Galatians: All Bait, No Switch

sermon notes from the Vineyard Church of Milan 11/13/2011

[explain bait and switch…]

So maybe you’ve had this kind of experience:

You want to share the good news of Jesus with someone at work, or a friend, or a family member. You know that Jesus’ good news is good news to you. That Jesus is good news to them. That it contains – for them, and their circumstances – explosive, transformative, life-changing, saving power. But you also know that when they hear it, they are going to have some questions about what else goes along with it.

Like, if I go to your church to find out more about Jesus, will I have to give my money? Will I have to stop partying? Will I have to change something about how I express my sexuality? Will I have to dress differently? Will I have to stop talking the way I normally talk? Will I have to start believing some particular things about the end of the world? Will I have to stop believing some particular things about the beginning of the world? Will I have to change my politics? Will I have to stop smoking? What religious things will I have to start doing? Will something in my past disqualify me from going very far on this journey? Will something central to my identity be a problem pretty soon?

And you’re not sure what to do with those questions. Truthfully, you hope they don’t ask any of those questions until after they meet Jesus. Because you want to be able to say, no, none of that matters, just come, check it out. But you’re also thinking, I hope once they check it out, they fall so in love with Jesus fast enough that once they find out the reality about ____________, they don’t care anymore, and they are ready to change.

And so you feel like you’re sort of doing a bait and switch. Advertising one thing, hoping that once they are in the store and find out it’s not exactly as advertised, they’ll still buy, because after all, it truly is a good deal; they just wouldn’t have come to the store in the first place if you’d told them the whole story.

We are going to start a two week series on the book of Galatians, because Galatians is about the first bait and switch in the history of Christianity. But we won’t get to the scripture itself until nearly the end of the message today. So hang in there.

Let’s begin today by defining the goods we Jesus followers are peddling. Those goods are the good news, the gospel. This is my dad’s 100 word summary of the gospel:

The gospel is good news that our exile from God, others, and ourselves is ending thanks to a great rescue. God has entered the human condition once and for all through his Beloved Son—to reconcile and redeem us by his coming, living, dying, bodily rising, ascending, Spirit-infusing, and promised future coming as judge. Jesus is gathering a community of disciples to bear witness to the future-glorious reign of God breaking into the present, empowering us to work toward the day when heaven and earth are once again fully integrated in a new creation—which through Jesus, has already begun.

It’s that good news that gives us our vision of being a centered-set church. That for us, the one thing we have in common is Jesus and the good news we hear from him and see in him and experience with him. That something about him has gotten our attention, and to one degree or another he is capturing our hearts. So much so that eventually, the only thing of supreme importance in our lives is figuring out our next step in following him. What we might call our next step of discipleship.

We believe that Jesus has announced the good news of the kingdom of God. That God’s kingdom – his good rule and reign that sets us free from everything that might try to enslave us, the rule and reign that brings us life, that makes us secure in his presence – is here now, and it’s coming more and more, and it will one day come all the way, through and through, everywhere, and then everything will be set right: in us, in our relationships, in our world.

Everything.

Everywhere.

Made new.

Set right.

By the rule and reign of God.

And we believe that the kingdom of God comes by Jesus’ authority and the work of his Holy Spirit. Our job, therefore, is simply to receive the grace that lets us see what he’s doing so that we can join in with Jesus as creatively and joyfully and wholeheartedly as possible.

And as tempting as it is to try to authoritatively define exactly what it means to do that [prayer, bible reading, stopping this behavior, starting that behavior, etc.], we know that that responding to that temptation would – despite our best intentions – actually change the good news of Jesus into a religion. And in the end it would cause us to take our eyes off of Jesus and turn them towards things that might be good, but would be less than he is.

So we choose instead to be pilgrims on a pilgrimage toward Jesus, living lives that are responding to Jesus, shaped by his gospel. Sharing what we’ve learned along the way with other pilgrims, but never letting anyone’s response to any particular thing we’ve learned along the way become a criteria for joining together in pilgrimage.

No, instead we will create breathing room for everyone we encounter along our path. Confident that Jesus will work out all of those differences that truly matter along the way.

After all, if Jesus really is who he says he is, and if the kingdom of God really is what Jesus says it is, then all who seek first his kingdom will find that everything else that matters will be added to them.

That’s why we describe our mission this way:

Together we follow the way of Jesus and create breathing room the disfavored to find favor, for the discounted to count, and for the disconnected to connect. Starting here.

And since Jesus is the treasure hidden in the field, since he is the pearl of great price, we simply will not allow ourselves to let anything else – no matter how good and true and right it is – take center stage in our vision.

For example, any one of us might feel sure of what heaven is and how it works, or what hell is and how it works, or how the world started, or how it’s going end, or what behaviors are life-giving and God-honoring, or what actions are destructive and disobedient. Any one of us might feel sure that a particular way of reading the bible, or a particular passage, is the right way and that other ways are the wrong way. But we will not let any of those things we may feel sure about trump the commitment we have to not letting anything get added to the gospel. Because it is the gospel that is the power of salvation for those who trust it. And if we force anyone to trust the gospel, or Jesus, and something else in order to be called brother or sister, than we ourselves do not actually trust the gospel, or Jesus, do we?

Gospel comes from an old English word meaning “good news.” The gospel is good. In fact, it’s the best possible, nothing better anywhere ever. And it’s news. As in new and noteworthy. Unheard of before. Fundamentally unlike the same old same old.

The gospel does what good news does. It drops like an explosive energy into the midst of space and time, and transforms everything about its surroundings and its hearers. [remember Oprah’s favorite things…?]

 

“favorite things” reaction

Nothing is ever the same again in the wake of good news. The gospel invites us to embrace the new reality that the good news announces and let it work its power on our hearts and minds and bodies and souls.

The gospel is not the same thing as religion.

Religion comes from the root word “lig” which has to do with connecting (as in ligament) and “re” which means again. So religion is a way to connect us again to God and to one another and to all of creation. Religion at its core is as good as people are good and as bad as people are bad. Which means it can be both pretty good and pretty horrible. And religion is most definitely not news. No matter how new the religion, religion is always made out of the same old same old, just in new configurations, for better or for worse.

And so religion does what religion does. It connects and guides and guards and shapes and gathers and defines. Religion can be an agent of blessing people, communities, cultures, or quite the opposite. But because it does its work from the outside in, religion tends not to invite, but rather to usher, with varying levels of forcefulness, and its power is a function of the effectiveness and wisdom of its systems.

Various forms of Christianity, then, are various religious forms wrapped around the gospel.

Thankfully, the gospel is so powerful that it’s possible for huge gaps to exist between the religion it’s wrapped in and the gospel itself, and many people will still buy it, and it will still be a good deal. But sometimes, those gaps between the gospel and the religion it’s wrapped in can be so large that they obscure the gospel. Obscure it thoroughly enough that some people never even glimpse the gospel that lies at the heart of that particular religious form. Or sometimes those gaps are so significant that the gospel sneaks right out of the picture all together, and all you’ve got left is empty religion.

Let’s go back, now, to that hypothetical person with whom you shared the gospel at the start of the message today.

What if you could say, in response to their questions about the religious wrappings:

There is nothing in your past that will disqualify you from getting everything out of this good news that the best person in the world gets out of it – in fact, in a strange way, you may even get more out of it.

There is nothing central to your identity that will ever be a problem as you explore this good news – in fact, you will find that God’s love for you as you are right now is even greater than your own love for yourself right now, and the impact of the good news is always to make us more of who we truly are, rather than less.

What if you could say:

And I honestly don’t know the answers to any of those particular things you are concerned you might have to start or stop because all of that isn’t up to me; in the end it’s up to you and Jesus, and his ideas about all of that might be different than mine.

I can tell you what it’s meant for me, though, if that helps, and how I’ve experienced it. And others can tell you what it’s meant for them.

But none of us knows where your journey is going to start and what it’s going to look like along the way. Because your next step and my next step and his next step and her next step – even though they are all going in the same direction – aren’t necessarily the same at all.

What if you could say:

And if and when the time comes for you to start doing something new, or stop doing something old, you’ll be doing it because you want to, out of some place deep inside of you, out of a conviction that this new way of living is the best possible way to live, that leads to the most joy and satisfaction and blessing, and definitely not because somebody else is forcing you to.

And as to what you’ll have to believe or think, the only thing that is of central importance is the good news of Jesus, and trusting him.

Because Jesus is our center.

And the gospel is our message.

And love is our aim.

And all of that is the case because the Bible is our book, and the Bible is what tells us the story of the gospel, and Jesus, and love.

What if you could say all that?

The truth is, you can say all of that. Because that’s what Jesus says. That’s what the gospel says. That’s what Love says. And, that’s what the Bible says.

In particular, that’s what Paul says in the letter to the Galatians.

