(Easter 2) The God who wants to be found

Easter 2 – “Peace be with you”
TURNING
John 20:19-31

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“Ubi caritas et amor, ubi caritas Deus ibi est.”

Thanks for helping start this sermon on the right note,

literally and figuratively.

Whether you knew it or not,

you sang the essence of my message this morning.

“Where charity and love are, there God is.”

I want you to know something about that song—

that pairing of an ancient Christian text,

with that particular melody.

That song grew out of a monastery

purposely built near the front lines of a long battle

between France and Nazi Germany during WW II,

in a part of France that was defeated and decimated,

and maybe looked like Ukraine does right now.

A Swiss young man with a deep spiritual burden,

decided to move away from his safe community

in neutral Switzerland,

and traveled into the heart of France in 1940,

as the war was raging.

He bought a house near the demarcation line,

and started taking in war refugees and helping them.

The Gestapo took over his house and occupied it for several years,

but as soon as France was liberated,

the man moved back into his house,

resumed his ministry to war refugees,

and established a monastic community

that included, from the beginning,

both Catholic and Protestant monks,

and whose mission was to build a community

that demonstrated reconciliation and peace.

That man was called “Brother Roger,”

and that community was known as the Taizé community.

It attracted young pilgrims from all over the world.

And developed a unique style of worship and music,

that influenced church music and worship

in nearly every Christian tradition.

22 of their songs are in Voices Together,

including the one we just sang:

“Where charity and love are, there God is.”

Now why would I start with this song,

on this last sermon from John’s Gospel?

In our story the risen Jesus appears to the disciples, then to Thomas,

in the room where they were hiding in Jerusalem.

This is a story about believing . . . or not . . .

that the living God is present with us in Jesus,

still, even after crucifixion and resurrection.

Jesus showed up for the disciples at their point of need.

They were hiding, fearful, behind locked doors,

afraid they would be found by the same authorities

who had just killed Jesus.

Jesus showed up, said “Peace be with you.”

And again, “Peace be with you.”

And then, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”

And, “As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”

Now, a lot is made of this text, drawing attention to Thomas,

the so-called “doubting disciple.”

Completely unfair nickname, as I’ve said many times before.

Because all the disciples—every one of them—

received exactly the same evidence,

before they came to believe.

And Thomas’ belief was then accompanied

by a statement of faith more robust and profound

than any other disciple had spoken—

“My Lord and my God!”

Despite any lesson you ever heard

from a preacher or Sunday School teacher,

this is not a story about condemning doubt,

or looking down on people who ask questions and seek answers.

This is a story that highlights a God who comes to us on our turf,

who enters our space, and our time,

and says, here I am, to be with you.

Now. And in a way that you can see me.

This is a story about God moving in with us,

full of love and grace and restoration and healing and forgiveness,

and lots of other things we don’t deserve.

God does not try to make it difficult for us to have faith.

God does not play a cruel game of hide and seek.

God wants to be found.

God wants to be seen and recognized.

Yes, it is a fact that some of us do have a hard time finding faith,

some of us struggle with God’s apparent silence or absence.

But that is not a spiritual shortcoming on our part.

Maybe we are looking for evidence in the wrong places.

God is generous and gracious, and comes to us where we are.

God is now and always ready to provide what we need for faith.

So why do so many of us, so much of the time,

struggle to find a sense of God’s real presence with us?

Could it be that part of the reason

is our shallow definition of faith, of belief?

We’ve been formed by a faulty assumption

that faith happens in the head—

that it’s intellectual agreement with some

doctrinal formula or proposition.

No, faith is about trust. It’s about loyalty.

It’s about whole-bodied allegiance

to the way of Jesus in the world.

It’s about choosing to go where Jesus goes,

to follow God into the world,

and participate in what God is doing,

with our whole being.

If we get hung up on having to

sign-off, intellectually, on all the right formulas,

and perform all the necessary rituals, in just the right way,

in order to encounter God in Christ,

then we will have been defeated by duty-bound religion.

Sure, there are spiritual disciplines that many people find helpful.

