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“What Guides Are Trained To Do” Sermon Delivered By Rev. Dick Stetler – March
11, 2018 Centenary United Methodist Church
Ephesians 2:1-10; John 3:14-21 This morning we are going to consider a text that I repeat every
time while serving communion.
For
God so loved the world that he gave us his only begotten son, that
whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life.
For God sent his son into the world not to condemn the world, but that
through him, the world might be saved.
(John 3:16f) When the Scriptures were being gathered by Church authorities,
there were doubts about the continued existence of our world. One
school of thought was that
the world was going to end within the lifetime of the writers.
There is even a Scripture that
attributed such an understanding to Jesus.
He said, I assure you that
there are some of you that will not die until you see the Son of Man
come as King. (Matthew
16:28) This quote may have been one of those sayings that Jesus never
said. Either that, or he
said it because he actually believed that the end of time was close at
hand. This quote from Jesus
ties into such a thought described in Mark's Gospel.
Jesus was clearly indicating that the end of the world was near.
Jesus taught that in the
latter days, before the end of time, there will be many false
messiahs. Following those days, the sun will grow dark, the moon will no
longer shine, the stars will fall from
heaven, and the planets will
be driven from their courses. Then the Son of Man will appear, coming in
the clouds with great power and glory.
He will send his angels out to the four corners of the world to
gather God's
chosen people. (Mark
13:22-27) This story-line could be found in numerous sources of apocalyptic
literature that were circulating during the time of Jesus.
Many Jews believed that the world was so
evil that God was going to
bring down the curtain on the
drama of humankind even though there had been a time when God called
everything Good and pleasing to
him. (Genesis 1:31)
Fear drives people to develop many ideas that have no basis in
what is real, particularly thoughts that have evolved over time about
God's nature and the nature of humanity.
Fear seldom leads anyone correctly. What we have to recognize is that life was defined by what was
happening in the lives of the Jews within a five hundred mile radius of
where they lived. Their understanding of humankind was extremely
limited. They knew nothing
about the Chinese to the east nor the Mayan, Aztecs, and Inca nations to
the west. If all the life forms on earth come to an end, it will not be the
result from any act of God, but from the desire of people who cannot
tolerate diversity. The other school of
thought confined the application of these Scriptures to life as it
has unfolded in every generation.
It would be ridiculous to assume that God was out of options when
it came to educating human beings on how to navigate their
life-experiences more successfully. God would never have allowed any of us to be born into the
physical world, blind as bats, and then to hold us accountable for the
choices we would make. The Hebrews never understood that human thought,
emotion, and spirit evolve over time like everything else. Here again, fear has allowed many Christians to believe that we
are in charge of our spiritual destiny as they point to Scriptures that
seem to suggest this idea.
Nothing could be further from the truth. Is there a better answer for
the chaos that people have experienced in every generation?
There is a better answer.
Free will is what
causes our constant drama.
There are billions of individuals, each with his or her own opinions on
how life should be lived. If we doubt this, just read
the headlines that have
appeared during the last several generations. There are different forms of governance. There are world leaders who are both loved and hated by the people who cast their ballots. No matter how thoughtful these leaders are, there will always be those who disagree with their policies of governing and will never find peace within themselves until that leader is removed. We can hardly imagine that a teacher who preached
love one another could ever
be crucified. If we want to
know how this can happen, look around at what angry responses have
caused people to do twenty-one centuries later during
a more civilized time. When it comes to religious practices, some of the values of faith
cause people to be extremely intolerant of the beliefs of others.
Some of them follow a war-god that wants death to everyone who
believes differently. Others have love and compassion as the
cornerstones of their lives while believing they have the exclusive path
to salvation. No one else is
in on this style of enlightenment. We could go on and on discussing the differences between
everyone's opinions. There
is no way to catalogue everyone's thoughts.
However, what we can do is realize that some opinions create
happiness, creativity, hope, and a willingness to forgive the results
from other people's lives.
Other opinions based in fear create hostility by projecting negativity
and dark outcomes. When we look at our Scripture lesson today and consider the words
of John 3:16, we learn that God never ceases to reach out to humanity
out of love. A teacher came
into our world to become a tour
guide, a moral compass, and a road map to navigate through the many
opinions and judgments that are being repeated by others.
Free will is a condition in which we find ourselves in our modern
history. People have never
had the freedoms that we enjoy today. Which would we prefer, freedom to
express anything we wish, or nice, orderly societies that march in
lockstep to the dictates of laws and mandatory social protocols?
The best definitions of living in the Life
develops such enthusiasm that the experience is like finding a treasure
partially buried in a field.
The discoverer sells everything he or she has in order to buy the
field. Or, a person
shopping discovers a vendor who is selling jewelry and he or she finds a
pearl that is worth far more than the asking price.
Again, the person sells everything in order to purchase that
pearl. In our language, Jesus was describing what happens when a person
chooses to live with a spirit that generates positive, loving results
regardless of his or her personal circumstances. Guides are trained to guide, not to intimate, not to use fear to
force others into some ideological mold, and to not dictate lots of
rules that require a discipline to follow. Jesus knew that people needed
to be loved even when they were thrashing around aimlessly with
attitudes that are not working for them.
