The Holy Spirit Gives the Promise of a Future

First Sermon on the Holy Spirit: The Holy Spirit Gives a Promise for the Future

2 Cor 5:1-5

Understanding the Holy Spirit can be challenging.

Perhaps this is because talking about the Holy Spirit can lead in one of two confusing directions.

First, we can get bogged down in the creedal language which tries to explain the Trinity, such as the insertion of the word filioque in the Nicene Creed which caused the East-West schism in 1054. I will admit, my eyes glazed over at this point in my History of the Church class. It isn’t particularly interesting or meaningful, and we Baptist’s tend to take a pragmatic approach to theology in general.
On the other hand we may have some experience with the Holy Spirit through the charismatic church, Pentecostals and the practice of speaking in tongues, dancing, and in rare and extreme cases the snake handling. And while I’m not denigrating speaking in tongues, it’s just not my thing, nor is it yours I suspect. But since we’ve seen or heard of these practices ‘In the Spirit’ we get a little nervous about this thing called, the Holy Spirit.

Which is why I wanted to talk about the Holy Spirit by focusing on the work of the Holy Spirit. Today, we are going to talk about the Holy Spirit as a Promise, as providing Hope.

But to get there we have to turn to Paul and understand a little about the situation he is in with the church at Corinth. Because this situation leads him to write about a number of things, including the Holy Spirit.

First, as much as Paul loved the church at Corinth, a church which he started, he had a contentious relationship with this church. They were famous, many years after the writing of letters we now call 1 and 2 Second Corinthians for being ‘engaged in strife’ (1 Clem. 47.3) NIB

Paul wrote many letters and made visits to the church at Corinth after he established it. At one of those visits it is suggested that one of the church members made a verbal attack against Paul, none of the other church members defended him and this left him feeling hurt and angry. He left, thought about another visit, decided against it as it may have lead to a confrontation which may have made him feel better, morally superior and powerful, which publically embarrassing someone else can do I suppose, but it isn’t the way to handle things in church, so he decided not to risk it.

The Episode at Corinth:

The church at Corinth, which Paul is exchanging correspondence with, is a bit of a mess.
There are many issues that Paul has to deal with... We find the list of problems detail in the first letter to the Corinthians.
Factions are forming around who has been baptized by whom...Peter, Paul, or in the name of whom... Jesus... cliques about whose baptism is... correct... those who baptisms are (quote unquote) correct consider themselves to be of higher status than the others.

A man is living with his father's former wife
while other groups are espousing abstinence from marital intimacy
both again based on their... enlightened faith... both those who have an anything goes view and those who have an abstinence only perspective...feeling themselves superior

there are groups fighting about meat sacrificed to idols... some say that their faith means that it does not matter where the meat has come from... others thinking that practice of eating meat sacrificed to idols is a sin... both thinking themselves better than the other.

Some speak in tongues and think themselves superior... some prophesy and think themselves better...

The wealthy members are starting communion with cocktail hour and are inebriated... with little food or drink left for the poor members to share in the agape meal... at the Lord's supper that they are supposed to share. They assume their economic status enables them special benefits that the poor members are not worthy of.

I mention all of this because what inspires Paul to write about the Holy Spirit isn’t his love of metaphysics, logic or philosophy. What has inspired him to write his letters and to write about the Holy Spirit is his experience with suffering, trauma and the trials of life. And although our lives may not compare to arrest, imprisonment, angry mobs and beatings… we can identify with this experience in a much deeper and more personal way than in considering the fine metaphysical points of the filioque.

