This is the third in our series The Sage and The Son, where Aaron and Tony sit down to discuss topics of theology, social justice, and where they see the American Church heading (and where they hope it will go).

Speaker: Aaron Vis and Tony Vis

Paul says these things are good and right and true and beautiful. They sound simple...until we try to do them.

The church in Rome was the location this letter was headed, and Paul was writing to a deeply divided church. So where are we in the letter? We're about three quarters of the way through. The first part of the letter is filled with all sorts of theology: sin, grace, mercy, Jesus, life, death, atonement, reconciliation. Theology that is deeply beautiful. Then we get to chapter 12; he says, "Therefore." In other words, all that theology has to become more than a simple set of beliefs. It has to transform us so we are living into it.

"Love must be sincere." No pretending. No performance. No religious theater." Be devoted to one another in love." Devoted. It means we don't leave when things get complicated. Devotion sticks around for hard conversation, when a crisis of faith happens - when questions come. Devotion sticks around after the diagnosis, in the hospital, through the treatment. This is one of the most powerful things we can give to others. Not answers. Not explanations. Just presence.

"Do not repay evil with evil." Evil tends to reproduce itself. Someone has to ask the question: who will stop it?

"Enemies - feed them - give them drink." The good news isn't about defeating enemies. It isn't about winning. We can disagree without dehumanizing. We can create healthy boundaries without hate. We can work for justice without violence.

All of these things are what it looks like to allow beliefs and theology to work on us and transform us to live into the new humanity God is creating in us and through us.

Speaker: Aaron Vis

Scripture: Romans 12:9-21

http://bible.com/events/49658096

This is the story of the beginning of the book of Exodus. It is one of our primal stories, a foundational one. So first, let's walk slowly through a retelling of the story and I'll comment along the way.

Pharaoh has all the power. Yet he's afraid of people who have no power. He does what fearful people with power often do. Fear turns into policy, suspicion turns into laws of the land. He enslaves them, he uses them, and yet they continue to grow larger in number. So he orders that all newborn male babies are to be killed.

In response to this order, two Hebrew midwives resist. They won't participate. Maybe that's something we can live into. Most of us will never stand before a Pharaoh, or a president, or a powerful politician. But we will stand before those who will ask us to diminish life. Sometimes faith isn't that complicated; sometimes faith is the refusal to participate in the diminishing of life.

Next comes the story of Moses' mother and sister, and then Pharaoh's daughter. They, too, refuse to participate. We see that most people think that power is the ability to control people. In this story, we see that true power looks like courage. True power looks like compassion and empathy and love.

The story gets better; Moses' sister gets Pharaoh's daughter to agree to allow Moses' mother to take care of him. And get this, Pharaoh's daughter PAYS her to take care of her own son!

Pharaoh thinks he's controlling the future. But he isn't, really. God is moving. Quietly, subtly, underneath the surface, through ordinary people. Sometimes we look at all that is happening in the world and we think that we can't possibly make a difference. Exodus tells a different story. All we have is the next courageous thing, the next faithful thing, the next compassionate thing. What if those things really do matter? What if the work of God always looks smaller before it grows and gets big? What if the kingdom of God really is hidden in the small before it gets large?

All we have is the next faithful step and trust that God is working through the little things.

Speaker: Aaron Vis

Scripture: Exodus 1:8-22; 2:1-10

http://bible.com/events/49654964

This is the story of the Canaanite woman asking for healing for her daughter. Okay, so this is another story, along with the version found in Mark, that I've preached several times. Here, we have yet another angle.

The world is starving for good news these days. It seems like every corner we look in online, there's something bad or depressing to read about, and everyone we talk to could tell us a story about some other bad thing happening. As followers of Jesus, we're called to be bearers of that good news the world is longing for. The promise that God is good and loving and is even now leaning towards us with love and mercy. The promise that God's saving, reconciling, liberating power is available to all people, in all times, and in all places. However, it seems that a good number of people in our Christian tribe no longer believe this promise.

But this story brings me hope. Why? Because in it, Jesus changes his mind. That makes us uncomfortable. But if we read this story literally, it's pretty obvious.

The major question I want to ask is this: what if Jesus learned something from this desperate foreign mother? What if, in his humanity, Jesus encountered somebody whose experience expanded his understanding of his own mission? We often think of Jesus as fully divine. But he was also fully human. Hungry. Tired. Frustrated. But also moved by compassion. Listening. Learning. Growing. Evolving. Changing his mind.

We live in a world where changing your mind feels like losing, feels like failure. But what if changing your mind is evidence that you've been listening and learning? What if changing your mind means that your heart has become larger? What if it isn't failure; what if it's growth? This woman changes Jesus. And he doesn't punish her for it. He praises her faith because she refused to believe that God is smaller than her need. She refused to believe that as an outsider she had to stay an outsider. Even if there's a crumb of grace, I'll take it, she says. It'll be enough.

That's why this story gives me hope. If Jesus can change his mind, so can we. And so can the church. If Jesus can listen, so can we. Maybe the deepest spiritual practice isn't being certain, but being open.

There are moments when God comes to us through people we don't expect, someone we were prepared to exclude. And sometimes that person expands our hearts. The Canaanite woman asks for a miracle, and she gets it. But so do Jesus and his disciples; they get changed minds and expanded hearts. And now, generations of people who read this story discover that God's table is much, much bigger than they were previously taught or imagined. And isn't THAT good news?

Speaker: Aaron Vis

Scripture: Matthew 15:21-28

http://bible.com/events/49651807

Here's the story of Jesus walking on water, but from a different angle than usual!

