"Here I am. . . I have come to do your will, O God."

Last Sunday at Southeast Church of the Nazarene, Pastor Steve preached from Hebrews 10:5-10, which was a scripture reading chosen by the universal church for the Sunday before this year's Christmas.  Hebrews 10 has been on my mind lately; I recently wrote a post after hearing another compelling sermon based on that chapter.  Here I want to offer my own meditation on the passage, with thanks to the three preachers who preceded me, the third being the unknown author of Hebrews.

Therefore, when Christ came into the world, he said:

"Sacrifice and offering you did not desire,
but a body you prepared for me;
with burnt offerings and sin offerings you were not pleased.
Then I said, 'Here I am--it is written about me in the scroll--
I have come to do your will, O God.'"
verses 5-7, NIV

I am compelled by Christ's words upon entering the world:  "Here I am. . . I have come to do your will, O God."  When I see the words "Here I am," I think of when God called the prophets Samuel and Isaiah to proclaim God's word, and they each responded "Here I am."  I also think of when God tested Abraham.  God called, "Abraham!" and Abraham said, "Here I am" (Gen. 22:1).  Then God told Abraham to sacrifice his son Isaac.  To make a long story short, Abraham was about to kill Isaac when an angel of the Lord called, "Abraham!  Abraham!" and Abraham said again, "Here I am."  God then provided Abraham a ram to sacrifice as a burnt offering instead of Isaac (Gen. 22:11-13).

Each of these people were called to do God's will.  For Samuel and Isaiah, God's will was to proclaim God's word to specific people.  For Abraham, God's will was, as I see it, to trust God to the point of offering Abraham's son, whom Abraham loved and in whom he had a future.  In response to their calls, Samuel, Isaiah, and Abraham said, "Here I am."

So it was with Jesus.  What was God's will for Jesus?  Here is all the author of Hebrews says:  "And by that will, we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once and for all" (v. 10).  Was it God's will to make us holy?  Or that Jesus sacrifice his body on the cross?  Or something else?  It is not clear.  But what is clear is that as a result of God's will, we have been made whole, rejoined to God, through Jesus' sacrifice forever.  Our offenses against God have been canceled; our relationships with God and one another have been restored to harmony. 

Just as the prophets, Abraham, and Jesus were called, I believe we too are called to do God's will.  What is God's will for us?  Paul says God's will for us in Christ is that we be joyful always, always pray, and give thanks in all situations (1 Thess. 5:16-18).  When Jesus' disciples asked what God required of them, Jesus said that God's work was to believe in the one God had sent (John 6:29).  (What does it mean to believe in Jesus?  That would be fun to explore in a future post.)  The prophet Micah says that what is good and what the Lord requires of us is "to do justice and to love kindness and to walk humbly with [our] God" (Micah 6:8, NRSV).  Those are just some passages that come to mind.  

Does God have a specific will for my life beyond what I said in the previous paragraph and beyond the greatest commandment of loving God and loving my neighbor as I love myself?  Does God call me to something as God called the prophets, Abraham, and Jesus?  Personally, discerning God's will has been an adventure, and I am still learning how to listen and respond.  I have made mistakes, and I have discovered truth thanks to God's whispers in my heart and the help of friends and guides.  I hope that, like the prophets, Abraham, and Jesus, I too respond to God's call with a life which says "Here I am.  I have come to do your will, O God."

God, thank you for Jesus, who has taken away the sin of the world.  Help us to discern your will, and may we follow through on what you have already revealed your will to be.  May your presence, love, joy, and peace come in all their fullness, and may your will be done in the world as it is in your realm.

Waiting for the Coming of Christ (sermon)

Last Sunday, the first Sunday of Advent, I preached the following message, "Waiting for the Coming of Christ," at West Richmond Friends Meeting. 

“Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls” (1 Peter 1:8-9, NIV). 


This passage was written by Peter to Christians and meetings scattered throughout the world.  He writes, “Though you have not seen Jesus, you love him.”  This is a bold statement to make.  How does Peter know these believers love Jesus?

Peter, of course, had seen Jesus, and knew of his own love for Jesus.  Peter had been called by Jesus to leave his job as a fisherman to gather people into God’s reign.  Peter had seen Jesus heal his mother-in-law from a sickness.  Peter had seen Jesus walk on water—and walked on water himself, for a little bit.  Peter knew about Jesus’ death, and was there when Jesus revealed his resurrected self to his disciples.

