Different
Sermon
Sermons On The Second Reading
Series I, Cycle A
The Christian faith is supposed to make a difference in our lives. If it doesn't, why should we bother with it? If the Christian faith is supposed to make a difference in our lives, then we should expect that Christians will be different. And, Christians are supposed to make a difference in the world. We know these things - and yet, we tend to want to minimize the difference. We want to be like everyone else - not to offend anyone - to make our faith more attractive to others. But it is the difference that gives the Christian faith its power to save. We would do well to remember just how radically different the Christian faith is from the way in which most of the other people we know live and to let that difference turn our lives into adventures in becoming and in changing things.
Paul said he came to preach the message of the cross and to preach it so that its power can come through.
Do you remember what the cross is all about? It is easy for us to forget, to turn it into a symbol of our religion - or a piece of jewelry. Remember where we got that symbol. The cross was an instrument of cruel torture and execution. A certain young rabbi, who came to show us a new way to live, was executed on the cross for being different and for trying to make a difference - and in that event, the eternal God, who made the heavens and the earth demonstrated God's self--giving love for us. The cross is not just a piece of jewelry or a symbol of a religion. It is the memory of an event whose meaning just keeps on unfolding for those who pay attention to it.
Paul said that message of the cross sounded like foolishness to most of the people to whom he was talking. The Greeks had one way of thinking about everything and the Jews had another, but the cross didn't fit into any of their ways of thinking. He said the cross was a stumbling block to the Jews and foolishness to the Greeks, something that got in the way of their accepting the Christian faith. The Corinthian Christians must have been tempted not to talk too much about the cross. They must have been tempted to turn Christianity into an attractive philosophy that sophisticated people would like.
That same thing is true for us today, isn't it? If we really take seriously the most essential aspects of our faith, won't most of the people in our own culture find it foolishness, something contrary to the way they usually think and act, something they would want to reject? (And isn't there something within even those of us who profess faith that argues with our faith and feels the same way about it?) Let's look at what this message of the cross really has to say to us.
First, it talks to us about God. The truth is, that is a problem for lots of people. No, there are not many people who claim to be atheists. Most of us say we believe there is a God - but most of us live as if there is not one. Most of us live lives shaped only by our relationships with those things that we can see and touch - and put in the bank. The idea of actually living lives that are shaped by a relationship with some great invisible reality that is beyond our understanding and our control is foreign to most of us. And the wisdom of our day argues against it, too. Science tells us that only things that can be proven "empirically" can count. Law tells us that our community affairs must be conducted in ways that are entirely secular. And, popular culture - the stuff that comes over the television - is eager to push God out of the way because most people associate God with some moral expectations that they find troublesome. Taking God seriously puts us at odds with our culture right off the bat.
Then when we talk about a God who loves us and demonstrates that love is an act of costly commitment, we are really talking a foreign language for lots of people. As we look out at life, many of us see something that is entirely indifferent to us. Others see something that just lays there and waits to be exploited. And many of the rest of us see life as something hostile that attacks us and against which we have to defend ourselves. To see life as the gift and embodiment of someone who loves us and wants what is good for us is a real stretch. But when we think of the giver of life as one who loves us enough to suffer for us, that is really hard to take in.
And if our culture has a hard time understanding what the message of the cross says about God and about all reality, we have an even harder time taking in what it tells us about how we ought to live. It calls us to live in ways that are exactly opposite to the ways in which we are most inclined to live.
The message of the cross calls us to live trustingly. To live in faith means to live trusting the love of God that was demonstrated in the suffering and death of Christ. The wisdom of our day tells us we had better not trust. We had better not trust many people, if any. And, we had better not trust the institutional structures of business or of government or even the church. With more and more of those institutions that we need to trust letting us down and giving us reasons not to trust them, we find it awfully hard to move out into life trusting something we can't see.
The message of the cross tells us to live lovingly. There are still some of us who know that the verb "to love" does not just mean "to have sex with," but when we talk about living in love, we don't have a very clear idea of just what that could mean. We suspect that it has to do with some kind of unrealistic sentimentalism.
And the message of the cross tells us to live in commitment to something bigger than ourselves. It tells us to take up our own cross, that is, to be ready to suffer if we have to and to live in commitment to the purpose of God. That is pure nonsense in our culture. Our culture tells us that life is about getting all you can for yourself no matter what you have to do to get it and that all suffering is to be avoided at any cost.
