Heaven and Earth through Jesus’ Eyes

We start a New Year not in a freezing crowd in Times Square, but in a crowd on a mountain with Jesus. Even the poorest among us can hardly imagine this crowd from Galilee towns. No medicine, police, grocery, banks; few schools; no political voice, no technology. But still like us, human, hoping, wanting better life, identity, wanting help to understand. What do you say to powerless, struggling people, gathered because of suffering, desire?

Jesus does not condescend with platitudes. He teaches them, reshaping theology, ethics, anthropology, cosmology through powerful images that still challenge every real listener.

God is real and present here, now - an intensity we’re not used to. Our lives can participate in God’s life, God’s kingdom, on the largest scale. It’s there. Seek it! His faithful justice.

You have to seek. God doesn’t force his power on you. Heaven and earth are not far apart. "Heaven" is God’s realm pervading all. "Earth" is the realm where God is visible only indirectly, but everywhere - space for real human freedom to see or not. We delude ourselves that indirectness is absence. God’s whole creation is his continuous delight.

Like heaven/earth, Jesus points to the unity of body and soul-life (psyché), both beloved by God. But within that unity, God has made us "something more." We can be not only God’s creatures, but God children. That "something more" makes all the difference!

Treasure, Eyes, and Lords

Jesus lays the foundation for "refuse to be anxious" with three images - splinters in the mind - that point to the intense challenge for us to live toward God’s Life/Kingdom.

We are treasure keepers. Everyone. What we treasure we want secure. Where is a secure place? On earth, where we think it’s just us?: We have to make it secure. In God’s realm? Can we really trust what we can’t control? Think about yourself, your heart? Life!

The problem is our eyes. Our vision is corrupted. We need new clarity/simplicity/focus for reality to come into view. We blind ourselves to the light of reality and live darkened. Jesus calls us to look, to see: sun, rain, birds, flowers, ourselves. God is there. Look!

We are servants. We think we don’t want to serve, but our lives are always constrained, limited. Lots of our "lords" enslave us by various forces. Mammon personifies all the stuff that offers us power, control, security, ease - practical "gods" that are not God. Our true Lord calls not by force but by love and devotion. But the love is life-transforming.

Anxiety, Vulnerability and the Generosity of God

Anxiety flows from vulnerable treasures, distorted vision, having a false lord. It’s the expression of our deep sense that we’re the only security we’ve got and we can’t do it.

When we live seeing only the "Earth" part of the Heaven-Earth unity, when we live only in the hiddenness of God -eyes darkened to his presence everywhere -we’re right to be anxious. Every day has plenty of trouble. That’s the human situation. We mess up. We lose.

But Jesus calls us to look deeper: When we see clearly, we see a Generous God everywhere. Feeding his birds. Clothing his lilies. We reunite in our lives the unity of heaven and earth. We learn to see God, trust God. God wants to give you life, not just stuff, but Life. The stuff is his too. He is generous with both. We’re part of God’s great creation, but also Something More. We can share is His Kingdom, his Life! Seek for it. Ask, Knock, Find!

Going for a Walk Together

When Paul writes Ephesians, he can’t walk, as he has through his ministry. He’s in prison. But he loves the image of walking, prominent in scripture, and uses it throughout his letter. For Paul, it’s not where you go (travel, prison) but how you walk - "worthy" of your calling, the invitation you’ve received from God in Jesus.

Paul saw all kinds of people come into these communities shaped by the event of Jesus, and he saw transformations: Eph 2:1-10. We were dead people walking, in delusion, futility, shaped by the air we breathed. God in his Love gave us life in Jesus, raised us with him. It’s Grace, a gift we receive by faith. A new creation, a new walk, toward every good action. Minds made new. Walking in love, as "children of light." Becoming wise adults who learn to think for themselves, to discern God’s will, "humbly to walk with God."

Learning from a Shared Walk

It’s not every Sunday that falls on our 49th wedding anniversary and New Year’s eve. Looking back and ahead, we’ve reflected on a few things we’ve observed.

Unforeseeable patterns of growth and change. From farm and small town we never imagined NYC. God has built a sense of surprise, even randomness, into our experience. We grow and learn from unexpected turns, open to being led.

We’re distinct individuals who share life. Interdependence not dependence. Each of us is beloved by God, a mystery. Our journeys intersect, interweave, but are never the same.

