Being Fed: Having Heavenly Concerns...
Being Fed (Summer 2020) • Sermon • Submitted
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What would you do if you were not afraid?
What would you do if you were not afraid?
A few months ago, I stumble across this statement and while it hit me that day as I read it, it struck me more this week as I studied this story about Jesus describing how we are to live and what we are to do in this life. So, let me ask you to contemplate a few questions this morning…what would you do if you were not afraid? What kinds of things do you think that we could accomplish in this community and beyond, if we were not afraid?
Having been a part of Al-Anon, Nar-Anon, and ACOA, I have heard another phrase that speaks volumes to me and that is this one...
F = False
F = False
This may be hard to truly accept but what I have found in my life is that these statements are very true. Everything that I have ever truly feared in my life has never been what my mind has projected being the worst outcome and trust me, I am the king of projection when it comes to situations and scenarios.
But here’s the thing…when we think about our lives of faith, there really is nothing to fear because we hear over and over again, from Christ’s lips, that our lives are not about what we have or don’t have but rather what we do to reach out to the least of these. This is also a good time to stop and consider what the church truly is…so, let me ask you, what is the church? Who owns the church? And who is truly the head of the church?
As you contemplate all these questions in the coming days, let’s begin digesting another one of Christ’s corrective and difficult teachings on how we are to live and really talk about the question of who are we in Christ.
Background...
Background...
To get us started on this passage, let’s look at where and when we are in Christ’s life…we have been spending our time over the last few weeks within Jesus’ ministry in the Galilean countryside. Much of what we have talked about was his getting people prepared for today’s words. He has been establishing himself as the Messiah, doing some pretty amazing things to prove the he is who is who he says he is. He has also been transitioning to a time when the disciples and the others that follow him will be somewhat prepared for what must come next…his movement toward Jerusalem and ultimately his death on the cross.
For them, this was a difficult time. It was difficult because they had envisioned that Jesus would fight against the Roman oppressors and win some form of battle to bring peace to the Jews. However, in this passage, we hear him telling those gathered around him that this was not going to come to pass in their lifetimes (nor has it happened to this point in history).
Hard Lessons
Hard Lessons
What Jesus speaks in this passage is a hard lesson for his contemporaries and to be honest, it is hard for us to hear today. This is one of those times when we must truly face the hard, honest fact that God did not promise that we would have a life of ease. Quite the contrary, Jesus reminds us that our lives will be anything but easy and if we are truly living our lives the way he instructs, we will need to suffer.
The cold hard honest lesson here is that we must take up our own crosses and carry them through this life. Now, one little side note here…when we think about a cross, we often think of the one that Christ had to carry up the hill of Calvary and place on the ground, only to be nailed to it. While we may never physically endure this kind of torture or punishment, some of the things we face as a church are going to feel much like this. That is what Jesus is telling us we must do. OUCH!
I can hear you already thinking, “Wait, I thought that his burden was light”…well, gang, the burden that is light is not that we must carry our own crosses but rather the things we do to help others, love others, and be in service to others should be light in our hearts. These things should never be a burden to us…the opposition we face will always try to hold us back, give us reasons as to why we should not help, and it is these things that are heavy to carry.
What Christ is saying...
What Christ is saying...
In this passage, we hear Christ saying quite a bit actually and we will not be able to cover it all but I want us to focus on some really important words...
You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns
So here we have Jesus confronting Peter. The same man who is to be the rock of the church. The one who Jesus relies upon to carry the message of salvation for all peoples into the world. The one who Jesus calls out to personally to make the world a better place. And Jesus is telling him that he is a stumbling block. Another Ouch!
What we need to remember about this part of the passage is that Jesus offers Peter another way to look at his responsibility in advancing the kingdom of heaven here on earth…what I am hearing Jesus say here is this… “look, Peter, I get that we are really good friends and you don’t want me to leave or to die. But here’s the thing, you are focusing on my physical, earthly body. If you think about it long enough, I think you will see that this is not the most important thing about me. Think about all that I have done with and for you, none of it involves what you have in this world, but rather all that we have done together should show you that the most important thing is to give up trying to get ahead in this world and focus more on those who do not have as much as you.”
I know that is much more than what Jesus says, but this is the cross that Peter must bear. Peter must be willing to give up who he is, give up trying to be the best, the most informed, the one with all the answers, the one who knows everything, and especially, be willing to sacrifice himself for others. There are very few people, even today, who are willing to do all of these things.
I have to be honest with you here…over the last few years, I have experienced people telling me that they have this huge fancy house, or expensive car, because God wanted them to have it. And I have so wanted to say, “Fooey”. I don’t honestly think that God desires for us to have all these fancy possessions because it betters us. I think that God truly desires for us to have...
Where Our Hearts Are...
Where Our Hearts Are...
Hearts dedicated to the work that Jesus did while he was here…and what have we heard in the last few weeks that Jesus did?
Well, we heard him feed the only fish and loaves that were available to those gathered without concern as to whether the disciples or he ate. We heard him speak about how the miracles he has performed were not for the disciples or for himself, but for those who needed God’s healing love and to know that God cares about them. He has spoken about what it means to have a clean and pure heart.
Everything we have heard lately, while often hard to digest, is corrective even for us today. Most of what we have heard is that if we are going to profess to be Christian then we better be living as if we are…today is no different. If you heart is focused upon what you have or do not have then you have completely missed the point.
The Point...
The Point...
Simply put, the point is that our lives are not about this building, the land that we do or do not have, it is not even about us here today…our lives in Christian faith should be about making sure that ALL know about God’s love. If we want to share God’s love, cuz God knows the world needs a whole lot more love, just given the activities of the last week in this country…we need to figure out what cross we are going to bear and how we are going to carry that cross so that everyone knows that we are truly Christians. Your cross, meaning the one that each of you individually carries, is between you and God, but as a collective, I think there is more that we can be doing to reach those who need us…this is our challenge, something that we will be talking about quite a bit over the coming months. Amen.