Agents of another reality

Mark 1:14-20 

When a company is under investigation, nobody suggests it’s a great time to invest your money. Who decides to buy an apartment in a building that’s on fire? I’m just saying, cheerfully recruiting new talent when your public spokesperson has just been arrested seems an odd strategy.  

Even though John’s been thrown in jail, Jesus still blows into town saying, I’ve got great news! God’s way is unfolding right now! Change your whole way of seeing things and sign on with me!  At the least, John’s arrest is terrible PR for the movement; at most, shouldn’t it give you pause? And yet, Jesus seems worried not at all. And yet, a bunch of them actually join up.  

The NRSV version makes it sounds like they sign up for a job change – instead of fishing for fish they’re going to fish for people. OK, maybe not entirely the same skill set, but kind of an exciting, lateral move? Risky obviously, given John’s arrest, but a possible upgrade in adventure, at least. Think it over, talk it over with the family, find out the benefits package and maybe give Jesus an answer in a day or two?  But they don’t pause to mull it over, “Immediately” they leave their nets and follow Jesus. 

Being human in the world means with all of our choices and actions we are always asking, What is a good life and how do we live it? And these guys had it answered, at least for the time being. They were fishermen; fisherpeople. They had the skills, the training, the connections and the tools. It’s who they were, it’s how life worked, it’s what they knew, and how they were known in the world, they were fishermen. There was no questioning it, it was the order of things. But with one word from Jesus, and despite the bad news about John, they walk away from everything they know to follow him.

 

When our translation says, “I will make you fish for people,” it captures the true meaning, which is that it is for everyone, humankind, not just men.  But we lose something from the original poetic contrast. Listen: As Jesus passed along the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a net into the sea--for they were fishermen. And Jesus said to them, "Follow me and I will make you fishers of men.”  

But by changing “fishers” to “fish for” a noun was made into a verb.  

 

In that moment, Jesus isn’t just giving these people a different job, telling them to do something different. He’s not calling them to work for a new cause. He’s not changing their verb; he’s giving them a new identity.  Jesus isn’t calling us to do stuff for him. Jesus is calling us to follow him and then he points us toward other people.

 

Follow me, and I will make you a fisher of persons. He’s starting where they are, in terms they understand, but inviting them into something they can barely grasp, something that doesn’t even exist in their imagination, something only discoverable by following. 

 

Today we so often think our verb is our identity. We mix up who we are with the things we do.  We think the answer to what a good life is comes from our own efforts, or we let the voices around us tell us makes a person successful or right, and we cling vigilantly to those ideas.  We make it ok to despise those with opposing strategies for the same security and fulfillment as we’re chasing.  And we center ourselves and our well-being, because if we don’t who will?

 

These first disciples did not leave their nets to follow Jesus because he offered a better salary and benefits package, or a more exciting opportunity for advancement, or because he inspired them to fight for a cause, or guilted them to work for a change, or gave them a chance to prove how good they are, or promised a sure path to safety.  

I think they followed Jesus because Jesus came embodying a completely different reality altogether. One where the circumstances around you don’t dictate your identity and your security.  Where—even in the midst of frightening developments and unexpected losses—you still somehow trust, and even proclaim, that God’s up to something unstoppable.  Where the authority over your life is bigger than the powers of the age, and fear doesn’t determine what you’re willing to do or say, your connection to God and others does.

 

The time is fulfilled! Jesus declares. There are two words for time in the Greek, Chronos time means hours, minutes and days, and Kairos time, means the right, opportune time.  Jesus says there is no better time.  Eternity is breaking in now. Right now God’s reality is fully here.  God’s way is unfolding around and in and through and despite us, in no time like the present. 

Love that is eternal - unbreakable, unstoppable and neverending - has punctured our limited, ordinary, right now existence. Eternity is invading this chronos time where our bodies wear out, and our jobs disappear, where our capacities ebb and flow, and our friends move away or die, where we’re always facing unknown, and nothing ever stays constant, where we struggle to find our footing, and when we think we’ve figured life out, it’s not long before we have to start figuring it out all over again.  

 

But, as real as all that seems, as real is it all is, as all-encompassing as our verbing along in chronos time feels, none of that is what truly, deeply defines us. That is to say, being fisherpeople-or teachers or pastors or nurses or Democrats or Republicans or colleagues or volunteers--for however long, or however well, we do that, while those things we do are part of us, they are not who we are. 