But Paul’s view of suffering is, well, strange…

For Paul suffering and trauma is a confirmation that the Holy Spirit is working… He is comforted by suffering because it proves to him that God is saving, re-creating, renewing individuals, humanity, community, all creation, through the Spirit.
And that is Paul’s comfort… as Ernest Best says, ‘ [for Paul] comfort is not the removal of suffering nor the assurance that everything will turn out all right in the end nor that others have suffered worse things nor that it will soon be over…’ ‘the comfort lies in knowing Christ better, in being more firmly united with him…’
Did you hear that? All of us as disciples are in a process of being saved from sin, old destructive, selfish, hurtful ways. The Holy Spirit is working in us and through us, saving us and saving others… but that causes suffering. To face our own failings and fears is painful. To patiently walk with others as they are confronted by the Holy Spirit with their failings can really hurt. To stand up to the sin that surrounds us, that causes poverty, bigotry, intolerance, or violence can be frightening. But Paul see’s this as proof that the Holy Spirit is doing something.

Let me insert the clichéd and obligatory ‘Pastor’s Children’ illustration here.
Lance is playing baseball this spring. Lance takes after his father (me) in many ways. He has talents and gifts… but baseball is not one of them. Catching and throwing and batting just doesn’t come naturally to him, it is a struggle. It frustrates him that he can’t do well. Just the other day he was very disappointed with himself for not hitting every ball pitched to him at batting practice. So he wants to quit. The frustration and discomfort of learning something new and difficult overwhelms him a bit. Now I know from personal experience, that with a little patience, some work and some time, he can learn. I know he has the potential… but to get to the potential, he has to suffer the frustration…
This, I think, is how Paul views the suffering he goes through in his ministry. The personal suffering of squabbles, the suffering of watching his churches struggle with sin and past behaviors that they cannot seem to leave behind, the suffering of mobs and arrests and beatings. All of it is the momentary frustration of growth… growth in him, growth in his church, growth in the community… toward Christ, the Kingdom… the Spirit is working in all of this for our growth.

This is perhaps the challenge to the church, a critique really, of the church, not just ours but all…
Because instead of teaching people how to face frustrations, new and challenging situations, ideas, differences as the Holy Spirit working in and through us… we avoid the whole situation. Send it to a committee, take it to a vote, loose patience and argue our point of view, leave and go somewhere less challenging where our perspective will not be challenged, stay home…
In a sense Paul I think has a good word about conflict, which we try to avoid. Conflict that he certainly didn’t enjoy, but which he fervently believed was the work of the Holy Spirit fulfilling a promise of a future of a tomorrow in which we will be close to Christ, resurrected with Christ, made a new creation as God intends. The Holy Spirit gives Paul the gift of seeing what is being accomplished, salvation, what is yet to come, new Life in Christ… which will cause some conflict within and among us… but the end result is New Life…
Paul has the crucifixion of Christ fixed firmly in his mind. Through that suffering the Spirit created new life. Which is why Paul could have such an odd view of suffering and strife, could virtually celebrate it.

I must be doing something right… Paul seems to say… the Holy Spirit must be working here…

Which is not my first reaction. Someone boos and I stop singing. Someone criticizes and I stop speaking or acting. But not Paul, Paul saw resistance and struggle as a sign that the Spirit was renewing. The Spirit gave him a vision of what he was to become and what all creation was to become, and suffering and struggle is just the process; like learning to hit a ball, or do algebra, learning a new skill for a new job, marriage counseling… facing the discomfort of today, because the Holy Spirit promises us a tomorrow closer to Christ, a tomorrow in which we are that much closer to the image God created us to be.

How do we do it?

That is the question right?

That is another thing that makes the Holy Spirit difficult to think and talk about. It is mysterious because it can’t be qualified.

But I think that Paul had some promises in his mind that I want to share with you to close…and if you want to learn, as I too want to learn, how to stop avoiding the struggle and to see it as a process of growing in faith, remember these verses, read them daily, meditate on them, pray them…

Isa 32:14-17
The fortress will be abandoned,
the noisy city deserted;
citadel and watchtower will become a wasteland forever,
till the Spirit is poured upon us from on high,
and the desert becomes a fertile field,
and the fertile field seems like a forest.
17 The fruit of righteousness will be peace;
the effect of righteousness will be quietness and confidence forever.