Daily choices for love. It’s today, this moment, in this action that we have a choice for or against grace, love, generosity, fairness, forgiveness. This moment shapes the future. Valuing the other person. Learning the Grace of God’s choice to seek our good. We gain

life by giving it to others, not by taking from others. Good, true self-interest.

Worthy of the Calling

"Worthy" is a loaded word. Many struggle with self-worth. What would I write as life worthy of God’s call? Why not challenge people to great deeds, building a great church, changing the Roman empire. Paul’s list is unexpected, unless you have looked at Jesus.

Humility, self-forgetfulness. Freedom from self-assertion, perfectionism, fear, defensiveness. God’s vast love enfolds us; we’re nourished and secure in him. Knowing that, we can begin to live Jesus’ teaching about trusting God. The great story is God’s work. We share it.

Gentleness. Freedom from hurting others. We made ourselves God’s enemies, God responded with love: I’ll live and die for you, take your sin on myself, give you healing, and my own life. Jesus’ gentleness shines, shows how to honor every person. Illuminates our life choices.

Patience, slow to anger. We mess up. God’s Spirit stays with us, picking us up, never giving up. We learn that anger is a choice we don’t have to make. Free from a bad vulnerability.

Bearing with one another, love. This is giving grace to each other, learning the joy, delight, community that is the heart of God. We imitate God by walking in love, as we are loved.

Keeping a tight grip on peace. Jesus not only heals us, he heals us together. God loves the diversity of people but wants to heal the alienation and hostility that splits us on every level. We’re not going to achieve unity, so he gives oneness/unity to us by giving us the same life - the Holy Spirit. Treasure that gift. Make peace as hard to break as shackles. That oneness fits the oneness of the gracious God who pervades over, through and in all.

Apostle to Nations who’ve Never Heard of Jesus

Paul knew that he was called to a special role, as one saturated in the Law, a Roman citizen, a Greek-speaker, confronted by the resurrected Jesus, sent especially to cities/people across a pagan Roman empire. He worked in Syria, Arabia, Asia Minor, Greece, now Rome, Spain.

Paul has a strong sense of Advent. God is always breaking in, coming to new peoples new lives. He’s seen it. Participated. That’s the particular calling he received. Rome’s empire was tied to its own throng of gods. The Jews’ story seemed superstition. - A crucified Jew as Lord? Paul was the instrument of Advent in regions beyond what’s known in Acts - Illyricum.

He "daringly" writes Romans to a church with many people he knows. He’s encapsulating their shared knowledge and experience that lays the basis for the power of that Gospel Advent. Now he hopes for new work in Spain in partnership with the church in Rome.

The God of Boundaries Crossed and New Territory

Paul quotes scripture. It may seem arbitrary but he trusts that we know it: Isa 52:15: The introduction of God’s great intervention, his holy arm, the suffering servant, without glory, wounded, but with great effect, healing, bringing peace and God’s salvation to the nations.

Paul has meditated on these scriptures deeply. We focus Advent on Jesus’ birth, but the whole story is God’s intervention, advent. The only hope is for God to intervene to heal, restore.

The whole story of Israel was seen as one exile/loss of identity and hope after another: Egypt, David (anointed outlaw, sinner), Assyrian scattering, Babylonian destruction of temple, exile, continued oppression under empires. Even Eden led to exile. God comes repeatedly with grace and healing, deliverance/Exodus, hope, new identity for his people. But the alienation is deep. It was Isaiah in exile who saw both the great hope of God’s advent and the deep mystery of what God’s mighty arm would look like when he appeared, wounded, healing.

Paul knew that leading Jews were focusing on a pure, exclusive community like the Pharisees. He saw in the crucified Jesus the opening of Israel’s story to all the nations of the earth.

The Advent of the Glorious Humility

It was that intervention, that Advent of God that Mary and others around her sensed/ recognized in the birth of Jesus. Mary speaks of God’s arm, as in Isaiah, when she sings before Jesus’ birth. God’s mighty arm has scattered the proud, raised the lowly (Lk 1:51-52).

The sign of the Coming of God’s Anointed King and Lord was a baby in a feed trough. The message was given not to the emperor or king Herod but to shepherds and foreigners. But it was given by Angel armies and Stars. It was weak but powerful beyond imagination.

Paul worked to continue the advent for new people. Each person who hears for the first time is the edge of God’s advent. Every one of us who shares the Good News shares ‘beautiful feet.’

