Does This Offend You?
Sunday, August 27th, 2006
Proper 16 B
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton VA
John 6:56-71
I remember the first time I walked into a Sunday School class at Crescent Hill Baptist Church in Louisville. I’d visited several churches since July of 1987, when I flew back from the two years I served in Spain, and was dealing with re-entry back into the culture of the United States after having been away from it.
I say ‘dealing with’ because two years can go by pretty fast, but it is a significant amount of time when you are going through formative – and TRANSformative experiences – both spiritually and emotionally. Moving from wherever those experiences took place BACK into what used to be familiar territory, but with a radically different outlook, can be a trying experience, and this was one of those.
I’d just spent the previous two years living in a culture that was post-christian – that accepted the fact of their historical enmeshment with the church, but which was, and continues to be, intent on ignoring the voice of faith. The society had relegated faith to irrelevance. The power acquired and wielded by the church over the previous 500 years resulted in a backlash against it – and by association, against most matters of faith. There were no active measures to keep it quiet, there is no suppression – no ACTIVE suppression of the practice of faith in Spain – on the contrary; there is a freedom of expression that had not been experienced for a long time in Spain, but the culture has been exposed to a view of the church that is foreign to the New Testament record – a church – an earthly church – that became powerful, and VERY powerful, and in the power, it became corrupt, and in that corruption, it lost it’s moral compass and strength.
That morning I walked into the adult 1 class, and the discussion if I remember correctly, was about the Good Samaritan. The question was, predictably, who was the most Christlike in their actions. A man who was sitting across from me, a schoolteacher, spoke up and said something along the lines of “I know we’re supposed to say the Samaritan was, but I can’t. If I came across that man, I’m not going to go out of my way to help him!” The response of the class was … mostly silence. I had only been attending Crescent Hill for about a month at that point, but if that was what I was going to find there, I thought, the point of the Gospel is completely lost here. It was the closest I came to getting up and walking out of a Sunday School class in my life.
***
In our text this morning, we’ve come to the end of chapter 6, and it is the conclusion of the lessons on bread, on wine, on the spirit, and on life – at least for the time being.
One commentator, William E. Hull, in summarizing chapter six of the Gospel of John, put it this way: “(the chapter) opens with 5,000 excited warriors (the folks who’d been fed on the shores of the Sea of Galilee and want to make Jesus a King), and ends with twelve troubled disciples, one of whom was a traitor!” (The Broadman Bible Commentary, Volume 9, Broadman Press, 1970, p 279)
The crowd-pleasing miracle at the beginning of the chapter gives way to what begins as a theological discussion on the significance of what real life is, and ends with Jesus being rejected by many of those who had up until then been his followers.
What turned them off? What changed? Did Jesus? I think not. What changed was their knowledge OF Jesus. Jesus’ message had always been – and would continue to be – the same. It’s in the perception of that message, in the internalizing of it, in the pondering it, mulling over it, studying it, and ultimately, putting it into practice – or not – that we find how we really see Jesus. Is he … an image? A picture on the wall, a concept, a word, someone who lived a long time ago and had some good things to say, but who probably wouldn’t cut it in today’s world, a religious genius, who knew how to manipulate people into believing he’d done something when he was actually doing something else? Is Jesus someone we relegate to the irrelevancy of Sunday mornings, to the reading of the Christmas Story on Christmas morning and the Easter story at Easter, someone we consider a historical figure, or are we willing to explore what it means to make Jesus actually Lord of our lives?
I know we speak a lot in Baptist circles about having a personal relationship with Jesus Christ as Lord of our lives. That is standard Baptist practice. It’s part of the culture of being Baptist. It comes as naturally to us as fried chicken in the fellowship hall. But what do we mean by that? And is that the only relationship we should aspire to in our faith pilgrimage? I remember at one point in my life going through a phase where I was pretty sure I had the inside track on what this whole business of being a Christian was about. There wasn’t a lot, if anything, anyone could tell me that I didn’t already know … kind of like a 15 year old, but in the faith sense of the word.
I remember saying with a degree of certainty that now seems alien to me, that I didn’t need to go to church to be a Christian. And it is true to a point – you CAN accept Christ and begin to follow him and NOT be a part of a family of faith, but it is a terribly lonely place to be. So lonely, in fact, that THAT is why Jesus entrusted us to each other. Because we are not alone in this – we weren’t intended to BE alone.
