Discovering a Beatitude Filled Life,"Blessed are the poor in spirit" (series) by Rev Steven R Mitchell,

Discovering a Beatitude Filled Life

“Blessed are the poor in Spirit”

By Rev Steven R Mitchell

Mountain View United, Aurora, CO 2/9/2014

Based on Matthew 5:3 and I Corinthians 2:13-16

 

        Last week the lectionary reading dealt with Matthew’s telling of Jesus’ first sermon, Sermon on the Mount or The Beatitudes.  As I reflected over those particular verses, I came to the realization that we need to slow down and ponder a bit longer upon this Sermon of Jesus.  So over the next few weeks I am going to take each “blessed are…” and reflect upon their original meanings to the First Century Church and how they may be heard and understood in today’s world.

The very first “blessed are…” makes it very easy to think of these nine blessings as relating to a world in the future and not of this physical world but of life after this world.   Yet these words of instruction, or guidance, or even disciplines are not the how to get to God’s kingdom, but indicates what life is like in God’s kingdom.   I truly believe that these nine “blessed are” to be the hardest of Jesus’ sayings for those of us who live in this country.  I believe this because most of us live at a standard that we identify as “middle class.”  Scripture warns us about the indifference that comes with being “lukewarm”, of not being either hot or cold.  As middle class, we are neither poor nor wealthy, we are middle, we are lukewarm, putting us in a perilous place to exist in.  It is perilous because it dulls our perspectives and more dangerously it dulls our passions.  Middle class is our world of The Matrixs – that sensation of living life without truly living life!

“Blessed are the poor in Spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”   So what does poor in Spirit mean and how long do we have to wait before we are rewarded with living in the Kingdom of heaven?  We first must understand what Matthew meant when he used the word “heaven.”   When we hear the word “heaven”, we are conditioned to think about the place where God lives, and we all know that God lives somewhere “up there”, up there in heaven, just as we understand the devil to live “down there” in hell, which is someplace in the center of earth.  But Matthew was writing for a predominantly Jewish audience, meaning that you as a devote Hebrew would never use the word “God”, because it was religiously forbidden to say God’s name.   We struggle today in mainline denominations with how to refer to God by not using gender pronouns.   So one way to deal with this issue is to assign a different word for God and Matthew chose to use the word “heaven” as a way to refer to God.  So when substituting the word “God” into this first beatitude it would read, “Blessed are the poor in Spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of God.”  This is consistent with Jesus’ pronouncement that the Kingdom of God is at hand, or is present.  So the Beatitudes are concerned with the present not some distant future.

This is not a hard concept for us to understand, but what about the first half of the sentence, “Blessed are the poor in spirit?”  What does it mean to be poor in spirit?  A few weeks ago, I was challenged with a question by a person who wished to know how I would describe what it means to be “living in poverty.”  To be very truthful, my first reaction to the question was one of repulsion.  I was repulsed because I had spent the early part of my life working my way out of a world that we call poverty and into middle class.  Yes that’s right into “lukewarmness.”  But that question started a very long conversation that is still ringing in my brain and has much to do with what does Jesus mean when he said “blessed are the poor.”

A man by the name of Clarence Jordan asked this question: Does Jesus mean “blessed are the poor” or is it merely an image?  Clarence was a man who believed he should live out what he read in the bible, so he started a farming commune, where blacks and whites lived together, sharing their property in common – and he did this in the 1940’s in rural Georgia, subjecting himself to the hatred of the KKK and affluent Georgians.  Preaching on this question of whether Jesus meant spiritual poverty or monetary poverty, he said: If you have a lot of money, you’ll probably say spiritual poverty.  If you have little or no money, you’ll probably say physical poverty.  The rich will thank God for Matthew; the poor will thank God for Luke (who said, “blessed are the poor” and left it at that).  Who’s right”  Chances are, neither one.  For it is exactly this attitude of self-praise and self-justification and self-satisfaction that robs people of a sense of great need for the kingdom and its blessings.  When one says, “I don’t need to be poor in things; I’m poor in spirit,” and another says, “I don’t need to be poor in spirit; I’m poor in things,” both are justifying themselves as they are saying in unison, “I don’t need.”  With that cry on one’s lips, no person can repent.” The Beatitudes for Today by James C Howell

I think what we have to come to understand in what Clarence was saying is when we are filled with ourselves, whether rich or poor, with our own justifications of self, there is no room for God in us.  We are unable to receive the blessings that God has for us until we are able to change the “I don’t need” to the “I don’t have anything”.  In AA it is called “admitting you are powerless.”  It is in our spiritual poverty that we are able to recognize the need for relationship – with God, with one another, and with our environment. 

