When the Truth Confronts You

No one likes to be told or shown that they are wrong. No one. Most of us are quite happy to grasp onto our beliefs despite argument to the contrary. Even if we are confronted with strong evidence that our stated positions are lacking, we will end any sort of debate or conversation with the be all and end all phrase, "Well, we are just going to have to agree to disagree." Such a statement is fine if you are simply disagreeing about an opinion. I mean we can agree to disagree that chocolate ice cream is better than vanilla ice cream or that pepperoni pizza is better than cheese pizza, but when it comes to matters of deep substance, when it comes to matters of truth, we can’t simply agree to disagree. We must have the courage to argue; to debate; to wrestle; and to even change our minds when presented with evidence that we are wrong.

As Christians, this is particularly so because it follows the nature and teaching of our founder, Jesus. Jesus was not an "agree to disagree" kind of guy. Nowhere in the Gospels do you see Him acquiescing to a point of view that is different by simply agreeing and letting that viewpoint go unchecked. Jesus entered into the dialogue, defined His position–which was God’s position, and then pointed out the error of the other view. It cost Him to be less likeable among certain groups, but it also won Him the admiration of many who saw that He was both impartial and consistent as He taught and proclaimed God’s Kingdom. Today’s Gospel lesson is a perfect piece of evidence showing Jesus’ confrontational nature when it comes to matters of Truth.

Let’s set the context once again as we turn to this encounter between Jesus and the Sadducees. Remember, Jesus had entered into Jerusalem with all the markings of the coming Messiah. He cleansed the Temple pointing out how the Sanhedrin or Jewish Religious High Court had used the Temple for their own selfish purposes instead of using it as a place where all the people of the world were intended to worship. The Sanhedrin took objection to Jesus’ actions and wanted to arrest Him and kill Him, but they could not because Jesus had endeared Himself to the crowds. Arresting Jesus without pretense would have caused a riot amongst the people causing the Romans to intervene thereby causing the Sanhedrin to lose their standing both in the crowd’s eye and in the Romans’ eye. Therefore, they had to discredit Jesus and turn the crowd against Him or show that Jesus was a threat to Rome. Last week, the Herodians and Pharisees took their shot with a question about taxes. This week, the Sadducees throw Jesus a religious curve ball.

Now, unlike the Pharisees and Herodians, the question the Sadducees throw at Jesus is not a life or death question. No one is going to kill Jesus or arrest Jesus based upon Jesus’ teaching on the resurrection. The Sadducees are trying to discredit Jesus by making Him look stupid. Little do they know the consequences that will befall them.

Mark tells us the Sadducees–who do not believe in the resurrection come to Jesus. Now, let me take just a moment to explain why this detail is important. You see, Judaism during the time of Jesus was not a united religion. There were many different groups vying for the heart of the populace. There were Pharisees, there were Sadducees, there were Zealots, there were Esseens, there were Herodians, and so on and so forth. Each of these groups practiced the Jewish faith a little different from the others. Each had various authorities they cited to bolster their positions. All of them agreed on the basic tenets of Judaism, but there were other things they disagreed about vehemently. The resurrection was one of them. Most Jews at the time believed that in the future, God would indeed resurrect those who had died as part of establishing the Messianic kingdom. They gleaned their beliefs from portions of the Psalms, Ezekiel, and the book of Daniel. However, the Sadducees did not buy these arguments. The Sadducees were convinced only by the authority of the Torah–the first five books of the Old Testament. If it could not be found in Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, or Deuteronomy, then it was human ideal and not to be trusted.

The Sadducees were convinced there were no referents to the resurrection in the Torah despite many arguments from the Pharisees to the contrary. The Sadducees were convinced that all of the Pharisaical arguments fell short, and they felt confident that they could show how stupid the belief in the resurrection was. They attempted to use that argument on Jesus.

"Teacher," they said, "Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother dies, leaving a wife but no child, the man shall marry the widow and raise up children for his brother. 20There were seven brothers; the first married and, when he died, left no children; 21and the second married her and died, leaving no children; and the third likewise; 22none of the seven left children. Last of all the woman herself died. 23In the resurrection whose wife will she be? For the seven had married her."

Now, my initial answer to this line of thought would be, "What in the world was that woman putting into her cooking?" I mean, honestly, if I were like the fourth or fifth brother in line, I would have been like, "Uh, no thank you. I would rather take the chance of enduring God’s wrath than marrying her!!" But, perhaps this is beside the point.

The point the Sadducees are trying to get across is a point based in the Torah which God was offering both protection for a woman and protection for the blood line of a family. There are certain stipulations that surround this law in the Old Testament, and should you like to delve into it further, you can read about it in Deuteronomy 25:5-10. We will not do that now. What we will do now is follow the train of thought of the Sadducees. They are basically trying to show the absurdity of this scenario. If the resurrection is real, and if we are married to our spouse in the resurrection, then this woman will have seven husbands. There is no allowance in the Torah for a woman to have seven husbands, therefore the resurrection will not happen.

Jesus responds rather harshly and with a great deal of confrontation, "Is not this the reason you are wrong, that you know neither the scriptures nor the power of God?" I want you to stop right there for just a moment and contemplate Jesus’ words. I mean, really just let that sentence sink in for just a moment. How in the world would you feel if someone asked you that question? Don’t you know you are wrong because you neither know the scriptures or the power of God? Jesus cuts the Sadducees to the heart because they prided themselves in knowing the Scriptures. They prided themselves in knowing about the power of God, but Jesus says they are ignorant of both, and He does so in two ways.

