Brad
Sullivan
3
Advent, Year B
December
17, 2017
Emmanuel,
Houston
Isaiah
61:1-4, 8-11
1
Thessalonians 5:16-24
John
1:6-8, 19-28
That Someone Greater Is Jesus, and that Something Greater is Love
So, John the Baptist really upset the uber religiousy folks
of his time, didn’t he? He was there,
baptizing folks to testify to the Light of God, to lead people into repentance
from the ways they were living that harmed themselves or others, and to prepare
their hearts for the coming of God’s kingdom.
That sounds like a good thing, something folks could pretty well get
behind, but the priests, the Levites, and the Pharisees, they were having none
of it. The priests and Levites were the
ones with primary responsibility for the Temple worship, and the Pharisees were
a group within Israel, focused on upholding the religious laws and rules of
Israel.
You might thing that such religious type folks would be glad
to see someone taking their faith seriously, calling people to repentance, but
not so. The priests, Levites, and
Pharisees were questioning John, basically wondering, “Who gave you the right
or the authority to be out here baptizing?”
“Are you the Messiah, Elijah, the Prophet? No?
Well then explain yourself. What
gives you the right or the authority to be out here baptizing folks?” You can hear in their questions the fear that
their power and authority might be questioned.
John wasn’t authorized by them, so there was this fear that their way of
living and leading their religion was being questioned or even undermined.
So, John responded, “I baptize with water. Among you stands
one whom you do not know, the one who is coming after me; I am not worthy to
untie the thong of his sandal.” In other
words, John was saying, “This baptism that I’m doing, guys, it ain’t nothing to
get your knickers in a twist over. You
wonder about my authority and the things I’m doing…oh, just you wait. I know you guys love the way you live out our
religion and that you love having authority over our religion, but this whole
salvation thing, God’s grace and favor, isn’t going to be only for you few uber
religious types. Truth be told, God’s
grace and favor never was reserved only for you uber religious types. God’s grace and favor is offered to all, and
if you have your knickers in a twist because I offered a baptism of repentance
to those you deem unworthy, just wait till God decides to sit down and eat with
them.”
Ok, so I suppose if we’re being honest and fair, the way of
the priests, Levites, and Pharisees to live and lead their religion was being
questioned…
…and if we’re being honest and fair, we see this played out
again and again in the church as well.
There was the reformation. That
was a pretty big questioning of how the Roman Catholic hierarchy was doing
things. Even now, today, we have a
change going on in our religion. Folks
who want to love God and people but aren’t really religious. Some have been
pushed out of the church (big C Church, worldwide) because of various ways of
life which others within the church deem unworthy of Jesus. Some have left the church because they have a
passion for loving and serving people and they see the majority of the time,
energy, and money of the church going almost exclusively to worship and
building which serve the church primarily and others as an afterthought. We see folks today within the church
following news practices, old practices, new ways of living out our faith with
a greater emphasis on serving others than on expensive, well-rehearsed and
polished corporate worship.
These changes, this turning around, this repentance, has
left some of the traditional religious types none too happy. There has been division and splintering. Repentance, by its very nature, causes
division.
The fact that repentance causes division is not a bad
thing. John’s baptism caused, or
revealed division. That’s not a bad
thing. Such cause for or revealing of
division is necessary. It hurts, and it
is ok, so long as it is followed by something or someone greater. Someone greater than I is coming, John
said. Something greater than repentance
is coming. That someone is Jesus, and
that something is love.
In Revelation chapter 2, [and now I’ve got your attention,
right? Oh my God, preacher man’s gone to Revelation! Now things are getting real.], in Revelation
chapter 2, Jesus gave this message to the church in Ephesus:
‘I know your works, your toil and
your patient endurance. I know that you cannot tolerate evildoers; you have
tested those who claim to be apostles but are not, and have found them to be
false. I also know that you are enduring patiently and bearing up for the sake
of my name, and that you have not grown weary. But I have this against you,
that you have abandoned the love you had at first (Revelation 2:2-4)
The church in Ephesus, they were working on repentance. They were trying to stop evildoers within
their church from causing harm. They had
done well, Jesus was saying. They had
stopped some of the harm by those causing harm, but their repentance had led to
division, and they had lost the love they had for each other.
Repentance will almost inevitably bring division, hurt,
strife. If we leave things there, we end
up with fracture, splitting, us versus them, winners and losers, permanent
division. Repentance is good. John’s baptism was good. After John’s baptism, however, came someone
greater, Jesus. After repentance comes
something greater, love.
Even in the midst of repentance, we need to make sure that
the presence of love is what drives us. With
repentance, are we making ourselves clean of others, removing others so that we
look or feel better? Are we concerned
with our own righteousness before God, or are we concerned with how well we
love and serve others? Remember, our
righteousness before God has been taken care of by Jesus on the cross. We’re not going to make ourselves any more
righteous before God than Jesus already has.
His love for us is greater than our repentance. In our repentance, we’re not seeking to be
righteous before God. In our repentance,
we are seeking amendment of our ways and healing of our hearts so that we may
more fully love others.
Repentance is of course, not the only thing that can cause
division within a church. Sometimes division is also caused by flood waters
drowning a church building, and groups of people end up divided over how they
want rebuilding to happen. With
rebuilding, just like with repentance, such divisions are inevitable. We all care deeply for our church home, for what
our church home is going to be and for how we are going to get there, and
surprise, surprise, we’re all different.
I think Jesus is glad we’re all so different. The body of Christ is as varied as
humanity. I think Jesus is glad that we
care so deeply. We are a caring and
loving people, and we want our building back so that we can serve others in our
community. We’re still able to
worship. It’s not exactly our home, but
we’re still able to worship.
What we don’t have is our building as a resource to serve
the needs of the community around us, and so I think Jesus is inspiring all of
us to want to rebuild, to want to do so well, and to want to do so in a way
that will serve not just our worship and fellowship needs, but will serve the
needs of the community around us. We all
have different ideas, passions, and dreams for how we are to get there, and I
think Jesus is glad for that too. Only
this Jesus would have against us, if we were to let those differing desires
truly divide us and if we were to abandon the love which we had at first.
Our vestry has worked hard with the diocese to get us back
into our building, and they have not done so in the exact way previous vestries
might have. Might, because we’ve never
had this situation before. Our current
vestry has worked not in the way previous vestries might have, but in the way
this vestry has. What I have observed of
the vestry and planning workstream tasked with getting us back into our
building, is that they have worked faithfully, they have worked with integrity,
and they have worked well.
This post-Harvey life is a season of forced repentance for
us, a prolonged season of turning around, of changing our ways, because our
church building was drowned. We will not
be what we were. We will be something new,
a new people by water and the spirit. We
will have division along with way, as is inevitable with repentance, but
remember, we’re not seeking righteousness before God, but the healing of our
hearts so that we may love more fully. We
must not abandon the love which we had at first, for something and someone
greater than repentance is here binding us together. That someone is Jesus, and that something is
love.
