God’s Will as Revealed in Jesus Christ (John 1: 1-18)

Sermon – First United Methodist Church of Salem, Oregon – April 18, 2010

by Robyn Morrion

Our granddaughter, Kaleigh Bea Tabb was born on March 24, 2010.  Kaleigh’s mother, father, grandmother, and grandfather were present to welcome her into the world.  Kaleigh was born into a web of relationships.  Newborn babies are deeply dependent upon human relationships.

Parents are given an awesome responsibility, to nurture and care for infants.  Parents also have a great deal of power over their children.  Babies are born without the ability to express their needs in words, their language is limited to facial expressions, gurgles, coos, and cries.

Those of us who have raised children to adulthood understand that the human WILL develops over time, with the first big push that comes around age two and another that comes in the adolescent years.  Raising a person is a balancing act, to provide enough structure and discipline to develop the child’s self control and moral structures while allowing the child to grow into the fullness of their unique identity.  If we exert too much power over our children, we break their will and stifle their unique personality and gifts.

Part of the process of maturation is language development.  To be fully expressed, a child needs to develop the ability to communicate.  Think of the story of Helen Keller, born deaf and blind.  When a devoted and caring teacher came into her life and gave Helen the ability to communicate, she was able to make something out of her life.

Language is essential for human development.  Although words are really only symbols that help us relate to each other, words also shape our perception of reality.  Words give us the ability to relate to other people.

The prologue to John’s gospel tells us that, “In the beginning was the WORD.”  The greek term is LOGOS.  The WORD that John refers to is beyond what we might normally think when we hear the english WORD.  WORD as LOGOS is that which binds all of creation into ONE.  WORD as the source of all relationships and connection.  It is also WORD that creates our perception of reality.

This WORD is the same generative creative WORD that God speaks in the creation story of Genesis 1.  God speaks, God’s WORD, and creates out of chaos.

There is nothing like the prologue to John’s Gospel in the other three Gospels.  In John’s gospel, there is no birth story, only this poetic description that the WORD existed from the beginning of time.

There is a similar LOGOS or WORD in the Hebrew Old Testament. The Hebrew people believed that Lady Wisdom existed from the beginning of creation, and that Wisdom was integral to God’s creative force.  The passage that was read this morning from Proverbs 8 describes a feminine aspect of the Divine that rejoiced and delighted in the human race.

One of the distinctions between the Hebrew Wisdom and John’s LOGOS or WORD is that the WORD was made FLESH and dwelt among the people.  The WORD is God incarnate. I think it is important to understand that God chose to become FLESH through the womb of a young woman. God embraced and carried in the womb, nurtured into life within the flesh and blood of a woman.  The WORD became flesh in the vulnerable dependent state of a baby.  God experienced the essence of being in human relationship.

When Pastor Dan asked me to preach, he explained his plans for a sermon series on the Will of God.  He selected John’s prologue and the theme, The Will of God Revealed in Jesus.  He mentioned that one of the books he was using was “The Will of God: Answering the Tough Questions” by Rev. Dr. James C. Howell.  Last week, in his introductory sermon to the series, Pastor Dan foreshadowed some of the points that would be elaborated in the coming sermon series.  He mentioned that Jesus reveals the Will of God.  On page 10 of his book, Howell offers a brief synopsis and says he could probably sum up his whole book with one sentence.  “Keep Jesus on your mind, and you will understand, and do, and be well with the will of God.”

I think this is a naive and dangerous statement.  My problem with the statement is that it ignores the history and current reality of Christianity.  Some horrible things have been done, and are still being done, in the name of Jesus Christ.

The cover story of the April issue of Christianity Today is “The Jesus We’ll Never Know,” written by an emergent New Testament scholar, Scot McKnight.  Scot has been teaching a course about Jesus for a number of years.  On the first day of class, he administers a two part psychological profile to the students in the class.  One part determines the behavioral personality profile of the student, the second part determines the psychological profile of their image of Jesus.  Guess what?  The results clearly indicate that we create Jesus in our own image.  Our image of Jesus is shaped by how we interact with our world.

One of my favorite writers Anne Lamott, sums it up in her statement that when our God starts hating the same people we hate, we can be pretty sure that we have created God in our image.

