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“When
Our Beliefs Become Real” Sermon Delivered By Rev. Dick Stetler – February
11, 2018 Centenary United Methodist Church
II Corinthians 4:3-6; Mark 9:2-9
In our Gospel
lesson for today, Mark described an experience by Peter, James and John
that has no parallel in the Bible.
These moments were traumatic for the disciples.
Not only did Jesus’ appearance become radiantly transformed, but
he also began to speak with two
spirit-beings that the disciples assumed were Elijah and Moses. Finally, when a
cloud cover descended on the mountain, the men heard a voice coming from
within the cloud. When the
voice said, "This is my son.
Listen to what he has to say," they were overcome with terror and threw
themselves on the ground.
(Matthew 17:6) One of the most exciting and yet frightening moments in life is when what we talk about on Easter morning actually happens in the lives of people. There are a number of common responses from people when they have an encounter with deceased loved ones. There is an
immediate fear of what is happening. People have said that they froze as
their hearts began pounding harder than at any other time in their
lives. After the event, they often develop a genuine curiosity. People
want an explanation for what just happened. They want to know if what
they experienced was real. For most
people, they find a hesitancy and reluctance about telling anyone about
their experience. They do
not want anyone to draw conclusions that their experience was a part of
some grieving process, or that it will bring into question their mental
health. There are
numerous incidences in the Scriptures where people have had close
encounters with extraordinary experiences.
It was certainly not normal for God to call out to people from a bush that looked like it
was on fire. (Exodus 3:4) It was not an everyday event for Jesus to reach out to someone when that person was on his way
to A number of
people during my ministry have wanted to talk about their experiences in
great length. For them, the
experience was life-changing.
They knew that deceased people do not come back and talk to us.
They knew that they will be awakening from their surgery in the
recovery room, not during surgery where they clearly watched
their medical team still at work. And
yet, when these experiences occur, very few people know how to
understand and interpret what is happening. Some years ago,
I served on the Board of Directors of a corporation that owns and
manages five major campuses of Continuing Care Retirement Communities.
One of our administrators called me one afternoon with a concern.
From previous conversations we have had over the years, she knew
I would understand and make some recommendations.
Over sixty
residents had reported seeing
ghosts on her campus.
These were credible, highly intelligent people.
Some of them were among our
professional staff. One of our
registered nurses actually threw a bedpan at one of these apparitions
that scared the wits out of her by walking toward her and passing right
through her body. These sightings
became a problem because children could be heard laughing during late
evening hours when there were no children in the building.
Some residents were getting out of their beds and putting on
their clothes because they were directed to do so by these entities.
On different
occasions, a number of residents saw a Native American woman.
They provided identical testimonies about what she looked like
including the same description of the garments she was wearing.
One of the
concerns of our administrator was that these episodes might find their
way into the newspapers. She
did not feel that this news would be welcomed by our marketing
department, particularly because there were no explanations for what our
residents were experiencing. What is most
intriguing about these events is that our administrator explored the
history of what had taken place on the parcel of land many years prior
to our campus being built there.
She learned that an entire family with a good number of children
died during a house fire.
Long before that, a Native American woman had been murdered on our
building site. We dispatched
our chaplain to go to the campus in order to hold a service with the
concerned residents. It was
an awkward moment for our chaplain.
He was not used to conducting exorcisms. As strange as all this
may sound, after the service, there were no more incidents.
What I do know
is that these episodes were authentic and that their ending also
coincided with the discontinued use of an experimental device at a
United States Naval facility near our campus. The device created a very
low frequency hum that generated waves of vibration that was designed to
be used for underwater Naval defenses. This by itself
would not have drawn attention as a cause for what our residents were
experiencing. However, a
news article surfaced months later that this same experimental device
had produced the appearance of apparitions in The reason I
have intimate knowledge about these events is that these episodes
occurred during my tenure as chairperson of that Board of Directors.
The matter never surfaced in any
of our board meetings, so I am not clear even to this day how many
people knew about it. My purpose for sharing this story is for us to ask ourselves why
such events are greeted with surprise, shock, and fear.
Rather than confirming the truth that we live after we shed our bodies, a number of people
find ourselves being traumatized like the disciples who threw themselves
on the ground utterly terrified by the abnormal.
Why are we frightened by an event
that demonstrates what all of us confess as a matter of faith? Being as wise
as he was, Jesus advised the disciples not to tell anyone what they had
just experienced until "the Son of Man has risen from death." (Mark 9:9)
One would think that it was great news to tell everyone that they had
just witnessed Jesus talking with one of the earlier prophets and the
giver of the Laws that governed their people.
