Gospeling Your Life ~ Weeping

 

Read John 11-12 – Chapter 11 is a profound and powerful story of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead.  I invite you today to enter this story.  Imagine being Mary and Martha, what would you say if Jesus didn’t show up?  Wait.  What do you say to Jesus when he doesn’t show up on your time schedule like a genie to grant you your wish?  Imagine being the disciples, wondering why Jesus don’t just “say it plain”?  Why did Jesus wait?  Why does Jesus say it won’t lead to death?

And why, given what Jesus said, does he weep in verse 33?  Especially, given how confident and certain Jesus seemed up to that point.  Jesus was clear that Lazarus was sleeping and that this wasn’t really, truly death, just looked like.  So, why weep?

 

I have a lot of questions about this passage.

 

I love the truth that Jesus wept.  We are not meant to be somber stoics unaffected by the world.  We are not made of Teflon but flesh (earth/dirt).  I weep.  I weep for the devastation caused by recent hurricanes.  I weep for women and children killed in wars by weapons produced in the United States and paid for by our tax dollars.  I weep for leaders who would rather show might rather than humility.  I weep for young people who are numb to violence and have grown up thinking school shootings are normal.  I weep for a country that may have “United” in our name but seems to have no desire or appetite to live that.  I weep for older generations who only criticize younger generations.  I weep for younger generations who struggle in so many ways.  I weep for the church trying to reclaim glory days that have passed us by and the energy we expend trying to recapture what was ~ rather than sink into what is.

 

I need to be unbound (like Lazarus) from the wounds of the past.  I need to be unbound (like Lazarus) from expectations of success that are only measured by numbers and noses in the pews.  I need to be unbound (like Lazarus) from feeling like it is all on my shoulders.  I need to be unbound from anger at family members who no longer talk to me.  I need to be unbound by hurts I keep lugging in the luggage of life.

 

Now is your turn.  Where do you weep today?  Name what is in your heart.   Where do you need to be unbound?  Pray this.  May the One who calls us out of tombs death that might become wombs of new life.   Amen.

Gospeling Your Life ~ Deconstructing

 

Read John 9-10 ~ These two chapters are rich in metaphor and meaning, worth reading a few times.  Chapter 9 is a narrative of a beloved son of God who is blind from birth.  Notice how the disciples want to explain (even blame or shame) who is at fault for this brokenness.  I don’t know what hurts more ~ the fact that this is in the Bible OR that we keep doing this today?!  We keep blaming and shaming people who are hurting, telling them that they didn’t pray enough, believe enough, follow our instructions well enough.  This adds salt to the woundedness of the world.  To be sure, Jesus saying the blindness was for God to work through this beloved, could be taken several different directions.  We should be clear that Jesus is breaking down the accepted theological explanation of the day ~ that if you had a disease, it was from the divine.  You made God angry.  Jesus is pushing against that.  I wish that he had said this a little clearer ~ that illnesses/pain/grief are not punishment!!  And I don’t want to miss how Jesus is deconstructing bad theology equation of the day that a bad event was caused by something you did.  As the story unfolds, the Pharisees (that is, good religious folk) want to figure this out.  So do we today.  We want, almost demand, reasonable and rational reasons for why bad things happen to good people.  The Pharisees cannot accept mystery and ambiguity.  The question is, can we?  Are we willing to enter a realm where our brain won’t be able to come up with witty, cynical, thoughtful, well-argued reasons?  Are we willing to be mystics who hold life loosely, or do we keep treating life as a problem to be solved?  Do we keep erasing the chalkboard pushing ourselves to understand everything.  Do we let grace confound and confuse us?  Do we let joy disrupt and disturb us (that evokes laughter at the absurdity of it all)?  One final note, I love how the medicine in 9:6 is mud – soil – earth.  This echoes Genesis 2 where God makes humans out of the earth – mud – soil, breathing in us the breath of life.

 

Breathe in the breath of God.

 

Breathe in the One who longs to shepherd your life through these words you’ve been reading for the last 40 plus days.

 

Breathe out the prayers of your heart ~ what is life giving right now, what is life draining?

 

Breathe out the voices that want to criticize and critique and throw tomatoes at you because you are daring to let your light shine and follow the voice of our Shephard/Savior.

 

Breathe and be.  Breathe and be.  Breathe and be.  Amen.

Gospeling Your Life ~ Written in Sand

 