In his day, Paul said the message of the cross is foolishness - to those who are perishing. We can see that in our day, too, the message of the cross is foolishness to most people. But that is because most people are perishing. The reasons for which the cross seems like foolishness are the reasons why people are perishing - the reasons why we are perishing.
But wait! Who is perishing? What are we talking about? Those who live according to the wisdom of our world look to us like they are thriving and prospering. Those who are best at it live in big houses and drive big cars and don't seem to have a worry in the world. And the businesses and institutions and countries that live in that way seem to get respect and to have the power to control others. So it would appear.
But look again. A certain young man went into the highly competitive field of commercial real estate because he admired the wealth of those who were successful in that field. But as he got to know some of those successful people, he realized that most of them were living over--stressed lives, empty of any real satisfaction, and that no one he knew had a happy family life. He took warning and changed vocations.
What is really going on in the lives of those who live as if God has abandoned the world and who live defensive or exploitative lives, empty of love and committed only to selfish little goals? Are they really living - or are they perishing?
And what is going on in your life as the result of your own participation in that way of life? It is hard not to get drawn into participating in it to some extent. What is it getting you? Is what is getting you what is really good about your life - or is what is really good coming from another source?
And what is it getting for our world? Are the structures of community life and public morality and business life and national life really healthy - or are things beginning to fall apart? Think hard about that.
The message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing. That is why we are perishing. But to those who are being saved, it is the power of God. It is time for us to talk about that, isn't it?
What does it mean that the message of the cross is the power of God for those who are being saved? It means that it can lead us into a relationship with God that can make life work. It can make life really good in this world and give us the promise of eternal life in the world to come. It means that the message of the cross can lead communities and nations into a way of living together that could actually bring peace with justice in this world. The Bible writers had experienced this new life and they wrote to bear witness to it and to tell us how to enter into it. Paul ends one passage of scripture saying, "[God] is the source of your life in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification and redemption" (1 Corinthians 1:30). All of those are religious words that mean, with God's help, they had finally gotten it right.
But that is still a bold claim: The message of the cross is the power of God for salvation. Why should we believe it? Why should we bet our lives upon it - because we know that is where this whole conversation is going. We really need to know.
Well, let's ask again: What has been your experience? Earlier we asked what you had found to be the results of living according to the skepticism and cynicism and selfishness of the world. We have all participated in some of that. We know what it got us. But most of us have at least sampled the ways of relating to life that the message of the cross has taught. Have you sampled, even just in brief moments, the awe of realizing that there is some greater reality out there beyond the little things we can see and touch, some invisible reality that holds things together and makes them work? Have you even experienced the freedom that comes with being able to trust? Have you ever experienced being loved? Have you ever experienced sharing love with others? Have you ever gotten involved in the service of something bigger than yourself and experienced the new meaning that gives to your life? What were those experiences like? Didn't you find those experiences making you really alive in a new way?
Try to imagine what life would be like if those were the dominant attitudes and motives and qualities of your life. Wouldn't that be life at its best? Wouldn't that be salvation? Do you know anyone who seems to be living that kind of life more fully than you are? Does that person's life have about it qualities that you would like in your own life?
And what about the salvation of the world? We have all seen things falling apart because people keep exploiting and threatening and abusing each other for their own advantage and profit. Many of the important structures of life in our society, things like the medical care system, the legal system, and the welfare system, are in danger of falling apart because people have been exploiting them. Where have you seen the opposite thing happening? Have you seen communities and families where people were able to live together trusting each other and loving each other and where people worked together for the good of everyone? What was life like in those situations? It was really good, wasn't it? Can you imagine what life would be like if every community, every church, every family, yes, if the whole world learned to live that way? Wouldn't that be a kind of salvation for the world?
When Paul said that the message of the cross is the power of God for salvation, he was saying that God acted in Jesus Christ to show us a better way of life and to put us in touch with one who can help us actually to be able to live it. It is interesting that he spoke of those "who are being saved," not of people who have been saved. He and the other early Christians knew themselves as people who were in the process of moving from one way of life to another, and he experienced that as the process of being saved.
But, now, what are we going to do about that? It requires a decision of us - and it is not an easy decision to make. It requires a commitment of us - and it can be a costly commitment. Can you actually believe that this message that will seem like utter foolishness to most of the people around you - and probably also to certain parts of what is within you - is the way to fullness of life? Are you willing to leave the familiar old ways of living and to be really different? You will not need to act superior or to be offensively different, but you need to be willing to be made deeply different from the way you may have been and from the way most other people are, different in your basic ways of understanding life and of relating to life and everything in it, different in your ways of putting life together and making it work. Are you willing to venture out believing that the way you are following will lead to fullness of life and salvation?