I found my image of Jesus shaped by the three years I spent living in Berkeley and attending the Pacific School of Religion.  I was learning to relate to different cultures.  I became one of the student leaders in the Dismantling Racism and Cultural Competency programs at the school. I learned the hard way that people who have experienced oppression appreciate language like LORD, Savior, and Kingdom…  language that offended the female ‘feminist’ Pastor of my home church.

The most significant experiences were two international trips during my last year of seminary.  In December, I had the honor of traveling to El Salvador and Honduras with eight other Georgia Harkness Scholars and Executives from the General Board of Higher Education and Ministry and General Board of Global Ministries.  One particular morning in San Salvador stands out in my memory.

We were staying in the poshest Hotel in the city.  As we gathered in the morning to wait for our van, I noticed the adjacent convention center lobby was filled with cameras, reporters, and men wearing very expensive suits.  The signs indicated it was a gathering of officials from the International Monetary Fund, World Bank, and the audience included the top elected officials in El Salvador.  The subject was international trade and international debt.

We left the hotel and drove fifteen minutes to the Chapel where Oscar Romero was assassinated.  Arch Bishop Romero was one of the early voices of liberation for the poor landless peasants of Latin America.  His image of Jesus was the Jesus who first public proclamation was, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor.  He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s Jubilee.” (Luke 4:18-19).  The contrast between wealth and power and the Pastor to the landless poor was overwhelming. Which Jesus expresses the Will of God, the Jesus of Oscar Romero, or the Jesus of Capitalism?

In January 2008, I traveled to Uganda and Rwanda with a group of classmates and professors from Pacific School of Religion.  Our goal was to listen to indigenous religious leaders to discover how we could be in solidarity with them, rather than continuing to create dependent relationships.

I discovered different images of Jesus as we traveled throughout rural Uganda and Rwanda.  The most profound part of the experience was our participation in the post genocide reconciliation hearings in Rwanda.  We also toured the Genocide memorial and museum.  The genocide between the Hutu’s and Tutsi’s was fueled by institutionalized Christianity.  Rwanda has been a predominantly Christian country since it was colonized.  The division between Hutu’s and Tutsi’s was created by the German and Dutch Christian colonizers.  For generations the church contributed to dominance and oppression.  During the genocide Tutsi’s fled to their churches seeking safety, only be slaughtered by other Christians.  The Hutu’s had an image of Jesus that involved violent retribution for the oppression they had suffered.

Which Jesus is Rev. Dr. Howell referring to when he suggests we only need to keep Jesus on our mind?  Is it the white supremacist Jesus that colonized the southern hemispher?  Is it the slave owning Jesus, the anti-semitic Jesus of Christian Nazis Germany, the anti-muslim crusader Jesus, the Native American slaying Jesus of Montana, Oregon, or the nuclear bomb dropping, war mongering, America first Jesus?  When we create Jesus in our own image, we can end up doing violent and destructive things while claiming we are responding to the Will of God.

How do we come to know the real Jesus?  Do we come to know Jesus through a reading of the Bible – starting with the God of Moses, continuing through Proverbs and the Hebrew prophets?  Or do we interpret Jesus through the post-Constantine Roman Catholic Church?  Do we follow the Jesus who died because he stood up to the power of the Roman Empire and Jewish religious elite, or do we follow the Jesus of Emperor’s and Kings?

The battle of God’s will versus human will has been going on since the beginning of time.  Can we believe in an all powerful God and also believe that human beings have free will?

The doctrine of Human Free Will is tied closely with the Protestant reformation, The Age of Enlightenment, and increasing confidence in human progress.  As a post-colonial Wesleyan theologian, I am painfully aware that the enlightenment myth of ‘human progress’ has created a world that does not work for all of God’s people.  My experience in Latin America and Africa cause grave concern that the rising tide of capitalism will never benefit the poor people of the world who are now the most impacted by global warming.

We as Christians in the powerful and prosperous United States of America are missing something very important, if we are to discern the will of God.  We are missing the ‘other voices.‘  We are missing the voices of the least among us, the marginalized, the post-colonized now globalized Southern hemisphere, the oppressed refugee and immigrant.  We are missing the voices of the newborn infants.