Advent - Story of the Event that Shapes Us

Advent means "Coming." The coming of Jesus as Messiah. All that that event means. No one knows Jesus’ birthday, but Advent/Christmas is about structuring life around the events of God’s promises of grace and salvation flowing from his love: Powerful, continuing Drama: One man (Abram) -> a Nation (Israel) -> One man (Messiah Jesus) -> the Whole World....

Paul comes to the climactic end of the main body of Romans: A way of life and relationships that flows from the whole story. The heart of Christian life and ethics - not general morality. Welcome - As the Messiah welcomed You - God’s Glory. What God has done for us in Jesus Christ, we learn as the permanent heart of God, we learn to practice toward others.

Paul quotes Isa 11:10 and other texts. Isa 11:1-10 is often cited at Advent (Greek read in Rome). Jesus is no break from Israel’s story but rather the revealing climax of the long drama.

Living in Our Moment within God’s Great Story

Christian life is not lodged in a series of rules or doctrines, but in an unfolding story initiated by God to Abram and in Exodus. It unfolds with promise, hope, but also disaster, faithlessness, puzzlement: Israel’s dreams of national greatness boiling under disappointment, questions.

In the climax, God reveals that God himself would intervene in his "Anointed" king. But the king would come as a servant - in a feed-trough, an obscure village, on a cross, in resurrection. This servant-man, servant-God served not Israel’s narrow ethnic glory against other nations but Israel’s promise and story that would transform God’s whole world-all nations/Gentiles.

Paul models the challenge of living in that ongoing story in an ever-changing new time. Not in Israel but Corinth, Rome, including Gentiles with Jews. Every new time brings new and old challenges. Scriptures guide and shape us through the story, so that we live it new again.

The Welcome of Love that Serves

The story is not of exclusion but of welcome! Extravagant, grace-filled, undeserved Welcome! Defined by the center: "As the Messiah has welcomed you!" But it is dynamic: Christ frees us, but self-giving love is the heart of that freedom. Each of us is a servant of God, together.

Each of us receives the challenge to be a whole human, loving, serving, like Jesus: In work, goals, relationships, politics, creativity, sickness, disaster, dreams, parenting, planning, play, etc. Jesus’ faithfulness creates our faith that flows in hope, joy, peace, growing trust, power.

True Strength -- Loving My Neighbor -- Jesus

A diverse community means that people are at many stages on their journey of faith. Some with long experience, others new, some struggling, others confident, hiding problems. Paul nears the end of Romans, brings together the impact of God's Good News of his Son (1:1-5).

Here Paul starts with (1) strength contrasted to weakness, lifting up weaknesses, something he's often thought about. (2) He sets that next to pleasing the neighbor, directed love. (3)This flows from focus on Jesus--coming among us, dying for us-- (4) climaxing the long story of scripture. (5) He prays for all the diverse community to shape life by the event of Jesus (6) so that all delight in God's grace for their journey and unite in worship. (7) Do it!

Paul starts with "we who have strength." Strength is real here, confident faith. But it's easily coopted as power to control, please self. This strength is love, obligated to support others.

But everyone has some strength and obligation to "please the neighbor" -- seeking their good, seeking to build up the whole community. Active interaction for good, not withdrawal.

This kind of community embodies Jesus' coming in self-giving love (not self-pleasing control). The event of Jesus is the lens through which to see the reality of God, creator, redeemer. In the humility of his incarnation and the endurance of the cross we learn to read God's story.

The God of Endurance and Encouragement

Paul quotes Psa 69:9 rather than describe an example from Jesus' life. Jesus is God's event, God's action, that marks where the story of all scripture was going. The psalmist, a faithful, suffering Israelite, comes to stand for all Israel, and all Israel is focused in the Messiah. Reviling God falls on the psalmist, on Israel, on the Messiah, who endures it in love for all.

Words written long ago, repeated, treasured, recognized as scripture, continue to teach and draw us into God's long story of self-giving love. But Jesus' as God's action, provides the light for finding our way through the complex story of scripture. Here is the coming of God in unique, unexpected strength, on a donkey, on a cross. God's weakness, stronger than all.

We can't do what Jesus did but we learn God's ways, real experience, endurance, the strength of love that serves the good of the neighbor, pleases the neighbor, builds up all. In such strong love we learn God's delight in love and realizes hope -- God is only beginning.