First, Jesus challenges their premise about being married in the resurrection: "25For when they rise from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven." Now, some of you might be looking at your spouse right now and thinking, "What? I won’t be married to her in heaven? That’s not what I want!" I am sorry to break the news to you. In the resurrection, there will be no need for marriage. We will indeed recognize one another. We will be overjoyed to see one another, but we are entering into a totally different reality. Angels don’t need to marry because they are totally and completely satisfied by the love of God. We will be like that, Jesus says thus nullifying the Sadducees premise and their logic.

But Jesus doesn’t stop there; He continues on with point number two: and as to the resurrection–whether or not it will take place. Jesus points out a critical text in the Torah. It is when God reveals Himself to Moses in the burning bush. God tells Moses, "I AM the God of Abraham. I AM the God of Isaac. I AM the God of Jacob." God does not say, "I was the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob." No, God IS the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. And then Jesus makes another appeal to a belief held by every religious group, "God is the God of the living and not of the dead." If Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were not to be raised; if they had ceased to exist, then God would not have spoken as if He were still their God! Jesus points this out to the Sadducees, I am sure, much to their dismay.
And then Jesus drives the final nail, "You are quite wrong." "You are way off base." "You do not know what you are talking about."

Oh, imagine Jesus saying that in our cultural milieu today. Imagine Jesus confronting the various religious groups today and saying, "You’ve missed the mark. You are wrong. You don’t understand scripture or the power of God."

You know what most folks would say to Jesus? You know how they would respond?
It’s not hard. We hear the arguments all the time:
"What gives you the right to say that I am wrong?"
"What is the Truth?"
"How do you know the Truth?"
"How do you know your read of Scripture is the right one?"
"We will just have to agree to disagree.
And, of course, Jesus isn’t exactly here to defend Himself. We are. And it is we who bear the brunt of these questions. They deserve some sort of answer as well–particularly if we want to establish Jesus as our authority.

First, we must establish that there is some sort of Absolute Truth. There are some who wish to say that truth is relative or that truth does not exist, but that is an absolutely illogical position to take. How so, you might ask. First off, you cannot start with a self-refuting statement. If you say, "Truth is relative," then the statement "Truth is relative" must be absolutely true. How can that be? Or, if you say, "Truth does not exist," well, then how can the statement "Truth does not exist" be true? It can’t. There must be some sort of Objective Truth giving meaning and, well, truth to our statements.

But now comes the hard part. We can know that there is objective Truth, but we cannot know it objectively. Think about that for a minute. There is objective Truth, but we cannot know it objectively. We are dependent upon that Truth being revealed to us. This is important especially when we get into arguments of a religious nature.

For instance, in the above argument between Jesus and the Sadducees, there are two positions: the resurrection will happen or there is no resurrection. Which of these is True? We have no evidence of resurrection (at least we didn’t at the time)? The two positions are mutually exclusive. They both can be wrong. One can be right, but they cannot both be right. How does one decide? They appeal to the evidence. They appeal to what God has revealed.

As Christians, this is exactly what we do when we enter into arguments of a religious nature. We do not appeal to our own authority. We do not appeal to ourselves. We appeal to Jesus. For if Jesus is who He says He is and did what He said He did, then to use the famous catch phrase of C.S. Lewis: He is either Lord, a lunatic, or a liar.

Jesus, of course, claimed to be the Son of God. He claimed that He was laying His life down for the world. He claimed to be the ransom for many who would reconcile the world unto God. He claimed to be the I AM, God incarnate. He claimed to be the resurrection and the life. He claimed to be Lord of the world. He claimed that God sent Him into the world because God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son so that all those who believe in Him should not perish but have eternal life. For God sent the Son into the world not to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.

Folks may say, "Well, that’s not good enough. Just because He said these things about Himself doesn’t prove that He wasn’t a liar or that His followers turned him into something that He was not." Fair enough criticism. But let’s look at the facts because there have been a lot of people who have claimed to be a Messiah. There have been a lot of people who came along in the history including the recent history of humanity who claimed to be God. What happened to their followings? What happened to their followers after these folks died?

Historically, whenever such folks came about, they would raise a following, but when the leader died, all the followers left. No one stuck around. Not so with Jesus. Everyone thought His followers would disband. Everyone thought the things that He taught would go away. But something happened that changed all that. Something happened that showed that Jesus was who He said He was and did what He said He did. That was the resurrection. Jesus was raised from the dead. Oh, sure, there are those who scoff at the notion and say that such a thing is impossible. Might I remind you that even science cannot say that such an event is impossible–they can only say that it is highly unlikely. If you add up all of the cumulative evidence, you must admit that something happened that unexpectedly changed the fortune of the world–that transformed a movement that should have died–that initiated a movement that has now spread throughout the globe. You can’t escape it. You must wrestle with it.

And when you do; when you delve into the resurrection you come face to face with Jesus. You come face to face with the God who died for you. You come face to face with the Truth who will confront you and love you with a love too deep for words. He will tell you you are wrong; that you are a failure; that you have misread scripture and gone astray, but He will also take you into His loving arms and transform you and your life like nothing else can do. Amen.

Fact, Belief, and Truth

If you read through the comments in my Reader's Challenge post, you will see something quite interesting.

I think, I am trying to discuss a fact.

Carl is trying to talk about belief.

The two things are very different.

I stated in one of my sermons that Christianity is unique because it alone of all religions and philosophies states that salvation and the satisfaction of justice comes not through any actions of humankind, but solely through the actions of God.

This is a statement of fact.  It can be falsified rather easily.  If there is another religion that proclaims this, then my statement is untrue.  My statement is not narrow, if it is true anymore than the statement two plus two is four is not narrow.  It is simply a fact.

