(Note: This blog entry is based on the text for “Bunker Busters”, originally shared on June 26, 2025. It was the 365th video for our YouTube Channel, Streams of Living Water (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCB7KnYS1bpHKaL2OseQWCnw), co-produced with my wife, Rev. Sally Welch.)
God worked in distressing times through St.
Peter and St. Paul, Apostles, to open the hardened hearts of sinful human
beings. God could do the same through you. Today, we’re going to find out how.
But, for
Christians, no two human beings have had a greater influence on us than St.
Peter and St. Paul, Apostles, who many churches throughout the world, will be
celebrating this coming Sunday.
It’s not a
major holiday, in fact you may never have heard of it 😊, but it’s a fixed one. It happens every year on June
29th.
So, every once
in awhile it falls on a Sunday and we celebrate it. Or we don’t. Our structure
of readings offers an alternative for the third Sunday after Pentecost, also
scheduled for this coming Sunday.
But today,
we’re going to take a look at the dynamic duo. The first one. 😊
Paul
was not a disciple of Jesus. He was a Pharisee, a careful student and keeper of
the Jewish law. He became a convert after The Day of Pentecost, the
beginning of the Christian Church. Paul
was a persecutor of the first Christians. He had a license to kill. He became a
leader of the earliest Church.
Peter
was one of Jesus closest disciples. He was a fisherman. He was impulsive. As
Jesus was being tortured, the night before he was crucified, Peter denied that
he even knew who Jesus was three times. He was later forgiven by Jesus three
times, as we will hear in this coming Sunday’s Gospel, John 21:15-19.
He also became a leader of the earliest Church.
Both were
apostles and, no, an apostle is not someone married to an epistle. 😊 An apostle is
someone who was a “sent one”, specifically called and sent by Jesus to proclaim
the good news.
Our readings
from the Bible this coming Sunday will focus on the story of Peter and the
writings of Paul, but I’d like to color a little bit outside of their lines
today.
I want us to
focus on something that God did through Peter and Paul together. And I
want to look at how their cooperation can show us a way to bring reconciliation
today.
Peter had
become a leader of the Church that was composed of people who had been Jews.
Paul had been a leader of the Church that that was composed of people who had
been Gentiles (everybody else). Were both groups the same one, holy, catholic,
and apostolic Church? That was controversial.
Peter and Paul
were at the center of the first big church controversy, which was about whether
new Christians who weren’t already Jews had to first be circumcised and keep
the law of Moses, that is become Jews, and then accept Jesus as the Messiah in
order to be saved, or whether they could come directly to faith through the
work of the Holy Spirit.
I think you
know how that turned out, based on what the Church is today.
But, what was
the process that led through Christian division to Christian unity?
Peter
had been led to share the good news about Jesus and led Cornelius, a Roman
Centurian, and his relatives and close friends to receive the gift of the Holy
Spirit in Acts 10 and 11, and they were baptized. Peter returned to
Jerusalem and the obvious presence of the Holy Spirit in the gentiles who came
with him convinced many who met them along the way that they were Christians,
but not everyone was convinced.
There needed
to be a gathering of the larger church to settle the issue.
We see it in Acts
15, at the “The Council at Jerusalem”.
Representatives of both groups were present.
Paul
and Barnabas had come and had reported about the conversion of the Gentiles and
their reception of the Holy Spirit.
Peter reminded
the disciples and elders of the church who had gathered there how he had been
appointed by Jesus to bring the Gospel to Gentiles also, and that they, too,
had received the Holy Spirit without first becoming Jews.
All listened
in silence. James quoted from the only scripture available at the time, what we
call the Old Testament, from the prophet Amos, and announced his decision that
Gentile converts should not be troubled by the external religious Law, but
should live in the Holy Spirit from the inside, out.
The first
church controversy was resolved by observing the work of God in the transformed
lives of the people who had received the Holy Spirit, Jew and Gentile alike.
This observation was confirmed from the Bible and by hearing from all in a
gathered assembly, seeing the obvious new life of the Gentiles without
reference to the requirements of the Law, and then declared by one in authority
commissioned by Jesus.
What can we
learn from this?
First,
that differences within the Church are not new.
We need not
experience them as threats but as opportunities to validate those with whom we
disagree as brothers and sisters in Christ and listen to all points of view,
determine motivations and sincerity, and listen to the voice of the Holy Spirit
to recognize where our living, common relationship with God takes us.
Second,
that it takes a lot to change the human heart, but when it truly happens, it
can be seen.
The lives of
Jews and Gentiles alike were demonstrably changed when they received the Holy
Spirit. They didn’t just receive religious language or popular social values;
they received new life.
The Christian
life looks like something. The fruits of the Spirit that Paul writes about are
not more laws to keep but are like the natural produce of a healthy fruit tree.
