Reflections on Ananias and Sapphira and the Community’s Call to Redistribute Wealth

Acts 5:1-10

A man who typically attends the 8:00 AM worship at Westminster, grabbed me a few weeks ago about ten minutes before worship began.  He said, “I got a joke.”  A robber broke into the home of a family who was gone for an overnight trip.  As the robber was pillaging the house he heard a voice say, “Jesus is watching.”  Thinking it was nothing he kept about his business.  But then again he hears the voice, “Jesus is watching.”  “Where is that coming from” he thought.  Continuing on he enters a room and hears the voice in a very clear way, “Jesus is watching.”  He flips on the lights and notices it was the family parrot.  So the robber says, “Did you say that parrot?  What is your name?”  The parrot squawked back, “Moses!”  The robber says, “What kind of idiot names their parrot Moses.”  The parrot says, “The same idiot who named that Rottweiler Jesus.” 

Sermon series on the Book of Acts usually sail pretty smoothly until the preacher hits Acts 5.  Over the first four chapters of Acts Luke describes the nature of a growing movement – this body known as the church – which seeks to correlate the activity of the community, to correlate the life and practice of the church with the nature and character of God as revealed in Jesus Christ.  So far so good – the community is demonstrating to the world the fellowship, love, generosity, kindness, and humility of God in ways that draw people in – so much so that 8000 people have been added to the number of the church.  If God is the God who takes care of the poor, if God is the God who generously shares fellowship with all of creation and generously shares divine love, then the form and content of the Christian community should bare the same direction.  The early followers of Jesus were focused on embodying the character of God by the way they lived, loved, and practiced faith and life together.

            So is it any wonder that we preachers, we church folk hesitate when we come to a text like this one?  A theological storm confronts us in this text: is God a judge who is willing to strike down those who demonstrate greed or who are liars?  Is God going to strike down all those who withhold a tithe to the church? I thought God’s judgment and wrath was enacted and satisfied on the cross of Christ and overcome in the resurrection.  I thought the community was called to be forgiving because God was forgiving.  In the case of Ananias and Sapphira there appears to be no wiggle room.  The couple withholds what they were expected to give, they lied about it, and then bam – they both die in turn on the spot.  Look out, Jesus is watching!

As we try to navigate this text for our own formation for service in God’s mission for the world we may notice the parallels between the Ananias and Sapphira story and the story of Genesis 3 – Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.  Both involve partners or couples.  Both stories involve a direction which should be followed and both stories include a deception, a hiding away, and a lie.  And both stories present significant consequences.  Adam and Eve are cast out of the garden, out of the presence of the Lord and Ananias and Sapphira are essentially cast out of the community viz a viz their death.  Both stories are about a pursuit of or a clinging onto more than we need.  For Adam and Eve it was a pursuit to be like God and for Ananias and Sapphira it was the pursuit of keeping more than they should have kept.

Leo Tolstoy once wrote a story about a successful peasant farmer who was not satisfied with his lot. He wanted more of everything. One day he received a novel offer. For 1000 rubles, he could buy all the land he could walk around in a day. The only catch in the deal was that he had to be back at his starting point by sundown. Early the next morning he started out walking at a fast pace. By midday he was very tired, but he kept going, covering more and more ground. Well into the afternoon he realized that his greed had taken him far from the starting point. He quickened his pace and as the sun began to sink low in the sky, he began to run knowing that if he did not make it back by sundown the opportunity to become an even bigger landholder would be lost. As the sun began to sink below the horizon he came within sight of the finish line. Gasping for breath, his heart pounding, he called upon every bit of strength left in his body and staggered across the line just before the sun disappeared. He immediately collapsed, blood streaming from his mouth. In a few minutes he was dead. Afterwards, his servants dug a grave. It was not much over six feet long and three feet wide. The title of Tolstoy’s story was: How Much Land Does a Person Need?

            Stories like Tolstoy’s, stories like Adam and Eve, stories like Ananias and Sapphira can serve our cultural and religious imagination as good moralistic stories; warning us against greed and idolatry and deception and encouraging us (or frightening) us toward honesty, generosity, and truth telling.  It would be easy to finish here.  To wrap this sermon up by saying, “Give your money! Don’t cheat or lie to God! Always tell the truth! You don’t really need that much. Amen!”  The problem is that we are still left with an unresolved meaning of the dire punishment all the characters in these stories receive as a result of their choices.  What is more, particular to Acts 5, we are still left with unanswered questions. Why do Ananias and Sapphira receive the fate they do for simply withholding the purse of their land sale? Why is it so harsh?