Beliefs are another matter.  Beliefs are not easily falsified.  For instance:

Christianity claims/believes that Jesus is God in flesh.  Jesus died on the cross as a sacrifice of atonement and was raised from the dead.

Islam claims/believes that Jesus was a prophet; he was not the Son of God; he didn't really die therefore was not raised from the dead.

These are two completely contradictory beliefs/claims.

Either they are both false or one is correct.  They both cannot be true.  You cannot say that Jesus was the Son of God and he wasn't the Son of God.  You cannot say that Jesus was raised from the dead and he was not raised from the dead.  Factually, this is impossible.

Similarly, the most basic difference between atheists and theists is the following:

Theists believe there is something beyond this physical universe.

Atheists believe there is nothing beyond this physical universe.

One of these statements is true.  The other is false.  They cannot both be true.

The question is: which one is ultimately true?

The answer is: we don't know for certain.

There is no way to scientifically test whether or not Jesus was the Son of God or if he was raised from the dead.  There is no way to scientifically test what is beyond this physical universe.  You can only make that decision based upon how you read evidence and which authorities you trust.

If you trust that Mohammed is Allah's prophet and his words are true, you will be a Muslim and believe Jesus is not God's Son and that he was not raised from the dead.
If you trust the biblical witness you will be a Christian and believe that Jesus is the Son of God and was raised from the dead.
If you look at the evidence and conclude there is nothing beyond this physical universe, you will be an atheist.
If you look at the evidence and conclude there is something beyond this physical universe, you will be a theist.

There is plenty of room to argue the evidence for these matters.  There is plenty of room for open dialogue and discussion of these things.  Facts can be laid out.  Arguments can be made for the authority of the Koran or the Bible.  Evidence can be pointed out for something outside the universe, and evidence can be pointed out for the non-existence of something outside this universe. Weaknesses of arguments can be pointed out.  Such things can be done because we are dealing with beliefs--points which can be disputed.

But you cannot dispute a fact.
You can show your ignorance.
You can pretend the fact does not exist.
You can uncover evidence to prove that what was thought was fact was indeed wrong.  (Science progresses in just this fashion!)

But in the absence of such evidence, you must admit that a fact is true.

2+2=4
Islam and Christianity have very different beliefs about who Jesus is.
Atheists and Theists have very different understandings about what lies beyond this physical universe.
And Christianity is unique among world religions and philosophies in that it claims that salvation and the satisfaction of justice are brought about by God's action alone and not by our own.

Cutting Off Your Hand Doesn't Work

    Last week, as we read through the book of Mark, we saw how Jesus coached His disciples in dealing with those who were not members of the “in” group.  An exorcist was casting out demons in Jesus’ name, but this exorcist was not a part of the inner 12.  Jesus sternly said, “Do not stop him for someone who does such a deed in my name will not soon turn against me.”  These are powerful words as we deal with our fellow Christians who do not believe as we believe.  Jesus name is what unites us, and doing what we do in His name renders most differences moot. 

    Then, Jesus spoke about those who do not follow Him as a disciple.  “Truly I tell you anyone who gives you a cup of cold water because you bear the name of Christ, that person will not lose the reward.”  Again, hearing Jesus’ words is important because this isn’t about the things we do–this is about how people treat Jesus’ disciples.  If a non-believer gives YOU a cup of cold water, then they will not lose the reward.  If Jesus regards even a non-believer this highly, the disciples should as well.  For Jesus came to save the world, not just a select few.  Only those who blatantly reject Jesus, whose hearts are consumed by other things, who seek their own satisfaction and self-preservation will bear some serious consequences. 

    This is why Jesus teaches what He teaches in our snippet from Mark chapter 9 this morning.  Jesus shifts the focus from those who are outside the faith, from the outer life, so to speak, to the inner life of the believer.  Jesus cuts through all external things and gets to the heart of the matter.  This is extremely important to grasp, especially since today is Reformation Sunday–a special day for those of us who call ourselves Lutheran Christians–a day when we strongly emphasize God’s grace and our inability to save ourselves.  How does this all come together?  Let’s turn to the text.

    Jesus begins with some powerful, strong words: 43If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life maimed than to have two hands and to go to hell, to the unquenchable fire. 45And if your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life lame than to have two feet and to be thrown into hell., 47And if your eye causes you to stumble, tear it out; it is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and to be thrown into hell, 48where their worm never dies, and the fire is never quenched.

    It is important to note that in the ancient Jewish world, people literally did blame their extremities for sin.  William Lane in his commentary on Mark says, “It was not a Palestinian custom to refer to an abstract activity but to the specific member of the body which is responsible for it.”  So, in the culture, it was acceptable to say, “My hand sinned.  My foot sinned.  My eye sinned.”  Jesus confronts this thinking and says, “Well, if your hand causes you to sin, cut it off.  If you foot causes you to sin, cut it off.  If your eyes cause you to sin, pluck them out.”  Jesus pushes the culture’s logic to its logical conclusion.  It’s better for you to be lame or blind than to be sinful.  It makes perfect sense, but it is horrifying.

    Not only is it horrifying, it’s also forbidden by Jewish scripture:

    Deuteronomy 14:1 reads, “You are children of the Lord your God. You must not lacerate yourselves or shave your forelocks for the dead.”

    Deuteronomy 23:1 reads, “No one whose testicles are crushed or whose penis is cut off shall be admitted to the assembly of the Lord.”  (Bet you didn’t know that one was in there!)

