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“Share
Your Truth With Enthusiam”
Meditation Delivered By Rev. Dick Stetler – March 31, 2019
Centenary United Methodist Church Psalm 32;
John 18:28-38 This morning we are going to discuss a topic that has been
confusing inquiring minds for thousands of years.
After Jesus told Pontius Pilate, "I was born and came into the
world for this one purpose, to teach people about the truth."
Pilate responded by asking,
"What is
Truth?" (John 18:37f)
There is no record of Jesus' response to his question.
No one has ever defined
truth in a manner that has
satisfied everyone. There
are so many problems connected with why
the truth for one person can
vary widely from the
truth held by another. Pastors can deliver extremely insightful sermons
that reflect the same ideas that Jesus was teaching. However from their
pulpits, pastors can sense that many in their congregations are not
paying attention. Our minds naturally wander.
What is it that keeps our attention focused on what we consider
to be the
truth? During Jesus' ministry his people had absorbed
centuries of tradition, rituals and disciplines required by the Torah.
Do we honestly believe that Jesus verbally connected with his
listeners? Jesus knew that very few of them resonated with what he was
teaching. (Matthew 13:11) This is why Jesus became a storyteller. Jesus'
words of his first sermon
were very pleasing to people.
Yet as Jesus continued talking, within a matter of minutes,
his words became so threatening that they seized Jesus, dragged him out
of the synagogue, and attempted to throw him off a cliff.
(Luke 4:29). Can we
imagine Jesus' preaching creating violence in his listeners? There was another occasion when Jesus' teachings
had become so difficult to understand that countless people refused to
follow him any longer. This response to his preaching deeply discouraged
Jesus to the point where he asked his disciples, "What about you?
Are you going to leave me as well?"
(John 6:66) Think about how difficult it is today to speak
the
truth in a way that does not
offend or conflict with the
truth held by others.
Pilate's question was right on target for what has intrigued humanity
for thousands of years.
Truth is different for each
of us. Bermuda, the United Kingdom, and the United States
are among the nations that have political parties that differ widely on
their vision, values, and goals.
What holders of different truths
desire is a compromise where various political parties give a little of
what they want in order to achieve their goal of getting something done
for the good of their people. Perhaps Benjamin Franklin described the governing
process with great accuracy when he wrote:
When you assemble a
number of people to have the advantage of their joint wisdom, you
inevitably assemble with those people all their prejudices, their
passions, their errors of opinion, their local interests, and their
selfish views. Given this
understanding, what good is truth
if what we consistently get is a compromise or a composite of what
everyone thinks?
Suppose that the
truth Jesus was teaching had
nothing to do with any definition supplied thus far by any philosopher
or theologian? Jesus gave the answer
when he taught that truth was
instilled in people when they were born.
He encouraged his listeners to find
their truth by
choosing to live in the Kingdom
of God. In other words,
truth has been different for
everyone since the beginning of time.
How does our personal
truth become visible in our lives?
One day, I visited a
mother who had just had a baby.
When I came to the front door, I was greeted by her six-year old
daughter. She said, "Good morning! May I tell my mother who is here to
see her?" I introduced
myself. She responded,
"Would you like to come in and sit down while I get her?"
I could not believe such polite words were coming from a very
confident six-year-old. When I spoke to her
mother about the courteous way I was greeted, she said, "Mark and I have
no idea who this person is who joined our family six years ago." She
invited me to see her daughter's bedroom. The room was immaculate.
Everything had its place.
Her bookcase was filled with
books that she had read and they were alphabetized by the names of the
authors. She had taught herself to read and write with only mild
encouragement by her parents. Her mother continued,
"Dick, she is totally self-directed.
She knows what she wants to do and she does it without seeking
any guidance. Her daughter
had no idea how unique she was if compared to other children her age.
She was making visible very
early in her life, the results of
her truth of being what all of us are -- one-of-a-kind.
What Jesus came to teach was how to
live in our world and produce results that have value for ourselves and
for others. Such
truth cannot help but be as
different as there are people. Some people dedicate
their lives to sports by owning, coaching, or playing for an athletic
team. Their mutual goal in life is to produce winning teams. Channels on
our televisions are dedicated solely for sporting events.
Being involved in certain games produces salaries that ordinary
people will never reach.
What makes people different is the
amount of dedication and commitment they give to their passion.
Seen in this light, everyone has
a truth within them that
they can willingly embrace with enthusiasm once they find it.
This definition of truth
may be one that we have never considered.
Yet it makes total sense.
By embracing our core
desire, we differentiate ourselves by becoming electricians, carpenters,
doctors, plumbers, writers of computer codes, research analysts,
artists, dancers, entertainers, politicians, visionaries, news
reporters, or librarians.