There are some tried and true pathways

many have discovered that get us in a good space,

in an open frame of mind.

I’m not knocking any of that.

But as soon as we start thinking it’s up to us

to conjure up God’s presence in some deep devotional moment . . .

as soon as we start assuming that

30 minutes of daily meditation,

or contemplating the writings of ancient mystics,

or reading through the Bible in a year,

or praying the Lord’s Prayer in a certain way,

is the ticket to unlock the secret passageway

into God’s presence,

then let’s admit it.

We just invented another sophisticated form

of works righteousness,

trying to earn God’s favor with our good deeds.

Let me repeat.

God wants to be found.

God does not try to make it difficult.

God does not have a code we need to crack.

We can skip days of devotions,

weeks of worship,

go long periods without prayer,

miss months of meditation,

or (gasp) even break from our Bible reading habit,

and God will be no farther away from us,

than when we were doing all those things.

Not that I’m recommending we neglect spiritual disciplines.

Not at all.

I’m just saying,

let’s get over the idea that it’s up to us to

make God appear in our Upper Room, wherever that may be.

We don’t have to get it all right.

And we don’t get a prize

for having devotions five out of seven days.

God does not issue a Frequent Flyer Rewards Card.

We already know where God is, and we know what God is doing,

because God has told us and shown us,

in just about every page of scripture.

God is love.

God is mercy.

God is justice.

God is healing.

God is about whatever it takes to reconcile and restore and save.

So naturally, God moves toward those who suffer.

Where there are wounded people,

you will nearly always find someone

showing love and compassion.

Therefore, you will find God.

Maybe Brother Roger didn’t put it these terms,

when he left Switzerland in 1940 to head into a war zone,

but what he was doing was helping people meet God—

both the war refugees and himself.

And when Jesus showed up in the middle of room

of traumatized disciples, and said, “Peace be with you,”

he was helping those people he loved to meet God,

and to have faith.

So you want to meet God?

You want to have faith?

You want to move past your doubt?

Then don’t memorize a formula.

Don’t go through any contortions.

Just go to where there is suffering,

where there is woundedness,

whether they are the wounds of others . . . or your own.

And if you show love and mercy in that place,

to others, or to yourself,

God will be there.

Believe it.

Trust it.

Whether or not you see it or feel it.

Because where charity and love are found, there is God.

Join me in the confession, printed in your bulletin,

and on the screens.

one God beyond all knowing, we sometimes wonder where you are.

        In the shadows and pain of this wounded world, 

        we feel lost to your sight; and you seem lost to ours.

all We confess our fear of being left alone in this world.

one Help us rest in your promise to never leave or forsake us.

all We confess we depend too often on tangible evidence,

we fail to grasp that you want to be found,

we fail to notice signs you place in our path daily.

Forgive us.

[silence]

one Friends, we are loved and sought by God, the Hound of Heaven,

        We are fully seen and fully known 

        and fully in God’s gracious presence,

        when we realize it, and when we do not.

        The Risen Christ is with us. Alleluia!

“Ubi caritas et amor, ubi caritas Deus ibi est.”

—Phil Kniss, April 24, 2022

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(Easter) Is that a threat or a promise?

Easter Sunday – “The Whole World Turns”
John 20:1-18

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Lift your glad voices, indeed!

What a pure joy it is to be here today in worship.

What a pure, unadulterated joy to celebrate resurrection,

in a world full of death, and destruction, and violence,

and evil.

I don’t have to rehash the long list of sorrows

that are on our minds,

in our world of awareness,

even in our immediate experience.

From personal health, to grief, to politics, to disaster, to war,

we come this morning looking for relief.

For good news to outshine the bad.

And we get exactly that! Especially in the hymns we sing.

Just looking over the hymn text of what we just sang,

it’s like everything dark and death-like is obliterated.

Vain are the terrors!

Short is the dominion of death and the grave!

Burst are the fetters of evil!

Loud is the chorus of angels!

Full are the anthems!

Cheered is the deep valley of sorrow!