The letter to the Galatians revolves around a significant conflict between religion and the gospel. This week and next we’re going to look at it in order understand some of the implications for our church. If the Bible is our book, what does it mean to be a faith community with Jesus as our center, with the gospel as our message, with love as our aim? And how does that shape our mission to follow the way of Jesus together, creating breathing room for the disfavored, the discounted, and the disconnected?

So first, some background on Galatians.

Gospel lands first in Israel, embraced primarily by Jewish people. They continue, most of them, to practice Judaism, but it’s a Judaism that is transformed, fulfilled by the good news of the resurrected Jesus and empowered by the outpouring of Jesus’ Holy Spirit. Some of the main leaders of the church in Jerusalem are Jesus’ original disciples like Peter, and Jesus’ brother, James.

Then the message of Jesus begins to spread, and communities of faith begin to form in non-Jewish parts of the Roman empire. These non-Jewish people are called Gentiles, and their primary religious forms are not Judaism, but various forms of paganism, having previously worshiped Greek and Roman gods. Paul, a Jewish Pharisee who had previously tried to kill followers of the way of Jesus until he had a dramatic encounter with the risen Jesus, is one of the main announcers of Jesus’ good news among the gentiles. He starts lots of Gentile churches, including a church in Galatia.

Meanwhile, in Jerusalem, an uprising against the Roman occupiers is brewing among the oppressed Jews living there. Since Jesus’ followers in Jerusalem are primarily Jews, there is a lot of pressure from the Jewish religious leaders for them to cooperate. And one of the keys to the rebellion’s success, according to the Jewish leaders, is for the Jewish people to be extra-faithful to the tenants of Judaism, things like circumcision, and keeping kosher, and observing the holy feasts. Which is no problem for the church in Jerusalem, since the Jewish followers of Jesus were continuing to practice Judaism faithfully, just as Jesus – who was also a Jew - had.

By this time, there are a number of Pharisees who have also received Jesus’ message of good news and joined the Jerusalem church. Since they are more educated than the original disciples, they begin to exert influence on Peter and James. They notice what’s happening with all of these gentiles around the Roman empire becoming followers of Jesus and forming communities of faith, and they know it is going to have an impact on the Jerusalem church’s reputation. So a movement starts to convince the Gentiles that they need to be circumcised just as Jewish people are circumcised (not to mention keeping kosher and all the rest).

And they’ve got the Bible to back them up. After all, Abraham, who had been a pagan until he heard God’s invitation to follow him, was circumcised when he became part of the family of God. And these new gentile followers of Jesus were joining the family of God through faith in Jesus, being grafted onto Abraham’s family, so a very strong case could be made that they should be circumcised as well.

It would be tough to make a biblical case, in fact, that they shouldn’t.

But when Paul hears that the gentiles in Galatia are being pressured to be circumcised, and keep kosher, and celebrate the feasts in order to be true members of the family of God in Christ Jesus, and when he hears that they might go along with it, he goes ballistic. And writes a letter to the Galatians.

⁶I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you by the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel— ⁷which is really no gospel at all. Evidently some people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ. ⁸But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let that person be under God’s curse! ⁹As we have already said, so now I say again: If anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let that person be under God’s curse!

Galatians 1:6-9

¹¹When Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned. ¹²For before certain people came from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles. But when they arrived, he began to draw back and separate himself from the Gentiles because he was afraid of those who belonged to the circumcision group. ¹³The other Jews joined him in his hypocrisy, so that by their hypocrisy even Barnabas was led astray.

¹⁴When I saw that they were not acting in line with the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas in front of them all, “You are a Jew, yet you live like a Gentile and not like a Jew. How is it, then, that you force Gentiles to follow Jewish customs?

¹⁵“We who are Jews by birth and not sinful Gentiles ¹⁶know that a person is not justified by observing the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. So we, too, have put our faith in Christ Jesus that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by observing the law, because by observing the law no one will be justified.

¹⁷“But if, in seeking to be justified in Christ, we Jews find ourselves also among the sinners, doesn’t that mean that Christ promotes sin? Absolutely not!...

²¹I do not set aside the grace of God, for if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing!”

Galatians 2:11-21

²³Before the coming of this faith, we were held in custody under the law, locked up until the faith that was to come would be revealed. ²⁴So the law was put in charge of us until Christ came that we might be justified by faith. ²⁵Now that this faith has come, we are no longer under the supervision of the law.

²⁶So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith, ²⁷for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. ²⁸There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, neither male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. ²⁹If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.

Galatians 3:23-29

¹²Those who want to impress others by means of the flesh are trying to compel you to be circumcised. The only reason they do this is to avoid being persecuted for the cross of Christ. ¹³Not even those who are circumcised keep the law, yet they want you to be circumcised that they may boast about your circumcision in the flesh. ¹⁴May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. ¹⁵Neither circumcision nor uncircumcision means anything; what counts is the new creation. ¹⁶Peace and mercy to all who follow this rule—to the Israel of God.

Galatians 6:12-16

What counts is the new creation. Amen. And Amen.

Next week we are going to look at Galatians, chapter 5 to see what Paul has to say to us about how a law-free gospel helps sinners behave. Because, when it comes down to it, that’s part of what is so uncomfortable about all of this for us. It’s the “yes, buts…” Yes, but what if somebody is doing such or such? Or doesn’t believe such and such? Or won’t do such and such? Or still believes such and such? Yes, but, doesn’t that mean anyone can do anything they want, and there is nothing to stop them? Yes, but…, yes, but…

For now, a couple of practical tips:

1. Read the whole letter to the Galatians, out loud. Better yet, listen to it on audio.

2. Offer Jesus your Yes Buts. Write your “Yes, but…” down on paper. And give Jesus permission to answer your “Yes, but..” After all, discipleship starts between us and Jesus, doesn’t it? So theoretically, if him answering your “Yes, but…” is important to your next step of discipleship, he just might have something to say to you.

3. Sign up to get baptized. Baptism is saying, “Jesus, I’m yours.” Not, I’ve got all this religion business worked out. Or that I’ve got myself all worked out. Just, I see who you are. I hear what you’re saying. I love what you’re doing. I’m yours. Lead on.

1st John: Santa, Lightsabers, Joyful Asking, and Idols

sermon notes from the Vineyard Church of Milan 11/06/2011

¹³I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life. ¹⁴This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. ¹⁵And if we know that he hears us—whatever we ask—we know that we have what we asked of him.

¹⁶If you see any brother or sister commit a sin that does not lead to death, you should pray and God will give them life. I refer to those whose sin does not lead to death. There is a sin that leads to death. I am not saying that you should pray about that. ¹⁷All wrongdoing is sin, and there is sin that does not lead to death.

¹⁸We know that anyone born of God does not continue to sin; the One who was born of God keeps them safe, and the evil one cannot harm them. ¹⁹We know that we are children of God, and that the whole world is under the control of the evil one. ²⁰We know also that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know him who is true. And we are in him who is true by being in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life.

²¹Dear children, keep yourselves from idols.

1 John 5:13-21

Our vision of G-d shapes our relationship with G-d.

Competing visions of nature of relationship between human beings and God…

The God who sets things in motion and has a set of rules for us to follow; reward for obedience, punishment for disobedience. Alternatively, a God who is experienced primarily as a mysterious, powerful force for us to figure out how to use to our advantage; learning the right way to interact with him to get what we want. [Watchmaker Santa vs. Force Baby]

The vision Jesus gives us is neither of these.

What we see in Jesus is a God whose primary desire is intimate, cooperative, creative relationship with us. A God who is covering the distance between us by running toward us and by inviting us to turn and embrace him. A God who is up to incredibly powerful redemptive, restorative work in our world, but who has chosen to include us as joint participants, co-laborers with him in his new creation. And so the idea is that there are all sorts of things God desires to do, but he generally only acts when he can do so in cooperation his kids. [Father, Mother, Brother, Friend]

Because fundamentally, the universe the triune God has created is relational. In other words, at the center of everything is relationship.

God, after all, says John, is Love.

By this, says Jesus, everyone will know you are my disciples, if you love one another.

The greatest commandment? Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength. And Love your neighbor as yourself.

After all, what was humanity’s first encounter with God? Not an instruction. Not a pointing finger.

A kiss.

⁴This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. ¹⁵And if we know that he hears us—whatever we ask—we know that we have [echo/hold] what we asked of him.

Ask anything. Start there. It’s a good rule of thumb in relationship with God. Because after all, if you’re asking, your relating. And that always pleases God.

Perhaps you are concerned you are asking about trivial things.

God is not like a frazzled parent who gets overwhelmed by the small requests and doesn’t have time to deal with the big stuff that really needs attention.

Or perhaps you are concerned that you are asking for “wrong” things.