If we are to discern the will of God as revealed in Jesus, let it be the vulnerable infant Jesus born to a young peasant woman in the worn torn region of the Middle East.  We need to walk with the Jesus who consistently chose to hang out with those who were at the bottom of the power pyramid.  We need to listen to the Gospel and the words of Jesus who said:

“Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.”

“Love each other, as I have loved you.”

“Forgive seventy times seven times.”

We remember the Jesus who said:

“Blessed are the poor in spirit, blessed are the meek, blessed are the merciful, blessed are the peacemakers…”

If you want to know the Will of God as revealed in Jesus, then you need to be in genuine interdependent relationships with the least powerful in our culture.  We will find Jesus when we engage in empowering relationships with the poor, the homeless, the hungry, the sick, the imprisoned, and vulnerable babies born to powerless women in war-torn lands.

I have a dream for our precious little Kaleigh.  I dream of a world where all children are loved, fed, clothed, and have safe roofs over their head.  I dream of a world where we have matured beyond the rivalries of nation states, and the limitations of language.  I dream of a Church for Kaleigh, a church that teaches her that Jesus loves all the children of the world, red or yellow, black or white, they are precious in his sight.  I dream of the Kingdom of God on earth as it is in Heaven. I pray that Kaleigh will grow up into a follower of the Jesus who came to show us the will of God, that we should love each other the way that he first loved us.

Amen

 

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Where is God when the Earth Quakes?

by Rev. Robyn Morrison
1/14/2010

An earthquake is a natural phenomenon, partially explained by science as the tectonic movement of the lithosphere. Physics and science only describe what happens. Science fails to truly explain why creation works the way it works. The great intellectual and scientist, Albert Einstein, once wrote, “What I see in Nature is a magnificent structure that we can comprehend only very imperfectly, and that must fill a thinking person with a feeling of humility.”

Pat Robertson’s absurd allegation that God caused the earthquake to punish the people of Haiti for the sins of their ancestor’s comes from an ancient pre-Christian image of a wrathful punishing God. The ancient vengeful God was most likely a reflection of a less socialized or civilized ancient society. Einstein also wrote, “I cannot imagine a God who rewards or punishes the objects of creation, whose purposes are modeled after our own — a God, in short, who is but a reflection of human frailty.” Thousands of years later, most literate human beings understand the inexplicable randomness of earthquakes. Science knows where the tectonic faults are. They can measure the strength of earthquakes. They can describe the relative probability of an earthquake, but so far they have not been able to accurately predict catastrophic quakes. Pat Robertson is proof that not all human beings have evolved to the level that they can comprehend the ineffable, magnificent, and mysterious nature of God.

If the death, destruction, and suffering involved with earthquakes cannot be adequately explained by science; and if they are not acts of God to punish sinful humanity, then where is God in the midst of the earthquake? The incarnation of God in the person of Jesus is where we find God in the midst of emptiness, abandonment, injustice, and suffering. God is always beyond our knowing, yet Jesus is God in flesh, human and yet divine, utterly approachable and touchable.

Jesus, God incarnate and fully human, abides with us. We remember Jesus as he moved among the people healing with his touch, teaching his disciples to do the same, and empowering with his presence. Jesus moved to the fringe of his society, to the untouchables and those who suffered the most. In an age when religious authorities were quick to blame suffering and affliction on sin, Jesus healed and taught that faith was all that was necessary for salvation and healing.

Jesus, God incarnate and fully human, experienced the absence of God on the cross and uttered an all too familiar lament, “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me.” In the person of Jesus, we find the intermediary who not only knows our suffering, but also knows our experience of abandonment. Yet, God was merciful to Jesus and in the end, Jesus experienced the assurance of knowing. “Into your hands I commend my spirit.”

God the creator is always and forever at work in creation. God is somewhere in the midst of natural phenomenon, but I cannot answer the great questions of why. Why these people? Why now? Why this destruction is necessary at all.

At times like these I turn to Jesus. I hear Jesus calling to me, and to all of God’s children. “Come and follow me.” Jesus taught his disciples, empowered them, and sent them out to heal those who were sick or suffering. He taught his disciples that they would find God when they ministered to people who were hungry, thirsty, imprisoned, or sick.