It is in our middle-class environment that gives us a false security of living the “I don’t need” mentality.  In affluent American communities, it is often the case that our material abundance creates a kind of spiritual poverty in which the sufferings of life cannot be acknowledged and God’s blessings cannot be celebrated or cherished.  Instead of our abundance giving us freedom to act, it actually fosters a deep seeded insecurity, a life that is filled with anxiety, a fear that what we have today will be gone tomorrow.  It is a mentality of living life in scarcity not truly receiving the blessings of abundant living as given by God. Claiming the Beatitudes by Anne Sutherland Howard pg 14    Why?  Because we don’t recognize that we are living in the “I don’t need” instead of living in the “I am powerless” mode.  This is the peril with us living in the middle – we do not fully open ourselves up to the true blessings that God has for us.  Living in the middle holds us back from moving beyond charity to advocacy, from moving beyond seeing the poor as “other” to seeing ourselves in solidarity with these brothers and sisters in Christ.   

The very first reality of living in God’s kingdom, whether in heaven or here on earth is to recognize that we have to trust in God solely for our existence; that the blessing comes with God being in charge not ourselves.   Another way of looking at this would be: As followers of Christ, we have an unbreakable relationship with those who are persecuted, suffering, or destitute. Their material poverty reveals our own spiritual poverty.  They are poor so we are poor.  Often we choose not to recognize the relationship between the immensity of poverty in the world and our spiritual incompleteness.  But in the beatitudes, Jesus challenges that kind of denial of involvement or self-removal from a world of suffering. Claiming the Beatitudes, pg 17   

Paul told the church in Corinth: Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit that is from God, so that we may understand the gifts bestowed on us by God. And we speak of these things in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual things to those who are spiritual.   

Our culture tells us that “more” is satisfying, that you look after number one, that those who are poor deserve to be poor, but God tells us that God’s ways are not understood by the world.  Jesus tells us that being a part of God’s kingdom is empting ourselves of the fear of scarcity and trusting in God and that this can only happen when we are “poor in spirit”, for it is in our poverty that we recognize God in our lives.   Amen

Blessed is Mountain View when..., by Rev Steven R Mitchell 2/2/2014 based on Matt 5:1-12

Blessed is Mountain View When…

By Rev Steven R Mitchell

Mountain View United, Aurora, CO 2/2/2014

Based on Matthew 5:1-12

 

        Each week we sing a thank you, an exhortation to God as we bring up our financial offerings and the very first line of that song is “Praise God from whom all blessings flow.”   It is easy to think of “blessings” as those things we perceive to be the “special and good” in our lives, like sugar on our cereal or the frosting on the cake, and conversely think of those negative things in our lives as “trials and tribulations.”  Yet what if the word “blessed” doesn’t mean just the “good things?”  What would you think if receiving a blessing meant living a life that is not necessarily filled with the “good” that popular culture has assigned to the word “blessing”, or “Blessed”?

        The Gospel written by Matthew tells us that Jesus starts off his ministry by delivering nine “Blessed are you…” declaratives to his disciples and a crowd that had gathered.  These nine statements are then expanded throughout the story of Jesus’ ministry with stories of giving to the needy, prayer, fasting, treasures in heaven, do not worry, judging others, ask – seek – knock, narrow and wide gates, wise and foolish builders, cost of following Jesus, healing, and restoration of possessed men, all of these are the subject labels given in my bible in chapters 6-8. 

        We read stories found throughout the Hebrew Scriptures of fathers passing on his blessing to the eldest son.  It is in receiving that blessing that one receives the inheritance.  We still pass on blessings today.  When someone is baptized we include a blessing, when a building becomes occupied with a faith community, we bless that building, when we commission our Sunday School teachers and other church leaders, or in the ordination or installation of a new pastor we give a blessing.  In that blessing we are passing on the inheritance of God’s will, of God’s desires.

        These past few months have been especially tough months for us as a congregation as we entered into some very tough discussions centered on financial realities and how this will affect the ministry of Mountain View.   These discussions culminated in last Sunday’s Annual meeting with a vote to make some very dramatic adjustments in staffing and the call for a stronger lay involvement.  To some it may feel as if we are moving backwards instead of forward, to others it may seem that the health of the congregation isn’t what we have envisioned, all these giving a lot of emotional pain to many. 

        What better opportunity for us then to hear the words that Jesus delivered in what we call The Sermon on the Mount!   The other evening the Design Team met to discuss “where does Mt View laugh and play” or another way of asking this question is “where do we find our energy” or “Where do we see the Spirit of God at work in our congregational life?”  For clarification, the Design Team has been doing a study of the church using the Appreciative Inquiry model, which looks at where our strengths lay and how we can use those strengths in developing short-term and long-term goals and strategies for growth.

        As we began our meeting, it was evident that last Sunday’s vote was still looming over us, clouding our ability to recognize the question at hand.  Yet it was specifically that question of what gives us our energy, where do we laugh and play, and where do we see the Spirit within our congregational life that allowed us to realize the blessings that we have.  By the end of that meeting, everyone present was making the observation that in asking this question helped bring us back into reality of just how Blessed we are at Mountain View, even if we don’t have any money.  “Blessed are the poor” is the way the Gospel of Luke states it.

