8.25.24, "Where Else?" Westminster Presbyterian Church, Pasadena, CA

 1 Kings 8.22-26; John 6.63-69

Overhead wires on the C Line being replaced … 

Why?

Those wires are nearly 30 years old, near the end of their lifespan … 

The wire is being replaced.

I wonder how the wire feels?

Hey, what’s this replacement business all about? I’ve got some years left. Let’s not be in a hurry. I can still get the job done. Come on, gimme a break! I’m not ready for the junk yard!

It happens all the time.

A month ago, we heard President Biden pass the baton to Kamala Harris … 

A movie star retires … a top-notch athlete hangs up the cleats, puts the racket away, and goes fishing.

In July, I travelled to Michigan to do a memorial service in the church where I had served for 16 years … I hadn’t been back in nearly 20 years.

The strangest of things: I didn’t recognize anything … 

Everything was different … 

familiar landmarks torn down, 

replaced by drug stores and gas stations … 

it didn’t even seem “vaguely familiar” - 

I was a “stranger in a strange land.”

 The church is still there … a little long in the tooth, as they say … Anne Lamott puts it like this: the tide comes in, the tide goes out.

Or as the song says: They paved paradise and put up a parking lot … 

Or as Shakespeare put it: Hey nonny nonny … whatever, what the heck, why not!

Things shift, things change … time moves on, and here we go.

In our gospel reading this morning, we find Jesus in a time of transition - a good many folks thought he was the One to answer their questions and solve their problems, but now they leave, like a jr. high love affair.

Jesus asks those closest to him: Are you gonna leave me, too?

Where else can we go? asks Peter.

To whom else should we listen?You have the words of eternal life … you are the one, the holy one of God.

Where else can we go?

I have learned over the years:

God creates mountains of truth all over the world … because God is the God of love, 

love supreme, 

love eternal, 

love that can only love, and never walks away.

Every religion has it’s Christ-point … the mountain where God and humanity meet … 

A quiet moment in a quiet room … 

in the rush and hustle of a morning drive to work … 

sacred places, sacred stories … 

spiritual experiences and conversion … 

when God seems powerfully close, and love rises to the top.

Every religion, every philosophy, has it’s entry point into the heart of God … because the heart of God shows up everywhere.

The Muslim in Mecca, the Jew in Jerusalem, the Buddhist in Bangkok, the Hindu in Bombay …  

No one has a corner on the religion market … everyone gets it wrong … and everyone gets it right … 

Every tradition has its radical elements where hate is preached and violence admired.

Every tradition has its beauty and its glory, wherein love is given and love received.

For anyone, the call of life invites us to take the entry point given to us … to walk into the heart of God … to embrace the ways of love and life … to reach high, and reach far …

Jesus puts it this way: Take up your cross and follow me.

And some found it just too hard … too difficult … they wanted something easy, they wanted some thing simple … but love isn’t easy, nor is love simple … because life isn’t easy, and people aren’t easy, and we’re not easy, either.

So, folks, looking for something easy, decided to look for another.

Jesus asks his disciples: Are you gonna leave me, too?  … 

It’s a real question … 

people walk away from the truth all the time … 

I’ve done it, you’ve done it, and we’ll do it again … before the last curtain call.

Because God never violates our freedom:

Our freedom to explore, think for ourselves, make mistakes, even big mistakes, and lots of little ones, all along the way … 

Our freedom is God’s ultimate gift to us … created in God’s image as we are … to be free … 

Like Adam and Eve, we pluck the fruit of self-interest and desire, and go our merry way … 

Like the prodigal son who takes his money and runs to the land of dreams and nonsense.

And in our freedom, to make the good choices, take up our cross and follow Christ … forgive one another and love profoundly … we rise to the occasion … to be responsible, thoughtful, courageous and decent.

In our freedom …

Are you gonna leave me, too? asks Jesus!

For me, the closest entry point into the heart of God is Christ! 