Jesus taught
his inner group of disciples: In my Father's house there are many
rooms and I go now to prepare a place for you so that where I am you
may be also. I would not
tell you this if it were not true. (John 14:2f)
We know this
teaching and we make claims that we believe this in our heart-of-hearts,
but a number of us would prefer to look forward to this experience and
have it become real after we leave our physical forms and not
before. As was
mentioned earlier, a number of people in my former churches have
reported to me that they were stunned when a spouse had returned to talk
to them, when a daughter experienced her mother's return to comfort and
reassure her that "Momma was doing just fine," or when a confirmed
atheist needed an explanation
for what he experienced. When I arrived
at the bedside of this police officer in our county, he told me that he
watched a nurse put the paddles of a defibrillator on his chest by
reaching through his body while he was sitting up. He turned
around and saw his body lying on the gurney experiencing a cardiac
arrest. Since I had performed his
marriage ceremony a number of years earlier, he turned to me for an
explanation. For John, this
experience became life-changing.
I told him that his
beliefs or lack of beliefs have nothing to do with what naturally
happens to everyone of us when we leave our bodies.
God would never allow
any of us to incarnate into our physical world if doing so put our
eternal destiny at risk. As
with many of our beliefs, we all formulate our own conclusions about
matters of faith. Our spiritual
growth advances according to the level of our spiritual awareness and
our thoughts about the nature of God's spirit. Lois and I both
experienced the intense presence of her deceased brother one evening as
both of us were returning to our home at different times. As she got out
of her car, she was overcome with fear and went directly into our home.
However, she told him to wait there because I would be coming
home shortly. When I
arrived, I also became filled with an awareness that Keith was there and
needed to communicate with me. I went into our backyard and had a
running conversation with him. A number of you have previously heard
this story. There have been
a number of these encounters in my life, so I am no stranger to such
events. However, I have never had a visual sighting.
I have only experienced words entering my mind that were clearly
not my thoughts.
What is most curious
about the experience of the three disciples in our lesson is that they
were not spiritually or emotionally secure even after this intense
episode with Jesus on that mountain.
They had listened to his preaching and teaching that the They ran as
Jesus was being arrested in the Garden. (Matthew 26:56) They gathered
behind locked doors. (John 20:19) Following
his death, Jesus appeared to a group of women.
When the women told disciples that Jesus was alive and that they
had just spoken with him, these
men of faith did not believe them. (Luke 24:11) Where was the
testimony of Peter, James and John about what had happened to them on Those of us who
know the story, recognize that something dramatically happened to the
disciples once they witnessed that Jesus was alive! These once
defeated men were suddenly energized by their new awareness.
They clearly were not bothered anymore by the threat of being
killed. They did not just
believe that life
continues, they knew
that life continues. Having such an
experience erases a lot of our fears.
If we could rid ourselves of fear, a large barrier to our living
would be removed. By conquering fear, we could bring with unbridled
enthusiasm a slice of Heaven
into the daily lives of everyone. CONGREGATIONAL PRAYER Loving, generous, and always present God, we often come together for
worship unaware of what to expect.
It is a challenge to let go of the distracting influences that
pass through our minds and emotions. We long for experiences that
transform how we interpret life’s events.
Help us to remember that without death we would not be able to
experience the joy of being spirit-beings. Without experiencing people
who are unkind to us, we would not have the opportunity to forgive.
Without hardships and challenges, we would become like
fair-weather sea captains.
Cause us to remember that the more we trust in your guidance, the
stronger our trust becomes.
Amen
PASTORAL PRAYER O God, there is so much about life that
we find difficult to understand. We look eagerly for the winds of
inspiration that give flight to our spirits.
We give thanks for the stream of divine energy that no one can
see.
Your presence surrounds
us and inspires our confidence that all of life’s complications will
eventually work out.
We are
amazed that not everyone can sense your presence as we do. We thank you for faith that enables us to
take risks that broaden our horizons. Thank you for the course
corrections that call us away from the places where we know we should
not be. We thank you for all the experiences that we cannot
explain.
Those moments
always come in a form that feeds our imaginations. Help us to remember
that in spite of how challenging life appears sometimes, we are never
without choices that are inspired by your presence. We pray for the 92 nations that have
gathered in The beginning of our Lenten season this
Wednesday is a remarkable time for the world to celebrate its
togetherness.
We pray these
thoughts through the loving spirit of Jesus, the Christ, who taught his
disciples how to pray each time they say . . . |