Jesus, Mr. Miyagi, and You (Or, why the doctrine of the Trinity is important!) ~ Colossians 1:15-20

 Not long ago there were some interesting articles written about songs that had changed the world. Some of the songs highlighted were those which helped fight oppression, others brought a sense of unity to fractured groups or nations, some brought hidden pain out into the open, and still others were like divine interventions which saved people from suicide, self-destructive behavior or even broad disasters like famine. This Sunday we will be discussing a song that didn't make any of the lists and yet could easily be argued as one of the most powerful ancient songs the world has ever known. I'm referring to the hymn which comes from Colossians 1:15-20, which sings about the identity and actions of Jesus in the world. And let me tell you - this song sings! What does this song sing?

First, it’s by looking at Jesus that we discover who God is.

The song is fierce in stating that Jesus is the “image of the invisible God,” the “fullness” of God. The ancient church also stated it this way: Jesus is homoousia with the Father. Literally, of one substance which can sound utterly odd and abstract to us. Yet this word should be one of the most exciting words in our vocabulary, telling us that who Jesus is and what Jesus is doing is one with the essence of God. The early church had a delightful image for this challenging reality: light one candle from another, and you don’t have any less of the first flame and you have a second flame as bright and hot as the first. The Son truly shares the living flame of God’s nature with no qualification or lessening. He is the character and nature of the living God made visible. What God shows himself to be in Jesus is simply who he always is; he doesn’t decide to be like Jesus for thirty-odd years but was so from the very beginning. One theologian said it this way: God is Christlike and in him there is no unChristlikeness at all. The song sings the fullness of God was made visible through him.

Second, the world and everything in it is Jesus’ place.

Paul and the early church were not content like so many Evangelicals to describe reality as spiritual and non-spiritual, with the former being that which is most real, most sacred, more deserving of our attention. But this song sings a different tune. Our days on this planet are a time-share in a gorgeous condo that is not our own. It won’t simply do to say – well, “We’re on vacation. It’s not our place. Who cares if we trash it a bit?” No, the song wants to remind us, and by “remind us,” I mean repeat incessantly, almost annoyingly, that “all things” were created, “all things” came into being, “all things” were formed, sustained, held together, by Jesus, through Jesus, and for Jesus. When the lavish and generous beauty of the world makes you catch your breath, remember that it is like that because of Jesus. Our mission then is to live in such a way that the world and all that is in it sees that it belongs to Jesus, that it is stamped with Jesus, that he is marked for Jesus, that she is already connected to Jesus. There is no such thing as a sacred and secular divide. This is what I love about Sue Enyeart’s testimony that she feels the joy of God by petting her dog, looking at trees, listening to birds. Wow, she sounds a lot like Jesus who said, “Look at the flowers . . . observe the birds” (Matt. 6:25-34). I’m not saying that things and people don’t need to experience redemption. I’m saying, with the Apostle Paul, that everyone and everything that needs redemption already belongs to Jesus. This world and everything in it, the song sings, is Jesus’ house.

Third, God was pleased . . .

Do you imagine that God is ever pleased? Stop and take a moment. Who do you imagine God to be? God is not the displeased actor in this drama the Bible wishes to tell. God is not the vengeful cowboy of this movie – seeking to kill everyone out of revenge and rage, like so many classic westerns. We should follow the text closely at this point: “For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things.” This is admittedly making the same point as point #1 but from a different angle, a different twist: that whatever we are to make of what transpires on the cross was not some weird exchange by which Jesus does something that God doesn’t want to do or somehow calms the supposed anger of God who needed to kill somebody. God doesn’t need to be reconciled. We do. There is a very dangerous set of ideas out there about sin, God, redemption and Jesus that goes something like this: God is angry because of sin and needs to crush us out of justice but Jesus loves us and satisfies God so that God can be reconciled to us. But the song isn’t saying that Christ changes the mind of God toward us sinful human beings and forces God reluctantly to be for us instead of against us; rather, Jesus is the deepest expression of God’s desire to be with us and for us. God is not two-faced (needing to somehow kill us and save us at the same time). Sin doesn’t change God. It changes us. Jesus doesn’t save us from God because the whole mission of the cross was a joint, collaborative, unified effort of redemption by the Father, Son and Holy Spirit to save us from sin.  