 

When God-with-us calls us to be fishers of people, we are called to point our lives in love toward the world and its inhabitants because right now, this moment, God is here with us. Right now, we are here, alongside each other in this fleeting time-bound life. 

No matter how much or little we contribute at any given time, how ready or equipped we feel or don’t, right now we are loved, and we can love. We are seen and we can see one another.  

Amidst an ever-changing landscape of upheaval, we are part of something transcendent and called to something permanent. Within our chronos reality we are drawn into Kairos kind of living, the right-now-ness of God’s presence. So we are fishers of people while we teach, or nurse, or parent young children, and when those verbs disappear, we are still fishers of people; our lives still participate in the deeper reality of love. From the moment our hearts are awakened to this calling, to our last living breath and then beyond, with whatever we have to offer, in whatever ways that looks, we are here with and for each other, because we’re following the one who is with and for us.

 

Even though John had just been arrested, the Kingdom of God is near. Even though bad things continue to happen, even though injustice and unfairness persist in our world, suffering is real and people are frequently cruel and more often thoughtless– no amount of darkness can put out the light, nothing can stop where this is heading. 

That morning Jesus came strolling onto their beach joyfully declaring, God’s reality is available right now, right in the midst of what is. Turn in a new direction, and trust in this good news.’  

Follow me, Jesus said to them that day, And I will make you agents of this reality in the world. 

To each of us, he says the same.

 

Amen.

Recruited for Love in These Times

Matthew 1:18-2:15

This morning I sat in my living room watching chunks of my Christmas tree lights stutter and blink insistently, like Will sending a message from the Upside Down, and then, section by section, over the course of an hour or so, groups of lights held hands and silently screamed and died.  Now there are several gloomy, unlit spots on the tree, and I sat contemplating how the tree in my living room feels like a symbol for everything.  

This was a lovely tree in the field when I cut it down.  But the trunk wasn’t long enough for my tree stand, so when I secured it in, it swung around wildly, crashing to the floor at least twice.  So I cut off some bottom branches, and ended up taking out all the beautiful tree-shaped bulk and leaving it looking like an upright, green chicken drumstick with a huge bite out of it.  So I stuck a piece back into the stand on its own to fill the hole, a patch, if you will. 

The tree boasts a sparse smattering of ornaments because, after three days of looking at it empty and commenting plaintively to each other that we needed to decorate it, Maisy finally mustered the energy to hang a few on. But the Bing Crosby listening, egg nog drinking, ornament nostalgia memorabilia fest was not happening in our house this year.  

I keep coming back to something Mark Yaconelli recently said is helpful to remind young people, which my pastor friends keep telling each other and everyone else: It’s normal to feel tired in tiring times. It’s normal to feel anxious in anxious times. It’s normal to feel sad in sad times. 

These are tiring, anxious, sad times.  And our skins are thin, our patience for navigating all of this was spent months ago. Lots of us are edgy, and most of us are tired. I copied down a line from an Economist headline the other day, “Era of Unpredictability is Not Going Away Soon.” I keep looking back at it to help myself let it in.

 

So, into this comes the Christmas Story. And I don’t know what kind of unpredictable times they were living in, or anxious times, or sad or tiring times, but it’s safe to say human beings have been times like these all throughout history.  And God keeps recruiting us for love anyway, or maybe even recruiting us for love for these kinds of times.  In truth, there is no time God is not calling us into this life alongside each other to join Jesus there, and to be part of what God is already doing, despite the times, in the times, and through the particulars of the times. And this week I have been struck by how God reached out to each of the people in the Christmas story differently, specifically.

 

We have spent Advent peeking in on the Christmas story, preparing our hearts to receive it again.  We began where Luke begins the story of Jesus – with Old Zechariah, a priest from the hill country, and his long dead prayers for a child being suddenly answered even as his prayers on behalf of the people for salvation for Israel were being answered. God met Zechariah in the silence. He was a witness, a mystery bearer, one who does the holy act of observing what God is up to.  

God recruited Zechariah through an ego tussle with a smug angel, nine months of imposed silence, and the invitation to watch and marvel.