            I think one of the reasons this story is told by Luke, why we are even privy to this harshness, is because money and membership mean something in the life of the church.  The early church possessed a cherished and deep belief that their witness to the world would only be as effective as the way they treated one another; more specifically, how they shared their money and possessions and how they took care of one another and the needs of others in their community.  There are dire consequences communicated to the reader of Acts 5 because the very character of God requires a community of character who cares for the needs of the church and the world.  Ananais and Sapphira at some point choose to be members of the church.  At some point they said “Yes” to Jesus and “Yes” to participation in his body for the sake of the world.  They are not forced or obligated or coerced into it.  Part of that “Yes” included a generous and cheerful spirit.  So important is this part of the commitment, so vital is this part of the covenant that the most extreme consequences await the one who neglects them.    

            Luke has this habit of pushing the envelope – a son called prodigal who squanders his father’s wealth is welcomed back with open arms, a man left for dead is tended to by a Samaritan, those on the outside are brought near and those on the inside are left out.  At the outset of Acts we are told about Judas trading life for thirty pieces of silver which results in death and in Acts 2 and 4 we are told that the believers share their silver, which looks to all the world like death but really brings life.  Here again Luke brings a tough word: when you say “Yes” to Jesus and “Yes” to Christian community you are expected to share – you are expected to give.   The character of God and the character of the community demand it.  Why? Because it reflects a faithful witness to the world where the community of faith trusts God and where the community of faith believes that its financial resources are not for them alone.    

As we continue through these choppy waters we come face to face with this theological storm’s eye: Ananias and Sapphira sin because they refuse to redistribute their wealth.  The concept of redistribution of wealth is an interesting one.  In many ways it is a hot-button phrase – some people believe it is code for “socialism” others believe it is the essence of “social justice.”  I remember speaking to someone a few years ago – she is part of a well known American philanthropic family – and I was asking her some of her opinion on redistributing wealth.  She said, “Taxes are obviously necessary to keep infrastructure in place. Taxes are a baseline form of redistributing wealth. As a political conservative I want that baseline to be low.  As a Christian, however, I look at the concept of redistribution of wealth from a different perspective.  The New Testament, which is a book for the Christian community not the governments of the world, calls us – no, demands us” she said, “to redistribute wealth to take care of the needs of the community and the needs of the world.”  In other words, her belief was that the church should be the welfare system of neighborhoods and communities. I found that to be interesting.  Unfortunately with an average giving rate of church folk hovering around 2% of annual income that number simply won’t cut it.  Even if taxes were lowered we would expect to see a rise in giving?  Would the church really embrace its role as an outpost to meet the needs of the community in a full and present way if we were the only outpost charged with such a task? 

A few years ago a prominent theologian was invited to dinner in Manhattan which included the top leadership of several denominations in the city and the mayor himself.  At one point in the conversation the head of one particular denomination said to the mayor, “Mr. Mayor we have a serious homeless problem on our hands.  Every day I walk by our churches and there are homeless people sleeping on our steps, sleeping on the sidewalks outside of our sanctuary.  Mr. Mayor, your government needs to fix the homeless problem.  What are you going to do about it? Now the theologian in attendance, someone who is known for speaking his mind, interrupted at that point.  He said, “Mr. Mayor, don’t answer that question.” And turning to the other leaders of the church he said, “What are we going to do about it?  What is the church going to do about all the homeless on the streets?” I am all for calling the principalities and powers of this world to account – there is biblical mandates to do as much.  But let’s first take the log out of the church’s eye before we take the speck out of the government’s eye

One of our core values out of our Outreach team here at Westminster is the redistribution of wealth.  Right now we redistribute approximately $160,000.00 per year in mission-outreach.  That money feeds the hungry, houses the homeless, fights for death row inmates who have been wrongfully accused, sends folks to Honduras and Mexico to participate in God’s work in those locations, and facilitates justice and peacemaking initiatives in our country and around the globe.  In a larger way, our church redistributes hundreds of thousands of dollars to staff and ministry initiatives which are caring for the sick and bereaved, facilitating healing and wholeness for the addicted, tending to the spiritual needs of children and adults alike.  As a leadership team we are hopeful that in the coming years we, as a community, can deepen our commitment. We hope and pray we can live into a community character modeled after the character of God.  We hope and pray that we, as a church, can open ourselves up to God’s grace to form in us a generous and cheerful spirit.  For the sake of the Gospel and the sake of the world we pray it is so, Amen!

Names and Numbers

Acts 4:1-12

            As we continue in our series on the Book of Acts we find Peter and John – these two leaders of the first church in Jerusalem; these two we met last week as they were part of the healing of a lame man who begged outside the Temple gates – we find them now incarcerated and in the custody of the Temple guard.  Their crime: teaching the people about Jesus and proclaiming his resurrection from the dead.  The Jewish Temple, this sacred house of worship in the city of Jerusalem, was led by the religious elite of the day and they had their own police force to keep order and orthodoxy in place.  If the religious elite of the day possessed even the slightest notion that this rag-tag group of Jesus’ followers would go quietly into the night they would be sorely mistaken.  The word was out – the Spirit was on the move – the church was gaining momentum and gaining converts.  Even against threat of imprisonment and persecution the followers of Jesus continued to proclaim salvation in his name and in his name alone. 