The Gift to Focus on What God did in Jesus

"Live in harmony" sounds better than "think the same thing" (v 5). But "the same thing" is Jesus. That focus is God's gift that carries us through all experiences (endurance) and lets us know that God's love will triumph (encouragement). All our different levels of strength, struggle, and suffering are on a path that Jesus experienced both as us and as God.

In all our human differences, Jesus unites us in one voice of praise, ringing through all spheres.

Think, Practice, Worship, Repeat

It's all really simple. We all have to do it ourselves. Think clearly, seeing God in Jesus at the center of everything. Practice his welcoming love. Serve and worship together. Do it again.

True Strength -- Loving My Neighbor -- Jesus

A diverse community means that people are at many stages on their journey of faith. Some with long experience, others new, some struggling, others confident, hiding problems. Paul nears the end of Romans, brings together the impact of God's Good News of his Son (1:1-5).

Here Paul starts with (1) strength contrasted to weakness, lifting up weaknesses, something he's often thought about. (2) He sets that next to pleasing the neighbor, directed love. (3)This flows from focus on Jesus--coming among us, dying for us-- (4) climaxing the long story of scripture. (5) He prays for all the diverse community to shape life by the event of Jesus (6) so that all delight in God's grace for their journey and unite in worship. (7) Do it!

Paul starts with "we who have strength." Strength is real here, confident faith. But it's easily coopted as power to control, please self. This strength is love, obligated to support others.

But everyone has some strength and obligation to "please the neighbor" -- seeking their good, seeking to build up the whole community. Active interaction for good, not withdrawal.

This kind of community embodies Jesus' coming in self-giving love (not self-pleasing control). The event of Jesus is the lens through which to see the reality of God, creator, redeemer. In the humility of his incarnation and the endurance of the cross we learn to read God's story.

The God of Endurance and Encouragement

Paul quotes Psa 69:9 rather than describe an example from Jesus' life. Jesus is God's event, God's action, that marks where the story of all scripture was going. The psalmist, a faithful, suffering Israelite, comes to stand for all Israel, and all Israel is focused in the Messiah. Reviling God falls on the psalmist, on Israel, on the Messiah, who endures it in love for all.

Words written long ago, repeated, treasured, recognized as scripture, continue to teach and draw us into God's long story of self-giving love. But Jesus' as God's action, provides the light for finding our way through the complex story of scripture. Here is the coming of God in unique, unexpected strength, on a donkey, on a cross. God's weakness, stronger than all.

We can't do what Jesus did but we learn God's ways, real experience, endurance, the strength of love that serves the good of the neighbor, pleases the neighbor, builds up all. In such strong love we learn God's delight in love and realizes hope -- God is only beginning.

The Gift to Focus on What God did in Jesus

"Live in harmony" sounds better than "think the same thing" (v 5). But "the same thing" is Jesus. That focus is God's gift that carries us through all experiences (endurance) and lets us know that God's love will triumph (encouragement). All our different levels of strength, struggle, and suffering are on a path that Jesus experienced both as us and as God.

In all our human differences, Jesus unites us in one voice of praise, ringing through all spheres.

Think, Practice, Worship, Repeat

It's all really simple. We all have to do it ourselves. Think clearly, seeing God in Jesus at the center of everything. Practice his welcoming love. Serve and worship together. Do it again.

The Importance of What's Not Important

Paul wants us to see that the profound event that God has brought about in Jesus (Gospel) comes to embodied fulfillment in transformation of life through a renewed mind -- a way of seeing ourselves, others, and God through the lens of Jesus -- his life, cross, and resurrection.

This section is marked by confident assertions: "nothing is unclean," "the kingdom of God is...," "everything is clean," "faith." But something happens. The idea of clean/unclean, holy/ common used to be objective, as in so much of the Torah: God is separate from the world. Paul's statements are heretical to Paul's own past. But Jesus happened! Now God has placed at the center of his holiness and love a cross, a scandal, horror, God dying for us. God is different from the world -- his self-giving, serving love is weakness and foolishness to our world, but embodies his power to overcome death's grip on us and give us real life now.

Christian life is taking that in. We are "in Christ," presenting our bodies, transformed, renewed mind, learning in ourselves day by day to recognize God's will and affirm it -- good, mature.

Maturity -- Simple, But Not Too Simple

Jesus is simple but he takes us deep. He wants us more grown-up than we can now imagine. The Gospel leads to a confident faith of freedom: the whole world is God's and we're God's beloved children. Nothing can separate us from God's love. But Love means community, and community means difference, diversity. Difference is the practice ground of Love.

