Bible hand
Were I a preacher, I know that I would not be sure what to do with the Lectionary Readings for Sunday, May 18. I know, because as I read them, I was at a loss. The martyrdom of St. Stephen; a Psalm praying for refuge; the declaration that we are a holy nation, a royal priesthood; Jesus’s declaration of His oneness with the Father, and the disciples stubborn insistence not to understand him. Preaching on one of these, perhaps, might make some sense. The goal of the Lectionary, however, is to bring together these readings to bring a message of faith and hope to the congregation. The Word is to be proclaimed, even in the midst of the confusion that the words often create.
One of the things that unites these passages is the centrality of the presence of God in the lives of the people. In the Gospel account, Jesus is trying to tell his disciples that His presence with them is a Divine presence, because of the oneness of Father and Son through the Spirit. The disciples, as usually portrayed prior to the resurrection, just don’t get it. This, by the way, is a marvelous way to counter all those arguments about how to read Scripture. If the Bible is so easy to read and understand, how is it that we are so often presented with portraits of people who, presented in person with the words of Jesus or a prophet, either don’t get it or refuse to get it? How are we so sanguine about our understanding, even previous, comfortable or comforting understandings, if far too often we are told or shown explicitly, in the text itself, that there is a lack of understanding?
In any event, sticking with my general concern for the current state of the United Methodist Church, one thing I would highlight, to repeat myself, is the centrality of God. All these passages are about God, how we are to find refuge in God – sometimes even in the midst of terror and death because of our faith in God! – and how we are God’s people, to be about God’s work. The most troubling passage, then – perhaps not ironically – is the passage from St. John’s Gospel. Jesus is seeking to reassure the disciples that, despite what is about to occur – the arrest, the torture, the execution – the disciples are to take comfort from the Divine presence, a presence that has been with them from the beginning, a presence that will continue with them long after he, Jesus, is gone from them. Rather than listen and take comfort, however, the disciples set .to arguing. Phillip demands to see the Father, as if he hasn’t heard a single word Jesus has said, now, or in all the time Phillip has been following Jesus.
Last week’s blog post by Asbury Seminary President Timothy Tennent, insisting that the divide in the United Methodist Church is one of orthodoxy versus heterodoxy has stirred a huge response, including one from me. Yet, how much are these arguments like the disciples sitting there, listening to Jesus, being completely stupid about what he is telling them? Part of the reason we miss the point, and sit around and argue, is I think because we allow our agendas to override the Word before us. “Yes, yes, Jesus, it’s all very nice that you go to prepare a place for us, but I really need something a bit more before I throw myself willingly in to your service. Give me a sign. Show me the Father. Something, anything that will make all that you’re saying make some kind of sense.”
Yet, the Psalmist reminds us we are to seek refuge in God, to commend our spirits to God even as enemies press around us. This comes with neither proof nor guarantees. It is just what we are to do. Likewise, St. Stephen, threatened with death, declares a vision of Jesus at the right hand of God the Father, for which he is stoned to death. His last words are a prayer for forgiveness for those who are killing him, including a young Pharisee named Saul. The writer of the first Epistle of St. Peter declares we are a holy nation, a royal priesthood – those whose lives are dedicated to God in Jesus Christ, fed on the spiritual food necessary for life and health. This doesn’t guarantee our work will be successful or without conflict. It just means . . . that’s who we are and what we are to be about.
So embroiled in an argument about who’s right and who’s wrong; who’s in and who’s out; what is acceptable behavior and what is not acceptable behavior from those who claim the name of Christ, we have forgotten that we are those who are to commend our lives to God, to God’s service, even as the threat of persecution, perhaps even death, hangs over us. As I am so fond of saying, God loves us, but God doesn’t care all that much about us; being a follower of Jesus is neither easy nor fun, precisely because it is so demanding. All of us need to stop worrying about who’s right and who’s wrong, because that just isn’t who we are called to be. We are called to surrender our lives to God, to live as those hidden in God through the risen Christ, in service to the world in need of the Gospel. There will be a cost to this dedication and service. It won’t be the cost of being wrong, because all of us are probably mostly wrong anyway. It won’t be the cost of not having power or influence, because these are not ours to want or even seek. No, the cost is, as Jesus says elsewhere, our lives. When I say that God doesn’t care all that much about us, I am just repeating what is declared at our baptism: we are those who have died and risen with Christ. Our lives, such as they are, are no longer our own. We in the United Methodist Church need to remember that. We need to live it, because it is, after all, who we are – those making disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.
This is a service of love for God. It has nothing to do with us, our egos, our power, or who among us is right and who is wrong. Because it isn’t about us at all. We have surrendered our spirits, our very lives, to God, our refuge. Not a refuge from physical danger. Just a refuge from the fear of separation from the God who brings us life, who has called us to be a holy nation, a royal priesthood. A God whom we have come to know through the Son and the Son’s promise always to be with us, to grant us power to ask boldly in his, Jesus’s, name and have that prayer answered.
Which is why Saul, who stood and watched while St. Stephen was stoned, became the great Apostle to the Gentiles – because Stephen’s prayer as he was dying, a prayer for forgiveness for those who were killing him, was granted. Let us remember this: It isn’t about us, our lives, our fortunes, our health, our popularity, or even our pasts. It’s about God, God’s future, a work into which we are baptized, for which we are strengthened around a common table, and to which we are sent after giving our worship to God. Because it’s all about God. Not us.
United Methodist layman Geoffrey Kruse-Safford of Rockford, Ill., blogs at No I Has Heard.