When in doubt, ask away. People in the bible are always asking for the “wrong” things. God is self-differentiated enough, and loves us enough, not to give us what won’t give us life. And again, coming to him with our desires, even our broken desires, is the starting place for relationship.

So ask anything. Start there. But where relationship really hits its stride is when we start asking “according to his will.” Because when we do that, we see God at work in our world and in our lives in all kinds of unmistakable ways. We get the joy of firsthand experience of his power, the joy of partnering with him in the most significant work happening anywhere in the world.

For some of us, the idea of asking “according to God’s will” seems like a religious technicality, the fine print that makes room for unanswered prayers. That’s not the sense here.

The sense here is that as we follow Jesus, our hearts, our desires begin to shift, transform, and become like God’s desires. And so we start to want the same things God is wanting, and we naturally start to ask him to do things that he’s been waiting since the dawn of time to do, and then, wow! Look out! We are in the middle of new creation, in the middle of resurrection life bursting forth in our lives and our world.

The word for God’s will here, is after all, “thelema.” The Greek word that means pleasure, or desire, rather than a set-in-stone plan.

So imagine it’s the Lord’s desire, his pleasure to heal someone. To set someone free from demonic oppression. To release someone from an addiction. To deliver you from some brokenness that has afflicted you for a long time in your life. To help a child find a lost toy. To keep a car running despite the fact that the gas is gone. To miraculously multiply some resources. Imagine that he’s just bursting with anticipation to do that.

And imagine you’re wanting the same thing, just in that moment. And so you ask him – Lord, here’s my request.

What John is saying is that God will do it, he’ll give you your request. Not because it’s magic. Not because you got the formula right. Not because you lived a sinless life that day. But because you had faith – which is just another word for trusting relationship - and in faith you expressed your desire, your pleasure, your thelema will, to God. And for God, this is what he’s been waiting for since the dawn of time itself. You and the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, co-operating in love. Dancing the kingdom dance. Singing the shalom song.

[Basketball season on brink of being cancelled / a last ditch prayer…]

How cool to find out that that not only did God answer the prayer – which means we got to play ball, but also that God wanted me to play ball. Life’s different when you know it gives God pleasure, isn’t it? [Lexi and the presents…]

[Jericho prayer experience / I will shout for you…]

You can bet I’m continuing to pray for those things, with such anticipation that God desires them, too. The only thing that stands between now and having the request in my hands is his timing, and, as always, the free will of others. But that’s the place from which Jesus lived his life, wasn’t it? I’ll take it.

[Turning 40 / and the 3 requests…]

Turns out I’ve been completely reluctant to embrace God’s way of answering, but beginning to discover the joy of realizing that these requests are his pleasure, his desire, his thelema.

It’s at this point that the letter gets a little intriguing, as John gives a specific example of the kind of request we might make “according to God’s thelema will”

¹⁶If you see any brother or sister commit a sin (sinning a sin) that does not lead to death, you should pray and God will give them [zoe] life. I refer to those whose sin does not lead to death. There is a sin that leads to death. I am not saying that you should pray about that. ¹⁷All wrongdoing is sin, and there is sin that does not lead to death.

Lots of scholarly discussion and debate on this passage. Is there a particular sin that John is speaking about, for example, that leads to death? One that everyone reading this letter would have known about? Murder, maybe? Speeding? Letting your dog poop on your neighbor’s lawn and not cleaning it up? Judging your neighbor for letting their dog poop on their lawn and letting bitterness build up instead of either forbearing it or talking to your neighbor about it? Driving on the shoulder during a traffic backup? Using your mobile phone during a movie? Sadly, we’ll never know.

I’ll give you my take on what’s going on here.

Centered set / Consider someone on a zoe-life trajectory – a settled, repentant decision to trust the gospel, to follow Jesus. Ask for life for a brother or sister who is on the way of Jesus but sinning; it’s always God’s pleasure/desire to give it. We all sin all the time, even as our next steps take us stumblingly after Jesus. But those sins aren’t going to have their way, not in the end. The zoe-life within us, the Spirit within us, is going to win the day.

(Ever felt reluctant to pray for life for our brothers and sisters who are sinning? Especially if they are sinning against us… We are afraid that it will encourage them, somehow. We are afraid to support, pray for, celebrate fellow disciples if their sin is noticeable enough. Don’t be anxious about inadvertently condoning their sin, John is saying; invest your energies in praying for an increase of the zoe-life within them. Interesting wisdom at work here. Notice the impact on our capacity to love instead of judge with this approach…)

But on a death trajectory, the free-willed person’s hands are closed to the gift. Yes, it’s still God’s thelema pleasure/desire to give them life, but something else has to happen before they can receive it. John’s not saying don’t pray for them, simply that the particular picture he’s painting of relational cooperation doesn’t apply here.

[side note: 1 John 5 seems to me to have all kinds of connections to John 5, where the story is told of the invalid at the Bethesda pool. There we have a picture of a man whose sin is leading to death. 38 years of complaining that no one will help him into this pool with superstitious healing powers. Jesus challenges him as to whether or not he even wants to get well. And then tells him to pick up his mat and walk. For this man heading towards death, the door opens to life when he hears Jesus’ voice, recognizes the truth and authority of it, and responds. By picking up his mat and walking, he is repenting of his helplessness and trusting the voice of Jesus, and the kingdom of God breaks through and brings him freedom/healing. Now he’s on a zoe-life trajectory. Stop sinning, Jesus tells him, or something worse may happen to you. In other words, that sin – the sin of not owning his life and going after what God has for him – was the sin that was leading him to death.]

We know also that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know him who is true. And we are in him who is true by being in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life.

²¹Dear children, keep yourselves from idols.

True, true, true v idols.

True / Alethinos – that which has not only the name and resemblance, but the real nature corresponding to the name, in every respect corresponding to the idea signified by the name, real, true, genuine.

Idol / Eidolon – image, or likeness.

Anything (or anyone) we attempt to draw life from that is not the one true God made known in Jesus. Something (or someone) we count on to have power over that before which we feel powerless.

An idol has nothing behind it. No Zoe-life in it. No power. Don’t let either hand grasp one. The Lord will take your hands off of it.

Even good things can become idols to us. Even and especially things that the Lord uses to bring life to us. As soon as we let go of Jesus to hold those good things in our hands in his place. [sibling tug of war strategy…the enemy does the same to us]

And so sometimes what Jesus has to do – as we follow him – is teach us to let go of our idols so that we can embrace him afresh, and hold tightly. And then those good things (people) can be restored to their proper place as glory vessels and image-bearers, instead of being images, eidolon.

(that’s why the people of Israel were so careful about not even having images / idols of the one true God. God wants us to know him and have relationship with him unmediated by our own creations. He has made a creation that points to him and image-bearers to reflect his glory, but he is jealous for us, and sometimes that jealousy can feel furious, just like his love.)

Healing of cripple by the pool / pool is an idol. Jesus wills, the man wills, the Father wills, holds his healing in his hands and walks toward life…

Practical Tips:

1. Make 3 big asks of God – requests that come from your heart, your deep desires - write them down, and make some sort of reminder to revisit them at least once a quarter for a year. Adjust them if your heart has changed, ask again if they are still your desire.

2. Be a Coal-less Santa. Pick somebody (a follower of Jesus) you’ve been judging because of what you perceive to be their sin (or somebody you’ve just been anxious about because of their sin) and begin to pray that God would give them more of the zoe-life of the heavens. See what happens to them. See what happens to your heart towards them.

3. De-Idolize . Ask Jesus to reveal to you, in your mind right now, something or someone that has become for you an idol.

Don’t rashly quit your job or cut off relationship – your particular idol may in fact be a holy and good thing meant to be used by God as a source of true blessing – but do tell Jesus you want him to be what you have in both hands instead of that other thing or person. And give him permission to lead you in the next steps of discipleship that will bring that about.

1st John: Echo Jesus

sermon notes from the Vineyard Church of Milan 10/30/2011

This is the One who came by water and blood, Jesus Christ; not with the water only, but with the water and with the blood. It is the Spirit who testifies, because the Spirit is the truth. For there are three that testify: the Spirit and the water and the blood; and the three are in agreement. If we receive the testimony of men, the testimony of God is greater; for the testimony of God is this, that He has testified concerning His Son. The one who believes in the Son of God has the testimony in himself; the one who does not believe God has made Him a liar, because he has not believed in the testimony that God has given concerning His Son. And the testimony is this, that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He who has the Son has the life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have the life.

1 John 5:6-12 (NASB)

What this passage is getting at is the answer to the question, “How can we enjoy real, deep, rich, satisfying life?” We who live in a chaotic, insecure world. We who have so much hurt and brokenness in our lives. We who have this ache inside for something more, who get tastes of it from time to time. Is there a way for us to drink deep from a river of life that doesn’t change with changing circumstances and moods, that isn’t subject to forces beyond our control, that isn’t fickle and fleeting?