The believers Peter was writing to, on the other hand, hadn’t seen Jesus.  They had only heard stories about him.  They had come to know God through faith in Jesus, and in Jesus’ name had received power to live as God’s children in the world.  But did they love Jesus, whom they had not seen?  It’s much easier to love someone you have seen than someone you haven’t.  Most of the people I love are people I have actually met.

The same issue arises with the next part of the passage:  “And even though you do not see him now, you believe in him.”  How does Peter know these Christians believe in Jesus?  Did Peter visit each meeting, asking each person what their theological positions or doubts were? 

I think the reason Peter knows that these Christians love and believe in Jesus is because of their very identity as meetings, gathering together to worship God.  They met regularly, maybe once a week, living and sharing life together, serving their communities, loving one another as they had been loved.  It was probably during one of their worship services that they read Peter’s letter.  Also, Jesus had said, “Where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them.”  So Peter knows and can say confidently that these meetings love and believe in Jesus.

Further, I think loving someone and believing in someone go hand in hand.  You love someone you believe in, and when you believe in someone, you love them.


“You believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls.”

Peter says that they are filled with joy because they are receiving the goal of their faith, the salvation of their souls.  I would here like to explore the word “salvation.”  The root of the word is “save.”  When people are saved, two things happen.  First, they are rescued from some kind of destruction.  Second, as a result of being rescued, they are then able to live their lives as they were meant to be lived.  For instance, if a child is lost in the woods, someone saves that child by finding and guiding the child home, delivering the child from danger.  The child’s being saved implies that the child can now live apart from fear, returning to a whole life. 

I understand “the salvation of your souls” to mean that these believers’ deepest, truest selves are being healed of their wounds, restored to completion, and brought to maturity in their identity as children of God.  Peter says this is the goal of their faith, the very reason they gather to worship God and why they love and believe in Jesus.  This is being given to them as a gift from God, and fills them with “an inexpressible and glorious joy.”

Again, how does Peter know they are filled with joy?  Personally, joy seems to me to come and go based on circumstance.  At the same time, I detect that there is joy dwelling in me even when I do not recognize it.  I believe that that of God is in each of us, and if so, then so does joy, because joy is of God, and perhaps the more we pay attention to God, the more we come in contact with that joy.  I think Peter can confidently say these believers are filled with joy because he has faith in God’s work among them to bring about wholeness among them on their deepest level.  For Peter, their joy comes from knowing that God is cultivating their souls to maturity.

Peter also says that this joy is “inexpressible,” so here is probably a good place for me to stop trying to explain it.


What does this have to do with Advent? 

Advent means “coming,” and is the time when Christians remember and celebrate the coming of Christ in two ways.  First, we remember how the Israelites waited for the Messiah and how Mary and Joseph waited for Jesus to be born.  We look back to how Mary herself was filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy when she was filled with the Son of God.  Second, we wait for the promised coming again of Christ to our world. 

First Peter 1:8-9 comes at the end of a larger passage in which Peter actually writes about this coming again of Christ, although instead of using the word “coming,” he uses the verb “reveal.” 

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ!  In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil, or fade—kept in heaven for you, who through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time.  In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials.  These have come so that your faith—of greater worth than precious gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may be proved genuine and result in praise, glory, and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.  Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls. 1 Peter 1:3-9, NIV

This passage is oriented towards the revealing of Jesus Christ, the coming again of Christ, when the believers will be honored for the genuineness of their faith, which is currently being tested and refined through “all kinds of trials.”  Peter is saying that the suffering they are going through is actually contributing to the goal of their faith because it is making their faith mature. 

As a student, I see a parallel between this time of waiting for the coming of Christ and finals week, which is this week for ESR students.  During finals week, we students go through suffering of one kind as we study, write papers, and take tests in the effort to achieve the goals of our being students:  finishing and passing our classes, and learning and becoming mature, or at least more mature than when we started.  This time of stress contributes to our learning process, because through taking these tests we learn what we are supposed to learn.  In the back of our minds, we know that Christmas break is coming, when we not only find rest, but know that we have finished the work we are here to do, completing our classes and learning all we were supposed to have learned for this period of time.  Knowing that break is coming gives us hope.

Peter is writing to these meetings who are going through their own kind of finals week, during which they are waiting for the coming of Christ, finishing what they are here to do, enduring their trials, and becoming people complete in God’s image.