All that any true guide can do is to point others to an open a
door and allow them to choose whether or not to enter.
No beliefs are required.
No thou shalts are
commanding that life must lived this way or that way.
However, what is required to own
the treasure or
the pearl is the desire to
experiment with attitudes that generate results that bring peace,
happiness, vision, creativity, thoughtfulness, and friendliness.
Finding and enjoying
these experiences is what
salvation looks and feels like.
What is misunderstood and often confusing to believers is that
salvation can be experienced
in spite of the label people wear of being a Hindu, a Buddhist, a Jew, a
Christian or a Muslim. What has prevented billions of people from experiencing a loving,
always forgiving spirit is that once their religions became
institutionalized and developed a professional priesthood, specific
beliefs, creeds, and orthodoxies were required by all believers.
After centuries of recitals, beliefs became dogma that originated
from God. This was a tragic
error in human thinking. Today we are free to
say that we do not have to believe anything about the meaning of the
cross or even about Jesus' resurrection to experience the
salvation
that Jesus was teaching.
We know this with absolute certainty because these
events had not yet happened when Jesus taught,
love your enemy and
first take the log out of your
own eye and you will see clearly to help your brother's or sister's
blindness. We need to ask ourselves,
Do we need to have any prescribed set of beliefs before we understand
the life-changing spirit that comes to us from expressing kindness,
mercy, and forgiveness?
Guides have one purpose and that
is point to a pattern of living that will generate essential results
that will enable us to be happy, peaceful, and fulfilled. We may encounter a very skilled, charismatic,
spiritual leader who tries to
convince us that we are lost
because we do not subscribe to certain beliefs that are absolutely
essential to salvation.
Being able to express the various qualities of life that Jesus
taught is far superior to being obedient to hundreds of beliefs, rules
and dictates prescribed by certain institutional religions.
Being happy,
contented, resilient, flexible, enthusiastic, optimistic, and visionary
come from our choices not our beliefs.
We depend of what we experience coming from our personal trust in
God. What others do with
their life-choices is up to them. They are sailing their
ships in exactly the direction that they wish, just as we are doing.
What often separates the quality of people's lives is their trust
in God's faithfulness to love them just as they are even if they never
develop the understanding of anything that Jesus was teaching. Remember that guides do one thing -- they point people to
an open door and allow them to make a decision about whether or not to
enter.
If we believe that Jesus saved the world because of what happened
on the cross on Good Friday, look around. We appear more divided than at
any other time in history.
How should we interpret this reality.
The human condition is
not a good thing nor is it an evil thing.
What everyone has always experienced throughout human history is
that life is what it is by design.
Our life-experiences have caused people in every generation to
search for better choices that work for them.
This is how salvation
appears in our lives.
Salvation comes in the form
of numerous attitudes that prevent us from remaining slaves to the
external influences found in our world. Jesus announced that we can become a light in darkness, long
before the events that we celebrate during Holy Week. (Matthew 5:14f)
When we are awakened spiritually, we become the guides Jesus wanted as
his disciples. We were called
to model a lifestyle filled with remarkable attitudes, not a
constellation of beliefs from priests imprisoned by the dictates of
institutional religion that provide an exclusive path to
salvation.
Those of us who can give ourselves away are living in
Heaven right now while others
can hardly wait to get there. They
have confused the way of life Jesus was teaching with some eternal
destination. The reality is
that Heaven has been here
since our birth and we have tried to find it rather than live in it. CONGREGATIONAL PRAYER Loving God, we ask this morning that you guide us through the maze that
our world represents.
So
often we find ourselves trying to serve two masters.
We desire to have what the world offers, yet we also want to
develop the skills of spirit.
We find our generosity being tempered by our material fears. We
want to stay young and attractive while aging happens anyway. We find
our calls for justice challenging our patience and peace.
So many aspects of life try to define us.
Guide us, O God, to remain faithful in our trust in you. Inspire
our decisions to reflect your loving spirit within us.
Amen.
THE PASTORAL PRAYER Always present God, whose word was as
faithful yesterday as it is right now, we thank you for the times when
we struggle with our responses to the conflicts that we have
personalized.
Lent offers
us such a unique time to graduate from holding on to the responses that
keep us prisoners of pain and that keeps us vulnerable to outside
influences stealing our peace at a moment's notice.
Since we will never control the attitudes and values of other
people, why not turn them into our personal trainers for our growth?
We
thank you that you created us with so many qualities that are available
to us. When we experience toxic personalities,
we can respond with patience and
compassion. When our values appear violated, we can remain
generous of spirit. When life presents us with challenging news,
we can display our trust in your support to carry our load with
confidence. When we experience the results from someone's lack of good
judgment, we realize that each person has many more talents and gifts
inside of them. Loving God, guide us to remember who you called us to be
so that we can find solutions to our conflicts rather than more places
to assign blame for how we think or feel.
No one directs our lives but us.
This morning we are grateful for the foundations of our faith that Jesus taught and demonstrated himself. He was never bothered by others because he had access to many tools that others did not have. Jesus invited us to use the tools that we have found to remain a light in darkness. We pray these thoughts through the loving spirit of Jesus, the Christ, who taught us to say when we pray . . . |