Then are you willing to invite others to come and be different with you? Are you willing to work to make the world different as God wants it to be different? If you will, you can become a part of the hope of the world.
A certain man, we will call him Bill, told how he happened to become a Christian missionary. His story started when he was an aggressive young businessman, riding the wave of a booming economy in a city that was enjoying spectacular economic growth. He was intent on getting rich. He presented himself to others - and to himself - as a successful man who had everything going for him. But, in fact, everything was falling apart for him, his marriage, his business, his life.
At just that time, Bill went to one of those gatherings where businessmen go to make profitable contacts, and there he met an old friend who had been very successful in business and was then living in another state. They talked for a long time. The old friend invited Bill to come to visit him. They made an appointment. When the day for the appointment came, Bill flew his private plane to his friend's city, expecting to have some opportunity to make some money. The friend met him at the airport and drove him to a bank. He ushered him into a conference room where they met two other businessmen. So far, everything was going as Bill had expected.
But when the conversation started, Bill got a surprise. His friend told him that, during their previous visit, he had realized that Bill was going through some things that he had gone through. He told how he had been caught up in scrambling after material wealth as if that were the most important thing in his life, and how he finally realized that he was just about to make a mess of his life. Then he told how he had found peace and a truly fulfilling life through the Christian faith. The other two men at the meeting shared similar stories. Then they engaged Bill in a conversation about what was going on in his own life. The "meeting" lasted several hours. Before it was over, Bill was able to deal honestly with the fact that his life was disintegrating and to enter into the new possibility that his friends were trying to share with him. Bill had been a church member for a long time, but he had never moved his faith to the center of his life. He did that as he knelt with the three other men in the conference room of a bank and prayed.
In the months that followed the meeting, everything changed for Bill. The three men who had shared their faith with Bill had been able to allow their lives to be reorganized from the inside out while they continued in their same family and business situations. Their transformations had transformed their world. But it was too late for Bill. His old life collapsed. But he had found what he needed to build a new one. Bill eventually found himself living in a foreign country doing the work of a Christian missionary, living a life that was radically different from his old life, a life shaped by radically different values and commitments. But, Bill said he had never been happier. He was a different person, a person whose life was shaped by the message of the cross that he once would have called foolishness. He was different - and he was glad.
We are called to be different, too.
Paul said he came to preach the message of the cross and to preach it so that its power can come through.
Do you remember what the cross is all about? It is easy for us to forget, to turn it into a symbol of our religion - or a piece of jewelry. Remember where we got that symbol. The cross was an instrument of cruel torture and execution. A certain young rabbi, who came to show us a new way to live, was executed on the cross for being different and for trying to make a difference - and in that event, the eternal God, who made the heavens and the earth demonstrated God's self--giving love for us. The cross is not just a piece of jewelry or a symbol of a religion. It is the memory of an event whose meaning just keeps on unfolding for those who pay attention to it.
Paul said that message of the cross sounded like foolishness to most of the people to whom he was talking. The Greeks had one way of thinking about everything and the Jews had another, but the cross didn't fit into any of their ways of thinking. He said the cross was a stumbling block to the Jews and foolishness to the Greeks, something that got in the way of their accepting the Christian faith. The Corinthian Christians must have been tempted not to talk too much about the cross. They must have been tempted to turn Christianity into an attractive philosophy that sophisticated people would like.
That same thing is true for us today, isn't it? If we really take seriously the most essential aspects of our faith, won't most of the people in our own culture find it foolishness, something contrary to the way they usually think and act, something they would want to reject? (And isn't there something within even those of us who profess faith that argues with our faith and feels the same way about it?) Let's look at what this message of the cross really has to say to us.
First, it talks to us about God. The truth is, that is a problem for lots of people. No, there are not many people who claim to be atheists. Most of us say we believe there is a God - but most of us live as if there is not one. Most of us live lives shaped only by our relationships with those things that we can see and touch - and put in the bank. The idea of actually living lives that are shaped by a relationship with some great invisible reality that is beyond our understanding and our control is foreign to most of us. And the wisdom of our day argues against it, too. Science tells us that only things that can be proven "empirically" can count. Law tells us that our community affairs must be conducted in ways that are entirely secular. And, popular culture - the stuff that comes over the television - is eager to push God out of the way because most people associate God with some moral expectations that they find troublesome. Taking God seriously puts us at odds with our culture right off the bat.