 

And Elizabeth, with her astonishing new role as a mother in her old age, keeping it all to herself until the summons to be a friend, sharing pregnancy with her very young niece Mary.   In her age and wisdom, she was bearing in her womb the great prophet who would announce the Messiah.  She recognized the mother of God who came to her.  And together they prepared for the world to change, with joy, and wonder, and trepidation, and learning, and hormones, and Zechariah at their beck and call, they bore in their bodies the God who comes in the flesh to bear this human life with us, and the one who will prepare the way, and ready the people’s hearts for his arrival. 

God recruited Elizabeth through resurrected hope, stirred vision and understanding and the gift of precious companionship.

 

And Mary, the one who said yes to being the bearer of God.  A life interrupted and rerouted, for a world reoriented and redeemed.   She was given Elizabeth and Zechariah, given courage and insight, given the Spirit to overshadow her and fill her very body with the life of the world.  Mary is shored up for the road ahead, and promised the guidance of God. 

God recruited Mary with an angelic visit of gentle reassurance and by being drawn into a small community of support to share with her this miracle, to surround her, uphold her and prepare her for what is to come.

 

Then we meet the shepherds, going about their business, not expecting or looking for anything outside the routine.  There was nothing to make them seem worthy of sharing in anything majestic or important, nothing to make them even wonder about such things.  They tend sheep, look after them, the way Jesus later says God does for all of us.  They become in Jesus’ teachings, a template of God’s consistent, relentless watching over us, God’s protection of us and God’s ceaseless, night and day care of us.  And they are invited to bear witness to what is unfolding. 

It was with an angelic choir breaking open the night sky, the most spectacular chorus of music and light and life, a heavenly celebration spilling over into earth, inviting these particular ordinary people to join in the joy, to peek at the promise that God recruited the shepherds.

 

Now this week we turn to Matthew’s story of the Christ.  And we meet Joseph, who wasn’t invited, wasn’t informed ahead of time, was simply told what was happening and left to adapt.  Joseph, who was called to walk a road he didn’t get to choose, chose to walk it with grace and generosity. Joseph chose to let go his own plans for life and accept the life he was handed, the role he was called to.  

God recruited Joseph through grief and loss and unacceptable circumstances, a dream and a relinquishment of power. And he accepted of a path of love and cooperation with God.

 

And we meet the Magi.  Scholars from far away, outside this story, not hoping, longing, looking for a Jewish Messiah, minding the signs of the cosmos, anticipating the movements of the universe. They are brought into the story and eager to follow where it leads, ready to discover what it holds. Persistent and dogged, traveling for years, arriving at the home of a toddler, shocking the neighbors and confounding his parents with their sureness and their foreignness. The magi embody the promise extending to the ends of the earth, celebrating a redemption that belongs also to them, and so to all of us too.  

God recruited the Magi through science and study, through their own intellect and diligent connecting of dots, through their determination and due diligence, and through their trust.

 

This story breaks all boundaries. Heaven and earth come together, kings are brought down and the marginalized and overlooked are drawn into the center. Strangers already belong.  Plans are thwarted and courage is kindled, the unknown is embraced and a community is formed of the most unusual collection of folk, recruited by God to be those to whom God comes, those in whose care God entrusts his baby human self, those who God trusts to share in this great mystery and promise for the whole world.  Not because they earn it or deserve it, just because God does it.  

 

And nobody gets the same invitation, nobody plays the same part; God takes pleasure in meeting each person specifically, uniquely, in a variety of unexpected approaches, particular to each life, which is to say, there is no end to the ways God comes into this world. There is no one outside God’s sights.   Each of us is called into the promise.  Each of us is invited to participate.  Each of us is recruited for love.  Every life is part of God’s great schemes.  

 

This week on Christmas Eve we will gather together to share the story of Jesus.  And we will tell this one little part of it. But the story of Jesus transcends all times.  It started way before this part – before time existed, when the word was with God and through whom all life into being.  And the story of Jesus outlasts you and me, and every nation and culture, and conflict and war, and advancement and civilization, and species and the very earth itself.  And you and I, right now, today, in these very times, are living the story of Jesus, the story of God coming in, the story of love greater than death interrupting ordinary life with promise.

 

May we be ready to receive this story. May we be open to being recruited too.

 

Amen.

Attuned and Ready

John 1:29-39

I am really awkward at parties. Maybe it's because I didn't go to a lot of them when I was younger so I'm still learning or something, but I just can't seem to find my way in to relaxing and being normal at a party.  