It's perhaps the greatest film of the 1980s – filled with well-known one-liners, heart-warming characters and a memorable kick to the face. I’m of course talking about the movie Karate Kid. In what might be one of the more memorable scenes, Daniel LaRusso is asked by Mr. Miyagi to do a series of mundane chores: sand the floor, wax the cars, and paint the house – all in very strange ways: up/down, wax on/wax off, side/side. In a moment of frustration, Daniel complains that he is acting like Mr. Miyagi’s servant and learning nothing about Karate, which Mr. Miyagi promised to teach him. And that’s when Mr. Miyagi asks Daniel, “Show me sand the floor.” And what follows is the amazing moment in which Daniel realizes that the repeated actions were teaching him karate and he didn’t even know it. That’s what’s happening today. This song is a Miyagi-like move to teach us about something very important that is often misunderstood - the Trinity.

So I’m teaching you something about the doctrine of the Trinity that is significant and important. The first is often referred to as the rule of appropriation and could be stated in this way: according to the Scriptures, all the works of God are indivisible. There is only One God who is Creator, Redeemer and Sustainer. To put it another way, all of God is involved in everything God does. This means whether we are speaking about creation (John 1:3), salvation (2 Cor. 5:19), or sanctification (Eph. 5:26), we are speaking about one God.  If we look more closely at creation, for example, this has a number of significant features to counteract popular errors about a Christians response to climate change, for example. A proper doctrine of the Trinity thus points out that the will and actions of Jesus on our behalf are not different to the will and actions of God the Father – what Jesus does and says ARE the Father’s words and actions. Jesus does not change the mind of God toward us sinful human beings or force God reluctantly to be for us; rather, Jesus is the deepest expression of God’s creating, redeeming and sustaining love.

The second rule of trinitarian thinking is less apparent in Colossians but nonetheless apparent in Scripture and moves us from an emphasis on what the triune God does to a discussion of who the triune God is – a divine community who lives with and for and in one another in mutual openness, and self-giving love. This is referred to as the rule of perichoresis, which literally means to go around together, to be in-step together. One of the ancient symbols for this reality is our own Triquetra, Trinitarian knot, which highlights a never-ending movement of giving and receiving. The modern word for this is social trinitarianism that upends our sense of individualism and hierarchical relationships because God is a “pleased” community of self-giving love, of obedience and submission, of sharing and receiving, and that relationship, that image of God, is also meant to shape our sense of community. And that’s my final Miyagi move today – will we be “pleased” to dwell together as a church, with Jesus, for Jesus, in mutual togetherness like God has revealed in Jesus? Will we be a pleasing image of the invisible God? Will you be pleased to dwell with others here, in this place, like that symbol?

Running with the Chariot: Reading the Bible with God and Others "This Very Day"

 

We are in series which explores the reality that God has something for each of us “this very day.” Today’s story better helps us understand how our relationship with God and others impacts our Bible reading. What does Bible study look like with a God who encounters us “this very day”? We will see through Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch that the Bible is a book that calls us to mission, to run toward desert places and excluded people, to encounter questions that we might not expect, and have us running with the Spirit in strange ways.

²⁶ Now an angel of the Lord said to Philip, “Go south to the road—the desert road—that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza.” ²⁷ So he started out, and on his way he met an Ethiopian eunuch, an important official in charge of all the treasury of the Kandake (which means “queen of the Ethiopians”). This man had gone to Jerusalem to worship, ²⁸ and on his way home was sitting in his chariot reading the Book of Isaiah the prophet. ²⁹ The Spirit told Philip, “Go to that chariot and stay near it.”

This crazy Bible study involving Philip doesn’t begin in a quiet spot with a commentary and a cup of coffee. It begins with the angel of the Lord directing him where to go and leading to an encounter. It continues because the Holy Spirit speaks to Philip and tells him, “Go to that chariot.” Philip encountered this Bible study because he was listening to God.

The book of Acts reminds us strongly that we read the Scriptures with God and not simply about God, that reading the Bible on the run is a team sport filled with angels, the Holy Spirit, outsiders and ourselves. And God directs us along side Scripture to where we need to go but also what we need to understand. And that can feel frightening. It’s far easier to believe that all we need to do is to keep our nose in the book but friends, the author of it is all around us and wants to guide and direct us. You can never know the Bible too much, but you can know the Spirit too little.

The book of Acts reveals a God who is active in the world and not merely trapped in the pages of a book. The Bible, in other words, is not Aladdin’s lamp – awesome cosmic power, in an itty-bitty living space. God is not trapped there but actively uses it to bring people to faith.