        Honestly, if we look to the Beatitudes as a list of things that we have to do to get into Heaven, we are truly missing the point of what Jesus was saying and what Jesus’ message to the world was about.  Remember the phrase, “on earth as it is in heaven” in the Lord’s Prayer?    Jesus was asking that the life in God’s kingdom be reflected here on earth as well.  A Beatitude, then is a description as to the way we live out God’s kingdom here on earth.  A summation of the Sermon on the Mount can be found in Micah 6:8 that touch three areas of life, “and what does God require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God.”

        The Design Team was able to identified 15 specific areas that we see the Spirit of God moving in our congregational life, 15 ways in which we find energy at Mountain View, 15 ways where we laugh and play.  So fasten your seatbelts, it’s going to be a bumpy ride, as Betty Davis once said in the movie, All about Eve.  This list is not in order of importance:

The Spirit, the energy, the laughter and play is found when we are making breakfast burritos, in post worship communion, through our Harambee circle, our music “the specials” as well as congregational singing, in the children’s time of worship, our congregational time of prayer, the closing circle, our fellowship through special gatherings such as the auction dinners, the pumpkin patch, the combined garden diners, those gatherings that are not focused on spiritual growth per say, special projects like the women’s group making scarves for those who are marginalized, there is energy and joy in the community garden, in the Friday group and in choir practice with Ruth Leadership and Mary’s dedication at the piano, hot cakes and hot topics has expanded it’s reach beyond our original goals, underground youth as it works through S.A.L (our own youth program), in our children and the joy they give us during worship, and in the way we as a congregation support our members in their social activities, such as attending school programs of our youth or in the going to community concerts that our young adults perform in.

        So you see my brothers and sisters, we at Mountain View are truly blessed.  We are blessed with ministries that too often we forget in how they reflect Jesus’ teachings.  I am sure that there are many more areas that are not mentioned and I invite you at this time to speak aloud ministries that give you energy, space to laugh and play, and feel the Spirit move within Mountain View.

        Jesus says, Blessed are the poor in spirit, blessed are those who mourn, blessed are the meek, blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, blessed are the merciful, blessed are the pure in heart, blessed are the peacemakers , blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness sake, blessed are you when people revile you on my account.  Beloved, Mountain View is Blessed because we as a congregation are living out the Sermon on the Mount.  Just like our walking in the Marade last week was an act of Repentance, so are we living the message of Jesus.  We have so much to rejoice about and to continue to grow into the Blessings that Jesus speaks about because over all, we are moving forward and helping bring about the kingdom of God here and now. 

Blessed is Mountain View as we continue to lift God up first in our lives, when we do justice, and when we love kindness.  This is the year my friends to Celebrate who we are – a people of God.  To celebrate our living into the Beatitudes that help build the kingdom of God.  Amen

Is the Church Still in the Business of Repentance? based on Matthew 4:12-23 for Mountain View United, Aurora, CO 01/26/2014

Is the Church Still in the Business of Repentance?

By Rev Steven R Mitchell

Mountain View United Church, Aurora, CO 01/26/2014

Based on Matthew 4:12-23

 

        Last week I touched on the Hebrew understanding of what John the Baptizer’s phrase, “here is the Lamb of God” means, not an acknowledgement of “atonement” in the sense of a sin sacrifice, but rather an acknowledgement of a person who was going to give us a fresh contact with the presence of God.  This week we are confronted with the invitation from Jesus as he starts his ministry saying, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.” 

        Repent!  For many people this is a red flag word.  It is like a matador displaying a red cape with a hidden sword in front of a bull, just begging the bull to charge and then when the bull is near enough, plunging his sword into the bull, killing it.  This understanding has developed because of how the word “repent” has been hijacked and misused by T. V. Evangelical ministers.  Many people when hearing the phrase, “repent” feel much like the bull who is being challenged by the matador to come forward to be slain by the sword of God in order to enter into the Kingdom of God.

        This past Monday was the national recognition of Rev Dr Martin Luther King, Jr’s birthday.  All across this nation there were public displays, rallies, and marches that commemorated Rev King.  Not because he was a preacher, but because of the truths that he stood for.  The truth of equality, not just in how we see the color of one’s skin, but equality in pay, in sexes, in disabilities; equality in the areas where any prejudice and denial of access exists.  We had 12 or so members from Mountain View join in Denver’s Marade, which was a march from City park down to Civic Park.  For those 12 who walked, I doubt that you think of your participation as being an act of Repentance.  Yet that is what was going on.  “Repent” is an act of turning around 180 degrees.  It is our recognition that the direction in which we are traveling is not taking us closer to God, but rather taking us further away.  Racism is one of those actions or frames of thinking that takes us away from God’s kingdom.  Through the courage of people like Rev. Dr. King and all those who throughout the life of this nation who have spoken out about racism and have acted in ways that defy that philosophy, we as a nation have been in the act of repentance, which is still being worked out today.  Like a large ship that is being turned; it takes time.