Where is God in the earth quake? Incarnate in the people who are suffering. Incarnate in the people who are following Jesus in mission, to minister to the victims of the earth quake. If we love God, we will respond by loving our neighbors in Haiti. Christians are called to respond to this crisis with the love and sacrifice modeled by Jesus. We are called to respond to the needs of people with whatever gifts we have. Doctors and medical specialists are needed now. People who are trained to respond to natural disasters are needed now. Anyone with money to spare is called to extravagant generosity, responding with gifts to organizations who we know can be good stewards of our financial gifts (such as the United Methodist Commission on Relief). Later many more people with a wider variety of gifts will be called to respond, to rebuild and restore communities.

Always we are called to examine the effects of injustice and imbalances in power and resources. We must continually strive to seek the kin(g)dom of God on earth. Fewer lives would have been lost if Haiti had more resources and a stronger infrastructure.

There is so much suffering in the world. If only we would truly seek the kin(g)dom of God in earth, perhaps we could relieve much of the suffering that is caused by human greed, injustice, and violence. We may not be able to predict or prevent earthquakes, but we can affect the human caused environmental destruction that scientists are beginning to link to changing weather patterns and increasing catastrophic storms.

Where is God in the midst of the disaster in Haiti? Look and see. Jesus is there in the midst of the death and dying and all those who are lovingly ministering to human needs.

 

Spiritual Maturity

November 9, 2009

In his view, the Fall was essentially a matter of wrong growing up. St. Irenaeus believed, as did many of the early Christians — in marked contrast to the traditional Jewish belief — that Adam was created as a young child. The reason why he was forbidden to eat from the tree of knowledge was simply that he had to grow up first, and that takes time. Unfortunately, Adam was impatient; in trying to anticipate his adulthood, by seizing the fruit before the time was ripe, he thwarted the process of true maturing. St. Irenaeus recognises that one aspect of this is the disorder that afflicts human sexuality, and in fact we might say that his presentation of the Fall is, essentially, as a mishandling of the crisis of puberty. The result is that man can now only grow up properly by a painful dismantling of his false grown-upness. To this end, the Son of God “came to be a child with us,” so that we could be led back to childhood and then grow up again, this time in a true way, till we come to the full stature of Christ himself (Eph 4:13).
from Prayer by Simon Tugwell

I have neglected my spiritual practices for months. It shows. I am losing faith, losing hope, falling deeper into despair and confusion. I find myself in a ministry that does not work for me. It is not a fit for my passions, experience, gifts, and abilities. I have very little experience and feel unqualified to work with youth. From the very beginning the youth did not want me as their youth group leader. I do not feel that I am doing any ‘good’ and certainly not all the good I could be doing. Where is my God? Has God forsaken me? Is it, or is it not, part of God’s plan for my life for me to be learning how to engage in ministries with youth and children at this late stage in my life?

When I read this passage by Simon Tugwell, it sheds light on my current confusion. I have a deep desire to help people connect to experiences of God’s grace. I am frustrated by the attitudes of the middle school and high school youth at FUMC Salem. They already believe they do not need to ‘grow up’ in their faith, to grow up into the full stature of Christ. They already have a false sense of grown-upness. They would argue with me about this, but you see even their parents, even I am guilty of this. We generally do not recognize our own spiritual immaturity.

John Wesley’s concept of sanctifying grace, and ‘moving on to perfection’ is similar. God’s grace is everywhere and always present, beckoning us into a deeper more mature relationship with God. When we accept that we need to grow up, that we do not possess all knowledge of good and evil, that we are incapable of choosing between right and wrong by our own discernment and effort, then we have access to God’s transforming grace. We must come as a child or we do not have access to the realm of God, God’s kindom on earth or in heaven.

The message for me in this text is my current work with young people and families with children at FUMC is important work. I do not need to know what to do. God will guide us all if we admit we are powerless, and we do not possess all knowledge, skills, and abilities. My role is to communicate the importance of this work. My role is to reveal what is inauthentic, what does not work, and enroll adults and youth in a transformed vision for children’s and youth ministries at FUMC Salem acknowledge that Christian education and faith formation – growing into the likeness of Christ – is a life long process.