How do we cultivate a sensitivity to angels and the Holy Spirit? Don’t read like an atheist. We often read the Bible like the author isn’t present. Acknowledge God, asks for wisdom and direction, take risks, and suspend disbelief. Angels are often easily explained away. In the library of Scripture, the Spirit often whispers.

³⁰ Then Philip ran up to the chariot and heard the man reading Isaiah the prophet. “Do you understand what you are reading?” Philip asked. ³¹ “How can I,” he said, “unless someone explains it to me?” So he invited Philip to come up and sit with him.

The story reminds us that the Bible can’t simply explain itself – it often needs, someone to teach it or explain it (the Spirit, the church, and maybe “you”). We need to move beyond the too easy comment, “The Bible says . . .” or “I just believe what the Bible says . . .” This isn’t to say that the Bible loses authority or must give way to only an elite set of interpreters but it does require some careful attention. 

In my last church we had a season in which the lens on our worship projector kept giving out making everything blurry. I was particularly struck when it would happen while Scripture was being read and shown on the screens. What seemed so clear would all of a sudden lose focus, become hard to read.  To be honest, I think the actual experience of the blurriness of Scripture is appropriate and, I suspect, so would Philip. If you don’t understand that the Bible is blurry you will never read it with the care that it demands. Blurry doesn’t mean you can’t see anything or that it’s inscrutable but neither is it easy. To read it well requires help, it requires others. We’ve already seen we need the Holy Spirit but we also need other people, even outsiders.

To read the Bible well you’re going to need to be like Ethiopian Eunuch. You are going to have to ask some questions. You are going to have to ask for help. You will need to discover some helpful friends to explain it to you. You will need to cultivate a proper disposition - a commitment to study, a determination to ask questions, a willingness to risk, the ability to laugh, and a readiness to ask for help.

You will also need to be like Philip. You are going to check-in on others, to ask if they need help with this book. You are going to have learn obedience to God and an ability to hear his voice and do what is asked of you. You are going to have to know the Old Testament and how it connects with the story that God wants to tell – “the good news about Jesus.”

³² This is the passage of Scripture the eunuch was reading:

“He was led like a sheep to the slaughter,
    and as a lamb before its shearer is silent,
    so he did not open his mouth.
³³ In his humiliation he was deprived of justice.
    Who can speak of his descendants?
    For his life was taken from the earth.”

³⁴ The eunuch asked Philip, “Tell me, please, who is the prophet talking about, himself or someone else?” ³⁵ Then Philip began with that very passage of Scripture and told him the good news about Jesus.

Reading the Bible on the run is a suffering sport. It involves a suffering road. Our story begins with Philip receiving an absurd command from an angel to go toward a not-so-comfortable road (vs. 26) – “Get up and go South, along the desert road (in the middle of the day).” This is not a comfortable book. If you find yourself never encountering difficult commands or desert places, you’re probably not reading it correctly. Bible reading with the Spirit demands a commitment to action and adventure. It requires engagement not simply understanding. It asks you to run to others with good news amidst suffering and about suffering. I’m wary of Bible readers who haven’t suffered – the sleek, the beautiful, the famous. They often read the Bible and think they’re good.

The Bible is a terribly wonderful book with a message that says: God has taken up our suffering in Jesus Christ. That God is found in suffering. That God can use suffering. It seeks to tell us about God and about ourselves and the story it wants to tell is a suffering story that is good news, that is horribly transforming, painfully fantastic. If you are going to read the Bible well, you are going to have to understand suffering and God.

³⁶ As they traveled along the road, they came to some water and the eunuch said, “Look, here is water. What can stand in the way of my being baptized?” ^{[37] 38} And he gave orders to stop the chariot. Then both Philip and the eunuch went down into the water and Philip baptized him. ³⁹ When they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord suddenly took Philip away, and the eunuch did not see him again, but went on his way rejoicing. ⁴⁰ Philip, however, appeared at Azotus and traveled about, preaching the gospel in all the towns until he reached Caesarea.