Jesus has risen and we shall not die!

And now you are expecting me to say . . . “but . . .”

But . . . I won’t.

I will say, instead . . . “AND . . .”

Because I do want to name another part of the image on the screen,

without deleting a single pixel of joy,

without darkening one bright and colorful dot of the picture

we have just been making with scripture, song, and prayer.

It’s obvious to all of us

that there is more to be said.

Because even though we proclaim today,

that all creation turns because of the resurrection,

we also know that Putin’s horrific war against Ukraine

is not going to go silent tomorrow,

the tornadoes are not going to stop,

our grievous losses are not going to be undone.

So here it is . . . 

“Jesus has risen and we shall not die! . . .”

AND . . . the resurrection should give us pause,

because is asks something of us that is not easy to give.

Yes, the world has turned, bringing us pure joy,

and bringing a new reality that not all of us are ready for.

_____________________

I hope, if you’ve been with us for our journey through John’s Gospel,

that you aren’t acting too surprised.

We’ve been looking at a whole series of turnings in John,

nearly all of which advanced God’s purposes in some way,

but also brought with them some new and painful reality.

The same is true with resurrection.

I won’t call it a “down side,”

because I really don’t think it is that.

But it’s a reality we need to face.

Resurrection means opening ourselves to a whole new horizon.

Resurrection means God is turning the world as we know it on its head.

Resurrection means saying goodbye to a world 

where we are familiar with the landscape,

and comfortable with its contours.

Parker Palmer, in his book The Active Life,

ends with a chapter entitled “Threatened with Resurrection.”

He got his inspiration from a poem of the same title,

by Julia Esquivel, a Guatemalan poet and theologian.

Palmer comments that sometimes we cling to our pathologies,

because in some way they are useful to us.

He calls our pathologies, our illusions, “little deaths,”

which we somehow prefer, over a new and transformed life,

because we benefit from our illusions.

Resurrection puts us to the test.

It tests our willingness to move into new territory,

to live a larger life than the one we are so familiar with.

We would never say death and defeat are good things, of course,

but at least they’re understandable.

They are part of the familiar landscape of life.

Resurrection forces us out of our comfort zone,

onto a whole new uncharted expanse of land.

_____________________

That probably explains the reaction of Peter and John,

when they confronted the empty tomb.

The resurrection story we heard from John 20

makes a point of the fact that Peter and the other disciple

(we presume John),

saw the empty tomb, and believed (v. 8)

They believed, but they didn’t understand the scriptures,

that he must rise from the dead (v.9)

So what did they do,

when faced with confusing evidence?

Their response is in v. 10.

“Then the disciples returned to their homes.”

They went back to the familiar. 

The safe environment of a house with doors that lock.

Standing in an open tomb,

in the presence of resurrection 

suddenly felt threatening, I think.

They couldn’t just stay there in that place,

where their world looked like 

it was about to be turned upside down.

By contrast, Mary Magdalene,

found it within herself to stay at the tomb.

To linger with this strange, threatening, and unknown reality.

It says in v. 11,

“But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb. 

As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb.”

And she was rewarded with an encounter.

By staying there at the empty tomb, despite her fear and confusion,

she met first the angels,

and then she met Jesus himself.

Because she persisted, 

she was the first one the risen Jesus appeared to.

And she was called by name.

And she was able to go back to the disciples,

and report with confidence, “I have seen the Lord.”

_____________________

Let’s be like Mary.

When we see signs of resurrection where we don’t expect them,

let’s linger.

Let’s stay with what frightens us, what troubles us.

When we detect the scent of new life, where we expect death,

let’s stay long enough to go deeper,

to step inside the empty tomb and look around.

If we are purposeful and attentive,

we might just encounter the risen Jesus.

To stay at the empty tomb

could mean different things, for different people.

It may mean we open the door to our grief a little wider,

show it hospitality instead of shutting it out.

It may mean daring to confront some darkness in our own lives,

instead of avoiding it.

It may mean a new level of vulnerability with someone.

It may mean taking a bold, and risky, action,

in relation to some injustice.