        When Jesus was calling to those around the Sea of Galilee to repent, for the kingdom of God was near, he wasn’t talking about a way into heaven above, but rather was speaking about a way in which God’s dream and God’s truth was near, was within their grasp and dealing with the present.  In just a few verses following this morning’s scripture Matthew tells us how Jesus understands the working out of this repentance and how the kingdom of God looks through the story of what we now call The Sermon on the Mount. 

        Pope Francis has been embraced by the world as the peoples Pope; meaning I suppose, a person who speaks out for the plight of the common person.  There are all sorts of warm and fuzzy feeling pictures of Pope Francis holding children and of his care toward the poor and those who are suffering.  But when Pope Francis starts to speak about economic justice, he starts to receive a backlash from those who hold the power and have influence over the resources of this world.  I just read earlier this week a great commentary on the need to get back to basic bible principles, written not by some famous theologian, but from the comic strip Peanuts.  Linus and Lucy are having a discussion about biblical Christian principles that goes something like this:

Lucy says:  America should get back to biblical Christian principles!

Linus:  So we should feed and shelter the poor? 

Lucy:  No, I’m not paying for a lazy person.

Linus:  We should visit and comfort the prisoners?

Lucy:  No, they don’t deserve that.

Linus:  We should pay our taxes without complaining?

Lucy:  No, that’s my money and I want it.

Linus:  We should show love and mercy freely?

Lucy:  No, that has to be earned.

Linus:  We should avoid violence?

Lucy:  No, we have to take out the “bad guys.”

Linus:  We should be gracious to foreigners?

Lucy:  No, they shouldn’t be here.

Linus:  We should seek to end social injustice throughout the world?

Lucy:  No, that’s not our problem.

Linus:  then what principles are you talking about?

Lucy:  Opposing gay marriage!

 

        What Lucy is saying in the Peanuts commentary focuses around “what it will cost us”, especially in the affluent West, to drop everything and follow what Jesus was asking for – a repentance from materialism, militarism, unbridled capitalism, and classism. 

        We see in this morning’s text, how Jesus moved north from Nazareth to Capernaum as he starts his ministry.  This happens once John the Baptizer has been arrested.  Capernaum happens to be near the crossroads of trade between Egypt and Damascus, but more importantly, it is located in an area where there is more freedom of thought.  In other words, Jesus has gone to an area that isn’t stifled by traditional sets of values or bogged down with dogma, but has exposure to multiple points of view.  I think this is a significant message to us in the church today, that in order to “repent” we need to be looking beyond what is currently comfortable and acceptable.

        When we see Jesus walking along the shores of Galilee and inviting Simon and Andrew to “follow him” and then giving the same invitation to James and John, we are seeing four people who seemingly stop what they are doing to turn to a new life.  A life of discovery, of uncertainty, of not knowing where they will end up.  Jesus says to them, leave what is comfortable and known to you and take a chance to grow in ways that would be uncomfortable and unknown to you. 

How well have we been able to turn loose of the “old” ways, the traditional ways, in order to share the good news with others?  How many marches have we undertaken to protest or support change of human conditions in our community?  How many letters of protest about unjust laws have we written?  How often do we chat with our elected representatives and ask “why”?    Latin American church leader and theologian, Dom Helder Camara, said “When I feed the poor, they call me a saint, but when I ask why the poor are hungry, they call me a communist.” 

John Buchanan wrote: The world and the church are changing more rapidly than we can comprehend…some things are the same: the world and the church desperately need our energy, imagination, passion, impatience, intelligence, and love…one of the great biblical themes is that God calls…all of us to walk into the future without knowing exactly where we are headed, to let go of old securities and certainties and trust the God who promises to be with us wherever we go.”Sermon seeds, UCC Jan 26,2014   This is the call to repentance and the building of Gods kingdom not in heaven, but here on earth, today and for tomorrow.  Amen

What good is a Truth that doesn't change our lives? by Rev Steven R Mitchell, for Mountain View United Church, Aurora, CO

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               

Whose Footprint is in the Sand? by Rev Steven R Mitchell for Mountain View United, Aurora, CO 1/12/2014

Whose Footprint is in the Sand?