This list goes on and on.
However, when we find these pursuits combined together, they create a
society that is useful and beneficial to everyone. Not only does
our truth generate income for
our livelihood, but we are excited to perform our tasks because our
performance is making a difference.
Our income is actually not that important when our desire is to
convert our
truth into an art-form.
Our
truth is our treasure and it
has little to do with the discovery of some remarkable insight that
links us with our Creator. What we are developing has extreme value to
us personally because it clears our vision.
It motivates us to develop skills and powers that others may
never develop. Our passion
for what we do energizes us as nothing else can. As we perfect our
discovery, we create new products, services, business plans,
successfully managed companies, and an array of new ways to deliver
our truth to a society that
is hungry for the next high-tech cell-phone, the next cars that are no
longer powered by fossil fuels, and the next cure for diseases that
challenge the health of millions of people.
No one could have known that Jesus'
ideas would become mainstream by defining our experiences as
our personal truth.
Jesus taught his listeners about the loving nature of our
Creator. He taught people
about an invisible world of enormous power that lies within each of us.
He offered information about how we are spirit-beings that are
having a physical experience.
He gave us an understanding of what eventually happens to us when
we leave our bodies at the end of our sojourn on the earth.
Jesus fed our minds with
the thought that our truth is
needed by everyone else, that by finding and sharing
our truth, we can
become like leaven for the entire batch of dough represented by
humanity. (Matthew 13:33) What makes us passionate for living is what
our Creator quietly and invisibly uses to feed the rest of us. You often hear me
singing the praises of Eugene Peterson who created a version of our
Bible that brings a clarity to our understanding of what was written
thousands of years ago. Had
Peterson lived in the 12th Century, he would have been burned
at the stake because he created an interpretive version of the Bible
rather than one that was accurately translated from the original Greek
found in the ancient scrolls. What is interesting is
that the Bible became known to the world as
The Word of God by a narrow
vote of an early Church Council.
Peterson made no such claim for his creation.
He simply gave what he wrote to his publisher and left the
authority of his words come from the minds and imaginations of
individual readers. What he
gave the world has worked for many readers that have rediscovered the
Bible. Readers could define
for themselves the inspiration that comes from his Bible called,
The Message. How could
Jesus' truth continue to give
courage, hope, and joy to thousands of generations.
His
truth is also within us.
Many people find a vocation to earn a living, but not everyone
finds their unique truth nor
do they develop a passion for expressing it. (Matthew 13:12)
They look at the clock.
They look forward to quitting time and our holidays like
Cup Match.
They eagerly await their paydays. Jesus presented humanity
with a forgiving, tolerant, and patient Creator that allows us to live
whatever truth we find. We
are free to break all the boundaries created by the
thou-shalts that can block
our growth.
Once we are free from fear, we
discover what living was designed to be.
THIS becomes our highly
personalized truth.
THIS becomes our gift to the world in spite of how humble that gift
might be. God uses
everything that we do which comes from our expressions of loving energy.
CONGREGATIONAL PRAYER
What peace comes over
us, O God, when we understand that you love us just as we are.
We are much like students who have come to the Master carpenter
to learn how to build a life.
We thank you for inspiration and guidance.
We thank you that we have the ability to change our minds, to
refine our thoughts, and to set our sights on more wholesome horizons.
Spare us from attitudes that make us complacent, comfortable, and
satisfied with who we have become.
Help us to remember that each day is a gift, each relationship is
a treasure, and each moment of uncertainty is a time when we can allow
our trust in you to become visible.
Use us as channels of healing during our moments with others.
Amen.
THE
PASTORAL PRAYER
Eternal
God, as we experience these days of Lent, for some of us they have
merely been like other days. Yet for those of us who have
intentionally looked within ourselves, we have found much to ponder.
We have wrestled with
our need to control our destiny, with our need
to smolder over experiences
that we will never change, and with our urgent need to accept peacefully
our lives just as they are. Jesus invited us to bloom anywhere we are
planted and not to complain about the quality of our soil.
Jesus taught us that authentic love expects nothing in return.
We have cried
"unfair" when our idea of justice has not prevailed. Through our
remembrance of Jesus' trial and murder, he has reminded us that
sometimes justice, fairness, and
truth are not a part of everyone's journey. We have learned
that when the righteous leaders
were the ones who brought charges against Jesus, you did not
intervene. You
turned the other cheek at his
crucifixion by giving us insight into eternal life that awaits all of
us. What a joy it is for us to understand that Jesus came to teach us, to lead us, and to liberate us from the poverty, tyranny, and imprisonment caused by our own thoughts and beliefs. We pray these thoughts through the spirit of Jesus, the Christ, who taught us to say when we pray . . . |