    There is a reason behind these laws for the Jews understood God to be holy and whole, complete.  If you were incomplete.  If you were not whole, you were seen as further away from God.  You were seen as less than what you should be.  For Jew to hear Jesus say, “Cut off your hand.  Cut off your foot.  Pluck out your eye.” would invoke absolute horror!  The Jew would have thought, “You are asking me to separate myself from God–to become incomplete–to make myself less than I should be!” 

    But is Jesus doing such a thing?  Is Jesus telling us to cut off our hands and feet or pluck out our eye.  No serious scholar believes such a thing because of this pertinent fact: if you cut off your hand, you will still sin.  If you cut off your foot, you will still sin.  If you pluck out your eye, you will still sin.  The cause of sin does not reside in your hand or your foot or your eye.  The cause of sin is much deeper.  Jesus knows this.  Jesus has taught this.  Unfortunately, it is not sinking in.

    Remember way back in Mark seven, there was an exchange between Jesus and the Pharisees where the Pharisees were complaining that Jesus’ disciples were eating with unwashed hands.  There’s a lot that is happening in that exchange, but eventually, we get to the place where Jesus says this, “4 Then he called the crowd again and said to them, ‘Listen to me, all of you, and understand: 15there is nothing outside a person that by going in can defile, but the things that come out are what defile.’  17 When he had left the crowd and entered the house, his disciples asked him about the parable. 18He said to them, ‘Then do you also fail to understand? Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile, 19since it enters, not the heart but the stomach, and goes out into the sewer?’ (Thus he declared all foods clean.) 20And he said, ‘It is what comes out of a person that defiles. 21For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come: fornication, theft, murder, 22adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, folly. 23All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.”

    It is from the human heart that evil intentions come.  Hear that one more time: it is from the human heart that evil intentions come.  Jesus pushes the cultural logic to its horrific conclusions to get people past the absurdity of it.  Jesus pushes the cultural logic to its horrific conclusions to show that blaming hands and feet and eyes for sin is asinine.  Sin is a condition, not of the extremities, but of the deepest recesses of the human heart.

    It is easy to blame a hand for stealing.  It is easy to blame a foot for walking into a house of ill repute.  It is easy to blame an eye for looking at another person with lust in your heart.  It is easy to blame the rich for all the world’s problems.  It is easy to blame those on welfare for their unwillingness to work.  It is easy to blame capitalism for poverty.  It is easy to blame communism for destroying human rights.  It is easy to blame Democrats or Republicans or conservatives or liberals.  It is easy to blame teachers for kids failing to learn.  It is easy to blame elected officials for failing to deal with the problems of a given community.  It is easy to put the problem “out there”, residing in someone else.  But Jesus won’t let us get away with that.  The problem isn’t in the hand.  It isn’t in the foot.  It isn’t in the eye.  The problem isn’t out there with any group or institution or form of government.  The problem is in the human heart.

    Now, most folks don’t like this.  Most folks would like to blame circumstances that are out there.  It absolves them of responsibility.  However, the Christian faith is not about shirking responsibility.  It’s about accepting it, and accepting the fact that each and every one of us is indeed sinful.  We are not just people who do bad things–who are imperfect.  No.  We are much worse.  We are rotten to the core.  We are self-centered and seek our own self-preservation. 

    You may not like me saying that, but let me see if I can show you the depths of your own sinfulness.  Why do you do most of the things that you do?  What is your motivation for getting up in the morning and going to work or engaging in any sort of activity?  What drives you?  I am not asking you to give me a superficial answer to this question.  I really want to know.

    You see, I get up most mornings and exercise.  I make two laps around Cat Spring doing interval training.  Most of you know I have lost quite a bit of weight in the past couple of years, and I want to keep it off.  Some of you know my motivation behind it.  A couple of years ago, my kids and I were visiting my parents.  We were going to go to the Texas State Aquarium, and my kids ran up to their grandpa and said, “Grandpa, are you going too?”  Grandpa, my dad, said, “Sorry, I can’t.  My knee is hurting too badly.”  Now, my dad hurt his knee playing football.  He is also on the heavy side.  These two things came back to haunt him.  I hurt my knees playing football.  I was on the heavy side.  I saw the future in an instant–a future that if I am blessed with grandchildren that I could face.  And I did not like that picture.  I did not like the idea of my grandchildren asking me if I could go with them and having to turn them down.  I decided right then and there to lose the weight and hopefully save my knees.  Now, who did I lose the weight for?  You could say that I did it for my children and my hoped for grandchildren.  But that is not the truth.  I didn’t want to deal with the disappointment of my grandchildren.  I didn’t want to deal with their hurt.  I didn’t want to see that in their eyes because IT WOULD BOTHER ME.  My reasons are selfish.  They have nothing really to do with my future grandchildren.  They have nothing to do with this body that was given to be by God.  My motivations are purely selfish.  Purely.

    Do I need to give further examples?  Do I need to delve into why you get up and drink a cup of coffee?  It’s because you enjoy it, right?  You like the taste.  Would you drink it if you didn’t like it?  Would you drink it if you got no benefit from it?  Oh, here’s another story putting the crosshairs directly on me.  When I was on internship at St. Matthew Lutheran Church in Waco, I did a lot of visitation.  I really enjoyed visiting the little old ladies who were all too happy to provide snack for me.  They found out I liked to eat, and they were happy to spoil me.  One day, I went to visit Emma.  I was told that Emma tended to be on the depressed side.  She hadn’t done well after her husband had died.  I hoped to cheer her up.  Emma and I visited, and then she said, “I have something for you.  It’s some fresh banana bread.” 