For our time together this morning I want to take an angle through the text that will give attention to two of the primary ways in which we measure our lives, our success, and our place in this world: names and numbers.  This direction was first prompted by the interesting inclusion by the writer Luke concerning the number of people who came to believe in the name of Jesus.  In verse four we are told 5,000 men convert to the Way.  This is actually the second time Luke quantifies church growth.  In 2:41 we are told that on the day of Pentecost, 3,000 people were added to the number of the church in Jerusalem.  One of my mentors, John Galloway Jr. says, “We church folk have a confused relationship with numbers…We love them as a sign of God’s blessing, and we hate them as the devil’s effort to distract us.”   Inevitably we use numbers to let us know how we are doing both inside the church and outside the church. We read in the opening chapter of Acts that the church in Jerusalem goes from a small church of 120 people to a mega church of 8000+ in a very short period of time and our immediate response, I would assume, is to label that successful.  In a culture where bigger is better we often measure success and failure in quantitative ways.  From our streams of income to our GPA to our 401(K) to the price of our car or to how many friends we have on Facebook to how many members our church has, we use numbers to define our place in the world, to define our success.

Is that a bad thing?  To be sure bigger is not always better and just because everyone is doing it doesn’t mean it is the right thing to do.  Remember your parents when they said, “Well if everyone jumped off a bridge would you jump too?” And yet we know numbers are vital, even in the life of the church, to let us know how we are doing.  When the doctor says that your PSA number is high or your blood pressure is high do you say, “Well doc, those are just numbers.  There is nothing to be concerned about here.”  When the college admissions office looks at your SAT scores and your grades do we wish they would say, “No worries on that – they are just numbers.  We like your smile and the way you dress so we’ll see you in the fall!”  No.  We live in a world that lives by and makes decisions on numbers.  The problem is that many of us use numbers not as one simple indicator of how we are doing but rather as a totalizing identity marker.  In other words we may believe we actually are our numbers.  I am the numbers on my paycheck, portfolio, and pension. I am my zip code and my test scores. Is it any wonder then when the economy crashes, when jobs are lost, when homes are foreclosed, when test scores are not enough to get in to your school because it also takes some cash, that people experience crises of the spiritual and social kind? When those numbers fade or change, does our identity fade or change with them or is there something more? 

  A second way we find our value and our identity is by names.  What is your name? Who are your people? Where are you from? Where do you work? Who are your children? Where did you go to school? What neighborhood do you live in?  Names mean something as we assign value to them.  Last Sunday I was invited to play a round of golf at the Pine Valley Golf Club in New Jersey.  For the golfers in the room, the name “Pine Valley” is easily recognized – it means something in the world of golf.  The course has been ranked as one of top courses in the world – usually it’s rated the top course on the continent.  With only 900 members by invitation only, its mystique and hype are legendary.  Let me tell you, it lives up to its name!  When I was first invited my jaw dropped.  I couldn’t believe I was getting to play Pine Valley.  When I told Don Lincoln, our Head of Staff, I was going to play at the club he said, “Where is it? Never heard of it!” Don, who is more comfortable with a fly rod in his hand than a five iron, was not at all impressed with my news.  Not that he didn’t care that I was excited to go.  But the name Pine Valley really didn’t mean anything to him. 

You see sometimes it is about, as I said last week, what we choose to pay attention to.  It is sometimes about what names we give value to that shape the contours of our lives.  When I was at Pine Valley it was a bigger deal to me to see Sean Connery’s name on the member board then it was to know that Justin Timberlake was golfing a few holes ahead of me that very same day.  When I told some of my friends, they happened to be women, that I played the same day Justin Timberlake played they could have cared less about the golf course or Sean Connery or what I scored.  They were more interested in whether or not I met the superstar Timberlake and if I happened to catch a glimpse of what he was wearing.  Negative on both counts!  All of us have names we give allegiance to or spark our attention or that we would sacrifice for.  All of us have names we value.  All of us have names that define us from our family names to the names of the places we grew up to the schools we went to and to the companies and organizations we work for.   Names construct identity.  We have names and places we think fondly of because of the legacy they have left us and we have names and places that make us cringe, that we want to leave behind, because of the memories of pain and destruction they cause. 

            I think all of this may help us understand, at least in part, what it means when Peter says, “Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name given under heaven by which we must be saved.”   Salvation is not just about heaven it is also about the world under heaven.  Salvation is about a restored life here on earth – a reconciled relationship with God and neighbor here on earth – which is but a foretaste of restoration and reconciliation in the life to come.  It is by this name, the name of Jesus, which all of this is made possible.  It is this name and this name alone which shapes our identity in the ways in which we were created and designed to be shaped.  It is this name and this name alone that opens up, unequivocally and universally, right relationship with God in this life and life in God’s future.