By Rev Steven R Mitchell

Mountain View United, Aurora, CO 01/12/2014

Based on Isaiah 42:1-9

 

        The book of Isaiah is sometimes referred to as the Fifth Gospel, as much of its content tends to point to messianic activity and easily can have Jesus plugged in as the person referred to as “my servant.”  Scholars across the spectrum argue as to who the author was referring to in the phrase “my servant”; was it someone who was soon to come into power, was it Isaiah himself, or was it speaking of a person who would be born in the distant future, possibly like Jesus of Nazareth?  When Jesus first announced his ministry to those leaders in the synagogue as recorded in the Gospel of Luke, he chose to read out of Isaiah chapter 61, a verse that was very much similar to this morning’s reading. “The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to preach good news to the poor.  He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor…”

Within the second part of Isaiah, there is the reoccurring theme of “my servant”, which explains the reason for Isaiah being referred so often along with the four gospels.  Jesus obviously took the understanding of “my servant” to be the primary call of his ministry and is the building block to what we call Social ministry.  Because of this morning’s reading being the corner stone of Jesus’ understanding of God’s desire for his creation and ultimately the meaning of “restoration”, I would like to reflect on some specific verses and explore how this affects those of us who strive to follow God’s intent.

So, who is “the servant” and what does the servant do?  Isaiah says that God is the one who has chosen the servant and supports him to the point that God’s very soul delights in him.  This servant of God has been given God’s spirit.  Today is recognized in the church year as Christ’s Baptism Sunday.  We can read in all four Gospels that when Jesus was baptized the heavens opened up and the Holy Spirit descended upon Jesus.  I was so moved by the story’s of Jesus’ baptism, that at the age of fourteen when I was being baptized I was sure that as I would come up out of the water (I was baptized by immersion) that I would have a vision of the clouds of heaven opening up and I would get to see the gates of heaven or something very special.  I was truly disappointed when all I saw was the face of my pastor, Rev Bill. 

The servant of God will not harm a bruised reed, or extinguish a dimly burning wick, and will faithfully bring forth justice.  These are marvelous metaphors of being wounded; so wounded that you feel as if you can no longer live, or so wounded that “hope” no longer exists.  I think that most of us try to live our lives in a way that we would never intentionally harm or try to cause pain to someone, yet even in an unintentional act of being dismissive way toward someone because we feel we don’t have time to acknowledge or listen to them – is that not breaking a bruised reed or not supporting a dimly burning wick? 

Take just a moment to think about the kind of reaction most of us have when we stop at a street light and a person is standing on the corner with a sign asking for help (usually in the form of money, but it’s a request for help none the less.)  How often do we look that person straight in the eye?  Usually, we tend to look straight ahead, maybe time to time glancing over to see that person, but never doing anything that might encourage that individual to come over to your car window.  That is being dismissive of someone who is a dimly flickering light.  It’s dismissive because we don’t even recognize their presence.  We may justify this behavior by saying, I don’t wish to give any money to this person because I don’t know what it will be used for or maybe we don’t have any coin with us, but would a more probable reason for not looking that person in the eye be because we do not want to be confronted with the reality of what it means to be without hope?  Yet when we do take that leap of courage and look eye to eye with that person, the spirit of servant swells in us, we often call it our humanity.  Even if there is no money exchanged, when we look eyeball to eyeball with that person, we have given them the gift of “existence”, we have justified that they are not invisible in a world that so easily can dispose people that are deemed inadequate.  

We in this country are so eager to make sure that there is procedural justice (the proper and unbiased understanding and application of legal factors in courts and human relations.)  Yet there is another way to look at justice, which is distributive justice (the equitable distribution and utilization of resources and responsibilities in non-legal contexts.)  Here is where the church starts to vary in its willingness to participate or define as part of the job description as being a “servant.”  When we see someone on a street corner with a sign for help, we are seeing a breakdown in distributive justice.  Yet this was Jesus’ major call in ministry to make accountable those in leadership and power for distributive justice. 

Scripture like this one in Isaiah, realizes that there are times in our lives when we are so beaten up, so low with despair that we believe that not even God is there with us; that living in exile in Babylon and we like the Israelites can believe that God has abandoned us.  This is surely how it must have felt for the average Jewish person during WWII living in Europe, as Hitler’s mandate exterminated of over 6 million lives, just because they happened to have Jewish blood.  But the promise of God is, “I have taken you by the hand and kept you; I have given you as a covenant to the people, a light to the nations, to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon.”  God is saying, “no matter what life is throwing at you, no matter how low you feel, or how hopeless a situation may look, I am with you.  And out of these despairs you will be able to be the light for others.”

I would like to share a modern day rendition of today’s scripture.

The Footprints Prayer:  One night I had a dream... I dreamed I was walking along the beach with the Lord, and across the sky flashed scenes from my life.  For each scene I noticed two sets of footprints in the sand; One belonged to me, and the other to the Lord. When the last scene of my life flashed before us, I looked back at the footprints in the sand. I noticed that many times along the path of my life, there was only one set of footprints. I also noticed that it happened at the very lowest and saddest times in my life.