Then when we talk about a God who loves us and demonstrates that love is an act of costly commitment, we are really talking a foreign language for lots of people. As we look out at life, many of us see something that is entirely indifferent to us. Others see something that just lays there and waits to be exploited. And many of the rest of us see life as something hostile that attacks us and against which we have to defend ourselves. To see life as the gift and embodiment of someone who loves us and wants what is good for us is a real stretch. But when we think of the giver of life as one who loves us enough to suffer for us, that is really hard to take in.
And if our culture has a hard time understanding what the message of the cross says about God and about all reality, we have an even harder time taking in what it tells us about how we ought to live. It calls us to live in ways that are exactly opposite to the ways in which we are most inclined to live.
The message of the cross calls us to live trustingly. To live in faith means to live trusting the love of God that was demonstrated in the suffering and death of Christ. The wisdom of our day tells us we had better not trust. We had better not trust many people, if any. And, we had better not trust the institutional structures of business or of government or even the church. With more and more of those institutions that we need to trust letting us down and giving us reasons not to trust them, we find it awfully hard to move out into life trusting something we can't see.
The message of the cross tells us to live lovingly. There are still some of us who know that the verb "to love" does not just mean "to have sex with," but when we talk about living in love, we don't have a very clear idea of just what that could mean. We suspect that it has to do with some kind of unrealistic sentimentalism.
And the message of the cross tells us to live in commitment to something bigger than ourselves. It tells us to take up our own cross, that is, to be ready to suffer if we have to and to live in commitment to the purpose of God. That is pure nonsense in our culture. Our culture tells us that life is about getting all you can for yourself no matter what you have to do to get it and that all suffering is to be avoided at any cost.
In his day, Paul said the message of the cross is foolishness - to those who are perishing. We can see that in our day, too, the message of the cross is foolishness to most people. But that is because most people are perishing. The reasons for which the cross seems like foolishness are the reasons why people are perishing - the reasons why we are perishing.
But wait! Who is perishing? What are we talking about? Those who live according to the wisdom of our world look to us like they are thriving and prospering. Those who are best at it live in big houses and drive big cars and don't seem to have a worry in the world. And the businesses and institutions and countries that live in that way seem to get respect and to have the power to control others. So it would appear.
But look again. A certain young man went into the highly competitive field of commercial real estate because he admired the wealth of those who were successful in that field. But as he got to know some of those successful people, he realized that most of them were living over--stressed lives, empty of any real satisfaction, and that no one he knew had a happy family life. He took warning and changed vocations.
What is really going on in the lives of those who live as if God has abandoned the world and who live defensive or exploitative lives, empty of love and committed only to selfish little goals? Are they really living - or are they perishing?
And what is going on in your life as the result of your own participation in that way of life? It is hard not to get drawn into participating in it to some extent. What is it getting you? Is what is getting you what is really good about your life - or is what is really good coming from another source?
And what is it getting for our world? Are the structures of community life and public morality and business life and national life really healthy - or are things beginning to fall apart? Think hard about that.
The message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing. That is why we are perishing. But to those who are being saved, it is the power of God. It is time for us to talk about that, isn't it?
What does it mean that the message of the cross is the power of God for those who are being saved? It means that it can lead us into a relationship with God that can make life work. It can make life really good in this world and give us the promise of eternal life in the world to come. It means that the message of the cross can lead communities and nations into a way of living together that could actually bring peace with justice in this world. The Bible writers had experienced this new life and they wrote to bear witness to it and to tell us how to enter into it. Paul ends one passage of scripture saying, "[God] is the source of your life in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification and redemption" (1 Corinthians 1:30). All of those are religious words that mean, with God's help, they had finally gotten it right.
But that is still a bold claim: The message of the cross is the power of God for salvation. Why should we believe it? Why should we bet our lives upon it - because we know that is where this whole conversation is going. We really need to know.
Well, let's ask again: What has been your experience? Earlier we asked what you had found to be the results of living according to the skepticism and cynicism and selfishness of the world. We have all participated in some of that. We know what it got us. But most of us have at least sampled the ways of relating to life that the message of the cross has taught. Have you sampled, even just in brief moments, the awe of realizing that there is some greater reality out there beyond the little things we can see and touch, some invisible reality that holds things together and makes them work? Have you even experienced the freedom that comes with being able to trust? Have you ever experienced being loved? Have you ever experienced sharing love with others? Have you ever gotten involved in the service of something bigger than yourself and experienced the new meaning that gives to your life? What were those experiences like? Didn't you find those experiences making you really alive in a new way?