Read John 7-8 ~ Jesus shows up in chapter 7 at a major Jewish religious festival, the Festival of Booths.  He creates quite a stir, makes a scene.  He starts challenging the preachers and teachers, demanding the organist to play certain hymns, and offering his own prayers.  In some way, I wonder, what would I do if Jesus showed up on Sunday and did that at our church?  Would I embrace this rebel-rouser or ask the ushers to call the authorities?  Would I recognize God’s love incarnate or would I want to protect/hide behind the way things are supposed to be done?  And not only does Jesus cause a stir, some in the crowd think, “He’s got a point.”  They start calling him the Christ or Savior or Messiah.  Quick aside, remember that is political language.  Caesar (and Caesar alone) was the Savior, that job was taken and no one else should even dare apply.  This creates more chaos as people try to arrest Jesus and creates division among people.  Good Lord, that sounds like the news I read this morning.  Then, there is this powerful story of a woman caught in adultery.  Note, where is the man?!?  We all know, to quote my grandma, “It takes two to tango.”  But apparently the guy got to walk away, because, sigh, that is still heartbreakingly truth today.  Jesus writes something in the dirt (8:6) and inquiring minds, like mine, what to know, what did he write??  Did he write the man’s name?  Did he start writing the law, which commanded that both parties be held responsible and accountable?  Did he start writing down what others in the crowd did?  Whatever he wrote, the people drop their rocks, and slowly back away.  And yet, friends, we still carry rocks and throw them around.  Oh, today it is much more anonymous online or gossip behind people’s backs or in parking lots after the meeting.  Jesus says in verse 12, I am the light.  Light helps us see and light casts a shadow, both are truth.  To abide, be present, and take up residence in the presence of Jesus will not be all pony rides and chocolate rivers, we will face our shadow sides.

 

You may want to light a candle today and ponder where you are at.  Where is just stirring up dust in your life?  Where is Jesus writing in the soil of your soul, what do you sense him writing?  Where is your shadow that you are protecting (or ignoring) because we have rocks to throw at those people?  May these questions cause all of us to know that as we drawn to abide in the light, there is work to be done in us, through us, around us, and only by the grace of God. Amen. 

Gospeling Your Life ~ Stories we Tell

 

Read John 5-6 ~ Please note, I will be preaching on John 4 in March to honor Women in the Bible during Women’s History Month.  Just a short note that I believe the Woman at the Well serves as a wonderful counterbalance to Nicodemus.  The two are meant to be linked and remind us of two parts of ourselves.  I am both Nicodemus and the Woman at the Well.  Both are curious.  For Nicodemus, he needs to sit with the wisdom of Jesus for a while (contemplate what Jesus said), for the Woman at the Well her heart is instantly and immediately opened to God in transformation.  Sometimes change takes time, other moments we adopt and adapt quickly.  Hold these two important characters in scripture pondering the truths each teach and tell us.

 

As you read chapters 5-6, there is a wonderful question Jesus asks the beloved on God sitting by the pool.  In 5:6, “Do you want to be made well?”  That is a great question.  Do I want to be made well, whole, full of God’s Shalom?  On the one hand, you may think, “Duh, Wes.  Of course I don’t want this illness, pain, ache, brokenness, hurt.”  On the other hand, we can sometimes hold onto past pain tighter than grace.  I can feed, fan to flames, the words of another person, lugging them around in the luggage of life and tell anyone who will listen, “You won’t believe what that church member said to me…fifteen years ago.”  Or I can rehearse and replay the actions of another anew and afresh each day, until my life is defined and confined those actions.  You can tell a lot about a person by the stories they tell.  You can tell a lot about yourself if you listen to the stories you tell.  Do I want to be made well?  Yes.  Am I willing abide in the One who calls for forgiveness, non-violence, standing with the marginalized, being a peacemaker, being a seeker/learner, being an embodiment of God’s love?  Is that where I want to reside in a world, especially when none of that is trending on social media?  How do I want to show up and let God write the story of my life?  We ask and answer that question moment by moment, hour by hour, day by day.  How you life each day, is how you live your life.  May you find ways to abide with the One who is calling us to wholeness/shalom/healing/wellness this day and every day.  Amen.

Gospeling Your Life ~ Nicodemus

 

Read John 3-4 ~ I confess, I love Nicodemus.  I think he has gotten a bad reputation from the church. Oh, we love to criticize him coming in the middle of the night.  What, Nicodemus, afraid of what your peers will think of you?  We love to laugh at his expense.  What, Nicodemus, can’t wrap your mind around Jesus’ being ‘born again’ puzzling comments?  And then, Nicodemus, fades into the background, steps back into the cover of a starlit night, not to appear again…until chapter 7 when he defends Jesus.  And also, at the end, chapter 19, when he is there at the last breath of Jesus’ life. 

 

You see, I love Nicodemus, because I am Nicodemus.  I sometimes hide from my faith.  I don’t go around blurting and blasting to everyone that I am a pastor.  I sometimes duck and cover, especially when the people around me start criticizing religion.  I justify this by saying/singing, “They will know we are Christians by our love.”  Which, yes actions speak louder than words, but sometimes words, sharing our faith, is helpful too.  Second, I am often baffled and bewildered by Jesus.  I don’t get him.  I’d rather shake my head with a smirk at Nicodemus than confess that I don’t have Jesus figured out.  I have some thoughts on being born anew/afresh, which is what Jesus is saying to him, but I also don’t get what Jesus is saying entirely.  And I can fade into the background, be a wall flower, slip off the sidelines of life silently, hoping that no one notices. 