    A little part of me died inside.  I hate bananas.  I really do, especially since the taste of a banana makes me gag.  Literally.  I will gag when I taste banana.  So, here is this wonderful lady; who went out of her way to make me this bread, who was a little on the depressed side, who didn’t need her intern making any sort of negative comments; what was I to do?  I choked down the bread.  I did something I didn’t like in the least.  Hiding my gags and chugging water, I got that darn bread down.  Self-sacrifice?  Hardly.  I wanted Emma to enjoy the visit.  I wanted her to think positively about me and what I brought to her.  I choked that bread down for purely selfish reasons.

    Are your motivations any different?  Do you engage in activities that you get no benefit from; no enjoyment out of; no satisfaction at all, yet continue to do so because it is the right thing to do?  Most of us don’t.  Not in the least.  In fact, most of us know the right things to do, but we don’t do them because it costs us.  It costs us dearly.

    Which is why Jesus says, “Everyone will be salted with fire.”  Most scholars are perplexed by this saying, but interestingly enough most of them link Jesus’ saying with Leviticus chapter 2:13, “You shall season all your cereal offerings with salt; you shall not let the salt of the covenant with your God be lacking from your cereal offerings; with all your offerings you shall offer salt.”  These offerings were sacrificial offerings.  They were offerings set forth showing a radical dependency on God.  They were offerings saying, “Lord, we trust that you will get us through thick and thin, and we bring the first fruits of our grain to you to be burned in fire, with salt.” 

    But Jesus is taking this offering a step further.  It’s not the first fruits that are offered and burned and refined and salted–it is us.  We are refined and salted.  We endure the fire and refinement as living sacrifices.  St. Paul puts it this way in Romans chapter 12, “I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.”

    This is the calling Jesus gives to His disciples.  Don’t be superficial.  Don’t look at your hand, your foot, or your eye.  Look at the deep recesses of your heart and let the sinfulness of it be burned and refined.  Offer your very self as an offering to God.  Discipleship is not for the faint of heart.

    Now, anyone who grasps this and understands this should be terrified.  Really.  If you understand what I have proclaimed to you to this point, you should be shaking in your shoes.  For Jesus is demanding your entire being.  He is asking you to walk away from all the desires of your heart.  He is asking you to walk away from your own motivations and selfishness.  He is asking you to forsake your identity and your well being to follow Him.  It’s not a very good sales pitch.  Most of us, if we were honest, would say no.  We would say not a chance.  None of us here this morning would accept such terms because they are just too difficult.  The need for self-preservation and self-satisfaction is just too strong.  We are unwilling to sacrifice ourselves.

    But there is One who was willing.  There was one who was able.  There was one who did such a thing in our place.  If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it dozens of times, we must understand all scripture through the cross.  We must understand all of Jesus’ teachings through the cross.  The cross is the center of our faith and understanding, and Jesus knows you cannot and will not sacrifice yourself.  Jesus knows the depths of your sinfulness.  Jesus knows the hold that sin has over your heart.  And He must break that hold.  He must show you that following Him and trusting Him is worth the sacrifice.

    And so when you could not sacrifice yourself, He sacrificed Himself.  When you were afraid to face the fire, Jesus descended into Hell and faced that fire for you.  When you were afraid of the pain of forsaking yourself, Jesus faced the ultimate forsakenness as the Father turned His back on Him as He hung on the cross.  Jesus looked at you in the midst of your sin and in the midst of your selfishness, then looked at His Father and said, “Father, forgive them for they do not know what they do.”  Jesus offered Himself as a sacrifice on your behalf. 

    When you could not do; when you were in bondage to your self, Jesus did.  He saved you from yourself when you could not.  This was not something you earned; rather it was given to you by sheer grace.  And when you are moved by this, when those chains fall off your heart because you know you are deeply sinful yet deeply loved, you want to die to yourself.  You want to become a living sacrifice.  You want to be salted with fire.  You want to deny yourself, take up your cross and follow Jesus.  Your heart beats with a deep gratitude for the One who gave Himself up for you because He loves you.

    For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son so that all those who believe in Him should not perish but have eternal life.  For God sent the Son into the world not to condemn the world but that the world might be saved through Him.  This is most certainly true.  Amen.

This is Most Certainly True

    We do not know how to wrestle with Truth.
   
Why would I say such a thing?
   
I am going to go back a few years to 9/11 when radical Islamists hijacked four airplanes and crashed them into the World Trade Center, the Pentegon, and intended to crash into the capitol building.  Initially, we came together as a nation to recognize this attack against us, but then we began disagreeing, sometimes vehemently, on how to respond.  There was a particular struggle in how to handle religious ideology –especially in trying to deal with a religious sect that believed it had the absolute Truth and used that belief to justify the killing of innocent people.

    There were two basic responses to this.  Fortunately, most people know that both responses in and of themselves are inadequate, but we have yet to find a happy medium–if such a thing is even possible.  Why would I say that?  Let me begin to define the problem as I see it.

    As we began to delve into the psyche of those who hijacked the planes, we began to focus on their absolute certainty in their beliefs about God.  We reasoned, “If they wouldn’t have been so absolutely certain, they would have been more humble.  They would have known that flying those planes into those buildings was wrong.  All those people would not have been killed if religious nuts wouldn’t be so certain of their beliefs and try to force them on everyone else.” 

    And so, there has been a concerted effort among some to question anyone who has certainty in his or her religious convictions.  Certainty is the enemy in no uncertain terms, and if anyone espouses certainty, then that person is close minded, arrogant, a fanatic, exclusive, or whatever derogatory term you wish to apply.  Now, there are a couple of problems with these trains of thought.