There's an interesting relationship that Christianity has had with fear, especially over the last 50-100 years, maybe even longer. Don't know what to call it. Buff Christianity? No Fear Christianity? Instead of making a compassionate, gracious space for us to acknowledge our fears, fear has been used to manipulate and control. Fear has been seen as the opposite of faith. I don't think that's healthy or helpful.

So now to walk through the story...on the surface, it seems to reinforce No Fear Christianity. They're afraid. Peter then has faith to ask Jesus to tell him to walk on water. He sees the wind and the waves and gets afraid again. As long as he has faith, he does the impossible! When he fears, he fails.

However, nowhere else in the stories about Jesus are we called to prove our faith, or test the character of God, by taking pointless risks that threaten or endanger our lives. Nowhere else in these stories are we taught that bad things will happen to us if we're too chicken to do the hard thing to earn God's protective care. So what's the alternative? How else can we possibly read this story?

Things happen, the disciples are afraid. I don't think it's wrong to be afraid, it's part of what it means to be a human being. Maybe the issue isn't with feeling fear. Maybe it's where that fear can lead us. It can lead us to believe that possibilities are threats. It can lead us to believe that the pain will never end, that we'll never love or laugh or hope again. It can even lead us into suspicion. That's where it led Peter in the story.

Then Jesus asks the question, "Why did you doubt?" Maybe when Jesus asks that question, he's really asking, "Why did you doubt me? Why do you not trust that I'll be honest with you? Why do you doubt that I am with you, and for you, and in you, and around you? After all this time, why do you feel the need to test whether or not it's really me?"

So the last thing I'll say is where I think this story leads us. Notice Jesus. No matter what the disciples say, or do, or feel, Jesus continues to move toward them. Nothing can stop him from moving toward us. Not the wind, the waves, mistaking him for a ghost, and definitely not our fear. Jesus continues to move toward us.

Speaker: Aaron Vis

Scripture: Matthew 14:22-33

http://bible.com/events/49648667

Speaker: Bev Modlin

Scripture: Luke 7:36-50

http://bible.com/events/49645386

Parable of the Wheat and the Weeds. Honestly? I kinda hate this parable. So we'll see what we can do.

All of us have this sense of justice in our bones; we know right and wrong, and when something's wrong, we want to rush to make it right. We want the bad guys to get what they deserve and we want the good guys to win.

So when Jesus tells this parable, it feels pretty unsettling. The weeds grow with the wheat. The servants say, "Should we pull the weeds?!" And Jesus says, "No, let them grow together." AHHHHHHH! That sucks.

We realize that this is a story about humanity. Goodness and evil are all tangled up together. Why doesn't God just fix it? Then we ask the deeper question, if we're honest enough and mature enough. Why doesn't God fix us? The field isn't just out there, it's also in us. We're a mixture of love and fear. Generosity and greed. Etc, etc...maybe the place for us to start is by tending our own interior field.

"Should we pull the weeds?" Yeah, that resonates with me; it mirrors my own heart, and maybe it mirrors yours, too. I can get all worked up about the weeds. Sometimes my own weeds, but more often than not, it's the weeds in other peoples' lives. "Jesus, trust me, I know good and evil, let me pull the weeds."

Jesus says, "No. Wait." I hate that he says this. He's insisting on humility and patience and restraint when it comes to patrolling the borders of the field that ultimately belongs to him. The point isn't that Jesus will go easy on the weeds. Apparently, there will be a separation and burning and plenty of weeping and gnashing of teeth; how that works out? Yeah, we have no clue.

I think Jesus is trying to tell us that we can't police the field without damaging some wheat. So the question this brings us to is this: where do we want to spend our energy? Burning things down, or growing healthy and strong? Maybe the challenge is to grow healthy and strong, which is hard enough. Maybe it's to become less interested in labeling people and more interested in loving them. Maybe it's to become less interested in deciding who is worthy and more interested in making room for grace.

Speaker: Aaron Vis

Scripture: Matthew 13:24-30; 36-43

https://www.bible.com/events/49642325

Speaker: Alexia Hanson

Scripture: Haggai 1:1-15

http://bible.com/events/49639260

We're starting off here by talking about how many of us have this little voice inside our heads that asks the question: Am I enough? It sometimes gets louder after we've made a mess of things...and we've all made a mess of things. Since we all live with that voice I want us to sit with Paul's words, "There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." No condemnation. That isn't just good news, it's like a whole world being opened up in front of us.

But that's not the end for Paul; it's just the beginning. Jesus tells a story about a farmer who just sows seeds, like, all over the place. God scatters seed with reckless abandon. Everyone is invited. The seed lands on all kinds of ground just as grace arrives in all kinds of lives. Maybe we've spent years analyzing the soil of our lives. Rocky? Thorny? Hardened? Notice that Jesus never said any patch of ground is permanently doomed. Rocks and thorns can be removed. Hardened ground can be broken up.

Paul gets this when he talks about living according to the flesh and living according to the Spirit. It's like two different kinds of soil. Jesus loves to talk about plants and growth, and if there's one thing we know about growth, it is that it's slow.

The invitation here from Paul and Jesus isn't to try harder. It's to become softer. More receptive and less defensive. More open to change and less afraid of it. Because the promise of these two passages seems to be: when soil opens itself to grace, when the heart makes room for the Spirit, life begins to emerge where we thought only death existed. There is no condemnation. That's where it starts. Then growth and transformation happen slowly. And maybe, years from now, someone will find themselves standing in the shade of the tree that is your life that grew from a seed you don't ever remember being planted.

Speaker: Aaron Vis

Scripture: Romans 8:1-11; Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23

http://bible.com/events/49636153

Speakers: Aaron Vis and Tony Vis

In part two of The Sage And The Son, Tony and Aaron answer more of the submitted questions from back in May.