, and enables us to shine in the world.