    First is the premise.  Does certainty necessarily cause people to kill others?  Does believing in God with absolute conviction necessarily lead a person to commit atrocities?  The answer, of course, is no.  As Timothy Keller once reported in his book Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism, “You never hear of an Amish terrorist.”  Why?  Because the Amish believe uncompromisingly that God commands them to be non-violent.  Their firm religious conviction leads them to be passivist.  So, it’s not religious certainty that leads someone to kill others in the name of faith, there must be something else.  We will get to that in just a moment.

    The second problem with a war on certainty is that it is logically impossible.  You may wonder what I mean by that.  Just this: the next time someone comes up to you and says, “We cannot be certain about anything.”  Ask them, “Are you certain about that?”  Do you see the problem?  Even if someone wants to narrow it down and say, “We can never be certain about any claims about religion.”  Well, you have just made a truth claim about religious belief.  How can you say with certainty that we can have no certainty?  The statement is self-defeating.  Everyone believes they know something.  Everyone has to have some sort of certainty in order to simply function.  It is a requirement.

   Thirdly, can you imagine anyone preaching a sermon with no certainty?  Can you imagine what it would be like for someone to get up in front of a group of people and basically say, "Well IF God exists--now, we don't know for sure.  Maybe there is a God, maybe there isn't.--then maybe that God is good.  Again, maybe God is evil, but perhaps God is love.  And IF that God is love, then maybe, just maybe that God wants us to care for each other, but we really don't know what that God wants if God even exists.  But it might be a good idea to care for each other anyway.  I can't tell you that for certain, but it might be a good idea."  Yeah, how many of you would stick around for that kind of sermon?  Certainty is necessary. Even in religious belief.

    But if certainty is necessary, then why did religious fanatics hijack planes and kill people?  Why do some “Christians” picket funerals of military personnel and cause extra grief for families?  Why do some people of religious persuasion have a holier-than-thou demeanor and look down their noses at others?

    It’s not because of certainty.  It’s because of self-righteousness.  It’s because they believe they are better than other people.  It’s because they believe they are able to follow the tenets of a particular religion, and they believe everyone else should be able to accomplish what they accomplish.  They believe their performance makes them righteous before God, and “if I can do it, everyone else should be doing it too.”  And if they are not doing it, “then they are of less value than myself.  They are destined to hell.  They deserve punishment.”  You see, it’s not certainty that leads to the demeaning and killing of others, it is self-righteousness. 

    And so, we have these two extremes: we have those who don’t want any certainty, and they are convinced that the world would be better if no one had any convictions; and we have those who are consumed with the certainty that they are righteous and everyone else needs to get with the program.  And the reality is, there are many of us who actually jump between these two poles depending upon the circumstances.  If we don’t like something that someone tries to tell us about faith, we are happy to say, “No one can be certain.”  However, if we want others to fall into line with our own train of thought, we will gladly say, “God is (fill in the blank)...”  In some ways, we are either too open, too closed, or we gladly jump between the two extremes to suit our own agendas.

    You may be wondering just what this has to do with our Gospel lesson from the seventh chapter of the book of Mark.  Perhaps it is time to turn to that now.

    Jesus has an encounter with a man who is deaf and who has a speech impediment.  Jesus is in the midst of a journey through Gentile territory when they– bring to Jesus a man who is deaf and “mogilalon.”  Now I know that sounded strange.  I gave you the Greek word for a speech impediment, because it is an important word.  It is only used once in the entire New Testament–right here by Mark.  And there is a very important reason Mark uses this particular word. 

    It is the same word used in Isaiah chapter 35:6.  I’m going to turn to Isaiah 35 now and read verses four to six to you so that you can see what is going on here.  “4 Say to those who are of a fearful heart, ‘Be strong, do not fear!  Here is your God.  He will come with vengeance, with terrible recompense.  He will come and save you.’  5 Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; 6 then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the “mogilalos” the speechless sing for joy.”

    Mark is unequivocally tying Jesus encounter with this mogilalon to the promised coming of God in Isaiah 35.  Mark is showing us, once again, that this Jesus is the promised One–the promised Messiah–God Himself coming to earth.  And what Jesus does here to this deaf, mogilalon, speech impediment bound man is nothing short of amazing as He offers extreme compassion.

    First, Jesus takes the man aside.  I want you to contemplate this for just a moment as we remember what it would be like for this man given the culture he was in.  For you see, they didn’t have special places to care for those who were deaf and unable to speak in those days.  They didn’t have sign language.  They didn’t see people in such conditions as contributing members of society who had worth and value.  Most folks who were suffering from disabilities were outcasts; mocked; degraded; seen as burdens to the rest of people; contemptuous.  This guy could see, but he would never have been able to hear the insults thrown his way.  He would not be able to understand people’s contempt or hatred.  If he entered Jewish territory, there was then a whole other layer to contend with: for most of the Jewish religious authorities believed that if you suffered with such a malady, then you were under the curse of God. 

    So, Jesus, God incarnate, takes this man aside–away from the crowd and gives him His full attention.  Imagine being a Jew who was hearing this story.  Here is a man who would be seen under God’s curse standing before God with a private audience.  What was God going to do with this cursed individual?  What was God going to do with this man who was an outcast; on the fringes; who was looked down upon and seen as contemptuous?