Last night I was at a party in a neighbor’s backyard. And as we were standing there with our drinks in our hands making small talk, a mom in the neighborhood, who I’ve known since our kids were in kindergarten, began complaining about the religious teaching at the private middle school where her daughter attends. And she kept apologizing to me.  Knowing that I am a pastor, so not just a Christian, but like, a super invested, professional Christian, every time she brought up any criticism about, as she called it, “churchy stuff,” she would lay her hand on my arm and say, “I’m sorry,” and then go on to finish her comment.

I am not sure how to take it when this happens. As though I represent all of Christianity in any given situation, a whole belief system, never mind that there are some 43,000 different Christian denominations in the world, each believing nuanced things different enough from others to designate them a distinct group. And then between and within all those different groups, there are different ways to answer, Who is God?  

They Baylor University Institute for Studies of Religion survey of American religious life found that American Christians have roughly four different gods, a third of us believe in an authoritarian God, a quarter believe in a benevolent God, a quarter have a distant God, and the rest, a critical God.  Whichever of these gods we have is a higher predictor of our political and moral attitudes than is our religious tradition. 

So what does it mean to be a Christian? 

When my neighbor sees me, what does she think my life consists of? 

How does she imagine I shape my world, or operate within it? 

Differently enough from her that she finds it necessary to apologize to me if she says anything critical about religion, clearly.  But would she be surprised to know my own Christianity looks really different from my parents’ or my siblings, or the other Christians on our street, or other Christians in my own denomination, or even that our faith looks different within a single congregation?  

How do we know what to believe, how to live, what to follow? 

How do we know what God is really like?  

Do we just pick the version of God that sounds the best and go with that? 

What about the one that connects most to whatever childhood trauma or psychological issues I’m working through at the moment?  So I have a “distant God” until my guilt or shame conjures up a “critical God,” and then I soothe myself with with a “benevolent God” who suits me just fine till I mess up and then the “authoritarian God” kicks in?  

It’s all very confusing, what we humans have done with the whole idea of following Christ.  It seems it can mean anything people make it mean, as long as they can make a good case for it.  Does it mean adding things to my life?  Like prayer and good works and reading my bible? Does it mean subtracting things from my life? Like gossip and sex and drinking and lying?  

How do we know when we’ve arrived?  How can we measure if we are doing it correctly? The whole thing has become very complicated.

“In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God.  He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did knot know him.  The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness cannot overcome it."  

The book of John begins this way just a few verses before our text.  It goes on to say, The word became flesh and dwelt among us and we have seen his glory… full of grace and truth.”

How do we recognize God? How do we follow?  The first disciples in John are told, “Look! There’s the lamb of God, there is the one.”  

And they followed Jesus. They let their curiosity lead. 

They didn’t know what they were doing yet; they were just awakened to the possibility of something. They were looking, so they kept looking, kept watching.

And Jesus turns and sees them.  He sees them.

And then he asks them, “What are you looking for?”

And all these conversations are going on at many levels at once. 

They scramble for a response. How to keep the conversation going…“Teacher," they say, “where are you staying?”

And Jesus answers the question beneath the question, the one they are really asking but maybe don't have words for, the reason they’re looking, their deep longing and hope and curiosity, and he says, “Come and see.” Come find out.

So they do.  They spend the day with him; it says, they abide, they remain, they loiter with no agenda in particular. They sabbath with the Son of God, hanging out listening, talking, sharing food, and space alongside each other. Watching and listening, being heard and seen. 

They find Jesus and they are found.  

They go from looking to seeing. 

And the next day they tell a couple of others, We have seen; you should come and see too!

“He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; and yet the world did not know him.” 

God is in the world, right here among us.  

The Church is the community who sees.  Disciples, Christians, followers of Christ, we seek to see God right in the midst of it all, right here.  To see Jesus. 

And we need each other for this.  Because not all of us see all the time; in fact, most of us don’t see much of the time. 

We forget to look. We forget to listen.  Or we’re just learning again how to.  But because we keep inviting each other, Come and see, we keep taking turns getting glimpses. By being in this together we go from looking for Jesus out there to seeing Jesus right here.  

Rowan Williams says being a disciple is a state of being.  It’s not a belief system or a list of behaviors or doctrines to subscribe to. It’s a willingness to live attentive, expectant, awaiting the action of God in the world, trusting it is always about to occur.

