Eagerly Waiting

Sunday, November 11, 2012

Jerusalem Baptist Church (Emmerton), Warsaw VA

Ordinary 32/Pentecost 24B

Hebrews 9:24-28

²⁴For Christ did not enter a sanctuary made by human hands, a mere copy of the true one, but he entered into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf. ²⁵Nor was it to offer himself again and again, as the high priest enters the Holy Place year after year with blood that is not his own; ²⁶for then he would have had to suffer again and again since the foundation of the world. But as it is, he has appeared once for all at the end of the age to remove sin by the sacrifice of himself. ²⁷And just as it is appointed for mortals to die once, and after that the judgment, ²⁸so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin, but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.

Some of you may have had the opportunity to see the movie ‘The Hunger Games’ that came out in March of this year. In the opening scenes, we watch two young girls – one a teenager, the other a preteen – prepare for some event that is not quite defined. They dress in their finest clothes and leave their home and their mother to join hundreds of other children as they stream into a central square. There is some kind of verification process they go through, and eventually they are standing in formation – boys on one side, girls on the other. A woman steps up to a microphone and announces that this is the day that two of those present – one girl and one boy – will be selected to represent their district in the Hunger Games.

What we are presented with as an introduction to the selection – which is televised – is a brief summary of why there is a selection day and why there is such a thing as the Hunger Games. Suffice it to say that the day – and the Games – are about a competition – but they are about as far from fun and games as you can get. Two representatives from each of twelve districts – formed out of a nation that might or might not be the former United States – in a semi-distant future – are selected to fight each other to the death – until only one remains. These representatives are called Tributes.

The tension in the scene jumps as the woman draws a name from a glass container and it is that of Primrose Everdeen, the younger of the two sisters. As she steps out with a look of utter disbelief on her face and begins to make her way to the platform, being escorted by two ‘peacekeepers’ to be presented, her older sister screams “I VOLUNTEER! I VOLUNTEER AS TRIBUTE!” which stops the entire proceedings for a moment, but from which the authorities recover fairly quickly, and leave the younger girl and receive the older in replacement of Primrose.

When she gets to the platform she is asked her name, which she gives as Katniss Everdeen. The woman notes the same last name, and makes the connection that Primrose must be her sister.

When the woman announces Katniss as the Tribute selected, the crowd of children responds not with applause and cheers, but with a silent, three fingered salute – a sign of respect and honor for the person to whom it is directed.

One who did not have to put herself in harm’s way chooses to do so of her own free will.

And the story begins. And because we’ve not seen it presented in this context before, we are engaged and enthralled.

One of our greatest challenges within the Christian community of the United States today is to retain a sense of the newness – the uniqueness – of the message of the good news of Jesus Christ. After all, apart from the history of the Gospel in the last four hundred years being so intertwined with the history of the country, most of us have been exposed to that message for our entire lives. We have little if any memory of what our life was like before we first heard the message that “God loved the world so much that he sent his only Son …”

Usually, our context for revisiting that story is this – where we sit and stand right now – Sunday morning or Wednesday evenings in a sanctuary, singing familiar songs, listening to familiar words, sometimes rearranged, about familiar subjects and coming to familiar conclusions. That very familiarity, for better or worse, puts us in a mindset where we do not expect – and more critically – do not perceive – the newness of the message as it comes to us. I’m not saying we don’t try – we DO – every week – to find that new bit, that new aspect, that new glimpse – into the depths of the Gospel message.

Some weeks we catch it and some weeks we miss it. It is not for lack of interest or purpose, it happens because our brains automatically fill in with familiar words what we hear and don’t catch because they are unexpected or unfamiliar phrases or ideas. 

That same dynamic was taking place in the minds of those who first heard this sermon preached or read to them in the first century. They were coming out of a culture – a religious structure – that instructed that there was a requirement to repeat every so often – to present a sacrifice – as small as a dove or as big as an ox … but that this sacrifice was necessary to maintain or regain righteousness in the eyes of God, and thus to remain in God’s favor.

The radical truth that Jesus lived and brought was that God God’s self became one of us, and intentionally moved in history to do away with that form of relationship maintenance between humanity and God.

In Baptist circles and most evangelical traditions we are steeped in the ‘blood imagery’ of Christ’s sacrifice. We are familiar with – and expect to hear on a regular basis – references to Christ’s atoning sacrifice in our place.