And what John writes in this passage, which is what he’s been writing throughout the letter, is that the answer is YES! Those who “have the Son” have that kind of life.

Which is good to know, but which also brings up a few other questions, doesn’t it? Such as, “What does it mean to ‘have the Son’?” and “What’s up with all the water and the blood and the testifying and what does that have to do with all this?”

So here’s what we’ll do today:

1. Explore what the water and the blood and the spirit stuff is all about. At least as much as we can.

2. Try to understand the testifying stuff.

3. Describe what it means to say that he who has the son has life.

4. Practical Tips

Traditional Water & Blood interpretations, in reverse chronological order:

· Luther & Calvin: baptism & communion; we should be baptized and take communion.

· Augustine: water and blood flow out from Jesus’ side after being pierced in side by spear (eternal life flowing from Jesus).

· Tertullian: water and blood a reference to the beginning and end of Jesus’ ministry (baptism & crucifixion)

My take? Tertullian’s explanation brings us nearest to understanding what John is up to. Especially in light of what more modern archaeological findings have revealed about the gnostic heresy (“a different opinion”) that was probably a divisive influence in the church to which first John was written.

If you’re unfamiliar with Gnosticism, a very brief primer is in order (this will be very brief, and therefore oversimplified, but nonetheless, helpful). One, the gnostics taught that spiritual things were good and true and trustworthy, and that material things were fundamentally evil and false and unreliable. And secondly, as a result, the way to eternal life was through attaining rarified spiritual knowledge and insights. And thirdly, because material things were fundamentally evil, Jesus the Christ and Jesus the human being were separate and distinct from one another. The divine Christ had come upon Jesus of Nazareth at his baptism – which is why Jesus was able to do all the amazing things he did - and then left to go back to the heavens sometime before his crucifixion, because death is only something evil material things experience, but never something experienced by the divine Christ.

You see where this is going?

John is saying Jesus the anointed one (which is what “Christ” means) was anointed by water at his baptism (when the Spirit came from heaven and landed on him, and a voice from the heavens said, “This is my Son, whom I love, with whom I am well pleased.” And John is saying, not with the water only, but with the water and the blood. In other words, the blood of his crucifixion was also an anointing. Blood ran down his body when the crown of thorns was placed on his head, just as water had run down when he was baptized by John the Baptist. And when the crucified Jesus bowed his head – just as he might have in baptism – he gave up his spirit. Only to have the Father re-animate his body with the Spirit on Resurrection Sunday. The same Spirit that Jesus breathed on his disciples that same day when he anointed them to carry out the mission that had begun with Jesus’ baptism.

In other words, John is saying that Jesus of Nazareth was the Christ – the anointed one – through and through: fully human, and fully God. That the Spirit of God was joined to the stuff of the old creation so that the stuff of the old creation could be joined to God and made new again. John is saying that the good news is that the life of the heavens – eternal life – is through Jesus, getting all mixed up with the life of the earth. That the end, when the heavens and the earth are made new and unified again, has already begun in Jesus’ resurrection. And so eternal life is not something we have to wait for the future to enjoy, and then only if we’ve achieved the right level of rarified spiritual knowledge, but instead is something already present among us through Jesus the anointed one.

But maybe we are getting ahead of ourselves. Let’s slow down then.

It is the Spirit who testifies…

The Greek word for testify is the word martyr. Martyr just means “to bear witness.” So for example, when Jesus was baptized, the Spirit (wind, breath) bore witness that Jesus was God’s son when the voice (breath) from heaven said: “This is my son, whom I love, with whom I am well pleased.”

This is always what the Spirit is bearing witness to, no matter when we encounter him/her/it. The Spirit is always bearing witness to Jesus as the author of life. And John knows that the gnostics trust the Spirit, because the Spirit is good and true in their view. So he’s saying, “Listen to what the Spirit is bearing witness to in Jesus. Not just in his baptism, but always, everywhere we look.”

Some of you have the Spirit of God bearing witness to that in your soul right now. It’s an invitation from the God to trust Jesus. Listen to that invitation.

And John says that the water and the blood are also bearing witness to the same truth.

This is the One who came by water and blood, Jesus Christ; not with the water only, but with the water and with the blood. It is the Spirit who [bears witness], because the Spirit is the truth. For there are three that [bear witness]: the Spirit and the water and the blood; and the three are in [one/unity; i.e., unified in their witness]. If we receive the [witness] of men, the [witness] of God is greater; for the [witness] of God is this, that He has [borne witness] concerning His Son. The one who believes in the Son of God has the [witness] in himself; the one who does not believe God has made Him a liar [made him out to be a false witness], because he has not believed in the [witness] that God has [borne witness to] concerning His Son.

At a deep level, what John is getting at is that all of the life in the universe bears witness to the truth of who Jesus is. The eternal life-filled Son of God, through whom all things were created and who has come that we might have life and have it to the full, if we will only hold on to him in faith.

Water is the life-blood of the natural creation. Every living thing depends on water for life, flora and fauna, from the largest mammals to the smallest microbes. No water, and life ceases. It’s no surprise that God would use a moment when Jesus was immersed in water to bear witness to Jesus as the Life from whom all life comes.

Blood too, is at the heart of the human organism, bringing life-giving nutrients to every cell and oxygenating the furthest reaches of our bodies. No blood, and life ceases. It’s no surprise that God would use Jesus’ bloody death to bear witness to Jesus as the Life from whom all life comes.

And Spirit, which means equally breath and wind, is central to what it means to be alive. Winds blow on a living planet, and breath courses through our living bodies. No breath, and we die. The water and the blood and the spirit are all bearing witness in one accord. With Jesus, there is life. Without him, there is none.

[additional note for the blog version: notice the courtroom image of witnesses. Multiple witnesses make everything more reliable; here we have 3. Also, notice how those who trust Jesus (…believes in the Son of God…) bear witness in their lives to the truth of the life of the ages. We don’t just have to go on faith, as it were – we can see this truth at work in some people’s lives. And beyond that, there is this exhortation to the gnostics that if you don’t believe what God himself has said about Jesus through the Spirit after Jesus’ resurrection, you are in essence making him out to be a false witness. Which would be a sobering thought in that culture.]

And then John brings it all home, all down to earth, all rubber meets the road. Let translate in way that helps us see a little more clearly what John is getting at specifically for us.

And the [reality borne witness to] is this, that God has given us [the zoe-life of the heavens], and this [zoe-life] is in His Son. He who [echo/holds (keeps hold of in his hands)] the Son [echo/holds] the [zoe-life]; he who does not [echo/hold] the Son of God does not [echo/hold] the [zoe-life].

This is what the gospel, the good news, boils down to. God has given us this incredible gift of aionios zoe, the life of the heavens, eternal life, life all life flows from, life that’s deep and undisturbable and overflowing and insistent and joyful. Not he will give it to us someday in the future or that he might but that he has. It’s here now. Here among us. As close to us as our next drink of water, our next heartbeat, our next breath. And this zoe-life is in Jesus. The gift of Jesus and the gift of life are one and the same. You can’t separate them. You can’t have one without the other. The good news is all wrapped up in Jesus.

And so, for those who want this life that God has given us as a gift, John says it’s very simple. It’s not about a complicated ladder of ever more elusive knowledge and learning. It’s about keeping hold of Jesus. Like the way a student driver keeps hold of the steering wheel the first time she gets on the freeway. Like the way a toddler keeps hold of their first helium balloon. Like the way a best man keeps hold of the rings before the wedding. Like the way a special teams player keeps hold of the football when the onside kick comes his way at the end of the game. Like the way a pit bull keeps hold of a tennis shoe. Like the way a mother keeps hold of child in a riotous crowd.

[on stage illustration…?]

Keep hold of Jesus, John tells us. Which means the same thing as seek first the kingdom of God, and all these things will be added to you. The path to life is in giving our focused energy to Jesus. Where is he today, in this circumstance, in this situation? What is he saying to us? Inviting us to? Desiring for us? Desiring from us? Commanding us to do? Teaching us? Showing us?

Which has implications for the whole of our lives, work, relationships, body, money, and so on… [examples]

And also for our lives of faith, what it means for us to be religious (religion coming from the word for “ligament” – our connection to God.)

One of the ways we think about this here at the Vineyard Church of Milan is in this centered set model…

(diagram, show how focus is on the center, on Jesus, on the next step in discipleship…)

Life is in keeping hold of Jesus, not in fixing our eyes on the boundaries, or on others’ relationship to the boundaries… (we can’t know from the outside looking in what is keeping someone from their next step of discipleship with Jesus….)

Because he who keeps hold of the Son has life; he who does not keep hold of the Son of God does not have life.

Practical Tips:

1. Fill in the blank. I don’t have time or energy to look for/listen for/talk to/pay attention to/take the next step in discipleship towards/hold on to Jesus because of _________________.