 

And, I want to be like Nicodemus, showing up in places and spaces to share God’s love in real ways on behalf of those who are being hurt (see chapter 7).  Yes, I want to be like Nicodemus showing up in pain of death, when resurrection isn’t on anyone’s radar as the next logical step.  Thank you, Nicodemus, you don’t get the credit you deserve for showing us how to live our lives.  Thank you, Nicodemus for helping us realize that faith is complicated and contradictory and isn’t neat and tidy.  Thank you, Nicodemus for showing me a way to live this day.  Amen.

Gospeling Your Life ~ Abiding

 

Read John 1-2 ~ John doesn’t start with birth narrative of Jesus in a little town of Bethlehem.  No, John goes all the way back to Genesis 1.  If you open another Bible to Genesis 1 alongside John 1, the two echo each other.  John says, “In the beginning,” which is exactly where the Hebrew Scriptures begin.  John says there was the Word or in Greek – logos – which can mean wisdom/truth/life.  Logos is about the Holy’s presence.  One of John’s favorite words is “abide”.  Think of that great hymn, “Abide with me fast falls the evening tide, the darkness/night deepens, God with me abide”.  We need God’s presence.  So, this word/wisdom/truth/life of God comes to us in the flesh.  And John tells us from the start while this mystery is a miracle, it will be a tragedy too (spoiler alert that you already know from the other three Gospels, Jesus will face death on a cross).  We won’t get Jesus.  Eugene Peterson translates John 1:14 as God moves into your neighborhood, right next door.  God shows up disguised as your life.  God abides still today, and the question is are we awake and aware and alert to what God is doing? 

John jumps from a cosmic opening to…poof…Jesus is an adult.  That is a big leap.  And John the Baptist, a street preacher and prophet, not down by the riverside, but along the roads of life points out to his followers Jesus walking/waltzing past.  “That’s him!!,” John shouts making a scene.  And John’s disciples leave him, go to Jesus and say, “Where are you staying.”

That is an odd question.  Unless, the disciples are not asking about Jesus’ hotel arrangements or his sleeping quarters, but where he stands.  “Where are you staying,” could be translated, “Where do you stand?”  Here we are a month out from the election, and we want to know where candidates stand on issues.  People sometimes ask you what you believe.  Or someone may knock on your door and want to know who you are voting for.  We constantly want to compartmentalize and categorize other people, even when we believe that we don’t fit neat and tidy into a box because we are complex like a Rubix Cube. 

 

Come and see, Jesus says, not just to the disciples then and there, but you right now.  Remember, John’s question is how do we live/abide in joy?  How do we, amid the stress and strain, live out our sacred image?  Come and see, Jesus says.  The remaining 20 chapters of John are going to show you how John understands God’s love in the flesh.

 

What questions do you have for Jesus if he came waltzing/walking past?   Here you are winding down, in the last Gospel, what do you want to know more about?  Write your questions down. 

 

Finally, in chapter 2, Jesus offers his first sign by turning water into wine, even if that act was a bit coerced, reluctantly done.  You can almost hear Jesus saying, “Aww ma do I have to?”.  Remember, God in the flesh, abiding with us, loves moments of celebration.  God, in the flesh, is showing up in ways we may not comprehend or realize.  I often wonder if the bridal party ever knew of this hospitality crisis, because it would have been a major social faux pas to run out of wine.  The stigma would have stayed/stuck with the family for years.  How might you celebrate today with the One who is still saying to you, “Come and see” this day?  Amen.

Gospeling Your Life through Communion

 

Read Luke 22-24 ~ This is the third telling of the last supper, crucifixion and resurrection.  What details do you notice in Luke?  What surprised you? 

Now, go get a piece of bread and sip of juice. 

Hold the piece of bread, smell it, imagine the wheat waving in the wind through sunlight and storms.  Imagine the soil that sent its nutrients in a divine dance slowly forming, fashioning the wheat day after day.  Imagine the hands that harvested the wheat, the baker who formed the bread, and the worker who helped check you out when you bought the bread.  In your hands, with this bread, you hold a web of life.  There is a whole world in that one piece of bread.

 

Break the bread.  Jesus breaks open his life, not just in these chapters, but throughout the whole Gospels.  Jesus shows us, embodies for us, vulnerable love that is willing to see the ones on the fringe and fray as well as those who think their halos shine brighter than the sun.  Jesus sits at table with anyone and everyone.  In Luke, Jesus is always eating.  And every time we take bread, Jesus is there.  And especially in the sharp shards of your life today, the broken parts that like the bread in your hand, can’t easily be put back together.  Where does it hurt today?  Where do you ache?  This could be physically, emotionally, spiritually.  Hold that broken bread for in the middle is Christ’s presence.

 

Eat in remembrance of God’s unconditional and unceasing love.

 

Now, take the juice (or coffee or water or whatever).  Jesus said, “Brokenness is never the last word.”  Paul said, “Nothing separates us from the love of God”.  This is the foundational, formation truth.  Love is. 

 

Sometimes I love to take the bread (symbolizing brokenness) and dip it in the juice (symbolizing grace that saturates and soaks all my life).  You may want to do this.  May God, who brought to life Jesus our Christ, raised him from the tomb (which became a womb), out of pain, suffering, brokenness, death to a new way of being in the world.  May God saturate and soak your life each moment this day.  Amen.