There is comfort in companionship, true, there is also enjoyment, fellowship, and camaraderie, and there is even joy. But there is also accountability. There is a word we don’t hear too often unless it is in a congressional hearing.
There’s the … “iron sharpens iron” aspect of living together in community – when there is more than one mind thinking on something, different views, different perceptions come into play, and begin to fill out the picture we have of the Gospel. What would be a one-dimensional picture if one of us were the only one to think of Jesus in a certain situation gradually becomes … richer, deeper, the details begin to get filled in; the shading begins to lend depth and dimension to the somewhat flat portrait we had at first.
***
The reason I had almost walked out of the Sunday School class that morning was primarily simple aversion to fact that the statement made by the man across the circle from me flew in the face of the message of Christ – but it was also due to what I perceived initially to be a tacit acceptance of his statement by the rest of the class. I was new, I hardly knew anyone in the church, so I was not at a place where I felt like I could call him on it. I did say something that didn’t quite come out right. I think I may have been too afraid of what might come out that I held myself back considerably. That’s not an excuse. In retrospect, I still think I should have spoken up more forcefully than I did.
But I’m glad I didn’t walk out. I got to know him as the years went by, and learned more of where the statement came from – he was a new Christian, and from his experience of having to fend for himself from a very early age. He had not, in his life, experienced the grace of either receiving or extending a helping hand in the name of Christ. There were times when I heard or saw him react in later years that gave me the impression that his views on the matter had changed.
What does this mean for Jerusalem Baptist Church at Emmerton?
That is something we will, as I mentioned last week, continue to explore together.
What does it mean to make Jesus Lord of your life? That is something we begin by answering individually, but end answering as part of a community of faith – as members of the body of Christ.
Let’s pray.
Sunday, August 27th, 2006
Proper 16 B
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton VA
John 6:56-71
56Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them. 57Just as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever eats me will live because of me. 58This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like that which your ancestors ate, and they died. But the one who eats this bread will live forever.” 59He said these things while he was teaching in the synagogue at Capernaum.
60When many of his disciples heard it, they said, “This teaching is difficult; who can accept it?” 61But Jesus, being aware that his disciples were complaining about it, said to them, “Does this offend you? 62Then what if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before? 63It is the spirit that gives life; the flesh is useless. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. 64But among you there are some who do not believe.” For Jesus knew from the first who were the ones that did not believe, and who was the one that would betray him. 65And he said, “For this reason I have told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted by the Father.” 66Because of this many of his disciples turned back and no longer went about with him. 67So Jesus asked the twelve, “Do you also wish to go away?” 68Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life. 69We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God.” 70Jesus answered them, “Did I not choose you, the twelve? Yet one of you is a devil.” 71He was speaking of Judas son of Simon Iscariot, for he, though one of the twelve, was going to betray him.
I remember the first time I walked into a Sunday School class at Crescent Hill Baptist Church in Louisville. I’d visited several churches since July of 1987, when I flew back from the two years I served in Spain, and was dealing with re-entry back into the culture of the United States after having been away from it.
I say ‘dealing with’ because two years can go by pretty fast, but it is a significant amount of time when you are going through formative – and TRANSformative experiences – both spiritually and emotionally. Moving from wherever those experiences took place BACK into what used to be familiar territory, but with a radically different outlook, can be a trying experience, and this was one of those.
I’d just spent the previous two years living in a culture that was post-christian – that accepted the fact of their historical enmeshment with the church, but which was, and continues to be, intent on ignoring the voice of faith. The society had relegated faith to irrelevance. The power acquired and wielded by the church over the previous 500 years resulted in a backlash against it – and by association, against most matters of faith. There were no active measures to keep it quiet, there is no suppression – no ACTIVE suppression of the practice of faith in Spain – on the contrary; there is a freedom of expression that had not been experienced for a long time in Spain, but the culture has been exposed to a view of the church that is foreign to the New Testament record – a church – an earthly church – that became powerful, and VERY powerful, and in the power, it became corrupt, and in that corruption, it lost it’s moral compass and strength.
That morning I walked into the adult 1 class, and the discussion if I remember correctly, was about the Good Samaritan. The question was, predictably, who was the most Christlike in their actions. A man who was sitting across from me, a schoolteacher, spoke up and said something along the lines of “I know we’re supposed to say the Samaritan was, but I can’t. If I came across that man, I’m not going to go out of my way to help him!” The response of the class was … mostly silence. I had only been attending Crescent Hill for about a month at that point, but if that was what I was going to find there, I thought, the point of the Gospel is completely lost here. It was the closest I came to getting up and walking out of a Sunday School class in my life.