Do not overlook the way Luke writes in this section.  Notice how the religious elite – the rulers, elders, and teachers of the law – are named: Annas the high priest, Caiaphas, John, Alexander, and other’s of the high priests family.  It is no accident that he names them.  These names meant something to a first century Jew living in Jerusalem; these names carried weight.  Notice their question to Peter and John: By what power or what name did you do this? They are referring here to the healing of the lame man.  Peter and John, as they do and what others will do throughout the Book of Acts, point away from their own name and point the people to the name of Jesus.  It is not about them making a name for themselves.  It is about them making themselves a servant of the name which is above every name.                 

            For us, the exclusive tone surrounding this text may make us feel a bit uncomfortable.  Sure, Jesus has a good reputation – he has a good name in our plural and globalized world – but certainly it’s not the only name religious or otherwise. You can have your religion but you have to go out there and make a name for yourself.  Go to the school with the right name, get the job with the right name, get the portfolio with the right numbers, and buy a house in the neighborhood that has a name and has the right zip code.  Go out there and make a name for yourself!  The Gospel subverts this disposition; that Jesus’ name is on par with the names of the world.  But the names of the world simply cannot save us.  “Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name given under heaven by which we must be saved.”  We can’t change that reality.  That reality, however, can change us.  He can change our allegiance to the numbers and the names we have sought after, that we have lost sleep over, and the names we have allowed to define the value and purpose of our lives.           

In 1999, Josh Hamilton was finishing his senior year of high school in Raleigh, North Carolina.  A blue chip baseball prospect, the centerfielder Hamilton batted an outrageous .566 during that year.  His friends knew him as clean-cut, salt of the earth; an all American boy.  He was drafted number one overall by the Tampa Bay Devil Rays and received a four million dollar signing bonus.  The world was in front of him.  Following a spring training game that year he was in a car accident with his parents.  Hamilton became injured and couldn’t play the game he loved.  What was he to do with no home run numbers to strive for?  What was he to do without the team name on the front of his jersey and his name in bold letters on the back? While injured Hamilton experienced a significant identity crisis and turned to alcohol and drugs.  He tested positive in a Major League Baseball drug test and was promptly suspended.  The world he built around his numbers and his names was crashing down. Tampa Bay released him.  When his suspension was over he was picked up by another team but was injured again. The alcohol and drug abuse continued on.  One night at one of the lowest moments of his life, the 25 year old Hamilton, picked up his Bible and started to read about the name that promised him a second chance. He read about the name that had more power than the names on his jersey.  He quietly prayed in his bedroom for God to save him…and God did.  He didn’t ask to get back into baseball.  He didn’t ask to be lifted to the limelight again.  He simply asked God to be the name in his life that would be above every name.  In 2008, Josh Hamilton had his name on the back of a Texas Rangers’ jersey. He batted .304 with 32 homeruns and 130 runs batted in – all-star caliber numbers. But if you ask Josh Hamilton what defines him, what sets his direction, he would say it isn’t his numbers and it isn’t his name and it isn’t the 3 years he has been clean and sober.  He would say it is Jesus.  Friends, may it be the same for us! For the sake of the Gospel and the sake of the world…Amen!

Chosen

Acts 1:12-26

Theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer in the years leading up to his martyrdom at the hands of the Nazis often wrote about “Religionless Christianity.”  It is a concept that still gets a lot of air time in theological circles and the church.  When Bonhoeffer talked about “Religionless Christianity” he was offering a critique of how human beings have a propensity to form concepts of God for their own self-justification.  Bonhoeffer witnessed this in full-view as it played out in 1930’s and 1940’s Germany with the German Church’s support of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi program. Bonhoeffer viewed religion as a problem, it was weak, it was frail, and it could be co-opted by people like Hitler.  Religion, he would argue, could never be equated or exist on the same plane as the revelation of God in and as Jesus Christ.  Religion confines, excludes, and can even promote violence as it often has – it is an invention made with human hands – whereas the revelation of God in and as Jesus Christ moves to the contrary.  Jesus Christ frees, includes, and promotes love of neighbor, love of God, and love of self.      

Followers of Jesus Christ today would do well living into this motif, this idea of “Religionless Christianity.” We were not meant to create God in our image but meant to be recreated in the image of Jesus Christ.  Our formulations, our confinements, and our doctrines I am sure, provide God with a hearty laugh.  And yet there remains a problem.  How are we to witness to God (which is clearly part of the call on the early as well as the church today), speak of God in a religionless way, if our attempts will ultimately fail in the end?  Swiss theologian and fellow Nazi antagonist Karl Barth put it this way:

“…we ought to speak of God.  We are human, however, and so cannot speak of God.
We ought therefore recognize both our obligation and our inability and by that very recognition give God the glory.”