And then it’s submitting to that.  Letting it lead you.  Hanging out where Jesus hangs out. Which is both with the outcast, and with the Father – that is, really seeing those around us and sharing their place, being pulled out of our comfort and self protection towards each other – the other that might be most challenging for us.  

And resting in the love of the Father to the Son, the unconditional and without end love that flows inside the Trinity.  That’s the basis of prayer – to simply be as present as possible, and accept that God is already present right here with you, and then being in that love and listening with your being, open to what might come next.

A disciple is a learner. Williams says, and what we are learning is “how to be a place in the world where the act of God can come alive.” 

This is what we are learning. This is what God is doing to us.  Making our lives into a place in the world where the act of God can come alive.  Making us alive, and making us into participants in the resurrection power of Christ as it brings life to others, to the world.  

Being a disciple is living with attentiveness, ready and willing to act in love, expectant that God will act, and show will us what to say or do to join in God’s act.

This is not a religion. It’s allowing Jesus to come into our own death experiences and bring us alongside others in theirs, trusting new life will emerge, and then watching for it to happen. It’s being seen by God, being asked by God, what are you looking for?And responding.

And when God speaks, when God acts, it transforms our images of who God is. It’s not a type of god or a type of belief; it’s a living conversation with our Maker that remakes us.  The Holy Spirit reconnects us, to God and each other. 

I upped the awkward last night by excusing myself early from the conversation because I needed to go home and finish my sermon.  This neighbor asked, “What are you going to preach about?” 

And after she pressed me I told her about our question for the year – Who is God and what is God up to?  And she said, “I think God must be disappointed in us for how we’ve been treating each other lately.”

And I answered, “I believe God is always here, in every moment doing something, even right here.” I even gestured around the party, where groups of people chatted and ate, a band played music while a few people danced, and children ran around laughing and yelling.  

I continued, “And we can try to learn to pay attention under the surface, to notice how we already belong to God and one another and join in.”  

Her response was, “I’m with you.  It’s all about community, right?  It’s all about community.” 

And almost back to my house, in the middle of the sidewalk, I blurted outloud to myself, “No! That’s not it! It’s not just all about community!” And I felt frustrated that I hadn’t gotten to the heart of it. Because the heart of it is deeper, and unknowable, and something I couldn’t really explain.

GOD IS HERE, already doing something.  There is something bigger and wilder, not in our control, not ours to manipulate, or grasp even, or get right or screw up.  It’s beyond what our minds can comprehend or our bodies could contain.  Our hearts’ deepest longing cannot begin to sink to the depths of this, our most euphoric joy and most soul-rending sorrow are a finger dipped in the punch bowl of God.   

And when I had looked around the party, and suggested that God was right there, for just a moment my discipleship flared up, a little “what if?” sparked inside me. What if God does something right here? Right now? In one of these conversations? What if there is a moment that changes the trajectory of a life? That sets someone free? A word that brings unexpected healing?  A door that opens to new hope or possibility?An inexplicable flash of love and belonging that sets off a journey? It could happen at any moment.  It doeshappen at any moment; somewhere it is happening, even in this very moment right now. 

What makes us followers of Christ is that we expect that Jesus might do something at any moment, and that he might involve us.

So do we let things go?  Of course! 

Whatever clogs our view of what Christ might be doing, whatever blocks our path of participating in love when we are summoned to do so, we let those things go.  They are keeping us from the full and joyful life we are called to.  The harder we hang onto them, the more likely they are blocking our view of God, and the more clearly we will see and freer we will be to participate if we let them go.

Do we add things? Of course! Whatever helps us to both look and see, to both listen and hear where God is and what God is doing.  We are given witnesses of who God is and what God does in scripture and in each other’s lives, so let’s spend some time in those places.  Purposely adding things that take away barriers, deceptions and distractions– practices that clear us out and focus us and keep us present, like prayer and silence and stillness, these help us to be disciples, they help us to see Jesus.

What version of God do we go with?  It doesn’t matter.  They’re all two dimensional projections of god made in our image.  They will all be crucified when the real God encounters us. Start somewhere. God promises, when you seek me you will find me.  So seek. Look.

Which denomination is right? None of them! They’re all just structures, built around ideas which are built around a shared desire to know and serve God. They get some stuff right and lots of stuff wrong.  So pick one and begin.

Join a church. Find the disciples. Be a disciple. Let go the things that keep you from Christ, add in the things that lead you to Christ. And watch and listen for the living God, who might intervene presently, and who may summon you to act in love at any moment.  