Now this Bible study becomes very interesting. For this outsider, non-Jew, foreigner, does appear to know the Bible. And his knowledge is revealed in a question that perhaps we missed: “What can stand in the way of my being baptized?” That phrase in vs. 36 “stand in the way” is one word in the Greek - koluo [hinders, denies, restrains, punishes]. Why would he imagine that something might hinder him? Well, the Bible told him so. Unlike the other adjectives for our Ethiopian, Luke uses the word “eunuch” five times. Eunuchs were marginalized in Judaism and explicitly told that they could not be a part of the people of God (Deut. 23:1). He would not have been able to enter the temple nor eat any sacrifices that he had sponsored. Culturally, within Judaism, we know that he would have been considered effeminate and a bad omen if you crossed his path. In fact, calling a man a eunuch was an insult. Given the stereotype, cultural tensions, and clear Biblical text, many within the church could have easily said to this outsider: “Yes, the Bible hinders you.” They would’ve rightly quoted Scripture and hindered the work of God. The Bible is telling a story that points in a certain direction. It should not be read in all the same way for it speaks of a drama that centers on God’s work through an anointed one to bring about salvation. Another passage in Isaiah, Isaiah 56, tells of a future salvation that will include “eunuchs” and name them “better than sons and daughters: (Isaiah 56:5). Because of Jesus Christ and because of the Spirit’s prodding – Philip understood that one scripture was no longer true, no longer to be followed, and that another text was to take its place. He came to this conclusion not because he was awfully clever but because he was there by God’s command, asking questions of God’s book with God’s Spirit running alongside. It was God, he knew, who told him, “Run!”

So, Bible study is not for the faint of heart. It requires an openness to God and doing what God wants. It involves a mental, emotional, and spiritual commitment that will lead you into unfamiliar territory.

How do you know if you’re reading it right? Do people go on their way rejoicing? Do they have their suffering named? Do they experience the joy of God being present in it through Jesus Christ?

"This very day": the Spirituality of Jesus for the Present Moment ~ Luke 4:16-30

 

What was the spirituality of Jesus like? What animated his mission? Which is also to ask what animates us? And we’re going to discover that it includes a word that might not have come immediately to mind, and that it includes activities that we might not have called “gospel,” and involve a vocation that we didn’t expect. I’m speaking about the words “today” and “justice” in order to bless others.

1.    The spirituality of Jesus is the joy of “today.”

²¹ He began by saying to them, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”

It is interesting that in Luke’s Gospel the first word of Jesus’ public ministry, apart from reading Scripture, is the word “today” (the word appears in Luke more than any other Gospel and Luke, unlike Matthew and Mark, puts this story first). The promise of God is here, right now, Jesus says; God’s purpose has arrived, he declares; there is good news, freedom, and liberation, “this very day.”

And Jesus throughout his ministry will say more than that he was the long-awaited King that the Scripture foretold would come. He will model a daily spirituality that points to good news for the present moment. He teaches his disciples that we are to pray daily for what we need and ask every day that the will of God would be present “on earth as it is in heaven”. He taught that we should let go of worry about tomorrow and on many occasions will announce “Today salvation has come to this house” (Luke 19:9). And that means that every moment has potential for the in-breaking of God. Notice how Jesus borrows from what is around him, or possesses an awareness of what is occurring right in front of him, even when he can’t see it with his own eyes (i.e. the woman who surreptitiously touches his garment). He always seems aware of the present moment – what God seems to be doing in real time.

But friends, I’ve been in the church long enough to know that Jesus says, “today” and we say, “tomorrow.” Jesus says, “Look! right now” and we long for the past. Jesus says, “This very day God is here, active, present, liberating people on the earth” and we say “trust Jesus so that you can go to heaven when you die.” So how do we cultivate a joyful spirituality for “this very day” like Jesus? Well, I’d like to offer two tried and true practices that help cultivate a daily awareness of God.

First, Jesus regularly worshipped with others and immersed himself in Scripture. Luke tells in vs. 16, “He went to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, and on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue, as was his custom.” Now think about that for a moment. The theological tradition of Christianity is that Jesus was fully human – in every way – no cheats, no Cliff notes, no special privileges. He acted as our Savior from the vantage point of full humanity. So he came to the daily awareness of God’s ever-giving love through practiced devotion of worshipping with others, wrestling with others over Scripture, and daily, solitary, prayer. Sabbath worship was not the culmination of his week but the very beginning – it set the tone, was the diving board for his own leap into ministry. He needed it. So do you. Second, cultivate an awareness of gratitude. Gratitude keeps us in the present moment and helps realize that God is ever-giving. Our current commercialized spirituality wants us looking for the next best thing, which keeps us blind to the present moment. Illus. Our Amazon rainforest guide. A spirituality of today means that we already have so much – now – for the best thing is not something better, it’s not even better circumstances, it’s union with God by the power of the Spirit. Research on joy and happiness charts a direct correlation between happiness and fulfillment and a spirit of thankfulness. The more grateful you are, the more “thanks” you offer, the happier you will be because you will be more aware of the joyful gifts that exist “this very day.”