            One of the primary themes of the Book of Acts seems to be a “Religionless Christianity.”  It was a movement that sought to witness to and speak about God in a very free and humble way.  There was improvisation, flexibility, and openness to how God was leading them.  The early church, however, did not lack leadership or organization.  “Religionless Christianity” is not leadership-less Christianity.  Leadership and organization are crucial practices in the early church’s vision to be a witness and foretaste of God’s love and grace.  Early church leadership also recognized that humility was the proper disposition they should take as they discerned how God was leading them into God’s future. We see this early on, even in this first chapter of Acts.  Judas has betrayed Jesus and the Apostle’s need to fill his place.  They establish criteria for succession: the person chosen must have been with Jesus from the beginning and they must have been a witness to his resurrection.  They do their due diligence and bring two names forward: a man named Matthias and a man who goes by three names; Joseph, Barsabba, or Justus.      

What I love about this scene is the utter dependence early leadership had on the Spirit.  They engage in what appears to be a very arbitrary practice of casting lots.  Whoever picks the larger lot gets the job of the twelfth apostle.  Less we think this is simple superstition enacted through an arbitrary practice don’t miss the leadership angle the Apostle’s demonstrated in both setting up the criteria and proposing two names who fit the criteria.  They did their homework – they were co-actors with God in the process.  Trusting in the guidance of the Holy Spirit through both the process and the selection; the lot falls on Matthias and J.B.J. (as I will now call him) is left holding the short straw.     

There is no other mention of J.B.J. in the rest of the New Testament and there are only a few very vague references (if they are references to him at all) in the documentation of early church history.  That got me thinking: what did J.B.J. do after the lots were cast?  Leadership acted and the Spirit spoke.  How did J.B.J react? Did he demand a revote?  Did he think there was hanging Chad? Did he become bitter or angry?  Did he try to invalidate the process?  Did he take his marbles and go home?  I think it is so interesting that we have no idea and no record about what J.B.J did or what he said when the verdict came down.

Abraham Lincoln’s “unchosen-ness” before his election to the presidency in 1860 is well documented.  He lost eight elections and failed at two business ventures.  Lincoln is one of the stories many folks use to highlight perseverance and a fighting spirit that doesn’t quit.  Lincoln’s losses are only important to history in relationship to his presidential win. If he didn’t win the presidency would we have cared about him the way we do today? Probably not.  Lincoln is not the only one like that.  How about Charles Darwin who was such a poor student his father once told him he was a “disgrace to the family”? How about Albert Einstein who was asked by a teacher to drop out of high school because he was failing all of his subjects save mathematics?    We know Darwin and Einstein’s story of struggle against the backdrop of their success.  J.B.J. is different.  There is no success story that we know of.  The last we hear from him is when he drew the short straw and came in second place.

I sort of like it that way.  In a context like ours where anonymity is not valued, where everybody is looking for their shot at fifteen minutes of fame (just look at Reality TV), where hubris often trumps humility, and where everybody wants to be known J.B.J may be a hard character for us to identify with.  He is not chosen for the position and he is never heard from again.  I wonder if the historical silence surrounding J.B.J may actually provide us with a challenge.  Maybe J.B.J did take his marbles and go home.  Maybe he was ticked off at leadership.  Maybe he was ticked off at God and didn’t want anything more to do with the church.  Or maybe, just maybe, he stepped back into his previous role. Maybe he continued on in the way of Jesus – bearing witness to what God had done and what God was doing by the power of the Spirit in his own unique and gifted way.  Maybe it didn’t matter to him if his name would be known throughout history as the Apostle who replaced Judas.  Maybe all that mattered to him was that he wanted to do God’s will no matter what form or shape it would eventually take.       

History is full of names which are not “household names” but nonetheless did – in faith – what God called them to do. I am sure J.L. Elstin is not a household name to you.  Do you know his history? J.L. Elstin was a pastor at the Dilworthtown Presbyterian Church who in 1892 started the Westminster Presbyterian Church. What about Millard Fuller?  Some of you may recognize that name others no: he was the founder of Habitat for Humanity.  What about the name Janelle Hail?  She is the founder of the National Breast Cancer Foundation.  All three of these names are most likely unfamiliar to you and yet their passions and dreams are – Dilworthtown and Westminster, Habitat, and the National Breast Cancer Foundation are all household names.  It is the same with God’s mission! We do our part to get the mission and the passion of God known and not trying to get our names known.

Author Robert J. Hastings tells the story about a sociology project at Johns Hopkins University. A young professor assigned his class to one of the more impoverished neighborhoods in inner city Baltimore. Their task was to interview 200 boys with this guiding question:  On the basis of your research, community statistics, and interviews, try to predict the boy’s futures. Shocked at what they found in that neighborhood one glaring prediction arose above all the others: the Hopkins students estimated that 90 per cent of the boys interviewed would someday serve time in prison. Twenty-five years passed since that original research was conducted.  The same professor asked another class to try to locate the survivors of the 200 boys and to see if their sociological predictions came true.  Of 180 of the original boys located, only four had ever been in jail.  Why had the predictions not turned out?  A common denominator was sought in their lives again through research and interview. The new class was sure that some value or influence tied these boys together in this neighborhood that kept them out of trouble.  Through more interviews, it was found that over 100 of the men remembered having the same high school teacher, a Miss O’Rourke, who, they all cited, had been a tremendous influence on them at the time.  After a long search, Sheila O’Rourke was found in a nursing home in Memphis, TN.  The professor and his students presented their 25 years worth of data looking for some explanation on her part.  She responded: “All I can say is that I loved every one of them.”  Shelia O’Rourke, not a household name; just doing her part to love and bless the world. 