    As we read through the text, we might think that Jesus is a bit gross, but as I heard in more than one sermon this past week, Jesus is doing something quite amazing.  He is communicating with this deaf, tongue tied man in his own form of sign language.  Jesus puts His fingers in the man’s ears as if to say, “I know your ears do not work.”  Jesus spits on the man’s tongue. “I know your tongue is tied.”  Jesus looks us to heaven.  “God knows your bondage.”  Jesus sighs deeply.  “I am praying to God.”  Then Jesus says, “Ephphatha” which in Aramaic means, “be opened.”  I am sure the man saw Jesus’ lips move.  He had no idea what Jesus said, but he could not mistake the meaning of the word for immediately after Jesus’ lips moved, the man’s ears were opened, and the chains fell off his tongue.  That’s the imagery Mark uses.  The man’s ears were opened and the chains fell off his tongue.  Mark’s imagery here is beautiful.  Jesus reaches out to one who was shunned.  Jesus brings him into a special place alone.  Jesus communicates with the man and shows the man He understands his problems, and Jesus heals the man and restores him to community.

    Jesus’ healing causes quite the stir, but Jesus’ response is quite intriguing.  Jesus tells everyone keep things quiet.  Don’t talk about what I have done.  But the crowd, the man who was just healed kept talking.  Jesus said, “Hush!”  Everyone talked louder.  They proclaimed, “He has done everything well!!”  Jesus said, “Quiet!!” to no avail.  Why would Jesus tell them to hush?  Why would He tell everyone to keep it under wraps?

    The best answer I came across was this: Jesus didn’t want everyone focused on Him simply being a miracle worker.  Jesus didn’t want everyone to think that He was simply here to take away people’s pain and suffering.  Jesus didn’t want everyone just to see Him as the fixer upper of a person’s personal life.  No.  Jesus was much more than that.  Jesus was not here simply to fix all of our problems and make our lives perfect.  Jesus was not here to give us a comfortable position in all that we encountered.  Jesus was about restoration.  Jesus was about mending the relationship between humankind and God–a relationship broken by our hardened hearts, our self-righteous behavior, and our desire to submit ourselves to no authority but our own.  Jesus did not come to simply open ears and tongues, but open hearts to redemption.

    And so we return to the problems of self-righteousness and uncertainty.  We return to them because these are both ways of hardened hearts.  These are both ways of selfish behavior.  I become self-righteous when I think I can follow all of the commands of God–particularly the one’s I like.  I impose those beliefs on others because they should do what I do and be like me.  Oh, but if I am confronted by another’s beliefs in God or in what they think I should do, I will respond, “No one can know for certain God’s will or mind.”  At the heart of this problem is a hardened heart–a closed heart–a heart that is closed in on itself. 

    How does Jesus open such a heart?  How does Jesus change such a heart?  What language does He speak to us to help us see our problem?

    First, He speaks by living the life we were supposed to live.  He reveals to us our own failure to love the Lord our God with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our mind, and with all our strength.  Jesus reveals to us our inability to love our neighbor as we love ourselves.  Jesus does all these things well.  He does them perfectly.  He shows us the depths of our own sin.  Just like last week with the Syrophonecian woman, Jesus challenges us and shows us we deserve nothing for our selfish behavior.  Jesus becomes perfectly righteous, putting us all to shame.

    And then, revealing to us that He knows our condition–He knows our selfishness; He knows our shame; He knows our separation from God–He understands our inability to reconcile ourselves unto God, it is He who stretches out His hands and allows nails to be placed in them.  He sheds His precious blood as He hangs from the cross.  He looks heavenward and with a deep breath cries aloud, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?!”  In that moment, Jesus experienced the wrath and separation from God that you and I were meant to feel.  He experienced God’s silence as He suffered.  He bore the weight of our sin when we least deserved it.  He poured out His love while we were sinners restoring us to God.

    And because of Jesus’ actions, we have complete certainty about two things: number one we are sinful and unrighteous on our own.  We cannot look down our nose at anyone because we all fall short of the glory of God.  We cannot look at another with contempt and hatred because we deserve contempt and hatred.  We cannot kill another for a lack of believing because we lacked faith and trust in God ourselves as we trusted in our own works.  This should make us hang our heads in shame.  But that leads us to the second thing we can be certain about: that God loves us more than we can imagine.  For the Author and creator of the universe was willing to die on our behalf.  He was willing to die for us when we least deserved it.  He was willing to give of Himself to pay for our transgressions. 

    And when you hold onto these two certainties. When you hold them in dynamic tension: that you are undeserving and loved; when you are a failure yet accepted, then your heart is opened too.  Not because of what you do, but because of sheer grace.  A grace rooted in the Gospel:

    For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son so that all those who believe in Him should not perish but have eternal life.  For God sent the Son into the world not to condemn the world but that the world may be saved through Him.  This is most certainly true.  Amen.

You're So Open Minded...

Every once in a while I see a zinger that makes me literally roll on the floor.  While reading a particular news story, I hit the floor when I read the following:

"You're so open minded, your brain leaked out."

Here's why I laughed:

When I arrived at college, I began hearing the exhortation, "Be open minded.  Think about everything you've ever been taught.  Question everything.*"

Suddenly, the worst thing a person could be was closed minded.  If you were a Biblical Fundamentalist, you were considered anti-intellectual and non-thinking.  If you held certain views about the appropriate place for sex, you were considered Puritanical, impractical, and goody-two-shoes.  If you believed it was O.K. to appropriate wealth, you were considered greedy and uncaring toward the poor, etc., etc.

The quite covert and sometimes overt message was, "Do not hold any firm beliefs.  Do not believe you have anything resembling the absolute Truth.  Keep your mind open, and you will be free."

Not so fast.