***
In our text this morning, we’ve come to the end of chapter 6, and it is the conclusion of the lessons on bread, on wine, on the spirit, and on life – at least for the time being.
One commentator, William E. Hull, in summarizing chapter six of the Gospel of John, put it this way: “(the chapter) opens with 5,000 excited warriors (the folks who’d been fed on the shores of the Sea of Galilee and want to make Jesus a King), and ends with twelve troubled disciples, one of whom was a traitor!” (The Broadman Bible Commentary, Volume 9, Broadman Press, 1970, p 279)
The crowd-pleasing miracle at the beginning of the chapter gives way to what begins as a theological discussion on the significance of what real life is, and ends with Jesus being rejected by many of those who had up until then been his followers.
What turned them off? What changed? Did Jesus? I think not. What changed was their knowledge OF Jesus. Jesus’ message had always been – and would continue to be – the same. It’s in the perception of that message, in the internalizing of it, in the pondering it, mulling over it, studying it, and ultimately, putting it into practice – or not – that we find how we really see Jesus. Is he … an image? A picture on the wall, a concept, a word, someone who lived a long time ago and had some good things to say, but who probably wouldn’t cut it in today’s world, a religious genius, who knew how to manipulate people into believing he’d done something when he was actually doing something else? Is Jesus someone we relegate to the irrelevancy of Sunday mornings, to the reading of the Christmas Story on Christmas morning and the Easter story at Easter, someone we consider a historical figure, or are we willing to explore what it means to make Jesus actually Lord of our lives?
I know we speak a lot in Baptist circles about having a personal relationship with Jesus Christ as Lord of our lives. That is standard Baptist practice. It’s part of the culture of being Baptist. It comes as naturally to us as fried chicken in the fellowship hall. But what do we mean by that? And is that the only relationship we should aspire to in our faith pilgrimage? I remember at one point in my life going through a phase where I was pretty sure I had the inside track on what this whole business of being a Christian was about. There wasn’t a lot, if anything, anyone could tell me that I didn’t already know … kind of like a 15 year old, but in the faith sense of the word.
I remember saying with a degree of certainty that now seems alien to me, that I didn’t need to go to church to be a Christian. And it is true to a point – you CAN accept Christ and begin to follow him and NOT be a part of a family of faith, but it is a terribly lonely place to be. So lonely, in fact, that THAT is why Jesus entrusted us to each other. Because we are not alone in this – we weren’t intended to BE alone.
There is comfort in companionship, true, there is also enjoyment, fellowship, and camaraderie, and there is even joy. But there is also accountability. There is a word we don’t hear too often unless it is in a congressional hearing.
There’s the … “iron sharpens iron” aspect of living together in community – when there is more than one mind thinking on something, different views, different perceptions come into play, and begin to fill out the picture we have of the Gospel. What would be a one-dimensional picture if one of us were the only one to think of Jesus in a certain situation gradually becomes … richer, deeper, the details begin to get filled in; the shading begins to lend depth and dimension to the somewhat flat portrait we had at first.
***
The reason I had almost walked out of the Sunday School class that morning was primarily simple aversion to fact that the statement made by the man across the circle from me flew in the face of the message of Christ – but it was also due to what I perceived initially to be a tacit acceptance of his statement by the rest of the class. I was new, I hardly knew anyone in the church, so I was not at a place where I felt like I could call him on it. I did say something that didn’t quite come out right. I think I may have been too afraid of what might come out that I held myself back considerably. That’s not an excuse. In retrospect, I still think I should have spoken up more forcefully than I did.
But I’m glad I didn’t walk out. I got to know him as the years went by, and learned more of where the statement came from – he was a new Christian, and from his experience of having to fend for himself from a very early age. He had not, in his life, experienced the grace of either receiving or extending a helping hand in the name of Christ. There were times when I heard or saw him react in later years that gave me the impression that his views on the matter had changed.
What does this mean for Jerusalem Baptist Church at Emmerton?
That is something we will, as I mentioned last week, continue to explore together.
What does it mean to make Jesus Lord of your life? That is something we begin by answering individually, but end answering as part of a community of faith – as members of the body of Christ.
Let’s pray.
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