The theological term is ‘substitutionary atonement’, the idea that God demands a sacrifice in order to satisfy the requirement of holiness if we are to hope to approach God; and that the only sacrifice that met the strict requirements of God’s holiness was in the person of Jesus. Jesus met those requirements because, as the sacrificial animals had to be perfect specimens – no sickly or defective animal would do – so Jesus was free of defect – free of sin – and acceptable as a sacrifice. And as such, he substituted himself in our place in order to redeem us and make us fit for salvation – to make us fit to be in relationship with God.

The preacher of the message in Hebrews was using that as an example – as a way of describing what God was doing through the incarnation. And in this particular passage what is being underscored was the once-and-for-all-ness of that sacrifice – pointing out that Christ’s sacrifice was one that need never be repeated, and THAT was the ‘WHOA?!’ statement for those who were listening. You see, they lived in a context where it was part of the understood ‘way things were’ that there were going to be daily sacrifices going on in the temple. And that, periodically, there would be a particular day when the high priest would approach the ‘Holy of Holies’, that most sacred place in the temple, behind the veil, where they understood God to reside, and offer up a sacrifice on behalf of the entire nation of Israel, to secure their good favor for one more year.

The preacher is saying that none of that is necessary any longer. That Jesus has fulfilled the requirement once and for all time through the shedding of his own blood.

The mind-bending part of the story is this:

‘Substitutionary atonement’ is a descriptive term for what happened on the cross. It is not a definitive term for it. In other words, it does not completely encompass and explain what happened in Christ’s sacrifice – in God’s act of self-giving love – on the cross.

Think of it this way: understanding the cross as a straightforward sacrificial exchange in which Jesus steps into our place to propitiate – to make good – for our sins – in fact retains a view of God as distant and ultimately uncaring – until you factor in that whole incarnation piece.

When we take into account that Jesus was God incarnate, God in human flesh – that understanding begins to shift. There is now an awareness of God being engaged in – being invested in – seeking out a relationship with us – his creation, and in that we begin to understand the selflessness of God’s love for us.

And the term ‘substitutionary atonement’ doesn’t quite catch it all. We are faced with a God who – motivated by a father’s love more than a judge’s requirement of payment – steps into a process and re-images it. Who takes a transaction and turns it into a foundation and a definition of a relationship – while at the same time providing it as an example for us to follow.

The last verse of the passage then pivots and looks to the future, and again, while it does, on one level, speak to that ultimate future we will all face, I would invite you to consider the two words that are used to describe his followers in the meantime, and to ponder:

What does this mean for Jerusalem Baptist Church at Emmerton?

To be ‘eager’ to do something means one is excited about it – anxious to begin the process, or to continue in it. If we are walking somewhere, and are looking forward to being at that place, our steps are much more likely to be quick – if not an outright sprint – in order to arrive at the location as soon as possible.

Growing up, we had a membership in a municipal pool that was several blocks from our house in Santiago. Come summer, we would usually go at least three or four times a week – in retrospect it seems like it was that frequently – it may not have been that often. But I loved to swim. I still do. And I remember the walks to the pool – or later – the riding our bikes to the pool – were always much faster paced than the walks home FROM the pool.

So how do we eagerly AWAIT something?

How do you put something that is inherently action-oriented, like ‘eager’ with something that is by definition, passive – ‘waiting’? I hesitate to use this example, but it is what came to mind. Most of you have had the opportunity to meet our miniature dachshund, Max. We’ve probably explained to you that in Max’s world, momma rules – Leslie is his leader. He gloms onto her whenever she is in the house. He has to be in the same room with her, ideally he has to be touching her or at least near her. So when she is not in the house, his entire demeanor is anticipatory. He will perk up at the slightest sound that might be coming from the driveway indicating that she might be pulling in. Yesterday afternoon, as I was sitting at my desk in the study, he was making rounds – from the dining room door to the porch, he would come back through the kitchen, down the hall to the bedroom, then back through the study, across the living room, and back to the dining room door to the porch.

It occurs to me that our eager awaiting as followers of Christ needs to be at least that active. That we are called to be active in presenting Christ to the world – again, not introducing through words alone, but much more importantly, through actions.

Our anticipation of Christ’s return may then lend itself to finding that, long before the actual event, we may well become a part of his extended return insofar as we make his presence known in OUR hearts by OUR living.

Would you pray with me?