2. Go Dr. Phil on yourself. “And how’s that working for me?”

3. Put Blank in your Blank. Make a settled decision to move whatever you put into the blank out of the blank, to be replaced by nothing.

Prayer of surrender…

Jesus of Nazareth,

I acknowledge before you my thirst for what you have to give.

I surrender myself, whole and entire — what was, and is, and is to come — to you.

Plunge the wrongs I have done and the wrongs done to me into your fathomless mercy.

Receive me as I am today.

Make of me what I am meant to be, and let me walk in the path of your new creation.

Amen.

1st John: Not Burdensome

sermon notes from the Vineyard Church of Milan 10/23/2011

Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God, and whoever loves the Father loves the child born of Him. By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and observe His commandments. For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments; and His commandments are not burdensome. For whatever is born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith. Who is the one who overcomes the world, but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?

1 John 5:1-5 NASB

Here’s the plan today:

1. Zero in on one key verse.

2. Unload its baggage.

3. Unpack its meaning for us.

4. Practical tips.

So many themes in 1^st John are tangled up: Jesus commands about loving God, loving one another, trusting Jesus as the one-of-a-kind incarnation of God’s love in the world, trusting that we are born of God, that we know God, that he lives in us and we live in him, that we have already overcome evil through Jesus, that God is love, that he loves us and our love is a response to that love, living with confidence in the good news of his love, freedom from fear, the experience of God’s zoe-life that never changes even as our circumstances and perceptions and emotions and bodies change, and so on. John just keeps grabbing one strand after another, wrapping them around us, tying each one together with other strands, weaving them together, letting the colors and textures of one strand play off the colors and textures of the other.

The breathlessness with which he began is still present, even though his pace has slowed. It’s like a freestyle rap rather than a classical hymn.

[rap at Pastor’s Sabbath Retreat…]

The other day I took the Sabbath

It’s kinda like one of my favorite practices

I can go in and I try to do it but

It doesn’t flow right it’s not like fluid I

try to pause

I try to pray I try to play I

try to reflect but

It doesn’t go my way

It’s the way of the culture they surround me

They swoop on me like vultures

And they use busy

I get dizzy

I got a go off into a tizzy

I can’t keep going; I try to stop

But it doesn’t work; it’s like

hip hop to the beat

I don’t stop

I gotta be complete

With new wine and living in the spirit

I try to do the Sabbath I try to rest but

Somehow it doesn’t seem quite blessed but

that’s OK

I’ll rest in him: Jesus

J-e-s-u-s and he is Jesus

He with everything that he showers upon me

And it’s gonna keep going like it’s on me

Hip hop to the beat keep flowing in rest

It’s like alright, C’mon, I’m Sabbath takin’ and I’m

blessed.

Today, we’ll zero in on one verse in the middle of this freestyle rap we call 1^st John. Just one verse that brings this whole section to life.

For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments; and His commandments are not burdensome.

Some comments about language that should help us unload some baggage we often bring to this passage.

We almost never use the word “command” in day to day life, do we? We don’t command waiters or accountants or lawyers or doctors other people who serve us, even for pay. We don’t command employees. We don’t command our kids (unless we’re angry or stressed out, etc. or are named Georg Ludwig Von Trapp).

“Command” used almost exclusively in military and computer settings. A set of orders or instructions. Generally impersonal.

If you’re not a programmer or in the military, the only time you speak about commands on a day to basis is if you are religious, and you talk about being obedient to God’s commands. Which is unfortunate, because it means we come to this kind of text with a whole set of emotions and assumptions that weren’t necessarily present with the people to whom this letter was written.

Two things to note:

First, the language of command permeated the culture in which this text was written. Parents commanded their children. Masters commanded their servants. Employers commanded their employees. Teachers commanded their students. The masses were having to follow the commands of the Roman authorities. Almost everyone was being commanded by someone.

Which means it wouldn’t have felt like exclusively religious or military language to talk about keeping commands. Emotionally, it might have felt more like we feel when we describe someone telling us they “wanted” something. My dad wants me to get my homework done before I go out to play. My teacher wants me to turn in that report on Monday. My boss wants me to go to Atlanta to meet with a client next week. The newlyweds at table 6 want their check now, and from the eyes they keep giving each other, I think the sooner I get it to them, the bigger my tip might be.

And the second thing has to do with the actual Greek words that are translated “keep his commandments.” The word for commands has a range of meanings from “commandment” to “teaching.” And the word for keep, which we spoke about at length several weeks ago, means more literally to keep an eye on, to guard, to pay close attention to.

So perhaps we’ll understand the heart of this part of the passage in a fresh way if we translate it:

For this is the love of God, that we devote our attention and energy to what he is teaching us; and what he is teaching us isn’t burdensome.

That said, let’s get to the unpacking so we can hear what the Spirit of God might be saying to us through this passage.

God’s teachings aren’t burdensome. Remember Jesus’ statement: My yoke is easy and my burden is light.

“Yoke” is a rabbinic phrase referring to a list of rules for living, a way of interpreting the Torah for a particular Rabbi’s talmidin, his disciples.

One way to determine the heart of a particular Rabbi’s yoke was to ask, “What is the greatest mitzvah, or commandment?” To which Jesus replied, essentially, Love God and love your neighbor. All of the law and the prophets hang on these two commandments…

So, for example, when it came to the command about observing the Sabbath and keeping it holy, there was a conflict between Jesus’ yoke and the Pharisaic Rabbis’ yokes. The Pharisees had a strict, legalistic view of what that mitzvah meant. So strict and legalistic that they considered healing somebody on the Sabbath to be a violation of God’s commands or teaching.

That’s a hard and burdensome yoke.

Jesus’ yoke said every other mitzvah should be interpreted through the lens of loving God and loving neighbors as one loved oneself. So his disciples could see that the Sabbath was meant to be a day rooted in creation, and rooted in deliverance, and therefore to love God and love one’s neighbors meant that one would only be obedient to the Sabbath command if one cooperated with God’s love by healing on the Sabbath when one was led by God to do so.

That’s an easy yoke. It’s not burdensome; it lifts burdens.

Which isn’t to say life in pursuit of God isn’t burdensome, of course. Life in this world is burdensome. There is the burden of suffering. Of hard work with sometimes little immediate reward. The burden of broken, sinful, wounded selves. The burden of only being able to see God’s good future through a glass darkly. The burden of so many lies and falseness permeating our thoughts. The burdens of loss and conflict and physical illness and injury and shalom-shattered relationships. The burden of seeing the suffering of others and not always being able to alleviate it. The burden of regret and guilt and shame and emotional pain.

“Come to me,” Jesus says, “All you who are heavy burdened, and I will give you rest…” All of us who come to Jesus start out with heavy burdens, and even though his promise is rest, we know that we will not fully enter that rest until our new creation is complete in Christ, and that is still some time coming.

Yes, there are burdens to bear.

But God’s teachings aren’t one of them.

God’s teaching, God’s commands, point us to a way of life and love that cooperates with him in lifting burdens off the heavy burdened, and in which we experience increasing freedom and joy and lightness of being. We may have to join him in the fight for it. But better to join him in the fight for our freedom than to unwittingly join the enemy in the fight for our destruction, eh?

[fighting for rest at the PSR: arranging to go, not doing work there, etc. God’s invitation / teaching / command was not burdensome. But wading through everything that stood between me and obedience, between me and accepting the invitation, between me and devoting myself and my energy to his teaching presented itself as burden until I was on the other side of it. And then I could see the difference – burdens crush you. Responsiveness to God gives you life.]

For the thirsty in the desert, it may be a burden to get to water, but the sign pointing to the oasis is no burden, and the invitation to drink is no burden. Conversely, sitting in the sun and dying may feel like no burden compared to summoning one’s remaining strength and pressing on, but the truth is that resignation to hopeless death is the heaviest burden of all. And exhausting one’s strength to drink the water doesn’t leave you weary, but refreshed.

Jesus in Gethsemane…

He withdrew about a stone’s throw beyond them, knelt down and prayed, ⁴² “Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done.” ⁴³ An angel from heaven appeared to him and strengthened him. ⁴⁴ And being in anguish, he prayed more earnestly, and his sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground. (Luke 22)

The burden isn’t God’s commands to Jesus; the burden is the weight of sin, the brokenness of creation that Jesus carries to the cross…but God’s commands lead to resurrection life and new creation, the lifting of all burdens.

God’s teachings, his commands to love him with the whole of our being, and to love our neighbors as ourselves, aren’t burdensome. They are the way to life. They are his love present to us as signs pointing to the oasis; his love present to us as invitations to drink. To drink freedom and joy and true rest from his stream of living water.

You don’t experience it that way? Perhaps you are obeying not God’s commands, but something else’s commands in the guise of God’s. Guilt’s commands, perhaps. Or shame’s.