I believe that Peter’s words to these believers are for us, today.  Though you have not seen Jesus, you love him.  And even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls.

You may wonder if you really love God, and you may have doubts about your faith.  But Peter says that you do love and believe in God and in Jesus.  You are being filled with joy because you are receiving the goal of your faith, the wholeness of your innermost being.  God is faithful, cultivating you into maturity so that you may finish your faith journeys completely.  I do not know why exactly God is doing this, but I do know that God loves you.  The trials you are going through may actually be making your faith genuine so that when Christ comes, not only will Christ be honored, but you too will be honored for the kind of person you have become through your trials and through God’s working in you. 
   

Waiting worship is one of the main ways we love and believe in God.  In our time of waiting, may we wait for the promised coming of Christ into our world, and for the coming of Christ’s presence in our midst in even this hour.  And may we also be filled with the joy of knowing that God is working among us so that just as Christ is coming, we too are coming to be revealed alongside Christ in our full identity as children of God. 

As we enter waiting worship, may we wait for the One who has already been waiting for us, and may we grow in deeper love for the One who first loved us.

Making Things Holy and Whole

In today's programmed worship service at ESR, Michael Sherman preached from Hebrews 10 about sacrifice.  Michael argued that Jesus' death on the cross was the final sacrifice and that God no longer desires Christians to sacrifice, but rather to give of ourselves willingly.

This resurfaced some questions I have been asking since being in seminary:  What was and is the meaning of Jesus' death on the cross?  How did or does Jesus' death save us?  What does it mean for Christians to sacrifice?  Perhaps exploring the very word "sacrifice" will help.

Sacrifice comes from "sacra," which means holy, and "facere," which can mean to make, to do, or to perform.1  "Holy," it is important to note, comes from "hale," which means health, heartiness, wholeness.2  Literally, to sacrifice means to make or do something something holy, something whole. 

If Jesus' death on the cross was a sacrifice, then Jesus' death was something holy and whole, or it made some thing or things holy and whole--or both.  As I understand it, this is consistent with the gospel.  Christians proclaim that Jesus' death on the cross has reconciled humanity and God.  Some say that his death has reconciled the whole world with God.  That through Jesus' death, we receive forgiveness of sins, and through Jesus' wounds we are healed.  That the cross has dismantled the wall between Jew and Gentile.  Jesus' death is holy and whole because it makes us holy and whole.  If his death did none of these things, then it would not be holy; it would not be a sacrifice.

How does Jesus' death make us holy?  In my theology class last semester we learned about the classical theories of atonement.  First is the New Testament teaching about sacrifice, rooted in the Jewish tradition of sacrificing lambs for the forgiveness of sins, in which Jesus is the sacrificial lamb whose blood covers humanity's sins once and for all.  In the Ransom/Classic/Christus Victor Theory, Satan has dominion over human souls, so God offers Jesus' life to Satan in exchange for human souls.  But God tricks Satan by raising Jesus from the dead, thus winning complete victory over death and evil.  The Satisfaction/Objective Theory states that our disobedience has dishonored God to such an extent that humans can do nothing to satisfy our debt.  Only God can pay this debt, and does through Jesus, who is both human (thus he can die) and divine (thus his death fully pays back our debt).  Finally, the Moral Influence/Subjective Theory teaches that Jesus' death is an example of God's love for us, and that it should inspire us to turn from our sinfulness, seek God's forgiveness, and receive God's love.  Without Jesus' death, we would not be moved to so change.  These are not the only theories, no doubt, and I do not think they completely answer the question of how Jesus' death makes us holy because I think holiness is about more than only the forgiveness of sins.  Still, each of the theories, although in different ways, proclaim that somehow Jesus' death makes us one, or whole, with God. 

For Christians, Jesus' sacrifice is the act of holiness which changes everything.  But is it the final sacrifice, the final act of holiness?  Michael objected to someone doing something self-giving for another person with the expectation or requirement that the other person do something in return.  I think Michael's objection was because such an action is not healthy for relationships; it is not done in love, but in fear and selfishness.  Such an action, however, is not a whole or holy work, and thus it is not a sacrifice.  Rather, it is expression of a need, or manipulation, disguised as sacrifice.  I agree that God does not desire us to do such actions, but rather works done in obedience to God, in genuineness, in willingness, and in love.  I would call these works sacrifices.  I believe that Jesus went to the cross willingly in obedience to God, and not out of fear that God would damn him if he didn't, and not to guilt humanity into being good.  As horrible as he knew it would be, Jesus offered himself in the joy of knowing that his death would bring us peace.  I also believe that Jesus loved God and knew God's love for him and so obeyed God in love.