Isa 44:4
Do not be afraid, O Jacob, my servant,
Jeshurun, whom I have chosen.
3 For I will pour water on the thirsty land,
and streams on the dry ground;
I will pour out my Spirit on your offspring,
and my blessing on your descendants.
4 They will spring up like grass in a meadow,
like poplar trees by flowing streams.

Eze 37:12-14
13 Then you, my people, will know that I am the LORD, when I open your graves and bring you up from them. 14 I will put my Spirit in you and you will live, and I will settle you in your own land. Then you will know that I the LORD have spoken, and I have done it, declares the LORD.'"
I don’t know for a fact that Paul was thinking of these verses. But I do know that Paul was convinced that the Holy Spirit used suffering and struggle and difference and even division as a catalyst for growth…
Ro 8:34-39
Christ Jesus, who died — more than that, who was raised to life — is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. 35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? 36 As it is written:

"For your sake we face death all day long;
we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered."

37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.


2 Co 4:16-18

16 Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. 17 For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. 18 So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.
NIV

Earth Day Sermon: Loving What God Loves, How God Loves

Jn 13:34-35

34 "A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. 35 By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another."

What signs of spring do you notice and enjoy the most?

April 22nd marks the 40th anniversary of Earth Day

One of challenges of preaching about environmental issues is that some, if not many, will assume that this whole green movement is the trick or the conspiracy of Democrats and Liberals who are either quoting bad science or creating pseudo-scientific claims. So some feel as if this eco-theology is a wolf in sheeps clothing, the wolf being politics.

Another of the challenges to preaching about eco-theology is that some might think that going green is a perfectly legitimate thing… but what has it to do with faith? Talking about the environment should be the task of scientists not pastors and theologians. How can preaching about the environment have any affect on the my faith?

I hope to be able to answer those questions, briefly, today.

First, a little game.

I find myself becoming more and more an advocate of the true ecologists where their recommendations are realistic. Many of these people have done us an essential service in helping us preserve and protect our green zones and our cities, our water and our air. The growing possibility of our destroying ourselves and the world with our own neglect and excess is tragic and very real.

Who said that? Take a guess.

Is Creation Care a political game? Is all of this concern with going green rooted in the work of Politicians like Al Gore and Hollywood movie stars like Leonardo DiCaprio, and therefore completely suspect suspect
I want you to look in your bulletins at the call to worship, which is based on canticle of the sun by Francis of Assisi. It was composed by Francis in 1224 and incidentally Christine, you might find it interesting that it is definitely one of the first, possibly the first work of literature written in the Italian language.
Next I want you to look at the Thought at the beginning of this week’s devotional booklet
For God brought things into being in order to communicate the divine goodness to creatures and thus be represented by them. And because God’s goodness could not be adequately represented by any single creature, God produced many and diverse creatures, that what one lacked in representing divine goodness might be supplied in another. For goodness, which exists in God simply and uniformly, exists in creatures multiply and distributively. Thus the whole universe together participates in the divine goodness more perfectly.
Thomas Aquinas
Thomas Aquinas, another Italian priest, considered by some to be the greatest of the Catholic Churches theologians. Summa Theologica and Summa Contra Gentiles is still studied in seminaries today and not just Catholic Seminaries, I studied pieces of the Summa by Aquinas at Andover Newton which is a Baptist school. Thomas Aquinas lived from 1225-1274.

Now, I’m giving you this history lesson, because I know you love history lessons.

Seriously, my point is that eco-theology is not some new fad. It is not inspired by modern politicians or movie-stars. Creation Care has been a part of the Christian Tradition and a part of our practice as disciples for hundreds and hundreds of years.

On to Love…

The question you might be asking yourself right now is…

What has this all got to do with love. Remember the passage from John we read? What is the connection between Jesus command to love one another and Environmentalism, or a term I prefer for Disciples of Christ, Creation Care?
What does the popular culture mean by love?
What does the Bible, specifically the gospel story of Christ, teach us about love?
You see it all starts with love.
I want to suggest that one way to summarize our Christian faith is to say that by following Christ we are participating in the creative love of God.
Jn 13:34-35"A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you , so you must love one another. 35 By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another."
Jn 15:9-12 "As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. 10 If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father's commands and remain in his love. 11 I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. 12 My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you .
Jn 15:17 This is my command: Love each other.
What Jesus has come to earth to do is to teach us how to receive God’s love, respond to God’s love and share God’s love.