I was born into a Christian Family … Sheboygan, Wisconsin … the land of the Green Bay Packers and cheese curds … churches on every corner.

Christ is my entry point …

Had I been born in the Middle East, China, India, South Africa … if my family had been Jewish, Hindu, Muslim, even atheist … there would be other pathways, other entryway points, into the heart of God … 

because God is love, 

God is universal, 

God is everywhere … 

at work, to make all things new, and all things good.

Some years ago, a Christian mother came to me - deeply distressed - her daughter had married a Muslim and she was converting. 

I raised my daughter in the church, she said, tears streaming down her face. 

As we talked, she expressed here deepest fear, that when her daughter dies, she’ll go hell, and I’ll never see her again …she sobbed deeply … I will never see her again.

What’s her husband like?  I asked! 

He’s a good man, she said.

They love each other … and I love them, too.

I encouraged her to walk with her daughter … to learn and grow … ask questions … and not to fear … God at work everywhere … 

In this place, Christ is our entry point … we are Christians, and for that we can be grateful, 

Christ, our entry point, will never disappoint us!

The grand stories of scripture, the hymns we sing, the prayers we say … the waters of our baptism, the bread of the Table, the cup of blessing … we find God, and God most surely finds us.

If Christ is our entry point, then let us walk with Christ into the heart of God.

Let us follow Christ to the ends of the earth.

Let us cheer those who find God in other entry points. 

Where there is love, let us rejoice … 

where there is truth, let us dance … 

where we find goodness, let us praise God.

Let us build bridges of understanding … 

communication, respect, gratitude … 

learn from others, learn of God’s glory in their traditions, their practices, their stories, their faith.

And learn of our own entry point … if we’re Christians, then, for heaven’s sake, let us be Christians all the more.

Let God be God … and then love Christ.

In the love of Christ, let God be God the creator of the heavens and the earth …

God, for all the world.

Amen and Amen!

Distinction - October 19, 2008

Exodus 33:12-23

A minister was preoccupied with thoughts of how she was going to ask the congregation to come up with more money than they were expecting for repairs to the church roof.
On the Sunday she was the make the announcement, a substitute organist was brought in at the last minute.
The substitute wanted to know what to play. "Here's a copy of the service," she said. "But you'll have to think of something to play after I make the announcement about the finances."
During the service, the minister paused and said, "Brothers and Sisters, we are in great difficulty; the roof repairs cost twice as much as expected, and we need $4,000 more. Any of you who can pledge $100 or more, please stand up."
At that moment, the substitute organist played, "The Star Spangled Banner."

Last week Sunday, Roger Dermody lifted up the love of Jesus … for you, for me, for the world …

A great love …
Pure, unbounded …
For the lowly …
For the lofty …
For the lost …

The story of the Prodigal son comes to mind …
That boy did everything wrong …
You name it, he did it.

And it all came crashing down around his ears …
He ran out of money …
He ran out of friends …
Alone and hungry …
Desperate and tired …
He hired himself out to a pig farmer … and for a Jewish boy, nothing lower …
And to himself, in the slop of the pigs:
Why am doing this when I could be home?

Humiliated and frightened … the boy takes the first step homeward.
Along the way, the boy prepares an elaborate apology … I’ll say this, I’ll say that … maybe dad will let me stay awhile.

Before the boy reaches the gate, dad sees him.
Every day, Dad goes to the end of the road, and looks for his boy.
The boy slouches home … dad runs to greet him.

Bring out a robe for the boy, the best robe, says dad. Get a fat calf and let’s have a BBQ. It’s party time … my boy is home … we thought he was dead, but he’s alive … Whoopie and Yipee Kai Yay. Welcome home my boy. We’ve been waiting for you!

Home is a place where the door is always open … a light left on … and your favorite snack in the refrigerator.

To know that we’re loved … a love greater than we could ever imagine!