If God’s teaching is burdensome to anyone, it’s not because they aren’t cut out for following God. It’s not because they are extra messed up. It’s because it’s not God’s teaching. Somewhere, somehow, their perception of God’s teaching has gotten twisted along the way.

[examples…]

Consider the way a child experiences a good parent’s teaching. Burdensome? If it is good teaching, if it is the parent’s love expressed in sign pointing to life, in invitation to drink from a stream the parent knows of that the child knows nothing of, and not something else, then it is truly not burdensome. No matter how much it looks like it before it is embraced, engaged, entered into, experienced, guarded, kept, followed…. [cleaning room example.]

Take something simple in the realm of God’s teaching/commands about loving one another. Not judging one another, for example. The prospect of not judging could seem quite burdensome, especially if it’s a way of life for you and yours. The vigilance about your own speech and thoughts. The way it seems to distance you from others around you who are participating in it. The guilt you feel for all the judgmental thoughts you never paid attention to before. And so on…

But begin to devote yourself and your energies to God’s invitation, and what do you actually discover? You discover that judging others is the source of the truly heavy burden.

Of having to weigh the actions and motives of every other human being on planet earth. And as you stop – even though it takes effort – the burden lifts.

Of having to make the right call, all the time, and figure out how you are going to respond. Which usually involves pushing them out of your heart in one way or another. And as you stop – even though it takes effort – the burden lifts.

Of having to choose between one person and another in conflict after conflict. And as you stop – even though it takes effort – the burden lifts.

And then you notice that what you thought was intimacy between you and others who shared your judgments wasn’t intimacy at all, but in fact a false intimacy with its own excruciating double burden. The burden of making sure you never got on the wrong side of their judgments, and your own, which you’ve come to know so well. And the burden of isolation in a crowd, of not having any true friendships, because no one will let themselves be truly known by others when they know judgment is in the air.

And as you stop – even though it takes effort – the burden lifts. Because they start to come to you with their real selves, safe in the awareness that you don’t judge like the others they know. And because you are free to reveal your true self to them, because there is no hypocrisy in your brokenness.

And eventually, your only concern for others is discovering what ways the Spirit might be leading you to love them, and that – even though it is filled with effort - is adventure and life. And the only actions and motives you are weighing are your own – and even that you are doing not out of fear, but out of anticipation that if the Lord has something to teach and correct in you, it is because he wants you to have more life, not because he wants to judge you. And although that is filled with effort, it always leads to a greater lightness of being, not the heaviness of guilt.

And you will find yourself welcoming others into your life who you might previously have kept out because of judgments. And you will discover that although relationships with them take effort, the payoff is that you become more than you were before, and not less, and there is no burden in that.

And you will find that as you are no longer choosing sides between people in conflict, you begin to experience God’s love in a new way and with a fresh perspective, as a love that he gives freely to you; not because he has chosen your side, but because he has chosen you.

It is this way with all of God’s teaching. All of it. Everything he says to us. Every invitation he makes to us. God’s commands are not burdensome. They are the love of God in signs pointing the way to life, the love of God in invitations to drink from streams of living water.

Which is why John links it all up, bookends it all, with trusting Jesus. With believing in Jesus. Jesus is the one who invites us to follow him. His yoke is easy and his burden is light. He invites those of us who are heavy- burdened to come to him so that he can give us rest. Rest for our souls. Which means so, so much more than simply not worrying about death because we are going to heaven. It means knowing fullness of life because in him heaven has come rushing to meet us right in the middle of our heavily burdened lives and is beginning to work its way through everything as we cooperate with him.

For this is the love of God, that we devote our attention and energy to what he is teaching us; and what he is teaching us isn’t burdensome.

Practical Tips:

1. Examen yourself. Try out the spiritual discipline of the Examen (consolations and desolations) to identify something God might be teaching you. (notes posted online at the end of the sermon.)

2. Burdened down? Get help. Talk with your small group or a spiritual mentor about any commands of God that feel burdensome to you. See if you can identify what’s been twisted.

// The Examen

Drawing from Ignatius’s (1491-1556) Spiritual Exercises, in which Ignatius described the Examen, a daily examination of consolations and desolations, Charles Bello outlines 3 simple steps:

TO BEGIN, find a place where you can relax and be quiet. Acknowledge God’s love for you and His involvement in your life.

// STEP ONE: (consolations) Ask God to bring to your awareness the moment today for which you are most grateful, gave you strength, where you felt the most energized and alive, etc.

After you locate the moment or event, step back into it and let yourself relive the joy of that moment. Thank God for the consolation you experienced.

Discernment: Ask God to show you what it was about that event that gave you life. What was said and done that made that moment so life-giving?

Sit still and wait for Him to respond. If you journal, you might want to write your dialogue down.

// STEP TWO: (desolations) Ask God to bring to your awareness the moment today for which you are least grateful, where you experienced sadness, shame, failure, anger, where you felt life and energy being drained, etc.

After you locate that moment or event, step back into it and relive the feelings without trying to change or fix it in anyway.

Discernment: Ask God what is was about the desolation that made you so mad, angry, sad…

Ask God to comfort you and fill you with his love and sit in silence for a few moments. Again, if you journal, you might want to write down your insights and conversation with God.

// STEP THREE: Give thanks for whatever you have experienced during the day.

1st John: God is Love

sermon notes from the Vineyard Church of Milan 10/09/2011

⁷Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. ⁸Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. ⁹This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. ¹⁰This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. ¹¹Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.

1. Big picture.

2. Look at some key ingredients.

3. What’s it mean for us?

4. Practical Tips

So big picture…Gnosticism…The anxiety of secret knowledge. Am I one of the select few, the privileged elite? Do I have what it takes to attain salvation? How do I even know, because it seems like there is always someone ahead of me?

John’s message is simple. It’s not about secret knowledge; it’s about loving one another.

Are you doing that? Then you’re born of God. Salvation is yours as a gift. You know God. Keep learning to love, keep practicing; keep pressing into love (into God!). It’s not a level to achieve; it’s a wondrous, staggeringly beautiful landscape to explore, with more glorious treasures to find at every turn.

Are you not loving one another? Well, then you have lost the plot entirely. You don’t even know God at all – despite whatever “knowledge” you’ve attained. You may think you’re on the path to enlightenment, but you’re living in darkness, unseeing.

Let’s say you meet this woman. She’s beautiful, interesting, intriguing, challenging, inspiring. And she’s also a mystery. A mystery unlike any you’ve ever known. Just when you think you’re making sense of her, what makes her tick, what’s going on deep behind the scenes, she surprises you. Shows you something new. Proves your previous assumptions about her wrong.

Falling in love with her, you decide to ask for her hand in marriage, and she says yes.

Why do you want to spend the rest of your life with her?

Is it because you have determined to figure out the mystery? So that one day, she will make sense to you? So that one day, you can say, Aha, I have apprehended this mystery, and made her mine? And in that moment, somehow, you will have arrived…?

No, of course not. Because, for one, that will never happen. Anytime you think that that has happened, you will be wrong. And secondly, if that is your goal, you will have already missed the point. The point of you and her. The point of marriage. The point of exploring her mystery.

The point of exploring the mystery of her is so that you will be able to love her better; every bit of the mystery that you come to understand will give you new ways to love her. The point of marriage is to create a context in which the mystery can be freely explored and love can be freely expressed. The point of you and her is that by entrusting yourselves to the mystery that the other is, love would make you something more than you were before.

It is the same with every relationship. Including, and especially, our relationship with Jesus. The point of exploring the mystery of Jesus, John is saying, is love. The point of discipleship is to create a context in which the mystery can be freely explored and love can be freely expressed. The point of you and him is that by entrusting yourselves to the mystery that the other is, love would make you something more than you were before.

Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God…God is love.

Everyone who loves. From a Greek phrase meaning “everyone who loves.” Everyone who loves God? Yes, this includes that meaning. Everyone who loves people? Yes, this includes that meaning too. Everyone who loves fish and animals and lizards and insects? Yes. Everyone who loves the earth and flowers and trees? Yes. All those people have been born of God? Yes, that’s what this passage says. Yes, but! We say. Of course we do. We always say that when we hear things that challenge our preconceptions. But nonetheless, that’s what this passage says.

What are we to think or do in response to it?

Perhaps we should ask, what does it mean to be born of God? [gegennetai] = born of, fathered by, are sons and daughters of, have a genetic inheritance from. It doesn’t necessarily mean we aren’t estranged from him, or are in good relationship with him, or are full partners in the family business, or even that we aren’t actively working against his purposes in various respects. But it does mean we are his kids. That our love bears witness – in a way nothing else can – to our true identity as his children.

And it says that everyone who loves knows God. Ginosko knows him – in the sense of knowing that goes deeper than head knowledge, the kind of knowing that goes deep down.