But what does God love?

Us!

Yes! God loves us…

Ro 5:7-8 But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us .

But here is the thing…

Here is the connection.

Go to
Ge 9:12-17

12 And God said, "This is the sign of the covenant I am making between me and you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come: 13 I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth. 14 Whenever I bring clouds over the earth and the rainbow appears in the clouds, 15 I will remember my covenant between me and you and all living creatures of every kind. Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life. 16 Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth."

17 So God said to Noah, "This is the sign of the covenant I have established between me and all life on the earth."

What is a covenant?
It is a binding agreement… but more than that it is a relationship…
And at the last supper, before Jesus died, he said to the disciples…
This cup is a what?
A new covenant poured out in my blood, poured out for many…
So one way, not the only way, but one way of understanding covenant is to say that it is a loving relationship…
And we often think that this covenant… this promise of love… is for us…
But Genesis 9 tells us that God does not only love humanity…
God also loves… the earth, the creatures, the animals… Creation…

Now, a little bit more Bible hopping here… go to…

Ro 8:18-23
19 The creation waits in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed. 20 For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God.
22 We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time.

Did you hear that?
Creation itself will be liberated from its bondage!
Now what Paul is talking about is Justification…
The new creation that we become when we are re-born in Christ…
BUT, notice that it isn’t just humanity that God justifies, that God re-creates…
It is all of creation.

You’ve gotten the point now, haven’t you…
God does not just love humanity, but also, all of creation.

Paul, we just read, echoes Genesis 2. Genesis 2 says that we were created to serve and protect the earth… and Paul sees our re-creation through Christ benefiting not just us… but all of creation… the earth…
Here is the connection you see.
Christ has commanded that we love one another as he loved, his love inspired and empowered by God’s love… And God loves all of creation!
Therefore, if we as Christ followers, as disciples of Jesus, if we want to fully participate in God’s love…
We will participate in caring for all creation.

The growing possibility of our destroying ourselves and the world with our own neglect and excess is tragic and very real.

Who said that? Take a guess.

Billy Graham
Approaching Hoofbeats (1983)

Creation Care is not some new fad, nor is it a liberal democratic conspiracy. Even Billy Graham was concerned for Creation… you can’t accuse him of being liberal!

What I hope you have learned this morning is that Creation Care is an ancient part of our Christian Tradition even if it was largely ignored for our lifetimes…
I hope you have learned that care for creation, the duty to care for it comes not from the mouths of politicians and movies stars, but from the Bible itself…
And that we are inspired to greater levels of care for creation not so much from fear, although, as Billy Graham himself said, we should fear the consequences of our cruelty to creation, but through a deepening connection to the love of God. Through loving creation, caring for it, learning to live in ways that are gentle with the environment, that are careful and not damaging, we are participating in God’s love… Loving what God loves, how God loves.

I'm Alive! Should I Go to Church or to the Beach?

The question that is the title may seem silly, but I've been asked it many times in 10 years of ministry.

This assumption, that happiness or fun can replace worship, was the one fear I had about yesterday's sermon. Would people hear 'Remember, You are Alive, so savor and take delight in the beauty of life around you,' and think that walks on the beach, or in the woods, or sleeping in, or going dancing on Saturday night, would be a perfectly reasonable replacement for worship?

So two follow up ideas.
One comes from Thomas Merton who writes, 'A Tree gives glory to God first of all by being a tree. For in being what God means it to be, it is imitating an idea which is in God and which is not distinct from the essence of God, and therefore a tree imitates God by being a tree.' You can find this is Merton's 'Seeds of Contemplation' and if my theology memory is correct, Merton is riffing on some things that Aquinas once wrote about Nature. The point is... the created world around us in all its natural beauty hold great potential to point us to deeper reflection about God and experience of God. So taking time to attend to the natural world can be a form of prayer, a way of being present and aware of the presence of God.

