What good is a
Truth that doesn’t change our lives?
By Rev Steven R
Mitchell
Mountain View
United, Aurora, CO 01/18/2014
Based on John
1:35-42
This coming Monday is
Martin Luther King, Jr’s official birthday.
This past Friday, I attended a breakfast lecture hosted by the Aurora
Faith Community, where I listened to not only a reflection on Dr King’s life
and how his life was influenced by those he grew up around. I speak specifically about his father Rev
Michael King, who was also a civil rights activist. In fact, after studying church history and
learning about a variety of faith leaders throughout the centuries, the Rev
Michael King took the bold step of changing his name to reflect the significant
change in his life by taking on the name of church reformer Martin Luther. Not only did he change his own name, but
since his son was a Jr. to begin with, had his son Michael King, Jr. name
changed as well to Martin Luther King, Jr.
Dr King grew up in a family where civil rights was more than
just a concept, more than just a dream, it was a home that lived out the
responsibility to work for the truth that each person has the right to live
their life with dignity no matter what the color of skin. The need to be able to live life with dignity
was so powerful that it propelled Rev Dr. King into acts of civil disobedience
and brought upon him and the African American in general along with whites who also
believed in this truth the wrath of a society that did not wish to recognize
this truth. This nation fought a civil
war over this truth and yet war did not provide for the dignity of millions of
citizens in this country. Yes it freed
us as a nation, were no man could own another, but it was damped with a new
philosophy of “equal but separate.”
Battle lines had to once again be drawn and fought in the courts and on
the floor of Congress, but even that wasn’t enough to change the hearts of many
people to the truth of living side by side and safeguarding the dignity of all
our citizens. Even the assignation of
Rev Dr King has not moved us to change deep seeded racism. Which leads me to ask this question: What good is a truth that doesn’t change our
lives?
Two thousand years
ago, a man by the name of John the baptizer, understood a truth that lead him
to live in the wilderness and baptize people who wished to change their lives
because they had received a truth. John
understood himself as only an agent who was to prepare the way for the truth
that was to come. Then one day Jesus
came and was baptized by John. In that
baptism, John recognized that Jesus was the one who would was the truth
incarnate. When John saw Jesus passing
by him one day, he turned to two of his disciples and said of Jesus, “here
is the lamb of God.”
As the church has matured over time, the meaning of what John
was saying has been lost from the original Jewish understanding to our current
interpretation, meaning the “lamb of God” to be the sacrifice for sin. However, lambs were not used for sin
sacrifices in Jesus’ day, but rather only for Passover sacrifice, which remembers
the liberation and deliverance of the Jewish people out of slavery by God. So what John was telling his two disciples is
that Jesus is the one who is to liberate the world from slavery to sin by
bringing the world into new and fresh contact with the presence of God, so that
human alienation from God can end.
As the story unfolds, the two disciples who were told by John
that Jesus was the “Lamb of God,” leave John standing in place and start
following Jesus. Jesus stops, turns
around and asks the timeless question: What are you looking for? Or in some translations: What
do you seek? Is this not truly
the eternal question for all of us? What are we looking for? Are we looking for riches for our lives, or for
peace; not just for the world but for our heart? Do we long for justice, or yearn of violence
to come to an end? Do we still ask this
question for ourselves or have we become so busy with living life that we have become
too tired to ask this question?
The disciples were not prepared for this question I think,
for they had no deep theological question to respond to Jesus. They simply asked, “Where are you staying?” This may seem like a simple question, but
think about the questions we ask when first meeting somebody. Often we will ask questions like, “Where do you live?” “Are you from around
here or do you live in another city?” We ask these questions in order to learn
something about the person. What the two
disciples are really asking of Jesus is “can
we come and get to know you?”
When I was a teenager, a very popular song I use to sing had
a chorus that said, “Just seek and ye shall find. You gotta knock and the door shall be
open. Ask and it shall be given, and a
love comes a tricklin’ down.”
These two men were seeking a truth and they had been told by their
teacher John that Jesus possessed the truth, so they asked to learn more and
Jesus responds with, “Come and see.” Andrew
is named as one of those two men wanting to learn more about Jesus. After spending all day with him, Andrew has
come to understand that Jesus had a truth that was earth changing and acts upon
his conviction by running to his brother Simon and tells him that they have
found the Messiah. Simon then follows
Andrew to where Jesus was staying and has a conversion experience, as he allows
his name to be changed to Peter.
As a church, we are confronted with this age old question of,
“What
are we looking for?” Are we
looking for Jesus or something else?
When we actually take the time to sit quietly and think about our
deepest longing, we might ask ourselves, “What am I doing with my life? What and whom am I really seeking? What am I really hoping for? When we sit in Worship with several minutes of
silence do we take that opportunity to center ourselves and ask “What am I looking
for?” Is it a truth? Or is it something else? Jesus responded with “come and see”, a
response that is relational.
We
talk so much in church circles about how people are consumers of religion. We go to this church or to that because of
what it offers me. I go to this church
because I like the music that the organ makes, or I like going to that church because
of how the choir sounds. I like this church
because it makes me feel good but doesn’t ask anything of me.
In
one of the Christmas movies that I was watching this past Advent, there was a
struggling church, the Senior minister was plagued with declining membership
and attendance and was constantly looking for the latest “in” thing that might bring
in visitors. The younger pastor was
given “honey do” type tasks to do around the church and not able to do what he
felt he was called to do as a pastor. In
a conversation with a stranger who was willing to work for a place to sleep (who
looked suspiciously like the traditional picture of Jesus) was chatting with
the younger minister about the declining rolls.
The drifter then asked, “Are you
speaking the truth in worship?” This
took the young minister by surprised and asked what do you mean? The drifter again said, “Are you speaking the truth?”
We
hear the cliché so often, The truth shall set you free. Yet, what
good is a truth that doesn’t change our lives? Are we really set free? Moses heard the truth and lead his people out
of slavery. Martin Luther King, Jr spoke
the truth and helped move us toward desegregation. What truth do you hear in your heart this
morning? And more importantly, how are
you going to respond to that truth?
Amen
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