Dear Friends,
Grace and Peace from God our Father and Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
Slide 1) John said to him, “Teacher, we saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him, because he was not following us.”
Jesus' friends often have a very different visions for the Church and for doing God's will in our world than Jesus has in mind. Jesus friend John met such a situation head on.
John told Jesus, “Teacher, we saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him, because he was not following us.”
Let's get the facts straight. Jesus friends saw a man casting out demons in Jesus name. The man they saw exorcising evil spirits was not one of the 12 apostles and he wasn't even “Following them”. This didn't add up in John's mind. This man, who they didn't know, could cast out daemons in Jesus' name. Jesus' friends told their teacher what they'd seen and that they tried to stop it.
Slide 2) Are we on God's side?
I like to assume individually that I'm always on God's side. But I know better. I know that I'm a sinner and that in my sin I have fought with full force against God and God's will. That's what it means to be sinner who is desperate need of a savior. I believe that most Christians want to be on God's side. I believe most of Jesus followers want their church to be faithful to God and God's Word. But we who try to be faithful are all sinners. We, both individually and collectively, fight against God and God's will.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a German Lutheran executed for his roll in a plot to kill Hitler, once said it something like this. If you board the wrong train that's heading in the wrong direction it does you no good to run down the corridor of the train in the opposite direction. At some point you've got to get off the train and start walking in the right direction. Jesus friends have been learning this one lesson over and over for years.
Slide 3) Who is on God's side.
John and the rest of Jesus' friends expected rewards for setting the situation straight. John expected Jesus, at the very least, to give him and the other disciples a pat on the back and maybe say, “That a boy, way to go.” They believed they had stopped someone from misusing Jesus' name. They thought it was worthy of praise. And Jesus told them to leave the man alone.
The differences, which are sometimes quite small and sometimes quite big, between God's plans and our plans come out at surprising times. We see it sometimes in our ministry in everyday lives when we think that we are following God's will and then realize later on, some times much later on, that we aren't following in God's way at all.
Slide 4) Can they do that?
Throughout Christian history there's been a drive, among Jesus' followers, to be the closest to God in every possible way. We want to be Jesus' best followers and to be recognized and acknowledged by God and other people as the very best. If you believe in Jesus and commit your life to following him why wouldn't you want to excel? Why wouldn't you want to excel in following God as no one else ever has before you or will ever do after you?
The drive to be the very best as Jesus' followers has been here from the earliest days of following Jesus. Even before the cross Jesus' friends all wanted to be the best and to be closest to God. Martin Luther King knew about this drive. He called it the “Drum major instinct” Dr. King said,
And there is deep down within all of us an instinct. It's a kind of drum major instinct—a desire to be out front, a desire to lead the parade, a desire to be first. And it is something that runs the whole gamut of life.
And so before we condemn them, let us see that we all have the drum major instinct. We all want to be important, to surpass others, to achieve distinction, to lead the parade.
I thought about just reading Dr. King's sermon today instead of writing my own; but it took him nearly 40 minutes to preach and I don't think that most people here today are used to that kind of preaching.
Slide 5) What does Jesus see us doing as his followers?
We as Jesus' followers try to out do one another as Jesus' super-disciples. 50 years back, in Neenah, Wisconsin, a union worker, in a paper-mill in town, always tried to out do the managers in giving to his church. I learned years later how disappointed he was when church offerings were no longer made public. He loved to point out all the union workers who out did management in their giving.
Christians always want to honor God; but somehow our desire to honor God can and does turn inside of us into a desire to be honored too. Instead of just trying to bring honor to God we think that we deserve to be honored by God. Dr. King said God really wants us to be first and that God really wants us to be great. God wants us to be first in service to one another and greatest in our love for Him and for the people of the whole world.
Slide 6) Who is on God's side?
Jesus’ power can't and won't be contained in the boundaries we humans make for God. Jesus love for God the Father and for all of us is so total it won't just exist in the walls of this congregation or in congregations that look, think, believe, or act exactly like us. Jesus was passionate about the whole world. He couldn’t stand by and watch his friends try and limit the use of his name against the forces of his real enemy and our real enemy.
Jesus called them together saying,
“Do not stop him; for no one who does a deed of power in my name will be able soon afterward to speak evil of me. 40Whoever is not against us is for us. 41For truly I tell you, whoever gives you a cup of water to drink because you bear the name of Christ will by no means lose the reward.
42“If any of you put a stumbling block before one of these little ones who believe in me, it would be better for you if a great millstone were hung around your neck and you were thrown into the sea.
There's an old story about a man who arrived in heaven after dying. As he was being shown around heaven by Saint Peter and some of the angels he noticed a huge hedge surrounding one part of heaven. The was a quiet please sign placed right along side of the hedge. The man turned to Peter and the Angels and asked, “What's with the big hedge?” Peter turned back to him and smiled, “That's where the Lutherans go, they think that they are all alone up here.” I've heard that old joke with so many other denominations from Baptist and Pentecostal to Missouri Synod and Catholic in the punch line.