What does it look like for Christians to sacrifice?  What do we do that is holy and whole, or makes some thing or things holy and whole?  What contributes to the wholeness and completion of ourselves and the world?  An author pouring herself into a novel can be sacrifice.  A caregiver tending someone in pain can be sacrifice.  Also, playing ping pong with a friend can be sacrifice.  Worshiping in silence can be sacrifice.  Perhaps what makes these things sacrifices is love.  As Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 13, all the actions in the world, even the most self-giving ones, are meaningless without love.  Love makes a work holy and whole.

Our sacrifice shares in the same meaning as Jesus' death because both are done in love and contribute to reconciling that which is estranged from God with God.  Our sacrifice is our ministry, in wonderfully various forms, our cross that we take up and through which we live and share life with others.  Our sacrifice is our willingness to offer ourselves in obedience to God, wherever God may lead us--and our following through. 

The worship service ended with the hymn "When I Survey the Wond'rous Cross," which concludes with the following words:

"Were the whole realm of nature mine
That were an offering far too small
Love so amazing, so divine
Demands my soul, my life, my all!"

In receiving the love of God, we are invited to wholly offer ourselves to the Life, and so become holy and whole. While Jesus' death was, according to the author of Hebrews, the end of one kind of sacrifice, the burnt offering sacrifice, Christians are called to be living sacrifices:  vessels of love whose lives are holy and whole, people who, in obedience to and participation with God, make things holy and whole.



1 http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/sacrifice?s=t
2 http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/holy?s=t

Abiding in Love Abiding in Us

This morning in Sunday School, we read 1 Corinthians 13, the famous “love chapter.”  I would like to share a few thoughts inspired by our discussion.

Before diving in, I think it important to mention that, though I think this chapter can and does apply to committed relationships and marriages, Paul is not writing about romantic love but godly love, which should flow between and be expressed among all relationships for Christians.

Consider how Paul defines love:  “Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude.  It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth.  It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things” (1 Cor. 13:4-7).1   Paul gives love a character sketch.  Paul says, "This is what Love looks like; now you should be better able to recognize Love walking down the street."  We learn best by example, so Paul gives us the example of Love by which to model our lives.  This character, Love, does not celebrate hurtfulness but the truth.  Love perseveres and trusts in the goodness that God has planted in all things.  Love is defined not by individual characteristics, but by how Love responds and gives in relationship to others. 

Paul’s character sketch of love is surrounded by two passages about various forms of ministry among the community of believers.  In verses 1-3, Paul says that if he speaks earthly and heavenly languages, if he prophecies the truth and understands deep secrets of the universe and God, if he works miracles greater than Jesus or Moses ever did, but has not love, his words and actions are hollow.  If he gives all that he owns to the poor and is martyred for his faith but has not love, his sacrifices are meaningless.

This reminds me of the word of God through the prophet Amos:

"I hate, I despise your festivals,
and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies.
Even though you offer me your burnt offerings and grain offerings,
I will not accept them;
and the offerings of well-being of your fatted animals
I will not look upon.
Take away from me the noise of your songs;
I will not listen to the melody of your harps.
But let justice roll down like waters,
and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream."
Amos 5:21-24

Celebrations, gifts offered to God, and the chords of a hymn are good things, but they are not good on their own.  They are good when their source is a community whose relationships align with justice and righteousness, a community dwelling in love.

Paul's message is important for people participating in ministry.  Is there love in my service?  I may write a blog post that is so doctrinally sound that it makes Karl Barth’s Church Dogmatics seem nearly heretical; I may visit a sick person in a hospital and in so doing, visit Christ; I may even heal the divides between congregations and nations, but if I have not love, my words are clanging pots and pans, and my actions are plastic food.

The way we do things, the manner or spirit in which we act, is just as important if not more important than the actions themselves.  

