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Sermons at St. John’s Presbyterian Church Light and
Authority Transcribed from the sermon preached December 6, 2009 The
Reverend Max Lynn, Pastor St. John’s Presbyterian Church 2727 College Avenue, Berkeley, CA 94705 Telephone
510-845-6830 Fax 510-845-6837 Scripture
Readings: II Cor. 41-18,
John 1:1-5,16-23 Mark starts
his story of Jesus with
John. John baptizes
Jesus and the Holy
Spirit enters him. Matthew
and Luke
each bring us versions of the birth narrative.
The Spirit of God, they seem to be saying with their
birth stories, was
involved before Jesus was baptized in adulthood.
God had seen this life and death of Jesus coming
from his
beginning. Paraphrasing
psalm 139, God
knit him together in his mother’s womb.
Still that is not enough for John the mystic Gospel
writer. He takes us
way back, all the way back,
before John the Baptist or mother Mary, before David, before the law
and sees
the destiny of this person Jesus in the very Creative, life giving
force of the
Universe: Echoing the opening words of Genesis, “ In the beginning,”
But John’s
beginning is before that beginning.
Way
back then, that is when this story of Jesus, the story of life begins
to unfold. In the
beginning was the Word, and the Word
was with God and the Word was God.
He
was in the beginning with God. All
things were made through him…In him was life, and the life was the
light of
humans. The light
shines in the
darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. Neither the
darkness before Creation, nor the
darkness at the end of physical, created life can encompass this Word. The Grace and Truth Jesus
embodied was
before all things, and is the very Spirit and life of God. There is no
capturing Him; no boundaries or
descriptions can hold his authority, his grace and love. Jesus is not subordinate
to John because he
came into a physical body after John.
Jesus is not contained by scripture or the Torah or
the Law because the
scripture contains his story. His
truth
and grace are not limited by the words of scripture for he is the very
Word,
the logos, the original Word that spoke and Creation came into
existence. Jesus
the Christ is not petrified in words
or a grave but is alive; he continues to live and move, to be reborn
and
resurrected, in the flesh. And
when all
is said and done, when all leaders and tyrants, when all nations have
risen and
fallen, after laws have come and gone, when each of us has lived and
turned
back to dust, when we have spoken our last words, this Word, full of
grace and
truth will continue to live. John gives
us a comforting and empowering
vision. For in this
life we are so
often bogged down by temporal things, by physical ailment, by
skirmishes and
hassles. We need a
vision of truth and
grace that carries us beyond. Martin
Luther King Jr., responding to a group
of clergy who thought his demonstrations against segregation were
poorly timed,
wrote a letter from the Birmingham jail explaining his actions. At times he borders on
despair, and over and
over expresses disappointment in the church and society which continues
to
think justice can wait, that it is just not the right time for equality. But led by the spirit like
John, King sees
that the cause of truth and justice is not a new thing, not something
he just
dreamed up on his own there in 1963.
“I hope the
church as a whole will meet the
challenge of this decisive hour,” he writes.
“But even if the church does not come to the aid of
justice, I have no despair
about the future. I
have no fear about
the outcome of our struggle in Birmingham, even if our motives are
presently
misunderstood. We
will reach our goal
of freedom in Birmingham and all over the nation, because the goal of
America
is Freedom. Abused
and scorned though
we may be, our destiny is tied up with the destiny of America. Before the Pilgrims landed
at Plymouth we
were here. Before
the pen of Jefferson
etched across the pages of history the majestic words of the
Declaration of
Independence, we were here…We will win our freedom because the sacred
heritage
of our nation and the eternal will of God are embodied in our echoing
demands.” While King
is pointing our that African
Americans have been in America from the very beginning, he is also
pointing out
that the fight for justice and freedom goes back even before that:
Built into
the sacred heritage of the nation, but even before that, to the eternal
will of
God. Their little
struggle, in that
particular time and place, carried on and embodied by fallible, finite
human
beings is tied to the eternal will of God.
In the beginning was the Word. I don’t know
about you, but I sometimes wish
for the big clear battle, a cause for which I could write a great
letter. I dream for
the struggle where I am sure I
am right, where good and evil are easy to determine, where we have to
lay it
all on the line. But
as I move along in
life, I am beginning to see that it is often the minor struggles that
test our
faith the most. It
is humility and
grace along the way, in the midst of the undecided and the gray, not
only the
clear end goal that shows our connection to the truth and Word of God.
It may
be an issue in a relationship that almost nobody knows about. It is not just the broken
system but also an
annoying person, a bad cold, deteriorating equilibrium or a broken leg.
