Think And Let Think

Thomas wanted to know how to get where Jesus was going, he wanted an answer to his question, he wanted to know the way. And Jesus responded like this, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life.”

For far too long we’ve limited our imagination of the church to being the mechanism by which we can develop strategies that, to put it in political terms, Make America Great Again. But that is not the task nor is it the mission of the church. The task of the church is to be a community of character that can survive as a witness to the truth.

We make so many assumptions about people without ever doing the good and difficult work of learning who they really are. We see a bumper sticker, or we hear an accent, or we observe a skin tone, or we read a Facebook post, and we let that dictate who they are to us. When truthfully, what we make of those limited observations says far more about us, than about the ones we see.

Sometimes you have to watch somebody love something before you can love it yourself.

The resurrection of Jesus from the dead is the epitome of God’s power and grace. Through it we see how God took something like a cross, a means of death, and turned it into the joy of life-everlasting. On Easter God transformed the tomb in the same way that He did on Christmas in a virgin’s womb. God made a way where there was no way. On Easter, Jesus opened up a strange new world for people like you and me.

While sitting at the table with his friends, it’s as if Jesus is telling them that when they see him hanging on the cross, they should see a door with blood. It’s as if Jesus is telling them that his sacrifice, his death, is their exodus.

Don’t be mistaken; Jesus is as political as they come. But he rules not at the head of an army, but from an old wooden cross. He rules not by filibustering particular Supreme Court nominees or demanding democratic political policies, but by laying it all down for the ungodly. He rules not by ordering his troops to use chemical weapons against innocent civilians or even sending tomahawk missiles to destroy a military base, but mounting the cross and saying, “Forgive them Father, for they do not know what they are doing.”

One of the things we struggle to remember, here in our comfortable Christianity, is that Jesus was a revolutionary. He was not killed for loving too much. He was killed for calling into question who was really in charge, for confronting the elite about not taking care of the poor and the marginalized, and for telling the truth. Jesus was a revolutionary and calls us to join the revolution.

Our lives have changed forever. We can’t just retreat to the ways of the past because grace abounds. God in Christ has made in us a new creation! The gift of God in Christ on the cross was, and is, such that we are forever freed from the tyranny of sin and death. Should we continue to sin in order that grace may abound? HELL NO!

Truly I tell you, we cannot know who we are to be, if we do not know our story. This inexhaustible, unexplainable, indescribable moment from the beginning (Genesis) is who we are. It is the story of how the life of order fell into disorder. But, thanks be to God, it is not the end of the story.

We don’t like admitting our shortcomings, our faults, and our helplessness. We reject that gospel and substitute our own. We’d rather believe the American gospel: God helps those who help themselves. Actually, Paul tells us quite the opposite: When we could not help ourselves, when we were stuck in the shadow of sin, Christ died for us.

We can have the perfect advertising campaign, with our slogan in big capital letters, but that does not redeem our sinful actions and behaviors. We might think we are righteous and that we are “color-blind” or “LGBTQ affirming” or “economically transparent” but we are nevertheless sinners in need of God’s grace and forgiveness. We can even leave the church doors unlocked all week long, but we will still be broken and in need of God’s redeeming love.

By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread until you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; you are dust, and to dust you shall return.

In an attempt to live into my fear, I stepped up to the pulpit without a pre-written sermon and offered this about the Transfiguration.

When we pray like the psalmist, when we utter words with true faith and humility, when we ask for God's will to be done and mean it, our prayers will always mean more than what we hear from the pulpit.

Is the Church supposed to make the world a better place? - Sermon on 1 Corinthians 3.1-9

Does Jesus really want us to love the sinner and hate the sin? Why is this such a popular thing for Christians to say?

A sermon on the current refugee crisis, church bathrooms, and women (not) speaking in church.

Why do Christians say things like "God Won't Give You More Than You Can Handle"?

Why do eight out of every ten Americans think "God Helps Those Who Help Themselves" is in the Bible? - Part 2 of our series on Dumb Things Christians Say