One last thing…You know how I said J.B.J is never mentioned again in the Book of Acts or the rest of the New Testament? Well, guess what?  Matthias – the one who was chosen to take Judas’ place – is never mentioned again in the Book of Acts or the rest of the New Testament either!  As if the point needs to be emphasized again:  in the economy of God’s mission – God’s plan to make the world right – we are merely players! Our roles, our lives, our vocation exists for the sake of God’s mission. In the end it is about God and what God wants to do in us and through us for us and for the world.  It’s about God! It’s not about whether we are chosen for this task, that position, this role, or that job.  It is about the reality that we are chosen (no matter our circumstances or where we find ourselves on this journey of life) to love God, love neighbor, and to love ourselves in the pattern of Jesus.  In any case it is not about our press!  It is not about our recognition.  It is about the world recognizing by our witness that God is love, the Lord and Savior of the cosmos, the author of new creation, and the guarantor of eternal life.  In the words of John the baptizer when talking about Jesus: “He must become greater; I must become less.”  In other words: he must increase and I must decrease…he must become important and I must become less important.  Remember that you and I are chosen to decrease so that Christ may increase.  Whether or not the lot falls on us is of no concern. May it be so for the sake of the Gospel and for the sake of the world! Amen!

POWER

Acts 1:1-9

The first chapter of the Book of Acts, a book written by the gospel writer Luke as part II of his work, opens up with documenting a sort-of spiritual crisis. It is not too far after Easter, Jesus has appeared to his early followers, and he is spiritually and vocationally preparing them for their future without him. In other words this opening bit is about how the early disciples will carry on in God’s mission (a mission inaugurated by Jesus’ Kingdom message) when Jesus is gone from them. The gift of the Spirit is directly connected to their vocation (which comes from a Latin word meaning “to call”), their call as friends of Jesus. The gift that he will give is the Spirit. The call is to be a witness of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection in the world. Over the next few weeks I want to spend some time in the Book of Acts measuring how this gift of the Spirit and the vocation of the Christian community to be a witness in the world, begins to take shape in the early church. I want to draw some lines between that formation and the spiritual and missional formation God wants for us today. Our focus this morning will center on Jesus’ promise to his disciples that they would receive “power” when the Holy Spirit of God descends upon them. I want to talk some about power and what it means to be empowered by the Holy Spirit.

Here is my (simple) definition of power: power is the ability to create environments. You have heard the phrase, “Knowledge is Power” haven’t you? It was coined by philosopher and scientist Francis Bacon who lived and wrote in middle 16th to early 17th century England. Bacon believed that the gathering of knowledge through the sciences, the arts, technology, and innovation would give people the power to elevate the human condition. In other words, the world would be a better place to live if we could simply uncover the mysteries of nature and the complexities of culture and the human experience. Now on the surface this seems well-intentioned and a logical way to approach this world. However, knowledge is not pure because it is always in the hand(s) of someone who is biased toward that knowledge or some desired outcome when that knowledge is utilized. Take for example a drug company who pays scientists and doctors and patients to do a study with the intention of FDA approval for a particular drug. After the study the findings or the knowledge gained from the study are produced and documented. In Bacon’s generation the question might be – what did the study produce so that life can be improved? But in our generation, where we are suspicious of biases and beliefs we may ask – who paid for the study and what is the economic gain the company is due to receive if the drug is approved? French postmodern philosopher Michael Foucault in the spirit of the latter question flipped Bacon’s axiom around. Foucault said, “Knowledge isn’t power. Power is knowledge.” What he was aiming at when he said this was to distinguish power and knowledge as separate entities. Power is the ability to create environments and knowledge is what we glean and learn from those environments once they are created. But how we create those environments will produce a particular knowledge or particular data based on the environment that was created in the first place.

Here are two examples. Katie and I were at a couple’s retreat last weekend in Lancaster. The facilitator was talking about the power we have in our relationships to create environments that have either positive or negative outcomes. I drive home, I park the car, I open my front door, and I have a choice – I have the power to create what is about to happen next. I come into the kitchen, Katie is sitting at the table with the boys and the first thing I say is, “How come the dishes aren’t done?” Or, “Why did you leave me with no gas in the car this morning?” Or, “Why isn’t dinner ready.” If I come in and attack her or criticize her, what kind of environment am I creating – a negative one. But what if I come in and the first thing I say is, “It is so good to be home. I missed you guys.” What if I came home and kissed and hugged each one and said, “I am excited to be with you tonight.” What kind of environment would I create – a positive environment. What I chose to create in that moment will produce certain outcomes, certain knowledge. I have the power to create a loving atmosphere or a hostile one where a fight or argument and subsequently distance will take place.