Try to imagine what life would be like if those were the dominant attitudes and motives and qualities of your life. Wouldn't that be life at its best? Wouldn't that be salvation? Do you know anyone who seems to be living that kind of life more fully than you are? Does that person's life have about it qualities that you would like in your own life?
And what about the salvation of the world? We have all seen things falling apart because people keep exploiting and threatening and abusing each other for their own advantage and profit. Many of the important structures of life in our society, things like the medical care system, the legal system, and the welfare system, are in danger of falling apart because people have been exploiting them. Where have you seen the opposite thing happening? Have you seen communities and families where people were able to live together trusting each other and loving each other and where people worked together for the good of everyone? What was life like in those situations? It was really good, wasn't it? Can you imagine what life would be like if every community, every church, every family, yes, if the whole world learned to live that way? Wouldn't that be a kind of salvation for the world?
When Paul said that the message of the cross is the power of God for salvation, he was saying that God acted in Jesus Christ to show us a better way of life and to put us in touch with one who can help us actually to be able to live it. It is interesting that he spoke of those "who are being saved," not of people who have been saved. He and the other early Christians knew themselves as people who were in the process of moving from one way of life to another, and he experienced that as the process of being saved.
But, now, what are we going to do about that? It requires a decision of us - and it is not an easy decision to make. It requires a commitment of us - and it can be a costly commitment. Can you actually believe that this message that will seem like utter foolishness to most of the people around you - and probably also to certain parts of what is within you - is the way to fullness of life? Are you willing to leave the familiar old ways of living and to be really different? You will not need to act superior or to be offensively different, but you need to be willing to be made deeply different from the way you may have been and from the way most other people are, different in your basic ways of understanding life and of relating to life and everything in it, different in your ways of putting life together and making it work. Are you willing to venture out believing that the way you are following will lead to fullness of life and salvation?
Then are you willing to invite others to come and be different with you? Are you willing to work to make the world different as God wants it to be different? If you will, you can become a part of the hope of the world.
A certain man, we will call him Bill, told how he happened to become a Christian missionary. His story started when he was an aggressive young businessman, riding the wave of a booming economy in a city that was enjoying spectacular economic growth. He was intent on getting rich. He presented himself to others - and to himself - as a successful man who had everything going for him. But, in fact, everything was falling apart for him, his marriage, his business, his life.
At just that time, Bill went to one of those gatherings where businessmen go to make profitable contacts, and there he met an old friend who had been very successful in business and was then living in another state. They talked for a long time. The old friend invited Bill to come to visit him. They made an appointment. When the day for the appointment came, Bill flew his private plane to his friend's city, expecting to have some opportunity to make some money. The friend met him at the airport and drove him to a bank. He ushered him into a conference room where they met two other businessmen. So far, everything was going as Bill had expected.
But when the conversation started, Bill got a surprise. His friend told him that, during their previous visit, he had realized that Bill was going through some things that he had gone through. He told how he had been caught up in scrambling after material wealth as if that were the most important thing in his life, and how he finally realized that he was just about to make a mess of his life. Then he told how he had found peace and a truly fulfilling life through the Christian faith. The other two men at the meeting shared similar stories. Then they engaged Bill in a conversation about what was going on in his own life. The "meeting" lasted several hours. Before it was over, Bill was able to deal honestly with the fact that his life was disintegrating and to enter into the new possibility that his friends were trying to share with him. Bill had been a church member for a long time, but he had never moved his faith to the center of his life. He did that as he knelt with the three other men in the conference room of a bank and prayed.
In the months that followed the meeting, everything changed for Bill. The three men who had shared their faith with Bill had been able to allow their lives to be reorganized from the inside out while they continued in their same family and business situations. Their transformations had transformed their world. But it was too late for Bill. His old life collapsed. But he had found what he needed to build a new one. Bill eventually found himself living in a foreign country doing the work of a Christian missionary, living a life that was radically different from his old life, a life shaped by radically different values and commitments. But, Bill said he had never been happier. He was a different person, a person whose life was shaped by the message of the cross that he once would have called foolishness. He was different - and he was glad.
We are called to be different, too.