But probably in every case, it means daring to ask ourselves 

some challenging questions.

Parker Palmer asked himself these questions:

“If I lived as if resurrection were real,

and allowed myself to die for the sake of new life,

what might I be called upon to do? 

What strange and difficult tasks might be laid upon me?

What comforts might be taken away?

How might my life be changed?”

Believing the resurrection is only the beginning.

Peter and John were able to do that,

simply by seeing the empty tomb, and returning home.

We too can believe there is resurrection,

and go back home to life as usual.

It doesn’t require much risk or sacrifice.

May God give us the courage

not just to look quickly at the empty tomb, and believe . . . 

but to say “Yes” to God’s invitation to

stay and be transformed, 

to live the resurrection life.

In resurrection, there is both threat and promise.

The Risen Lord Jesus Christ,

not only asks us to lay down our own agenda,

and take the risk of walking toward an unknown horizon.

The risen Christ makes a promise to us.

I will walk with you.

I will never leave or forsake you.

You can trust me.

You can breathe in my Spirit.

My life is your life!

So let us rejoice, laugh, sing, and be glad that Christ has risen!

But let us never take it lightly.

Julia Esquivel, the Guatemalan poet I referred to earlier,

in her poem “Threatened by Resurrection,”

described resurrection this way:

“There is something here within us

which doesn’t let us sleep, 

which doesn’t let us rest,

which doesn’t stop pounding deep inside.”

If the idea of being resurrection people

keeps us awake at night, heart pounding,

we might just be on the right track.

May God give us courage.

May God give us grace.

—Phil Kniss, April 17, 2022

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(Palm Sunday) The Giving King

Lent 6 (Palm Sunday) – “Hosanna turns to Crucify: The Crucified Messiah”
TURNING
John 12:12-19

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Today we have one of the most interesting Gospel stories about Jesus,

and one of the most misunderstood.

It was grossly misunderstood by the crowds

watching Jesus ride into Jerusalem on a donkey.

And it is equally misunderstood by us modern readers of the story.

And to be honest, I probably greatly misunderstand it, too.

So take what I say this morning, and examine it, test it,

and then, still, take it with a grain of salt.

Let me first lay out a quick summary of the story . . .

Jesus rides into Jerusalem on a donkey,

permitting, if not encouraging, the crowds’ shouts of Hosanna.

The people want to make Jesus into a political King,

but Jesus subtly refuses by riding a humble donkey,

showing that he was a servant to the poor, not a mighty king.

Then in a matter of a few days,

this same crowd turns against him and try to crucify him,

because he is not going to rescue them from Rome after all.

And we find out,

after his trial, crucifixion, and resurrection,

that what he is after is a heavenly kingship,

not an earthly one.

And we are invited to

receive Jesus as our spiritual savior,

and worship him with a pure heart.

Does that basic summary sound familiar to you?

Now, let me explain why we need to take

virtually every element of that summary,

and rethink it,

because we have them all wrong—

mostly, if not entirely.

Let’s start at the beginning.

Why a donkey? And not a white horse?

I didn’t go back to my old sermons to confirm,

but I’m almost positive I’ve preached some sermons

that portrayed the donkey

as a humble animal of the working class, the farmer.

And that when Jesus choose a donkey,

a lowly working animal,

riding atop it with his feet almost dragging the ground,

he was rejecting the effort to make him an earthly King.

He was presenting himself not as King,

but as Servant to the poor.

All sounds good.

But it’s unquestionably bad biblical interpretation.

Because we have extensive evidence—

both in the Bible, and in other literature and archeology,

that donkeys were highly regarded in the Ancient Near East.

Maybe we’ve been led astray by Eeyore,

the donkey in Winnie the Pooh,

who hangs his head, and talks in a low voice,

as if he’s not worth much.

Today, for some reason, we associate donkeys

with being dumb or submissive or timid.

Not so in the time and culture of Jesus.

Because of their ability to provide

reliable transportation for long distances,

donkeys were sometimes even given semi-divine status.

And . . . they were often associated with royalty.