2.    The spirituality of Jesus is about the joy of liberation in this life and not simply the next.

¹⁸“The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free, ¹⁹ to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

The mission of Jesus – the one he received from God and derived from Scripture is not to save souls out of the world, but to save the world, to heal all of creation by drawing the human race back into its proper relationship with God and with each other. That’s what we mean by the word “justice.” And Jesus would add only one thing to that: “this very day” on the earth. But the passage from Isaiah also reminds us that this work applies not only to the anointed one but to us as well. For this anointed one, we are told will establish a people who are “oaks of righteousness, a planting of the Lord for the display of his splendor. ⁴ They will rebuild the ancient ruins and restore the places long devastated; they will renew the ruined cities that have been devastated for generations.”

God greets us every day with this charge, this promise, this joy – not simply for us to be faithful but for us by the Holy Spirit to be lovingly, graciously, liberating people. We are to comfort all who mourn, ³ and provide for those who grieve . . . to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair.

Friends, this past year we set out on a difficult journey of justice – of looking at our sins, our ill-begotten privileges, our inequities, and it’s been hard. We’ve made initial attempts to comfort mourners, and provide for those for those who grieve – we didn’t do it perfectly, I (and we) made some mistakes. But the biggest mistake was probably this: we forgot the oil of joy and gladness that lubricates the machinery of this work. Oil may not make the car run but it will not work without out. The heat and friction of the engine (despair, mourning, and grieving) will have the engine destroying itself if it’s not well lubricated. We have so much to learn from our brothers and sisters of color in this regard. In the present moment, nothing seems more important than the need for joy and gladness this very day as we join Jesus’ liberating work. Let “hallelujah” be the oil that fuels your justice because God is doing it.

One more remark – that mission reminds us that my personal liberation is important but always connected to the liberation of others.

3.    The spirituality of Jesus is about the joyful liberation of others “this very day” and not merely ourselves.

Up till now, in our passage, everything seems great. And the crowd tells Jesus: “Do these good things for us! Bless us!” Jesus’ strategy of church growth seems right on target and his spirituality appears poised to be a great success because who doesn’t love good news, freedom, and favor and so it’s ironic that the resistance is provoked by Jesus himself, by quoting two proverbs: “Physician, heal yourself” and “No prophet is acceptable in his own country.” Jesus’ response is to say, “Your vocation is do this work for others. You are to bless others, even enemies. Now Jesus isn’t saying that God doesn’t care for them. Rather, he’s exposing the people of Nazareth’s assumption of privileges for themselves first and their unspoken resentment toward any notion that God’s love could be for others, particularly enemies. Jesus uses two stories from 1 Kings 17:8-14, about Elijah aiding an enemy and outsider of Israel and from II Kings 5:1-17, about Elisha healing an enemy and outsider of Israel. Jesus isn’t rejecting Israel he’s reminding them of the social contract of salvation given to Abraham in Genesis 22:18 – “through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed”. They were to be the vehicle of that blessing and not merely its recipients. Jesus was reminding them prophetically of their purpose . Jesus, it turns out, was speaking Zulu. He was reminding them of the life connecting principle of “ubuntu” – I am because we are.

Anger and violence are often the response of those who are made to let go of their privileged importance (Gen. 22:18; Acts 3:25.) The crowd, however, could not face the reality that they might not be first in line - today. They got violently angry when they learned that they might need to give up their seat - today. They were very upset that God’s way of liberation ultimately connected to others, would mean that they should step down, divest, forgive, lose - today. They were confronted with the oneness of humanity, the challenge of Jesus that there is no ultimate liberation for me without liberation for you, there is no ultimate liberation for us, without liberation for them. Will we face that truth of our own vocation to be a blessing for enemies or will we play the part of our own ancestors and try and hurl love off of a cliff? Friends, “this very day” God is loving our enemies. “This very day” God is blessing people that we would wish he didn’t. And if God does such a thing “this very day” then we should give up our privilege and hope for their healing as well - today.