How do we know when we have arrived?  

There is no arriving, there is only abiding.  

And if we are worried about measuring if we’re doing it correctly, we are focusing our watching and listening in the wrong direction.

Being a disciple is “being where you are in order to be changed.”  This is thrilling and terrifying. Over and over it puts us to death and raises us to new life.  This being changed is never finished, but it’s also not ours to finish. God does this in us. 

What is ours to do is to be where we are. To expect God to act. To assume the Holy Spirit will change us.  To practice paying attention.  Something is about to break at any moment.  (Maybe even be in the middle of a party!)  And when it does, maybe we will see it, and perhaps we will let Jesus involve us in whatever that might be.  

Amen.

(This season, our congregation is reading Rowan Williams' Being Disciples: Essentials of the Christian Life, and drawing from it for our worship and Sunday school.  This chapter was: Being Disciples. Next up: Faith, Hope, and Love).

Armor off and asking Who

Photo by Rob Du Bois, http://robdubois.photography

Mark 8:27-38

Last weekend Andy and I led a marriage seminar at Mars Hill Bible Church in Grand Rapids, MI. 200 people signed up to give up 5 hours of their Saturday to come and learn from us.

For six months, this event has been a source of low grade terror for me.  Andy and I don’t really feel like we’ve got this marriage thing anything close to figured out, but they kept asking and insisting that they didn’t want experts, just people willing to be real and help them think about it from a new perspective, so here we were.

We met and prepared – like actually set meetings three times a week for several weeks to discuss content.  The week of, I bought a brand new shirt, set an appointment to have my hair done, and spent time going over and over my notes in my head, wondering if I would have the courage to do this thing. 

And then, two days before we left, our daughter got violently ill, and vomited all night long.  I lost lots of sleep, promptly broke out in a robust cold sore, was forced to cancel my hair appointment, and all my last minute seminar prep time was taken up with taking care of a sick kid and scrambling to catch up with work, and the next thing I knew we were on a plane, come as you are. 

The night before it began, I laid there in the darkness feeling frightened at every stomach rumble that the sickness Maisy had suffered would get me or Andy, and one of us would be forced to sit on the stage solo, or both of us would be running off the stage to the bathroom unable to finish the day.

We arrived the next morning sleep deprived with pepto bismol in my purse to a room filled with couples eagerly awaiting our wisdom.  Just before we were introduced, a woman leaned over to me, and looking cheerfully at my brand new shirt, she whispered, “Did you get that shirt from Stitch Fix? I just got the same one!”

And with that, the last of my armor was stripped away and I took the stage, in front of the lights and video and 200 expectant faces.

I took a deep breath, and then I opened my mouth and told everyone how scared I was to be there. How Andy and I don’t really feel comfortable talking about our marriage – even to a therapist, and how, in all our years of marriage and behind the scenes work collaboration, we’ve never taught anything together in front of people before and really had no idea how it would go.  I shared my longings for them and for this time – that we would encounter God and each other, that learning and connection would happen – and then I invited them to stop and think about what they were feeling and needing and fearing and hoping for our time together.

And from there, something happened. 

All the things I thought I needed to feel secure no longer mattered.  I was a person, inviting them to be people with me.  As a friend buoyantly responded, paraphrasing part of this passage for me, “Those who try to save their dignity will lose it, but those who give up their dignity for my sake will save it!”  It means being truly human.

Andy and I were kind of flayed open up there on those shiny stools with our fancy headset mics – showing parts of our relationship and ourselves that we’ve never really shown before.  We talked about how we get so trapped in the ideal- always asking how questions, how to be a better spouse, how our marriage should be, how I deserve to be treated, how I am being treated – questions of comparison and judgment, questions that, in the best of times, leave us feeling just short of the ever-elusive goal.

But in the way this whole being human and life in kingdom of God, and Jesus with us, thing works, the questions we’re invited to ask are actually who questions. Who is this person in front of me? Who am I?  In all our mystery and messiness, our beauty and brokenness, who are we? 

Jesus asks a question and throws his friends for a loop.  He starts by inviting them to describe stories, report rumors, recap the buzz.  Who do people say that I am? 

Fun game, ok!

Some say this, others that, you know.

But then he asks them what must feel like a frighteningly vulnerable thing- both to ask and to be asked, “Who do you say that I am?”