Just the other day as I went walking in the woods the sound of the shuffling leaves under my feet caught my attention. Were they dead leaves? No, not really, I thought. Although they were no longer green, they were in the process of enriching the soil. Their nutrients would one day nurture a flower or a tree. so they were not really dead to my thinking, but part of life, by enabling life. Which reminds me of the words of Jesus in John, 'Unless a grain of wheat falls.' Of course Jesus is referring to his own death and resurrection. But it seems that it also refers to the life of a disciple. We grow in faith not only for our own 'salvation' but also so that our words and deeds, our example and life, can become the nutrient for others to follow in faith. and I found peace and joy in that moment. Savoring life, watching and listening to nature, not working, but simply being, allowed the Spirit to speak to me.
so the beach is a great place to rest, relax, and enjoy the beauty of God's creation.

But it must remain in balance. This is point 2. In John 20 it is the presence of the risen Christ that bring joy and life. so created things, like the beach, music, movies, vacations, can be conduits for God's grace. A time of rest and happiness are wonderful things... but only if they, even in some simple way, cause us to ponder and experience God's love for us, God's grace. They cannot replace worship, but they are vital supplements, because they can be a time of reflection and rest for us.

Worship is the key really. THe point isn't to replace traditional sunday morning singing, praying and experiencing of the Word with something else, BUT to expand our own idea of worship, so that from the sunday morning prayers and sermons, we learn to seek and find times for prayer and reflection all around us in the world. And this is the key to being alive and savoring life.

John 20:19-31; Remember, You are Alive!

Remember, You Are Alive!


The doors are locked…
The disciples are boxed in by fear…
Locked in dread
Fear of the Jews…
Not all Jews, but the Jewish leaders who just handed Jesus over to be crucified…
And Peter knows that he is known to be a Jesus sympathizer…
The ‘Wanted Dead or Alive’ posters could be going up all over Jerusalem!
The disciples sit in their darkened room, listening for the foot-fall of a soldiers march…

The disciples are boxed in by fear…
Locked in dread
Fear of the Romans…
The Liberation, the Freedom they had so longed for…
Was dead… in the tomb…
If the Jewish leaders did not come for them…
Perhaps the Legions would
And they would stand before Pilate
And suffer his lash…

The disciples are boxed in by fear…
Locked in dread
Maybe Jesus is alive…
And maybe he is angry…
Angry at their failure to follow him
Angry that they abandoned him.
They once saw Jesus in a fit of anger curse a fig tree and
Within a few hours it was dead!

The disciples are boxed in by fear…
Locked in dread…
What will their families say when they return defeated?
Peter and James abandoned family to follow Jesus
Left behind a family business and a community
To put their hopes in a man found guilty of treason and blasphemy.
Will their families take them back?
What will the towns-folk say?
Will they be mocked? Made fun-off?
Will they be considered a danger to the community and run off?
With nowhere to go, no place to hide or lay their heads?

Disciples, we today may find ourselves boxed in by fear or dread…
Fear that tomorrow will be the same as yesterday…
Dread that the sinking feeling that greeted us when we awoke will last the day…
Fear of the past which held addiction will continue to haunt us…
Dread of the voices from our past, that made us feel unworthy of love or respect,
Voices that proclaimed our worthlessness will echo in our minds today…
Fear of paying the bills, that we will run out of energy,
Dread of getting laid off,
The list of our fears and that which causes us dread could probably go on
For some time this morning…

I hope you are getting this image…
The disciples crouching, cowering in fear…
Trapped by these external forces so far out of their control
By their own emotions, guilt, pain, mourning…

And if you are not in that space right now, that you at least recall a time when you too were
Trapped and frightened and in hiding…