Does that mean that everyone who loves has an intellectual understanding of God? That everyone who loves would encounter God in one way or another and say, Ah – I know you, you are the God of Abraham, Issac, and Jacob. You are YHWH who appeared to Moses in the burning bush and delivered Israel from slavery in Egypt and came among us in flesh and blood through Jesus of Nazareth? No, not necessarily. But it does mean that everyone who loves knows God deep down as much as the most enlightened, religious religion expert in the world. And if God were to reveal himself to them, they would, just as authentically as anyone else on planet earth, regardless of religious background and training, be able to say, “Ah, you I know. I have known you my whole life, even though perhaps, I haven’t been aware of it.”

Because, John says, God is love.

Not God is like love, or God is a big fan of love, or a proponent of love. Not God recommends love, or commands love, or even has a lot of love.

God is love.

Where you see the word love in noun form the scriptures, you see God. Where you see it in verb form, you see the activity of God. Where you see love manifesting itself in the world, you see God manifesting himself. Where you see God at work in the world, you see love at work. Where God is present, love is present. Where love is present, God is present.

If we have trouble wrapping our minds around this, it’s for one of several possible reasons. Maybe we’ve got misconceptions about God. Or maybe we’ve got misconceptions about love. Or maybe our capacity to conceive just isn’t well developed enough.

In any event, when John says God is love, it’s an invitation to further explore the mystery.

What we learn about God will teach us about love.

If it doesn’t, we haven’t truly learned anything about God.

What we learn about love will teach us about God.

If it doesn’t, we haven’t truly learned anything about love.

Our experiences of God will be experiences of love.

If they aren’t, perhaps it wasn’t actually God we were experiencing.

Our experiences of love will be experiences of God.

If they aren’t, perhaps it wasn’t actually love we were experiencing.

When we hear the voice of God, it will be the voice of love.

When we hear the voice of love, it will be the voice of God.

And on and on. Each encounter deeper exploration of the mystery of a God who is love.

And almost as if John anticipates the momentary stationary panic our brains might go into trying to mesh what we know of God and what we know of love to make sense of what he’s saying (since John knows we have a limited understanding of both), John gives us a starting point.

This is how God showed his love among us… [this is how the love of God (ephanerothe) is made visible, made actual, realized among us…] he sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him.

In other words, when John is talking about love, he’s talking about Jesus humbling himself and coming into our world – with all the pain and sacrifice that entailed – so that we might live through him. That’s what the love that God is looks like when we get to see it up close and personal. That’s what love made actual becomes when it materializes. That’s what love in its fully realized form is.

It’s as if we were told that God was gold, and we’ve got all these flecks of material that we think might be gold, and we’re wondering if what John means is that God is this stuff we are holding in our hands. So John says, here, here’s a bar of genuine God/Gold. Go ahead, examine it, and compare what you’ve got in your hands. If it’s made of the same stuff, then yes, that’s what I’m talking about. If it’s not, well, then you’ve probably got fool’s gold in your hand, and no, that’s not God.

Notice this phrase “his one and only Son” (sometimes translated “only begotten Son”). Which is a little confusing, isn’t it, since he just said that everyone who loves is born of God. The confusion is a function of translation.

The word translated one and only in Greek is monogene. Mono meaning one, and gene meaning kind (genetic, genus, etc.). All of us who love are children of God, are fathered by God, have our genetic inheritance from God, but Jesus is God’s one of a kind son. He’s unique among all of God’s children.

As those who’ve become Jesus’ disciples have come to understand it, Jesus and his Father are different persons but one and the same God. Jesus is God himself incarnated in now resurrected human flesh. An equal member with the Father in the three-personed triune God, Father/Son/Holy Spirit who has been with God from the beginning, long before his incarnation in the body of Jesus of Nazareth, who was present before creation itself, through whom and for whom all things were created, and whom all of creation will one day recognize as Lord and Savior.

At the risk of inappropriately deifying someone, it’s a little like the technology company, Apple. There are all kinds of people who work for Apple. Who make and design Apple products. But there has only ever been one person who is Apple. Steve Jobs. He has uniquely personified Apple, hasn’t he? It’s an open question as to whether or not he has deposited enough of his DNA into his company for it be what it always has been (or more) now that he has passed away.

It’s similar with those of us who love as God loved us. We are all children of God who love and bear his image in this world. But there is only one unique Son – Jesus – who is love, who is the image of the invisible God. And none of us can take his place. (He is, in fact, the one who has taken our place so that we might share in his place…but that’s another sermon).

So what do we do with all this?

Remember, 1^st John is in some ways a commentary on the gospel of John. And this passage is specifically referencing a scene from John chapters 13 and 14, which takes place after Jesus’ last supper with his disciples, but before he has gone to the cross.

It’s during that conversation that Jesus says to his disciples, “As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this you everyone will know that you are my disciples.” Which sounds a lot like that last line in our passage today, doesn’t it: “Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.”

A little bit later, when Jesus tells his disciples essentially that he is going to be leaving them (because he knows he’s going to be crucified), Thomas asks him, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?”

Thomas’s impulse behind this question is the same impulse driving Gnosticism, the heresy that said salvation comes from attaining secret knowledge, the heresy the people in this church John is writing to are wrestling with.

“What’s the way? Where are you going?” What are the secret truths we need to get where you are going, Jesus, to have the life you have?”

Jesus’ answer in John 14 is straightforward. I’m the way. I’m the truth. I’m the life. You can only get there (to the Father) through me.

Which is the same answer John gives here when he talks about God sending his son so that we can live through him.

The “life” in John 14 is zoe life. And the “live” in John 4 is zoe living. The life that runs underneath life, in other words. The life of God. The life that doesn’t change when circumstances change. The life that can’t be taken from us, even if we lose our biological life. The life of the ages that gives birth to all life. The life we can hold onto even when everything else is falling apart. Jesus came so that we might, through him, have it. Know it. Experience it. Be infused by it.

We can’t have it through learning secret truths. By getting our minds around the secret plan and executing it. The only way is by putting our trust personally in Jesus, God’s one of a kind son. The son who is showing us what love is, teaching us how to love, pouring out his love on us, inviting us to participate in his love, inviting us to enjoy the Father’s love for him as if it is for us, because it is.

Jesus is the way to get where he’s going. Follow him, not some complicated plan, no matter how detailed and well thought out it might be.

Jesus is the truth. Invest your energies in knowing him, not mastering some complicated theological system.

Jesus is the life. Trust him and him alone for everything you need, not some well-intentioned but ultimately inadequate strategy for successful life.

And along the way, let the growth of your love of others, and nothing less, be the measure of your discipleship.

Practical Tips:

1. Get specific with Jesus about your needs and desires. For 3 days, don’t express any needs or desires to anyone else, unless they ask you.

2. Try to do one thing a day for 3 days that Jesus leads you to do. You don’t have to be sure; just ask, and do what comes to mind if it seems reasonable, or even if doesn’t, do it if it’s likely to be at least harmless.

3. Commit yourself. Commit all of your life to Jesus. More than your work. More than your pleasure. More than your stuff. More than your money. More than your family. More than yourself. Entrust all of it to the monogene Son of God. And while your at it, entrust him with your sins, too.

1st John: Pneumalyzer

sermon notes from the Vineyard Church of Milan 10/02/2011

4 Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. ²This is how you can recognize the Spirit of God: Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, ³but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is already in the world.

⁴You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world. ⁵They are from the world and therefore speak from the viewpoint of the world, and the world listens to them. ⁶We are from God, and whoever knows God listens to us; but whoever is not from God does not listen to us. This is how we recognize the Spirit of truth and the spirit of falsehood.

If you’re irreligious, this passage sounds pretty much like religious mumbo jumbo. Totally useless for the real world.

If you’re especially religious, you’re already thinking of how this helps you have evidence as to why so and so is obviously heretical or of the devil, and reassures you why you are right in your beliefs. (Obama Heckler…)

Or maybe, if you’re both especially religious and especially practical, you’re taking notes for the next time you have to do an exorcism and need to test what kind of spirits are talking to you from the demonized person you’re trying to help.

Let’s set all of our preconceptions aside for a bit, and come at this passage with a clean slate, so that it can say what it means to say to us, nothing more and nothing less.

Here’s what we’ll do.

1. Define some terms, explore some of the original language so that we have a clearer picture of what this passage is actually talking about.

2. Look at the context of what was happening in the lives of the people to whom this was written, so that we can understand what it meant to them.

3. Talk about what it means to us today.

4. Finish up with some practical tips.

pneuma – wind / breath / spirit

Not distinct meanings, but a spectrum of meanings where the different senses merge into each other; Mysterious, dynamic, animating force of the world; mysterious, dynamic, animating force within a person, mysterious, dynamic, animating force within or emanating from God.

Sarx – flesh; material, earthly substance.