There are truths: "Nothing is unclean..." "My brother believes this is unclean." "My brother is struggling in faith and can be undermined in his relation to Christ by my action." "I have a right/authority to do this." "Christ died both for me and this brother." Going through the process of bringing such ideas together is the school of renewing the mind. Can I recognize and approve God's choice of self-giving love, affirming but releasing my right, being in Christ as he empties himself to die for me, experiencing the goodness, excellence, maturity?

God wants the one weak in faith to grow, but weak faith is vulnerable to destruction. A strong, confident faith is the aim, but its central pillar is Jesus on the cross, and that is Love. Serving the Messiah by living out faithful righteousness/justice, building peace, bringing joy in the shared Holy Spirit, learning to judge things through love for others is the path to maturity -- pleasing to God and recognizing and affirming God's will in relation to people.

Confident faith never means going against conscience. The point is to bring our consciences, our way of evaluating things, to the full meaning of Jesus. Both the "weak" and the "strong" are on the same journey. The one with inward doubts must not go against conscience and destroy its usefulness. The one with "confident faith" must shape and train the mind and conscience to see the priority that God gives to love for others, building them up, fostering the Gospel in them. And to delight in that priority. Love is more fundamental than right.

God's Reign in Our Real Life

For Paul it is in the wide range of such real-life relationships, each different, that we grow up, we learn to live God's kingdom now. What began in Abraham's faith is fulfilled in this Grace.

We are disciples, learning Jesus, God. This deep grace/love of God is the kingdom of true life.

Reflection from our 2017 Thanksgiving and Remembrance service

Tributes from our 2017 Thanksgiving and Remembrance service

Jesus as Lord and the Love that Shapes Life (7-9)

Paul wants the Romans to see the nature of a community that includes people not only diverse in background but in spiritual growth and understanding. He’s used issues of food and of special days, both with long histories and deep emotions, to highlight fundamentals.

Everything flows from the heart of the Gospel: Jesus’ life, death, resurrection that puts him at the heart of human existence as Lord - the Lord who conquers death and creates life. Jesus’ cross opens a relationship deeper and more defining than any human structure.

Human power stratifications are rendered obsolete by the one relationship of every person in life and death to Jesus/God as loving and saving Lord. That new, direct tie has deep power to shape life because it embodies God’s love for us in our weakness and hostility.

Each individual has a distinct relation to Christ, as a loved creature for whom Christ died. Each is called into "a walk" according to that Love seen in Jesus, empowered by God’s Spirit.

The Individual before God and in Community (10-13)

People with diverse stories and views often have problems with each other, judge each other. Now each is learning to see themselves relation to a loving God known in Jesus. Each life will ultimately be judged by one Lord, God, Christ, not by each other. Each is a learner of Love.

The diverse community is especially important because it’s the place where we practice toward others God’s love for ourselves. God loved us hostile sinners and gave us his own life - the story throughout Romans. God’s judgment evaluates us by how deeply that love has shaped and renewed our lives, how much we realize that God’s love/grace is the center of reality.

We usually judge by ourselves: Do you agree with me, do things like I do, avoid what I avoid? The Gospel challenges us to realize that we each have been called into a long path toward God’s Love, Grace, Faithfulness, Justice. A long way to go! Our relationship to each other is not to judge or despise, but to learn and practice love - helping not blocking each other.

Being Right and Being Right (14-16)

Remarkably, Paul is clear that in these controversies there can be a real right and wrong. The journey toward God involves real growth from weakness to strength. This is not tolerance in things that don’t matter, but the practice of love when things carry great weight.

Paul knows that no food is unclean in itself. But he also knows that it can be a language, a sign, that expresses of faith or faithlessness and much else (cf Rev 2:20). It is that meaning for a person that matters. Paul knows that he’s right to know that all food is clean. The knowledge is truly empowering. But there is a deeper rightness. God’s love is the heart of everything. If my knowledge is used not to empower but to tempt and to undermine another’s relation to Christ, my right undermines God’s love, becomes opposite of right.

It is more right to love and care for my brother or sister than to be right in asserting knowledge. Paul wants the weaker believer to grow, not to be destroyed. Ideas, practices are powerful. Every relationship is a challenge to grow toward the practice of God’s love in which real strength, renewal, transformation in us flourish, learning to love as Christ has loved us.