Imagine asking that of your spouse, your brother, your close friend, your daughter.  Who would you say I am?

Not, How would you describe me?

What are my defining characteristics, my strengths and weaknesses? 

But look at me. Really see me. In your words, who am I?

Perhaps the deepest and most difficult question most of us spend a lifetime with, is, Who am I? And just when we think we have a grasp on it, we keep changing, (slippery old us!) and we have to keep wrestling with it anew.

Who am I, now that my partner has died?

Who am I, now that I have this diagnosis?

Who am I with this newfound freedom?  This person to love? This job that inspires me?

Who am I now that I am suddenly responsible for this tiny new being? 

Who am I when I’ve done something so horribly outside what I thought I was capable of?  When I can’t take back those words, when I can’t repair that breach?

Who am I when who I thought I was has changed?

Who am I? is a scary question, and one we rarely, if ever, invite others to contemplate with us. 

But Jesus opens up his chest and asks them to peer inside,

Who am I, would you say?

And right away, Peter, who has been waiting for this chance, who has been mulling this question in those moments of deep thought before sleep creeps up to deliver you, who has given up a perfectly stable career to follow this guy around because the question has so intrigued and compelled him and now he’s finally invited to issue his conclusion, and, frankly, is thrilled at being asked, answers, “Why Jesus?! You are the Messiah!”

 

And oh, it feels great to say it! To say it outloud because it summarizes everything Peter has longed for and all that he hasn’t put words to until now.  God is saving us! Before my eyes every day I see the promise made real – in his words, in his healing, this is it! He is it! We are being delivered from all that is broken, the fulfillment is here and I am ready to declare it!

So face beaming in confidence and trust, he delivers his pronouncement. Most likely he is expecting a hug. Or some kind of praise for his astute observations.  Affirmation, at least. Yes, Peter, you hit the nail on the head, you. *nuggy*

But not this. Not Jesus’ diatribe about suffering, humiliation and death. 

Not this ideological whiplash.

What you say is true. I am the Messiah.

But I do not think it means what you think it means. 

Messiah means I’ll suffer. It means I’ll die. It m

eans that as hard as all this is, it’s going to be doubly hard on me and on those who follow me.

And Peter is rattled. Jesus, what are you saying? I’ve seen what you are! You are here to save us all!  Stop this crazy talk!  You’re stepping way outside the definition of you that I’m comfortable with.

And then Jesus sharply rebukes him, (which had to sting), and he then calls the crowd around him and tells everyone what Messiah really means.

Who am I?

Not your hero, after all. Not the fulfillment of all your wishes and dreams, who ends your distress and solves all problems and make everything better. I am not the one who saves you out of all this.  I am the one who joins you in all this.

In some way, everyone at that marriage seminar last weekend, including Andy and me, represent the desperately misguided thing it is to join your life to another person and think you’re going to come out unscathed.

I would love to be at a wedding sometime and hear a preacher tell it like it really is.  Eyes twinkling, opening jokes aside, he’d lean in and catch the couple’s gaze and hold it.  Then he’d say, perhaps a bit sternly, You two love each other; that’s good. You’re really going to need that. Because this thing you’re about to do is a lot harder than it looks. And sometimes you are going to want out.

He’d ignore the uncomfortable shifting of the people in the pews, and plow onward, speaking only to the couple on the brink of this life commitment.

And there are things about yourself you are going to wish you could change, and this other person is going to see all of that over the years.  And you are going to watch them change in ways that you like and in ways you don’t like so much, and also they’ll stay the same in ways you might secretly be hoping will change.  The point is, it’s messy. 

And it isn’t going to be easy, loving, choosing to love, every day, being who you are, accepting who they are.  You will be surprised again and again, and drawn into deeper mystery, fresh discomfort, and new discoveries.

And guess what? Your life doesn’t really belong to you anymore.  You’re losing it. From now on, you are his; she is yours. Car crashes, cancer, heartbreak and breakdowns – when they come, you will carry hers far heavier than your own, and when he suffers great loss, it will carve you out inside.

And now we would all be silent, not a cough or wiggle among us, watching the couple watching the pastor, taking it all in, weighing his words.

And if you have kids, when they come you’ll lose your life all over again – all the things you thought made you you, all the freedoms you enjoy and the capacity to worry just about your own self and each other- that disappears – your life belongs to them now. You will worry about them and shape your days and your nights around them, and you’ll sacrifice for them and see them and love them for who they are in ways that will break your heart over and over again.