Jesus was by far not the only king to have ridden on one.

As a matter of fact,

it was customary, when a king returned to his city,

after victory in battle,

the steed of choice for the victory parade into the city

was a donkey.

So it is simply wrong to suggest

that Jesus was rejecting earthly kingship by choosing a donkey.

It would be more accurate to say

that Jesus was giving a signal, both to the Jews and the Romans,

that he was coming in peace, not to take over with violence.

Kings rode horses when leading their armies into battle.

They rode donkeys when they were coming in peace.

So it seems to me that what Jesus signals here,

is that he is coming into Jerusalem as a king,

but not a king who will seize political power by force.

Rather, a king who exercises his power by giving it away.

He is the Giving King.

As the week unfolds, that message in reinforced in many ways.

Jesus’ power is manifest by acts of self-giving.

Whether in the upper room, washing his disciples’ feet,

or in the garden, condemning Peter’s use of violence,

or in the High Priest’s chamber,

responding with transparency and wit,

without belittling his accusers,

or before Pilate,

sometimes silent,

sometimes answering with respect,

but always true to himself.

Ultimately, he gives up his own life—

not as a helpless victim,

but as a king—the Giving King.

A little reminiscent of Shel Silverstein’s book, The Giving Tree,

about the tree who gave its apples, its branches, even its trunk,

for love of the boy.

Jesus is the kind of king that is willing to give whatever it takes,

to bring life to those he loves,

and who are subject to his reign.

In contrast to the power of the Roman Empire—

whose power was expressed by acts of

taking and accumulating—

taking money, freedom, dignity from others,

and gathering it all to themselves,

so they could lord it over others . . .

In contrast to the power of the religious hierarchy—

whose power was likewise exerted on others by coercion,

in order to maintain what little power they still had . . .

In contrast to all that, Jesus enters Jerusalem—

the center of religious and political power in that region . . .

and says, let me show you the nature of royal power,

the power of God that has been shared with me.

This kind of power may not save my earthly life,

but can save the world.

So yes, true enough, there is humility in his choice to ride a donkey,

instead of a war horse.

But Jesus is by no means rejecting kingship.

He is redefining kingship.

And it’s still a political kingship, in the sense that

this divinely-ordained power of giving

is meant to be lived out in human community now.

It’s not just for some age to come.

Giving, rather than taking and accumulating,

is an organizing principle for Jesus’ disciples,

then and now.

It’s how we are called to be formed as a people,

as a community in this world.

Therefore, it’s inherently political—

in the best and truest sense of the word.

_____________________

And now let’s consider the notion

that these people shouting “Hosanna” are fickle,

that they turn on Jesus.

That the very crowd that one day

was shouting the praises of Jesus,

was now shouting just as loudly to crucify him.

I know I’ve suggested that from this pulpit.

I’m not so sure any more.

I won’t say some of them don’t do an about-face.

I’m sure some do.

We know that mob psychology is a real thing.

It can make people do something in the heat of the moment,

that they couldn’t have imagined doing,

even days earlier.

But this notion is at best a half-truth,

is not supported by direct biblical evidence,

and does not take into account the complexity

of the power struggle at work in Jerusalem.

I talked about this in a sermon a few weeks ago,

pointing out the clear social and political differences,

between the rural north (Galilee and its region),

and the powerful, more urban south (Jerusalem and Judea).

If there is one thing that stands out as a newer, stronger

impression on me in this journey through John,

it’s that the way Jesus was received varied widely,

according to culture, geography, and social status.

In John, there is this repeated back-and-forth

between Galilee and Jerusalem,

which reveals as much about the people as it does Jesus.

In Galilee, Jesus regularly crossed religious and cultural boundaries,

with very little push-back.

He offered healing to Gentiles and Romans and Jews alike,

and no one mounted an objection.

His popularity only grew.

The crowd size grew,

so much so he could hardly find a quiet spot to pray.

But back in Jerusalem, among the power elite

(both religious and civil powers),

it didn’t take much to get them upset.