Paul the Apostle prays;
For this reason, I bow my knees before the Father … I pray that you may be strengthened … that Christ may dwell in your hearts … I pray that you may comprehend the breadth and length, the height and depth of the love of Christ …

I ask Donna, Do you love me?
Yes, you know that I love you.

I never tire of hearing it … there’s a hole in my soul, a bottomless pit … a little more love will always do …

Donna, do you love me?

That’s the question, isn’t it?
All around the world …
Husbands and wives …
Parents and children …
Friends and lovers …
Do you love me?

At the Academy Awards, winners thank their families for love … love for the long haul … love in the face of adversity … love during hard times … love given without question … love that bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things [1 Corinthians 13:7].

Love makes a flower bloom …
A child laugh …
A broken heart better …
Love gets the sun up, and love puts us to bed.

Do you love me?

That’s what Moses asks of God … [read text ...]

LORD, you told me what to do, but do you love me? Are you with me? Do you stand with me in this moment … when I’m weak and weary, when the burdens of life lay heavy upon my shoulders … do you love me? I can’t do it without you. Your love is what makes us distinct among the nations of the world.

What makes us distinct?

Christians have long pondered that question.
What makes us distinct?
Pentecostal women wear their hair long.
Amish men wear beards.
Mormons wear special underwear.
What makes us distinct?

The Jews asked that question repeatedly … much of the Old Testament, an effort to answer the question: What makes us distinct?
Circumcision?
The Promised Land?
Dietary rules?
The temple?
The Torah?

To be distinctive is one thing … but the struggle for distinction can go south in a hurry … we’re bigger, we’re better … inherently better … Israel struggled constantly with the temptation to think of itself exclusively … as if it were better then all the nations of the world …

To be distinctive is one thing; to think of ourselves as better is another …
Paul understands how easily something good becomes something dark; how easily the grace of God is translated into privilege and position.
So Paul says: “Think of others as better than yourselves” – wow and good grief … why does Paul say that?
Distinction needs the discipline of love.
Distinction needs the special grace we call humility.
And there’s never been a time more critical for humility.

There was a time when it was easy for Christians to think of themselves exclusively … we have the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth … and the rest of the world be damned!

For my family back in Wisconsin … we never saw a Hindu, a Buddhist, a Muslim … it was a Christian world for us … we sent out missionaries to far-away lands … and when missionaries came home, they regaled the faithful with remarkable stories of converting the heathen, saving them from spiritual darkness and the fires of hell.
We sang heroic hymns with heroic words … onward Christian soldiers marching as to war … to do battle against the forces of hell and heathen gods.
But that was all far away … like a fairy tale.

For a little Protestant white boy growing up in Wisconsin, the real enemy was the C A T H O L I C S … we had plenty of names for ‘em, and I won’t go into any of it … and I’m told that they had plenty of names for us, as well.

And we didn’t like Jews, either … we called them names.
And African Americans … and Asians … we didn’t like them either.
It was a white world … a Protestant world … and we had the truth!

Everyone else was wrong!
Or at least in pretty bad shape.

But God has helped us meet our neighbors …
God brings millions of them to our shores …
From our own Statue of Liberty:
Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me.

God opens our eyes to the world … via the internet and news 24/7 …

The world at our doorstep …
Next door and around the corner …
Over hill and over dale …
Hindus and Muslims … Buddhists and Seiks …
Christians and Jews …
Atheists and Agnostics …
People of every color, creed and conviction …
The world next door.

Do me a favor right – let’s get intimate … ask your neighbor to look at the label on your shirt or blouse – if you can…where was it made? [pause].

A global economy … interwoven, interconnected … the world next door.

The neighborhood has changed!
And it’s not all easy.

It’s hard to understand others whose native tongue is different than mine.
It’s a challenge to listen to people of other religions, who believe with the same fervor I do, who love their god or gods, who strive for justice, who love their families … who cook with strange spices and wear odd clothing.
It’s hard for some when “the other” moves into the neighborhood … “those people” … who dress differently, who talk differently …

So what makes us distinctive?
We’re Christians.
We’re followers of Jesus.
What makes us distinctive?