This really bothered me, and I questioned the Lord about it. "Lord, you said that once I decided to follow you, you would walk with me all the way; But I have noticed that during the most troublesome times in my life, there is only one set of footprints. I don't understand why in times when I needed you the most, you should leave me. The Lord replied, "My precious, precious child. I love you, and I would never, never leave you during your times of trial and suffering. When you saw only one set of footprints, It was then that I carried you.

It is pretty easy to see Jesus as the “my servant” in this morning’s text.  My question is: Do you see the commission or the covenant between God and the servant as including you?  Do you see yourself called forth to bring justice, to open the eyes that are blind, to lead out of darkness those who live in the shadows?  If the church is the extension of Christ, then this is our basic call; we too are chosen by God and have had God’s spirit placed upon us to bring about hope and justice, not just legal, but distributive justice as well to all nations.  We are called to help those who do not understand God’s justice to see and when we encounter darkness to be a light.  This is how we remember our baptism; this is how we become footprints in the sand for each other.   Amen

Excuse Me Sir: Where do we deliver our gifts? by Rev Steven R Mitchell for Mountain View United Church, Aurora, CO 01/05/2014

Excuse Me Sir: Where do we deliver our gifts?

By Rev Steven R Mitchell

Mountain View United, Aurora, CO 01/05/2014

Based on Matthew 2:1-12

 

        For many the decorating of a fir tree symbolizes the beginning of Christmas.  Most churches have a hanging of the greens on the first Sunday of Advent.  As such, the un-decorating of the Christmas tree indicates the end of Christmas.  As a child, our Christmas tree tended to stay up until New Year’s Day.  I think it was more for the spirit of celebration and had less to do with the idea of Christmas Tide being over.  As an adult, I leave our Christmas tree up until the actual end of Christmas, which from the view of the Church calendar is tomorrow, which is known as Epiphany. 

        Epiphany sets the stage for Lent and Easter.  It is during the season of Epiphany that the birth of the new Messiah is shared with the non-Jewish community, and this comes in the story of the visit of the Magi of the East.  Last week we saw how the fear of losing privilege and power caused great pain and suffering for the innocent, as King Herod learned about a new King of the Jews birth.  Herod was not only a cruel king, but a puppet ruler for Rome, as well.  If any major civil unrest were to occur under Herod’s administration, he knew that Caesar would remove him from his power.      If we look at the visit of the Magi only as a story about some “wise” men traveling across the desert to see the new born king and bring him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh, following a star that they had seen in the East, then we are very much missing the meaning to this story.  Dr John Pilch, former Theology Professor at Georgetown University states: These magi of the East represent a long-standing resistance to Western (at that point, Roman) imperialism, by traveling a long way to pay homage to the new king of the Judeans.  In doing so, they‘re poking their finger in the eye of Rome itself, and all its puppets, which include Herod himself.  (The reason why Pilch and other theologians talk about the threat of Jesus being seen as “the son of God” is from the fact that Caesar was also seen as “the son of god”, so there is a natural political rivalry between Caesar who was seen by the Roman state as the prince of peace and Jesus as the new Messiah,(the Jewish bringer of peace.)  Pilch says that the wise men were men of stature and importance back home, advisors to the rulers of ancient empires in the East.  The East also invokes images of former conquers of Israel, like Assyria, Babylon, and Persia; it is no wonder that Herod was feeling very uneasy about their visit.  I can just hear him thinking, “Why are these men really here?  What do they know that I don’t?  Are they spies trying to scope out our defenses so their kings can once again attack us?”

        Quoting from Kathryn Huey on her reflections of this text: This text at the beginning of the New Year gives us pause, to ponder the meaning of visitors from the very places we seem to fear most in the world right now.  Perhaps we would get a better sense of the reaction of Matthew’s earliest audience to this text about Magi from the East if we imagined a visit to our local church by religious or political leaders from religious faiths or countries that we fear. UCC Sermon Seed, 1/5/2014  How comfortable would we feel if we had a visit from Russia’s President Putin, North Korea’s President Kim Young-nam, and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas?  These three men represent the philosophies of Communism and Islam.  Would we be open armed and totally embracing, or would we view their visit with at least a small amount of suspicion? This is what Matthew’s hearers had to deal with in this story of the Magi.

        Another aspect of this story talks about a contrast between two ancient and holy places, Jerusalem the seat of power and prestige, and Bethlehem a humble little town, literally just 9 miles down the road.  One represents the idea of where God dwells, while the other represents the hope of a new messiah, a new king whose reign will be of justice and peace.  The magi go to the logical place, Jerusalem, the city where the Temple that houses the Holy of Holy’s is, to seek this new born king, but find Jerusalem lacking.  I wonder about the “holy temple” that Paul speaks that is our body, which would include our heart and mind, and if at times we find it lacking?  And if it is lacking, why?  Have we filled ourselves with the hope that is found through what Jerusalem say’s it has to offer and not putting our hope and trust in what Bethlehem represents; vulnerability, meekness, forgiveness?