A man unable to walk for decades was healed

when Jesus told him to pick up his mat and walk.

The ruling class of religious folk blew a gasket over that,

because Jesus told someone to carry their mat

on the Sabbath!

I can’t even imagine something like that happening in Galilee.

When Jesus returned to Galilee,

after his bold move

to clear the temple of the animals and moneychangers,

he was welcomed like a hero

by his fellow Galileans who heard what he had done.

While back in Jerusalem, in smoke-filled rooms (so to speak),

the elite were conspiring to find a way to kill him.

Here’s the thing—during big religious festivals,

Jerusalem streets were filled with all kinds of people—

both the rural northern folks who feel the brunt of oppression

and were angry at their oppressors (Roman and religious)

and are looking for someone to save them,

as well as local residents of Jerusalem,

many of whom, along with the priestly class,

along with scribes, Pharisees, and the Sandhedrin,

have found a way to thread the needle, politically,

to stay in the good graces of Rome,

and keep the peace,

so they can maintain their religious power structure.

It is any surprise that Jesus wasn’t popular

among residents of Jerusalem?

Most of them either had family in the religious ruling class,

or were neighbors to them,

or did business with them.

They were enmeshed with the power structures.

In today’s text, Jesus entered Jerusalem

during one of the biggest religious festivals—Passover.

People from every part of Palestine were there.

How do we know it wasn’t primarily his Galilee supporters

who came out en masse and waved their palms

and shouted “Hosanna,” which means, “Save us!”?

It would make perfect sense to me.

And how do we know that the crowds shouting “crucify him!”

a few days later, weren’t primarily residents of Jerusalem,

whose resistance was stoked by the religious ruling class,

who they were deeply connected to,

and easily influenced by?

Thing is we don’t really know.

But I’m beginning to assume

that is the most reasonable description of what was happening.

_____________________

This pivotal story in John’s Gospel,

which appears in all four of the Gospels in much the same form,

is a profound lesson to us as a people,

as a community of Jesus followers.

Who do we surround ourselves with?

Who do we shoulder up next to when we want something to happen?

What kind of power are we willing to wield

to get the outcome we want?

There is nothing inherently wrong

with holding positions that are politically powerful.

The question is how we are stewarding that power?

Is it the power of the empire—the take and accumulate kind?

Or is it the power of kingdom of heaven—

that reveals itself through self-giving love.

It’s a question I need to ask of myself, of course,

living as I do in one of the “Jerusalems”

of the Mennonite Church,

and being a 60-something white male senior pastor,

who has been in my role long enough

to have gathered a good deal of knowledge and influence.

Am I using my power to hold on what I have and what I want,

to secure my position?

or do I exercise my power and resources

by giving them away to others who need them more?

Am I surrounding myself with others in Jerusalem

who hold power like mine?

or do I open myself to what the spirit may be doing up in Galilee?

even if I don’t fully understand it or appreciate it?

I think many of us can ask the same sort of questions.

Just change the context a bit,

and you can probably find yourself in this story.

Are you with the crowd of outsiders shouting “hosanna”

at the beginning of the week?

Or are you with crowd of insiders protecting the status-quo,

and shouting “crucify” at the end of the week?

I imagine we can find ourselves in both places at times.

We are the ones who need to be humbled by this story of Jesus.

As you consider where you find yourself in this story,

let’s all join in calling on God’s mercy and forgiveness.

We will begin by singing again, the “Kyrie,”

translated simply, “Lord, have mercy.”

Then we will read the words of confession together, in unison,

Then repeat the Kyrie. Let us sing.

God of the foolish cross,

you are not the savior we expect.

     Your power does not look like the power

          we want our God to demonstrate.

     Your wisdom makes no sense to us.

We are happy to join the crowd,

          waving branches,

     but not so sure we want to follow you

          into the temple courts

          into the upper room

          into the garden of Gethsemane

          to the foot of the cross.

Forgive our false assumptions.

Clarify our clouded vision.

Free us to relax into the foolishness

     of your love and grace

—Phil Kniss, April 10, 2022

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