You see, I follow Jesus, and He is the one who famously said, "The truth will make you free."  However, it wasn't just that little snippet.  Let me give you the entirety of Jesus' words as He is teaching the Pharisees in the Gospel of John:

 31 Then Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, ‘If you continue in my word, you are truly my disciples; ³²and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.’  John 8:31-32

You see, freedom isn't tied to keeping a purely open mind.  In fact, there is no such thing as an open mind.  It is an impossibility to question anything and everything.  There are some truths which are self-evident i.e. if you take one penny and put it next to another penny, you have two pennies.  And there are some truths which are facts which are beyond question, i.e. a water molecule is composed of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom.  You simply cannot keep an open mind about such things.  If you indeed say that your mind is open to such things, then your brain has indeed leaked out.  Either that, or you never really had one in the first place.

The next question is, "What about truth that isn't self-evident or cannot be measured scientifically?"

That is a much different question, a question which is worthy of examination.  Yet, again, I believe that there is no such thing as a completely open mind in regards to such types of truth because all of us approach such questions with basic assumptions.

For if you say, "Such truth is relative," then your basic assumption is that the statement "truth is relative" is the truth.  That's a bit of a pickle, is it not.

If you say, "Absolute Truth exists, and I know it," well, then you assume the Absolute Truth can be known and that you have the intellect and capacity to know it and understand it.

If you say, "Absolute Truth exists, but I'm not sure anyone can know it fully," then you assume the Truth is seen but dimly.

And if any of these three types of people get together to argue, nothing will ever be accomplished because none will generally question the very assumptions they bring to the table.

If you would approach yours truly and try to get him to have an open mind, you would be wasting your time.  There are more than a few things that I refuse to compromise on, give up, or question.  These things stem from my assumptions which are based in faith--not reason.  In order to get me to have such an open mind, you would have to get me to convert to different assumptions.  How good of an evangelist are you?
*That little caveat was oftentimes used by professors and others who wanted you to change your particular beliefs; however, said professors and others usually meant, "Question everything you've ever been taught, but don't question what I'm teaching you now."

What Anti-Abortionists and Universal Health Care Supporters Have in Common

I think Timothy Keller said something similar in his book The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism, but it didn't sink in.  It did yesterday when I was listening to a lecture by Richard John Neuhaus on Youtube. 

Neuhaus tells us he was very much the liberal back in the 1960's and wrote for liberal publications.  He said there were two forms of liberalism which surfaced in that time: a liberalism which sought the absolute freedom of the individual, and a liberalism which concerned itself with expanding the definition of who should be included when it came to who was welcome in the public square.

Neuhaus said that when the issue of abortion arose, it was the first group that seized upon the issue making it an issue of individual freedom: the "right" of a woman to choose what happens within her womb.  Neuhaus argues the second phase of liberalism made a mistake in allowing this to happen.  Why?

Going back to the title of this post, he argues it is because the dignity and sacredness of human life.  Neuhaus argues that there is no biologist in the world who argues to the contrary that once a sperm and egg join, the process begins in the formation of a human being.  As adults, we can trace our very selves to the moment when that one in 6 million sperm found an egg, fertilized it, and began the process of cell division.  All of us arose out of that biological state.  You cannot argue that simple fact.  Anti-abortion folks extend the sacredness of life all the way back to this starting point.  They have a very deeply rooted conviction that God holds the beginnings of this human being as sacred.

In many ways, so do those who support universal health care.  Again, you have a group of people who believe that each human being deserves medical attention when in need, and they believe quite strongly that a person should not go broke to extend one's life--particularly if there is the ability to treat a disease.  I strongly feel this is rooted and grounded in the care and concern for fellow human beings because life is, again, sacred.

Fundamentally, these two groups view life as sacred, but how often do you see them actually joining together to work for both of these things?

Usually, not so much.

In fact, despite sharing this common ground, usually pro-lifers (as they are often called) are found in more "conservative" camps.  Those who support universal health care are usually found in the more liberal camps.  Why is this the case?

A failure to carry one's logic all the way through.  At least, this is what I think.  Why do I think in this fashion?

Let's start with a particular premise: human life is sacred or for those who are more uncomfortable with religious language: valuable.

If human life is sacred/valuable, then what are the consequences of having such a premise?

Well, it would seem as if the common good would want to protect life and extend it to the best of our ability--at least this seems to be a logical consequence.  Therefore, one would think that extending that protection would go to the potential for human life as well as human life which has been struck by disease and illness.  It should be a both/and, at least logically.

However, oftentimes, pro-life folks are against universal health care, and universal health care folks support a woman's right to choose to abort a baby.  The common good seems to travel only so far.

For instance, for many pro-life folks, protecting a potential human is more important than providing food, shelter, an education, and health care for a living human.

For many who support universal health care, providing food, shelter, a education, and health care for a living human being is more important than protecting the life of a potential human being.

What changes the equation?

Individual freedom.

Those who support a woman's right to have an abortion have a particular understanding of individual freedom for that woman.  It is the woman's choice and no one else has a say.  In a very real way, it's radically individualistic.

Those who do not wish to support universal health care have a radically individualistic view as well--pertaining to wealth.  They believe individual freedom to earn and spend money as they choose is paramount.

Interestingly enough, each group has an idea of the sacredness of life; however, they also are (is the right word) infected by a radical individualism.  Each group is not willing to carry either one of these positions (sacredness of life/individual freedom) to it's logical consequences, and so fodder is provided for anyone who wishes to exploit this and continue what some call a culture war.

Pope John Paul II repeatedly spoke out against a culture of death--a culture which allows the potential for human life to be prematurely ended  AND which devalues the lives of living human beings as it fails to provide basic care to those in need.

It seems to me that if the Universal Church believes that all human beings are created in the image of God, then it will be very protective of those which bear that image--before birth and after birth.