Douglass Church - Douglass Blvd Christian Church

It’s not enough to avoid hypocrisy by acting in congruence with our words—that is, it’s not enough just to be who we say we are. Realistically, who would ever argue otherwise? I mean, after all, you can say you’re a heartless jerk . . . and actually be a heartless jerk. Moreover, we’re not just trying to be loving by some broad calculation of human niceness. Rather, we’re trying to be loving in the way Jesus was loving--the one who gave himself up, who laid down his life for those who believed their lives weren’t even worth notice. Subscribe to us on iTunes! Sermon text: web | doc

Words are important, but they have to have at least a vague relationship to reality; which is to say, the words and the actions have to occupy the same conceptual space. What people want to know is: Do you actually live this stuff, or do you just talk about it? This Jesus you're always bringing up--do you just believe stuff about him, or do you actually try to live like he asked? Subscribe to us on iTunes! Sermon text: web | doc

But those who follow Jesus have been shown a different kind of world, one where the people we feel responsible for aren’t just those we care about, but those who don’t have the resources to care for themselves, where we view our resources not as things we must protect against the hordes of 'others,' but as things we share with strangers, whom we call family. According to the reign of God Jesus announces, there’s a world out there that, like it or not, we’re partially responsible for helping to shape. The question is: What do we want it to look like? Subscribe to us on iTunes! Sermon text: web | doc

In raising Jesus from the dead, God made a counter claim to Caesar, reversing the death Caesar dealt. Easter means that God has declared the inauguration of a new kingdom—a kingdom that prompts us to ask: 'What kind of world would we inhabit if God sat on Caesar’s throne?' How would our policies on poverty or healthcare look different if God occupied the Oval Office? What would our teachers’ pensions look like if God lived in the governor’s mansion? What would Sacramento look like if God were in Stephon Clark's backyard that night? Subscribe to us on iTunes! Sermon text: doc

Jesus leads a parade with the offer of a new kind of kingdom—a kingdom where victory is won not with war-horses and the bow, but with a donkey and some palm branches. A new kingdom, built on justice and equity for the downtrodden. A kingdom where people don’t have to live in fear that the state will tear them from their families because they don’t have the right documents, or that they may be struck down in their own backyards by officers of the state while holding nothing more threatening than a cell phone, or that their children must lie awake every night in fear that going to school may be the last thing they ever do. Subscribe to us on iTunes! Sermon text: web | doc

We beheld his glory, a glory that required us to redefine just what glory is. It’s easy to tire of the world as it is. The cruelty, the ignorance, the selfishness. We see it reflected in the eyes of those who’re told repeatedly that their lives are a burden society shouldn’t have to bear. We see it in the posture of those who can’t shrink far enough into a corner not to draw the attention of the bullies and the sharks. We see it in the weathered faces of those convinced the only safe place to find shelter on cold nights is on the steps just outside those doors. Hard to watch for most people. And yet when Jesus talks about being glorified, he’s talking about heading into the midst of the tired, poor, huddled masses—to look straight into the eyes of the death that binds so many to hopelessness. Subscribe to us on iTunes! Sermon text: web | doc

Are you sure Jesus meant the whole world? Yeah, I’m pretty sure he did. John 3:16 and stuff. And that’s where I think the real problem lies. I like the idea of Jesus going the extra mile to snatch me from the drink. But, I mean, come on, there are a lot of other people out there still who love the wrong people, who have the wrong color skin, who live in the wrong part of town, who didn’t have the good sense to be born to citizens of this country, who deal with mental and emotional demons most of us can’t imagine even in our worst nightmares—and too many folks would just as soon not have to make room for them. Subscribe to us on iTunes! Sermon text: web | doc

Jesus’ love, I thought for many years was my ticket to the party. The fact that I didn’t deserve that ticket was the practical limit of my understanding of divine love. Other people were just going to have to claim their own ticket. I’d help as much as I could. But when it came down to it, you have your salvation, and I have mine. But if you happen to be one of the people kicked to the curb by the folks in charge, Jesus’ anger down at the Temple may just be what love sounds like. Subscribe to us on iTunes! Sermon text: web | doc

Our cross to bear is a cross—a concession that our willingness to speak up on behalf of those who’ve been oppressed, a concession that our willingness to fight for justice for the powerless for whom justice is always a nice word used by the people in charge to give an excuse for why they’re the only ones fit to be in charge, a concession that our willingness to live like Jesus is a potentially deadly one. Our cross to bear, like Jesus before us, isn’t just a question of suffering our own private indignities; it’s a question of who we’re willing to suffer indignities for. Subscribe to us on iTunes! Sermon text: web | doc

The truth of the matter is, what follows our decision to follow Jesus is often much less glorious than we might have thought beforehand. In fact, the very first thing that may be required of us is to stand toe-to-toe against the forces of injustice and evil in the world, out in the wilderness, facing the wild beasts—no celebration, just normal, unremarkable acts that, if we’re faithful, have a chance to change the world. Indeed, immediately after his time in the wilderness, when Jesus says that 'the kingdom of God has come near,' perhaps what he’s talking about isn’t a nearness that avoids the wild beasts in the wilderness, but a nearness that comes from being compelled to confront them there, precisely because it’s hostile territory—where the powers and principalities are strongest and the victims of those powers need us most. Subscribe to us on iTunes! Sermon text: web | doc