I stand here today, in this pulpit, and I say with conviction and confidence, we are distinctive … we have a story to tell … and should we fail to tell the story, the world will be the poorer for it, and if we tell our story, and tell it well, the world will profit from hearing it.

There’s a hymn I used to sing:
We’ve a story to tell to the nations, That shall turn their hearts to the right, A story of truth and mercy, A story of peace and light, A story of peace and light. For the darkness shall turn to dawning, And the dawning to noonday bright; And Christ’s great kingdom shall come on earth, The kingdom of love and light. A story of truth and mercy … The kingdom of love and light …
Yes, we have a story to tell …
And I affirm that story with conviction and confidence.

But I also stand here today with a 21st century humility.
A consciousness of others …
Their devotion, their faith, their love.
Their truth and their religion …

I subscribe to a magazine called The Christian Century – I’ve subscribed since 1967, my second year in seminary.
It’s a great journal, cutting edge … edited today by one of our very own, the Rev. John Buchanan, pastor of Fourth Presbyterian Church in Chicago – across the street from the Hancock Center.

The Christian Century … any idea where that name came from?
Founded in the 19th century … a century called the “Christian century.”
Thousands of missionaries from Europe and the United States fanned out across the seas and over the mountains … to bring Christ and civilization to the world.
Colleges and hospitals were established… wells dug and teachers trained… an unprecedented time of religious fervor and missionary enterprise … the 19th century, the Christian century …
And then, the guns of August … August, 1914, when Christian nation took up arms against Christian nation … when French and Germans and Americans all prayed to Jesus, to have the strength to kill one another … the War to end all Wars? Not a chance … but it sent the curtain of history crashing down on the so-called “Christian Century.”
The Christian century died in the bloody trenches of World War 1

And how have we fared during the 20th century?
And how appears the 21st?
And where are the Christians in all of this?
Where are you?
Where am I?

A 21st century humility is needed!
Aware of Christianity’s failure …
The untold horror of slave ships and the shackled millions wrenched from their homeland and brought to a new world to plant cotton and harvest sugar cane.
The millions of Asians who came to our shores only to work on the railroads … to face discrimination that culminated in the sadness of Japanese-American detention camps – when American citizens were taken from their homes and jobs, made to live out the duration of the war in places called Manzanar, Amache and Mindoka.
Reach back a few centuries …
The Salem Witch Hunts …
The Inquisition …
The Crusades …
Pogroms …
The hands of the church are as bloody as the cross on which Jesus died … Jesus died at the hands of the powerful … and when the church grew powerful, our hands grew bloody.
Our own history as Presbyterians … folks kicked out of the church right and left … accusations and heresy trials … splits and more splits … even as I speak, claims and counter-claims for who’s in and who’s out, who’s right and who’s wrong, who has the truth and who doesn’t.

Those questions never had any value … we just thought they did.
Prove ourselves right by making someone else wrong.
Make ourselves distinct by discrediting what others believe.

There has to be a better way!
A better way for the 21st century.

A new humility … a 21st century humility …
Here’s how I see it, but tell me, how do you see it? Here’s what I believe, but I’d like to know what you believe? May I tell you about Jesus my LORD? Only if you want to hear … And you can tell me about your faith, your God, I want to hear … I promise to listen, and I promise to learn.

We honor Jesus best when we honor the world His Father created …
We love Jesus best when we love our neighbor, whoever that neighbor may be, whatever language they speak, and whatever faith they profess.
We serve Jesus best when we listen to the world with humility, when we speak our faith with gentleness, when we grant to everyone the right to be heard, the right to live, the right to believe and the right to be respected …
We receive Jesus into our heart when we welcome one another as God welcomes us …

Home - a place where the door is always open … a light left on … and your favorite snack in the refrigerator.

That’s what makes us distinctive …

For Jesus and the world … Amen!