        So we have these wise men that recognize the new, but do not know where to find it.  They have missed their mark by only 9 miles.  Even though they were able to utilize the signs that were familiar to them, they still lacked information that would lead them to the new born king – information that could only be found within the Hebrew Scriptures.  Matthew is telling us, that with all of our human wisdom available to us, we still need the guidance of the word of God to help us fully understand.  With the help of the Hebrew religious leaders the Magi were able to learn that Bethlehem was the town they would find the child. 

        Lastly, and possibly the most important message from this story about the visiting Magi, again isn’t found in the gifts that they bare, but rather in their actions.  Matthew three times states “to pay him homage.”  The Magi inquire at the palace of the new king, “so that they may pay him homage”; Herod tells the Magi to return with the location so he too may, “pay him homage”; and then upon their entering into the house where the baby Jesus lives, they with great joy, fall to their knees and “paid homage to him”, and then presented the gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. 

        It is within this story that the sequence of how a person in search of something to fill the void within them follows.  They first recognize that there is something more than what they presently experience.  Next they go on a journey seeking what they hope is to be the answer.  Then when they find that truth for them, they are filled with joy and give thanks or pay homage.  For Matthew that truth is found in the person of Jesus; the person who embodies God and brings peace to those who are in turmoil. 

        The magi represent the non-Jewish world, we gentiles.  This story represents a group of outsiders who saw the signs of change and wanted to be a part of that change.  Through the star in the sky that appeared at the birth of Jesus they set out on a long journey seeking this new king of the Jews.  They find themselves in Jerusalem, which is the capitol city of the Judeans.  I think that they were just as surprised to not find the newborn king not at the palace, as was Herod to hear about Jesus’ birth. 

The religious leaders had the answers at their finger tips but failed to see the signs.  I wonder why after discovering that the prophecy of the new messiah had been fulfilled, why neither the chief priests or Herod accompanied the Magi to Bethlehem in order to find the child?  One would think from Herod’s perspective, it to be prudent to go and see where Jesus actually was, so he could dispose of him in a more timely and efficient manner.  Maybe the reason was that the religious priests no longer took their scriptures seriously?  Had they lost the “hope” that scripture promises?

More directly, do we miss the miracles of God because we are not searching for them?  Is it possible that we do not feel the “Joy” that Christmas speaks to because we do not have the “hope” that the scriptures speak of?  Are we guilty of putting our security in the temporal things of life?  Have we bought into an imperial gospel that is promised by Wall Street?

The magi came bearing gifts, but before they presented them, they bowed down and paid homage, with joy in their hearts.  On this second Sunday of Christmas, don’t we want to find ourselves in this story, too; to hear what happened so long ago, and to connect our own lives with it?  I believe that we travelers from a distant time want to kneel with the Magi from the East, in awe and joy for the gift before us.  And we want to know how God is still at work in this world we live in now.  So let us be the Magi asking, “where do we deliver our gifts?”  Amen

The Problem Child, by Rev Steven R Mitchell for Mountain View United, Aurora, CO 12-29-2013

The Problem Baby

By Rev Steven R Mitchell

Mountain View United, Aurora, CO 12/29/2013

Based on Matthew 2: 13-23

 

This past Friday, I was able to hang-out with my eldest daughter and her family.  She has six children ranging from 15 ½ down to 8 months old, five of them boys and one daughter.  In one of our discussions my daughter told me among the many things that she is trying to expose my grandchildren to, is an appreciation for music of the 1980’s, my daughters era of course.  I was reminded of conversations I had with my kids as to why can’t they listen to Disco, and of my mother’s conversation with me about how the Beatles were not writing music. 

        This tension between parent and child, was humorously dealt with in a song from Bye, Bye, Birdie titled, “Kids.” 

Kids! I don't know what's wrong with these kids today!  Kids!  Who can understand anything they say?  Kids!  They are disobedient, disrespectful oafs!  Noisy, crazy, dirty, lazy, loafers!  While we're on the subject:  Kids!  You can talk and talk till your face is blue!  Kids!  But they still just do what they want to do!  Why can't they be like we were, Perfect in every way? What's the matter with kids today?  Kids!  I've tried to raise him the best I could.  Kids!  And while we're on the subject!  Kids!  They are just impossible to control!  Kids!   With their awful clothes and their rock an' roll!  Why can't they dance like we did? What's wrong with Sammy Caine?
What's the matter with kids today!

Now can’t you just see King Herod singing this song to his religious advisers as he learns from the three wise men who study the stars and have learned that there is a new King of the Jews?  No, I don’t think Herod was worried about a generation gap.  Herod is worried about his throne.  Herod hears this news with such fear that it disturbs the whole palace. 