Heart of Christian faith is the good news of a God who didn’t abandon his creation in its brokenness and pain, but entered into the heart of it, inhabiting it, clothing himself in it, gathering all of it back to himself, becoming mysteriously and inseparably united with it in such a way that he could redeem, renew, and restore the whole of it so that it would share in his glory just as he shared in its shame.

Homologeo – “say the same thing as, confess.”

Kosmos – a word that can mean different things depending on context, ranging from the staggeringly beautiful creation that flowed from God’s generous, overflowing love to the disordered and ugly mess that has been corrupted by sin and death.

The world here is the sticky web of the systems and structures whose mysterious, dynamic, animating force isn’t love, but rather “not-love” – judgment, fear, anger, hate. The tar-ball of systems and structures that cause division and oppression and destruction, rather than intimate fellowship, freedom, and restoration.

Context of gnostic heresy / controversy.

Gnostic coming from a Greek word for “knowledge” (from that word, ginosko, that we spoke about last week). Basically that only a select, privileged few could attain salvation through attaining extraordinary knowledge and insight, especially self-knowledge. Included the idea of dualism: that because God was pure spirit, matter itself was fundamentally evil, and all truly good things were purely spiritual. And therefore there was a difference between Jesus – the man from Nazareth – and the Christ (the anointed one). That at Jesus’ baptism, the divine spirit of the Christ had come from heaven and descended on Jesus. But at the garden of Gethsemane, before his crucifixion, it had departed back to heaven. Because there was no way the divine could suffer as Jesus of Nazareth did on the cross. No way the evil material world could claim God’s life. And so salvation came by what Jesus illuminated or revealed, by not by his suffering.

So throughout this letter, John is speaking to people who are wrestling with this gnostic controversy. John tells them about eternal life, but he’s also saying it’s something he heard, saw, touched. It’s spiritual, but it’s also firmly connected to our sensory, material reality. John tells them about Jesus helping us see things as they really are, but that when we do, we will see both ourselves as we really are, and God as he really is, and the result will be that we know God. John talks about how we see love most powerfully in Christ Jesus dying for us on the cross, and that that is where true illumination comes from. John talks about how knowledge isn’t just for the select, privileged few, but for all of us anointed ones. That our goal isn’t some guru-esque, spiritual existence, but rather an existence firmly planted in the day to day earthly reality of loving one another as Jesus loved us, exemplified in Jesus washing our dirty feet.

At the heart of the gospel is an announcement that God is inhabiting, redeeming, renewing, and restoring his beloved creation. At the heart of the gospel is a sacred affirmation of God's joyous delight in people of all sorts and sizes and colors and political persuasions and languages and nationalities and hairstyles and athletic abilities and intellectual capacities, his joyous delight in trees and sunsets and oceans and animals and insects and mountains and rivers and floppy eared dogs and Giant Pandas and lizards and even mangy, arrogant cats. His joyous delight in Beethoven and Jay-Z and Ella Fitzgerald and dancing (even with the stars) and Ewoks and Michelangelo's David and snow boarding and basketball and 18 speed bikes and Dodge Chargers and Belgian chocolate and whatever that secret sauce is that makes PF Chang’s lettuce wraps taste so good.

That's why John writes that the way to tell if the mysterious, dynamic force animating a person or group or organization or philosophical system or even the voices inside your head is from God or not is to determine if it's saying the same thing as Jesus inhabiting sarx is saying.  Is it telling the same story about who God is and who we are and what God is up to that Jesus tells? If it is, that spirit is from him. If it's not, it isn't.

Think about the impact of gospel when you first receive it... the fundamental goodness of the universe affirmed. God is good and God loves you, smack dab in the middle of your sin and brokenness. Things are going to be OK because God is saving the world and you are caught up in his grace, too. You see everything with new eyes. New beauty at every turn, your heart full of God’s grace towards others.

Compare to what you sometimes learn along the way... The complexities of trying to get everything right, understand everything, new things that you always thought were good that now you’re finding out are actually bad, new guilt about things you never felt guilty about before, new fears about this threat and that threat and new enemies who are conspiring to destroy the world, and so be cautious about this and cautious about that, and look out for this and look out for that because it’ll mess you up if you’re not careful.

Since when is the gospel a new set of things to be alarmed about?

What does any of that have to do with affirming that Jesus inhabits sarx? What does any of that have to do with the joyous, jubilant announcement that God so loves this world that he has gone to the greatest length possible to begin restoring, renewing, redeeming, and rescuing it? What does that have to do with a God who isn’t afraid of anything, not even the most horrible suffering, because of the joy set before him?

Nothing. It has nothing to do with any of that. It has to do with the spirits that are from this world.

That all happens because we sometimes listen to the spirits from this world – the mysterious, dynamic forces animating the systems and structures of this world, instead of listening to the Spirit of truth. (Isn’t it ironic that the spirit that makes us fearful about the antichrist is in fact the spirit of the antichrist?)

You, dear children, are from God, and have overcome them because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world.

What John was saying to these completely ordinary people was essentially, “You can do it.” You can tell the difference between the spirits that animate this world, and the Spirit of God that animates Jesus and now animates you. [Greek word translated “test” is the word used for examining a coin to tell if it was real or counterfeit. Like when someone pays with a 50 or 100 dollar bill.] We have everything we need to test them. One says the same thing as Jesus coming in the flesh says. One doesn’t. You can tell the difference. And if you encounter the fake one, no need to be afraid, because the real one is in you, so it can’t hurt you – in fact, you’ve already overcome it.

And John’s saying the same thing to us today.

Consider something like slavery or racism. Animated by the spirits of this world. By the ideas that some are superior to others in any number of ways, and the inferior out to serve the superior. That without the labor of the lower classes the whole economy would collapse. That some things just can’t or won’t change. Those are the spirits of the anti-christ.

Because the spirits that say the same thing as Jesus coming in the flesh say that The Superior one came to serve and dwell among the Inferior ones, in order to lift them up. That in the quest to set things right, no sacrifice is too great, not even death, because on the other side of sacrifice is resurrection life. That everything, even sin and death and evil, is subject to the redemptive purposes of God and will one day bend its knees to him and be transformed in welcoming his presence or be separated forever from his good creation. That is the Spirit of truth.

And the abolitionists and civil rights workers weren’t afraid of the spirit of the anti-christ. Rather, they listened to the Spirit of truth and allowed that spirit to animate their actions. Without fear, without hate, without paranoia. In fact, with extraordinary love. Because they knew that they were from God and in Jesus had already overcome the spirits of this world, and that the one who was in them was greater than the one that is in the world.

We hear whispers in our heads all the time, every day. Whispers about who we are, about who God is, about what God’s thinking or doing or not doing, about who this person or that person really is, about what the future holds, about what kind of hold the past has on us.

Where are those whispers coming from? Are they reliable, true? Or unreliable, deceptive, false? Which whispers say the same thing that Jesus coming in the flesh says? Listen to those. Dismiss the rest. [what would you do if someone gave you a counterfeit bill? Yell and scream, run in panic? No. You just wouldn’t accept it. Sorry, this isn’t real. Try again.]

We’ve got groups and organizations and companies and systems to join our energies and resources with. What spirit animates them? What’s the wind beneath their wings? What kind of air are they breathing? Is it a spirit / wind / breath that says the same thing Jesus coming in the flesh says? If so, join in. If not, move along.

We’ve got ideas and books and thoughts and philosophies and art and entertainment competing for our time and consideration. What animates them, what dynamic, mysterious force breathes life into them? Does that spirit say the same thing as Jesus coming in the flesh says? Then turn your face into that wind and breathe deep. But if it doesn’t, if it says the same things that the spirit that animates the systems and structures of this world says, well then maybe hold your breath in their presence, or wear a good HEPA rated filter at least, and if you start to develop asthma, maybe move to Arizona.

Practical Tips:

1. Take a hike. Pick a day to go for a walk or a drive in the midst of the fall color change, maybe at sunset or sunrise. As you soak in the beauty, thank God for filling the earth with his presence.

2. Soak in a song. Purchase the song “Brother Moon” from Gungor’s “Ghosts Upon the Earth” album and listen to it several times, writing down the lyrics by hand until you’ve got them all written out. Read through it and consider whether it is a song animated by the Spirit of truth or a spirit from this world. Consider how it might say the same thing as Jesus coming in the flesh says.

3. Take a Pneumalyzer test. Consider what spirit animates your life. Is your pursuit of Jesus preoccupied with attaining secret knowledge, or preoccupied with joining Jesus in the joyful, jubilant announcement that God has come right into the thick of things to gather all things to himself, to rescue, redeem, restore, and renew all of his good creation. Do some gardening as worship. Take your family and clean up a public space. Or serve the poor at compassion ministry. Or join the children’s ministry team. Or join the youth team as a relational youth leader.