Think about the Swine Flu. While I do not want to undermine the gravity of a potential pandemic it is interesting the environments that were created by mass media surrounding this illness. Could you imagine if the media covered every person who died – around 36,000 people – every year of the flu. Imagine it was the lead story every day on every web site and on every news outlet. Imagine the maps we would look at documenting where people were dying, on average 100 people a day. I would expect if that were the case mass hysteria would break out. People requesting flu shots would most certainly be up. People would take more precautions in their hygiene – washing hands, keeping kids home who are sick, etc. The media, however, in their power chooses not to cover 36,000 deaths a year in this country caused by influenza. They create an environment where the knowledge of influenza is really not a concern for the masses. With the Swine Flu it was covered daily and ritualistically and was headline news for two weeks. The media’s coverage created a serious environment of concern. In fact it had the power to change our church environment with our leadership cancelling communion and telling people not to shake hands during the greeting.

Power is the ability to create environments and those environments produce knowledge, experience, reality, and even history. So Jesus says to his disciples that “the power of the Holy Spirit will come upon you and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, and Samaria and to the ends of the earth.” Spiritual power or power enabled by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit is the ability to create environments which can enter and receive the Kingdom of God and thus produce knowledge of God which seeks to love and bless the world. As human beings we have a choice to tap into this gift, to be resourced by this indwelling as we are invited to be co-creators with God of Kingdom environments. To choose this is indeed countercultural. The principalities and powers of this world, both of the spiritual and physical kind, in power choose to create environments of fear, oppression, violence, poverty, alienation, abuse, division, isolation, and hate. The friend of God, follower of Jesus, and Spirit-filled individual and community chooses to act counter to these choices. As a co-creator we choose Spirit and the Spirit’s power to transform the environments of our homes, our schools, our workplaces, our relationships, our neighborhoods, our nation, and our world. By the power of the Holy Spirit we create Kingdom environments for the sake of being faithful witnesses to what God has done for us and for the world in and through Jesus Christ. The Christian life is about making Spirit empowered choices to create environments where the will of God, the Kingdom of God, and the knowledge of God may bloom, grow, and flourish in you and in the world.

This week I had breakfast with a regular from the church who was sharing some of the Spirit-filled choices he has been making. He lost his job a few months ago. He said, “My friends have asked me how I keep such a positive outlook on things. I tell them it is all about choice: choice of how I am going to live this day, choice of how I am going to be in relationship with my wife, choice in how I am going to parent, and choice of what I am going to do with my time.” While his professional situation is difficult he has made a choice to create an environment for himself, his family, and his friends that allows God’s Spirit to move and act in and through his life no matter what. He said, “You know what, Tony, all my relationships have improved. The more I trust God, the more I trust the leading of the Holy Spirit, the more I take initiative in the kind of life I want to live, the more I sense God’s presence and purpose in my life.” What it comes down to for him and for us, no matter what you are facing, is the choice to be empowered by the Holy Spirit to create an environment where we can know God’s presence and God’s purpose for our lives. We could easily sulk or complain or criticize and create environments that are giving more heat than light, more stagnation than vitality. The gift God wants to give each one of us is power – the power to be co-creators where the Kingdom of God can play out on the stage of our lives. Be empowered! Be Spirit-filled! Be a co-creator…for the sake of the Gospel and the sake of the world. Amen.

Τέκνά θεου – Children of God

1 John 3:1-7

Is there any other title, any other name that carries as much force, as much gravitas; as much ability to change people’s lives than the label, “Child of God?”  Spiritual director and author Brennan Manning in his book Abba’s Child puts it this way:

“Living in the awareness of our belovedness is the axis around which the Christian life revolves.  Being the beloved is our identity, the core of our existence.  It is not merely a lofty thought, an inspiring idea, or one name among many.  It is the name by which God knows us and the way God relates to us.”

The name by which God knows us – beloved – even child of God!  There comes a point in the spiritual life, I believe, where one begins to question the impact of such an identity statement.  The phrase itself, “Child of God,” seems more appropriate for Sunday school lessons with children and not so much for serious sermons from a pulpit. The claim is simple and we may actually consider it too simplistic.  Tell me more, preacher! Explain to me the nuances and contours of the spiritual life, render unto me a step by step process to make my life work – provide for me the answers to my deepest longings and my most profound questions.  Alleviate the pain; tell me how the burden of my sins may be lifted.  Give me more than just I am loved.  Give me more than I am God’s child. There comes a crossroads in the spiritual life when the individual is asked the question by God: is this enough?  Is this enough that you are my beloved? Is this enough that you are my son; that you are my daughter?  Is this enough?  The struggle for spiritual maturity hinges on this question.  I am convinced that spiritual maturity takes shape and proves itself as such in the way it allows this identity marker –I am a beloved child of God – to shape every aspect of our lives.