Because that is when some strange and amazing happens in today’s story…

Jesus appears
And
Well
Breathes on them
Odd isn’t it?
I have to admit that was the first thing that struck me was how odd it would be to have someone, even Jesus, just walk up and breathe on me.
I had this image stuck in my head of Lance and Isaac.
They will go upstairs to brush their teeth and sometimes I’ll do these random tests to see if they actually do brush their teeth and make them breathe in my face and check for minty!
I know this sounds irreverent but I just couldn’t get that out of my head…
Jesus walking around and puffing in the disciples faces…

Now here is what is going on…
The greek in John is emphusao…
To puff, to blow at or on…

But Jesus is doing this to remind the disciples of another bible story, actually three…
Take a guess…
What is Jesus re-enacting…

Ge 1:1-2
1:1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. 2 Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.

Spirit… Ruach…
It can mean spirit, life, anger, air… and breath
So one possible way of understanding the creation of the world
Is that God breathed on the chaotic waters and life began…
The breath of God brings life…
Jesus is re-enacting the creation story in our story from John today
Jesus breathes on the chaos caused by the crucifixion and creates life.

The same theme of breath and life follows in
Ge 2:7
7 the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.

Breath of life… ruach again…

The final story, for this morning anyway…
Eze 37:1-6
37:1 The hand of the LORD was upon me, and he brought me out by the Spirit of the LORD and set me in the middle of a valley; it was full of bones. 2 He led me back and forth among them, and I saw a great many bones on the floor of the valley, bones that were very dry. 3 He asked me, "Son of man, can these bones live?"

I said, "O Sovereign LORD, you alone know."

4 Then he said to me, "Prophesy to these bones and say to them, 'Dry bones, hear the word of the LORD! 5 This is what the Sovereign LORD says to these bones: I will make breath enter you, and you will come to life. 6 I will attach tendons to you and make flesh come upon you and cover you with skin; I will put breath in you, and you will come to life. Then you will know that I am the LORD.'"

Israel is once again enslaved…
This time in Babylon…
It isn’t the same kind of slavery…
They aren’t in camps, forced to do manual labor…
But they too are boxed in by fear and dread…
For they have witnessed the destruction of their city Jerusalem
Their homes, the Temple…
Everything has been destroyed…

God takes Ezekiel to a battle field strewn with corpses and says…
Preach to these bones
I will make breath… ruach, enter you…

Just when life seems hopeless
And despair sets in…
And we cannot catch our breath
God breathes for us…

Because I live, you also shall live… Jesus said the disciples before the crucifixion…
And he appears to them today to remind them of life
Remember, you are alive…

And I couldn’t help it as I was thinking about this story
Imagining it in my mind…
I couldn’t help but think that maybe Jesus didn’t just breath on them
Maybe he blew in their ears…
A playful teasing way of shocking them back into the joy of life…
These are difficult and troubling times…
Around the world we hear stories… Haiti and Chile
In our own nation we mourn for the loss of life in West Virginian

The poverty in our own state, in our own community…
Which we devote so much time and energy and effort too…
Wondering if any good will come of it…
If any change will result from our efforts
Which seem meager in comparison to the problems…
Not to mention the personal trauma’s
Loosing loved one’s
Paying off debts
Caring for sick children or aging parents

Jesus blows into our ears to remind us not to give up in hoping.
Ezekiel preached life before any life was apparent…

This story reminds us to not stop imagining life
Even if the evidence is contrary…

But it also reminds us…
And this is the main point I have today…
It reminds us to Remember that we are alive…
To savor and delight in the life that surrounds us…

I’m not saying that we ignore the suffering and the struggle
Pretend that these things don’t exist…
But that we not let the struggle be the only thing we see…
Remember, you are alive…
Because I live, you also shall live…
So take time to savor in and delight in life…
Take time to savor one another and delight in one another…
We work so hard together
And are so faithful to the call of Christ to serve
That I sometimes think we forget to enjoy life together also…
Remember that you are alive!
Make time to celebrate the life that Christ has breathed into you, into us together…