We
manage struggles, which never culminate in a decisive,
winner-take-all
battle. We see people who cannot find work, who cannot make the next
house
payment, who struggle to bounce back after a divorce or the death of a
parent. It is often
the small hassles
that make us feel human, bring out our weakness, the small temptations
that
wear down our defenses. We
will face
the lions for you Lord, but could you please get rid of these blasted
mosquitoes? This morning
Lisa Larges was to be our
special guest. On
November 10, in a
meeting that lasted until 11 p.m., the Presbytery of San Francisco
voted to
ordain Lisa Larges as Minister of Word and Sacrament, validate her call
as
Minister Coordinator of That All May Freely Serve, and enroll her as a
member
of the Presbytery. It was the
first time that Lisa, an out
lesbian, has been able to speak before the whole presbytery and
everyone had a
chance to meet and examine her. As in all ordination exams in San
Francisco,
she read a short portion of her Faith Statement and then answered
questions
posed by the Committee on Ministry. Unlike other exams in San
Francisco, a long
line of presbyters then posed additional questions, both about her
Faith Statement
and her Statement of Departure. (http://www.covenantnetwork.org/home.htm) After the
vote, during the prayer for Lisa,
the opposition filed a protest or a “Stay of Enforcement” which will
postpone
Lisa’s ordination at least until it is dealt with. Until that time she
is still
unable to administer the sacraments of Communion and Baptism. But that doesn’t keep us
from asking her to
pray and serve with us today, nor does it keep St. John’s from
supporting her
ministry both prayerfully and financially. I feel strongly and clearly
that God
has called Lisa and us to such a time as this. But I suspect the
greatest
challenge is not the big cause, but like most of life, the many related
and
seemingly unrelated challenges along the way. There are friends and
family with
whom we disagree, and there is the rest of life and its challenges And
while
Lisa is a great example of a faithful, spirit-filled lesbian and her
call is
clearly not about sexual orientation alone, but to love and serve
Christ and to
shine God’s light into our whole life. Through her we see the light of
Christ
coming. During the
examination, Lisa was asked over
and over to explain her claim that “Jesus alone is the authority to
which all
other authorities,” including scripture and its apparent laws against
same sex
relationships, “are subordinate.”
Never
mind that the Church has long ago disregarded scriptural laws regarding
dietary
restrictions, circumcision, disregarded the prohibition of handicapped
and
women from serving as spiritual leaders, argued for the American
Revolution,
changed its mind on slavery and inter-racial marriage, and resisted the
Nazis
based on just this primacy of the authority of the Word who is Christ
Jesus.
When we speak of the Word with a capital W we speak of Christ, not the
words of
Scripture. Lisa
answered with knowledge and
intelligence. But
as I sat there
listening to the same question being repeated over and over, I was
struck, as
always, not by the words and reason Lisa used, but how she embodied the
Word,
full of grace and truth. Even
to those
whose vitriol nearly raised the roof, Lisa responded with respect and
kindness. Normally,
candidates are
asked one or two questions, I guess Lisa was asked twenty, and she was
asked
the one question about the authority of Jesus and scripture four or
five
times. And yet she
answered the last as
patiently and gracious as the first.
Add to this that the normal length of the call
process usually takes two
to three years while Lisa has patiently and graciously been led along
by the
Holy Spirit for twelve years…with no clear end in sight, and we know
there is a
tremendous sense of call in this woman. “If any one
would sue you and take your
coat”, Jesus said, “let him have your cloak as well; and if any one
forces you
to go one mile, go with him two miles.
I Thess 5
says: “See that none of you repays
evil for evil, but always seek to do good to one another and to all.
Rejoice
always, pray constantly, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is
the will
of God in Christ Jesus for you.” Paul will
eventually be executed near Rome,
but all along the way he meets hardship. He is resolute that the Grace
of
Christ Jesus, not the law, is the foundation of our salvation. He has a
physical ailment, he is scourged, beaten and stoned, he has been
shipwrecked,
he has been hungry and thirsty, and suffered from cold and exposure. “We have
this treasure in earthen vessels,”
says Paul, “to show that the transcendent power belongs to God and not
to
us. We are
afflicted in every way, but
not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair, persecuted, but not
forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed. Rev. Dr.
Thomas Lane Butts writes, “For most
of us there is seldom a decisive battle in life where the war is won or
lost in
one engagement. There are many worrisome skirmishes, which seem so
trivial,
days of deprivation and depression and long periods of discouragement
when what
we think to be the real battle seems so far away. The truth of the
matter is
that this is the real battle. Duke ethicist Stanley
Hauerwas finds most Christians far too spiritual in the practice of
their
faith. Christianity "is not a set of beliefs or doctrines one believes
in
order to be a Christian," he says, "but rather Christianity is to
have one's body shaped, one's habits determined, in such a way that the
worship
of God is unavoidable." Barbara
Brown Taylor preaching on the command by Jesus to share a meal and wash
feet
says, “The
daily practice of incarnation—of being in the
body with full confidence that God speaks the language of flesh—is to
discover
a pedagogy that is as old as the Gospels. Why else did Jesus spend his
last
night on earth teaching his disciples to wash feet and share supper?
With all
the conceptual truths in the universe at his disposal, he did not give
them
something to think about together when he was gone. Instead, he gave
them
concrete things to do—specific ways of being together in their
bodies—that
would go on teaching them what they needed to know when he was no
longer around
to teach them himself.
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