This is counterintuitive to our culture, isn’t it?  Our society which judges us on appearance and then on merit proves the lie time and time again that love and acceptance are earned.  Whether it is a frumpy, middle-aged woman on a talent show who is jeered for the way she appears and then, and only then, earns applause when her angelic voice pierces the air.  We like the underdog story and we applaud too.  But does it give us pause as to why we judge her and then only accept her when her merits please us?  Consider the husband and father determining his worth and value in his job title, his salary, and his possessions.  is boss is hanging his job over his head saying, “Perform! Perform! Perform or I will find someone younger who I can actually pay less to do your job.”  Consider the teenager who is haggled over by mass media told to try on identity after identity until utter confusion sets in. Who am I? Am I my grades, my first chair violin, my touchdowns, my Facebook friends, my parent’s divorce, my parent’s dreams?    

The preacher speaks softly and yet defiantly in meritocratic culture, quoting from the writer John: “See what love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!”  Karl Barth, my favorite theologian and writer of countless and countless volumes of theology said it this way when asked to sum up the core of his theological ideas: “Jesus loves me this I know for the Bible tells me so.”

There is no magic formula, no detailed instruction as to how this identity marker sets in on the individual.  It is more like a seedling planted by the water’s edge which, over time, digs its roots deep and grows and struggles to grow and flourish.  Some of us would prefer the spiritual life to be like a trip to the landscape architect who will sell us a fully bloomed tree, tell us where it should go, dig the hole, and plant it for us while we watch from the bay window with a cup of coffee.  Unfortunately, the spiritual life only happens when we dig the hole, when get dirty.

Jean Pierre Camus was a 17^th century French bishop who was mentored by the famous spiritual writer and Catholic Saint, Francois de Sales.  Camus, seeking wisdom from his mentor concerning the way of love, records this encounter.

Once I asked Blessed Francois how one may best become perfect.  ‘You must love God with your whole heart,’ he answered, ‘and your neighbor as yourself.’

‘I did not ask in what perfection consists,’ I replied, ‘but how to attain it?’

‘Love,’ he repeated, ‘is both the means and the end, the one and the only way by which we can attain that perfection which in truth is love itself…and just as the soul is the life of the body, so love is the life of the soul.’

‘I am aware of that,’ I said, ‘but I want to know HOW one is to love God with one’s whole heart and one’s neighbor as oneself?

Again, he answered the same: ‘We must love God with our whole heart and our neighbor as ourselves.’

‘I am still just where I was,’ I rejoined.  ‘Tell me how I may acquire such love.’

‘The best way, the shortest and easiest way of loving God with one’s whole heart – is simply to love him wholly and heartily.’

This is the only answer he would give.

Finally, however, Francois said: ‘There are many others who would also like me to tell them of techniques and methods and secret ways of attaining perfection. Yet I can only tell them that the sole secret is a hearty love of God and the only method of acquiring that love is by loving.  You learn to speak by speaking, to study by studying, to run by running, to work by working.  All those who wish to learn in any other way only deceive themselves.  If you really want to love God, go on and love him more and more.  Never look back.  Move forward constantly.  Begin as a humble apprentice and the very power of love will draw you on to become a master in the art.  Those who have made most progress will constantly press ahead, never for a moment thinking that they have reached the goal.  For love should continue to increase in us until we draw our last breath.’ (Jean Pierre Camus, The Spirit of St. Francois de Sales, ed. And tr. C.F. Kelley, 1952, page 1).        

It is frustrating, a challenge, and a struggle to accept that we are loved by God.  We are God’s children.  Not because of anything we have done or left undone.  Not because of anything we have achieved or regret.  Not because of our sin or our good behavior.  We are God’s children because God is love and God’s love cannot be contained, restricted, or held back.  The greatest gift we can give God is to let God be God and allow God to love us.  The second greatest gift we can give God is to love God in return, love our neighbors, and love ourselves in the pattern and way of Jesus.  This is why the writer invites us to parallel our being like Christ at the end of history with our history today.  We seek purity – a pure love of God, neighbor, and self – because that is our future self, our unchanging destiny guaranteed by the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.  The writer, John, goes on later to say:

“This is how we know what love is – Jesus Christ laid down his life for us.  And we ought to lay down our lives for one another.  If any of you has material possessions and sees a brother or a sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in you?  Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth.” (1 John 3:16-18)  

The mature spiritual life awaits you.  May we move beyond our false understanding that the identity marker as a child of God belongs to the infants or irrationals of the faith.  May we embrace this mark as the essence of the Christian life!  May we engage the struggle to be loved by God without condition and may we struggle to be lovers of our neighbor and ourselves in the same way. May act and live lives of truth seeking to receive and embody God’s love to a world hell-bent living by merits, techniques, and accomplishments.  May we live on and from the simple and profound truth that God has lavished us with love and calls us God’s children! And so you are! Thanks Be to God! Amen!