But please hear this: in losing your life, you will gain it. Because to belong to another is the most precious thing there is. You are theirs.  They are yours. In all this vast world, the mystery of this other is a gift to belong to, and you give to them belonging as well. This is the power of love – it takes away your life and gives it back in breathless beauty and shocking suffering that is shared and given and known.  And this, my dears, this is what it means to be truly alive.

And maybe for a moment, before the evening disintegrates into nostalgia and schmaltz, we will all feel a little awed at what it is to be blessed human beings, gifts to each other, sitting here together in all our messy and mysterious glory and need.

Jesus looks at his beloved disciples, and at the crowds of people gathered around  unaware of what is coming for him, this moment frozen in time while they still see him as invincible savior and he sees the cross ahead. 

And he pauses, and takes a deep breath, filled with the ache of loving them in all their misguided expectations, looking into all of their hopefilled faces, and prepares to break through their illusions. The Messiah doesn’t get to swing into this life and rescue people out of it without touching down.  Every single place of grief and separation boring into our gut he shares with us, every single breakdown of trust, loss and tragedy wrought between us, every person who goes to bed hungry, angry or painfully alone, he is there, holding it with us, joining us in it.  His life is already entirely lost for our sake.

And then he breaks it to them, This Messiah gig is not all it’s cracked up to be.  Yes, I’m the Messiah.  That means I belong to the world, to each and every one of you, and in me the whole world has its belonging.  And so to follow me means opening up your heart as well, to all the world, and to every beloved, befuddled mystery of a person made in the image of God.  

It means feeling the suffering they feel, taking on each other’s burdens, standing with and for one another when the going is hard, accepting being misunderstood, getting angry but loving anyway. Sticking it out as a person who belongs to many others and to whom many others belong.  It means losing all you thought was your life and strength and dignity and armor.  It means being truly human.

This is not an easy life, being the Messiah.  And neither is it easy following the Messiah.  This is a real life you’re signing up for, Jesus wants them to know.  It’s not romantic escapism, or a religious formality; there’s no formula or protection or ideal. No, it’s actually the death of all that. It’s agreeing to the raw and often painful, a life lived wide-awake and open to hurt. 

How does God save us? How are we supposed to live? How should I feel if I am living like I should be?  How can I be a good Christian? A good person?

Lose the how questions, Jesus invites, and take up the who. 

Who is this - who calls us to follow him into the heart of suffering, the very heart of love?

Who is this – who confounds our definitions and draws us ever nearer?

Who is this - who pulls us away from answers and conclusions, and invites us instead into mystery, and belonging, and the power of love to take away life and give it fully all at once?

And we, with our own who am I?s - our relentless seeking is lifted to the One to whom we belong, the One in whom our selves are found and never lost, and here we are invited to venture that trembling and vulnerable inquiry – What about you, God? Who do you say that I am? 

Because I want to be that. How you see me.

If it is generous and brave and forgiving,

if it is daring to love and open to life and risking for others, I want to be that. 

And I want that thing where Jesus brushes aside what everyone else says about who he is and asks me himself, Who do you say that I am?

And I don’t want to be afraid when the answer surprises me, or makes me uncomfortable, when it isn’t as clean and pristine, or as strong and invincible as I had hoped. I want to be drawn in to try to answer it again and again each time I see God’s love and grace, and not to foreclose and accept how others define God for me, or how I think things are supposed to be.  I want to step into the vulnerable place to be asked by God, invited by God, Are you willing to follow where I go?

We spend so much of our energy on saving our lives. Building up our armor. Working on the how, crafting others’ perceptions of us, hiding the darkness and the weakness and the shame within us, protecting ourselves from the darkness around us, going after safety and doing whatever we can to make ourselves feel secure.  We live in the how and guard ourselves from the who.

But when we let go, when lose our lives, and all the control we had over shaping and protecting it, when we let ourselves be seen, when we let the truth of our humanity come to light, alongside each other, with and for each other, denying our selves, taking up our cross and following, that is when we are found.

That is soul ripping open to the world’s pain and beauty in each precious fellow child of the Divine.  That is love taking hold, and belonging setting in. That is watching your life become both utterly lost and joyously saved.

If that’s where you want to go, you guys, I will go there with you.

We can be brave together.

Amen.