You can change the punch line over the years and I still think it really makes the point. We like to assume we are on God's side. And that's a very dangerous assumption. It's dangerous when we are having debates with other believers over sensitive subjects that won't go away. It's dangerous to believe that one group, or one historic denomination alone is faithful to God in the world today.
John didn't get a pat on the back like he expected after telling the man to stop casting our daemons. So what about us. What do we expect God to say about our ministry and the ways we treat other believers; even the ones we disagree with over major issues. Many Christians are debating issues of human sexuality both in public and in private today. How we treat one another in this debate speaks volumes, especially to the vast majority of young people of our nation who are estranged from God's Word and church. They are learning what we believe about the cross, and sin, and redemption by what we do beyond these walls. We need humility today in church regardless of denomination or position on difficult and controversial issues. Coming to God takes humility; treating other people who call Jesus Lords as blood bought brothers and sisters, even when we vehemently disagree, takes humility. We treat God's saving death too casually if we have forgotten that Jesus died for others too.
Slide 7) It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. Hebrews 10:31 NRSV
The writer of Hebrews gives us a clue about what it's like to come face to face with God when he said, “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.” Hebrews 10:31 NRSV. The real God is often, as Martin Luther said, a hidden God. He is hidden from us in layers of mystery that we sinners can't comprehend. There are so many dimension to God's work that we shouldn't even pretend to understand. God's not a buddy who is always on our side.
This story about Jesus' friends reveals a dimension to Jesus' work in the world that is tough to accept if you are convinced your church and your church alone is the only right way straight to heaven.
We follow a God who will not be mocked; who sent a Son to die and rise in order that you and I might be saved. If you think that you are doing God a favor by serving him you have forgotten what he has already done for you. Jesus came to save the sick and not to be saved by all of us. When we think our particular church alone is worthy of being called Christian or faithful we have forgotten the Holy God who came to earth. He came as a man who died for us and the world.
500 years ago the pope and the Vatican told each believer in Western Europe what to think and what was true. War and threats of personal violence were used to enforce one particular version of truth. I grew up in a Roman Catholic Church and have chosen to be a Lutheran precisely because of Luther's great belief in the power of Jesus Christ alone to save. I believe that God's Word alone reveals Christ to us and that each individual Christian has a place before God as a member of the priesthood of all believers.
Today, thank God, we have no such institution with coercive power to tell us what to believe and do. Instead we individually are called to come together as the church of God in Christ. We each listen to Scripture and test the Spirit. Our Lutheran heritage only has a future if we as individuals are attentive to God's word. Our Heritage as the church that is built on God's Word is in greatest danger right now because our culture has stopped reading and only debates God's Word. God's Word challenges us, who disagree strongly with what others are saying or doing, to be faithful to God’s Word to be angry, but not to fall into sin in our anger. We are called to ready, sturdy and pray about the word and to give space for others to try and do the same.
Slide 8) Keep Jesus first in your mind and in your life
Us real sinners get overwhelmed by our sins. Our inability to save ourselves proves that we still fight against God and God’s will revealed in scripture. All our struggles to escape sin lead us further in to the mess. Jesus came not for those who have it all together. He came because we need a savior.
I have often wondered what Jesus would do if he walked in to a church (regardless of denomination) today in Minnesota and the rest of the United States.
Would he shake his head or silently weep while watching most congregations get older and most younger people walk away from church (except for a few notable exceptions like weddings and baptisms)? Would he cry over the crimes and sins of clergy and church leaders? Would he get in the face of today’s fathers and mothers who have not told their own children about God’s love for them and for the whole world?
Would Jesus rejoice when congregations send out teams to places like Mississippi or New Orleans to help people get their lives back together after hurricanes while serving in his name? Would he celebrate when families study his Word together and pray together in their homes? Would he come dressed as a pastor or a millionaire or as a homeless person looking for help?
We are a culture of lost sheep and we need to come back to the one true shepherd. We need Jesus today in our lives as moms and dads trying to raise our kids. We need Jesus as brothers and sisters redeemed through Christ's blood. We need to open up his word not to win arguments with other Christians but to come into his presence.
One of my great hopes for Grace and all congregations is that we not be distracted from our primary mission: preaching Jesus Christ crucified and risen for sinners. Our primary calling as Jesus followers has not and will not change. We are first to love God with all our hearts and second to love our neighbors as ourselves. No Christian is my enemy, even if I disagree with them, they are my blood bought brother or sister. The Devil would like it very much if we forgot that he is our enemy and that we were fighting against each other rather than him. Give thanks for Jesus who died that all who believe might live.