When you stop to think about it, the whole story about Jesus’ birth seems to be pretty disturbing, to just about everybody involved.   Staying solely with Matthew’s account of Jesus’ birth, the first two people that we learn about is Joseph and Mary, who are engaged to be married.  The first problem arises with the news that Mary is with child and Joseph is pretty sure he isn’t the father.  Joseph loves Mary and doesn’t want her to be publicly ridiculed so he was going to call off the engagement quietly.  Then he has a dream telling him not to be afraid of taking Mary as his wife, for she is going to have a son who will be called Emanuel, “God with us.”  So they get married and she delivered a baby boy by the end of first chapter.

At the very beginning of the second chapter, we are introduced to two more sets of people, the wise men of the East who have come looking for the new born Jesus and King Herod, who lives in Jerusalem just a couple of miles from Bethlehem where Jesus was born.   The wise men were looking for the New King of the Jews, for they had seen his star in the East and had come to worship him.  This was a huge surprise to Herod.  After confirming this prophesy with his own religious leaders, Herod calls in the wise men and asks one little favor of them, that they after finding the child come back and share the news with him, so he too might go and pay homage to this new king of the Jews.  Again another dream, this time to the wise men telling them to go home a differing route and avoid Herod at all costs. 

I’m not sure how many of you with children have ever thought about your newborn child as “being a problem”.  Oh sure, there are going to be those broken windows resulting from a stray pitch, or those fights with the neighborhood bully, and even those broken bones from falling out of the tree, but to be considered a problem to the point that the city sheriff, or the mayor wants to have your child killed?  What was it about this child that would attract attention of three learned men in a far off country and compel them to make the long journey to pay homage?  What is it about this child that at his birth caused the most powerful man in Israel to fear him?

        The problem with this child is that he is a threat!  If Jesus was truly the new King of the Jews as the wise men describe him to be to Herod, then this means that Herod was no longer an unchallenged ruler.  The problem of this child is that once he is a grown man, he would become a threat to the Emperor of Rome.  This baby was perceived as a threat, so much so, that Matthew tells us Herod wants him dead and is willing to kill a number of little male boys to insure it.  Again, Joseph has a dream and is told to take the child and his mother to safety in the land of Egypt.  Then another dream tells Joseph that it is safe for them to return, but to go on into Galilee and raise Jesus in Nazareth, an obscure little village a long way from the eye’s of the Herod’s.

When I look at my two youngest grandsons who are 8 months old and 2 years old and then think about this morning’s scripture, my blood runs cold.  How could anyone want to harm little ones who are so innocent?  I don’t know if this story that Matthew tells is factually accurate, but it does speak to the darker side of humanity.  A darker side that still goes on today with ruling powers who commit genocide and what they justify as ethnic cleansing. 

This story about Herod’s fear still speaks to us today.  It speaks to us at the levels of social justice.  Last month I watched the movie The Butler, which tells the story of a young black man and of his life from the 1930’s up to the election of President Obama.  At the end of the movie I was so moved that I couldn’t speak, because my throat was so constricted by emotion.  I knew going into the movie that I was going to be taken down memory lane of the civil rights movement of the 1960, what I didn’t realize was how much emotion I carry from that decade.  I think the greatest “aha” moment that I had in that movie was in watching the news reels that dealt with the violence heaped upon those civil rights marchers and activists as they marched out against the inequality found in this country.  What I saw was that those who wanted to hold onto inequality, to hold onto the power of oppression were those who acted out in violence toward those who protested peacefully.  I recall how civil authorities brutalized demonstrators who spoke out against the war in Viet Nam.  I was reminded that those who gain something from those who cannot defend themselves usually react violently to try and keep it.

Jesus came as a revolutionary against the greed and injustice of his time and his message still threatens the greed and injustices of our time.  The promise of peace, the promise of justice, and the promise of love that comes through the birth of this baby also brings violence, resistance, and fear.  Think about how Gandhi threatened the Imperialism of India, or of the Nelson Mandela’s message of unity against the Aparti in South Africa, or of Martin Luther Kings call for equality in our own country.  It brings violence and unrest because it challenges those who use their power, their wealth, and their positions at the expense of those who are disenfranchised.

        The problem with this child comes by what Jesus asks of us to give up.  When we meet this baby, we all have a part of Herod in us.  We have things that we are afraid to give up.  At some levels we are afraid to turn loose of what we perceive to be our power and allow the good news that God has given us to enter into our hearts, freeing us to see others as equals in the eyes of God.  On the night of Jesus’ birth, there was a joy, a peace that filled the air.  In the pursuing months, there was excitement as the wise men came to meet this new born Prince of peace.  And there is also fear that accompanies the news of Jesus’ arrival; fear so great that it can drive men to murder to stop the promise.  And yet, this is a story of how God continues to help guide those who are willing to listen, like the dreams that came to Joseph and to the wise men so that God’s work toward justice for all people shall continue to unfold.  Amen