In verse 8, Paul writes that while prophecies, tongues, and knowledge will cease, “love never ends.”  Our ministries and communities, on their own, are like all mortal things in that they will end.  My blog post will conclude with footnotes.  The worship service will reach its final note, and after singing it, we will move onto other tasks that await us that day.  A fellowship may stop gathering; a group of friends that I have come to love may one day scatter.  But when we do our work for God in love, when we relate to one another in love, our love is carried, and maybe along with it our work and our relationships too, on into the fathomless depths of the future.

How, then, do we minister in love?  How do we become loving people and communities?  Paul does not directly answer those questions in this chapter.  However, at the end of the chapter, Paul does say “And now faith, hope, and love abide” (v. 13).  It is interesting that he is translated as using the verb “abide,” which comes from the Old English “abidan,” which means to wait, remain, dwell (as in “biding my time”).2  Love lingers, sits waiting in the living room, stands at the street corner looking for the bus.  This suggests that the love of God is waiting for us.  It lives and moves inside and around us, and as we respond in acceptance to it, we become more like love; we become more patient, more kind, and so on; we become more loving.

In other words, love is the host and we are the guests.  Love is first; we are second.  Love is entrusted to us, and the more we are faithful with it, the more love we are given.  Like all relationships, love is a gift, one that must be accepted, treasured, and cultivated.  As 1 John 4:19 says, “We love because [God] first loved us.”  The Bible expresses in many ways God’s love for us; two core examples are God’s delivering the Israelites from slavery in Egypt, and God’s reconciling the world to God and to itself through the suffering and resurrection of Jesus the Anointed One.  In addition, we can and should read our own experiences for expressions of God's love for us.  Because Christians have been so loved, we are called to love one another, people outside of our communities, and even those who hate us.  Because the world has been so loved, might this not also be God's call to the world?

God, whose love waits for us, help us to abide in love, so that we may abide in you, and that you may abide in us.



1 NRSV.
2 http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/abide?s=t.

Hoping All Things

Today in my discernment class, after reading Ephesians 3:16-19 and a passage by Henri Nouwen about how God calls each of us "Beloved," we read 1 Corinthians 13:4-8.  Usually whenever I have read that third passage, I have thought about love between human beings, whether it be romantic or selfless love.  But hearing it today in the context of God's love for us, for me, portrayed a fresh perspective of God to me.

"Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude.  It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth.  It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.  Love never ends." (NRSV)

How I heard it was something like the following:  God is patient; God is kind; God is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude.  God does not insist on God's own way; God is not irritable or resentful; does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth.  God bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Here I want to explore the claim that God hopes all things.  I have not routinely pictured God as someone who hopes for things at all.  If God knows all things, then what room would there be for hope?  If I already know that Frodo and Sam will destroy the Ring of Power at the end of the story, for example, then when I am reading through The Lord of the Rings, can I truly say I hope they will succeed in the end?  I may feel something like hope, and that is to the credit of the writing abilities of J.R.R. Tolkien, but that seems to me an artificial hope compared to hoping for something which may not actually end up as I hope.

Maybe hope is one gift of being a member of a species that cannot see the future; if we knew what was to come, and how it was to come, then for what would we hope?  If I knew without a doubt that in the end, God would resurrect us from the dead, then I may eagerly await it, and I may even hope that it will come soon, but I will not hope for it.

Theologian Karl Rahner writes about a human hope for the salvation of humanity in the end:

"An orthodox theologian. . . is forbidden to teach that everybody will be saved.  But we are allowed to hope that all will be saved.  If I hope to be saved, it is necessary to hope that for all men as well.  If you have reason to love another, you can hope that all will be saved."1

If we love one another and our enemies, as Christians are commanded to do, then we will hope that the other and our enemies will be redeemed, even if we believe that the way to salvation is narrow.  Hope, then, indicates love.  What do I hope for?  For whom do I hope?  What do I hope for this person or that?  By asking what we hope for, we are asking who we love and what we value.  To say God hopes all things, then, is also to say that God hopes all things for us, which is yet another expression of God's deep and wide love for us.  Could it be that even more deeply than we are called to do, God hopes that all will be saved? 

We certainly do not know how the end will turn out, but to say that God hopes all things suggests that even God does not know how all things will end.    God hopes all things, which means that not all things are guaranteed.  Thus, in hoping all things, God is taking the greatest risk of all.  God shares in our vulnerability.

At the same time, God hopes all things, which means there is hope for us all.


1 Tilley, Terrence.  Story Theology.  (Collegeville, Minnesota: The Liturgical Press, 1985),  66.