They are the natural outcome of a changed life. He lists them in Galatians
5:22-23,
22 By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy,
peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, 23 gentleness,
and self-control. There is no law against such things.
That’s what
the Christian life looks like, and who would say that they don’t want that
life?
Yet, it’s
clear that the majority of our churches are aging and dying. What can we do
about it? Become bunker busters.
Third,
we learn from The Council at Jerusalem in the book of Acts that we, too, can
become bunker busters.
The First
Lesson for this coming Sunday is Acts 12:1-11. That name, however, is
short for “The Acts of the Apostles”.
It’s the first
book after Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, the four Gospels. It’s not “The
Prayers of the Apostles”, or “The Good Intentions of the Apostles”, or “The
Potlucks of the Apostles”. It’s “The Acts of the Apostles,” and it reads
like an action-adventure movie. It’s full of inhospitable crowds,
torture, shipwrecks, hostile authorities, persecution, imprisonment, and close
escapes. It’s also full of acts of God’s power, fearless declarations of faith,
calls for accountability, calls for personal sacrifice, death, and the optimism
of those who know that God will always have the last word.
Do you want to
read a church growth manual for today. I suggest that you start with The Acts
of the Apostles.
The apostles
were bunker busters, they were the means by which God opened the hardened
hearts of people both near to God and far, and then entered those hearts with
power, and transformed them, and made them places fit for God to dwell.
We too are
living in distressing times. We’ve seen the use of Bunker Buster bombs this
past week. They are bombs used to destroy mountains, to achieve peace or to
lead to a wider war. Only God knows what will happen.
What I do know
is that there is a bunker that is exponentially harder to bust than any
mountain, and that is the human heart.
But there is
also a power that is infinitely greater than ourselves. It’s a power that can
work through us, but is one that we do not possess. It is a power that can bust
the through the bunker of the human heart, as it did for yours and for mine. It
is the power of God. And that power is almost always made manifest through some
natural means: us, you and me. We cannot truly live without it.
All of us are
born separated from God, but we were reborn as children of God in our baptism
because we were baptized through water and the Word in the Holy Spirit. We are
brought to live in faith.
This is the
good news. It’s the best news in the history of the world and it has been
entrusted to us, the Church, yet many of our churches are aging and dying. Why?
Paul wrote to
a young pastor about how to live as a Christian in distressing times, just
before this coming Sunday’s Second Lesson, in 2 Timothy 4:1-5,
4 In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to
judge the living and the dead, and in view of his appearing and his kingdom, I
solemnly urge you: 2 proclaim the message; be persistent
whether the time is favorable or unfavorable; convince, rebuke, and encourage,
with the utmost patience in teaching. 3 For the time is coming
when people will not put up with sound doctrine, but having itching ears, they
will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own desires, 4 and
will turn away from listening to the truth and wander away to myths. 5 As
for you, always be sober, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, carry
out your ministry fully.
That’s why the
most important thing about evangelism is not to work on programs, but to work
on ourselves: you can’t give away what you don’t have. How would we do that?
What if we
affirmed the power God to the world. What if we were a community where new
life, a better life, a transformed life was not just talked about as a thing of
the past, but was expected and lived today?
What if we
pointed the way to forgiveness, faith, and Christian formation, to prayer and
worship, and retreats, and not to an apologetic blandness that offered only friendliness,
fun and food.
What if we
were living a new life, something that invited people to be born again
and not simply to be affirmed that they are fine just the way we are?
Fourth,
we learn that the work of God can be hijacked by those who would take it away
from us if we let them.
The Judaizers
told Christians to step back to living under the law. Peter and Paul busted
through the bunkers of fear and guilt, spiritual slavery and
self-righteousness, to point to the power of God to change human lives. How?
For many
years, churches have been content to do passive evangelism. That is to
offer things that we think have worked in the past or which would attract
people today. We think of our churches as hospitals, and we act as if people
know where to find us, if it becomes necessary, and that’s it. So why aren’t
they coming?
Because Jesus
called us to “Go…”, to be more like the paramedics. Not to be
attractional, but to be missional.
Fifth, we learn to raise our expectations regarding the new
life in Jesus Christ.
Peter
referenced Cornelius, a gentile, who had received the Holy Spirit. But
Cornelius was not only a gentile, he was a Roman military leader, one whose
loyalties had to be unquestionable. He put his life and livelihood on the line
by becoming a Christian. The Empire wanted loyalty and calm within its borders
above all else, and Christians and Jews were already gaining unwanted attention
for refusing to yield their intolerant view that there was only one God. And
they were beginning to pay a steep price.
Both Peter and
Paul died for their faith. Peter was sentenced to be crucified but he
objected that he was not worthy to die as Jesus had died, so he was crucified
upside down. Paul, who was a Roman citizen, was therefore given a
speedier death, he was decapitated with a sword.
What do we
expect to be the outcomes of our lives today?
We don’t
expect much in order for people to be recognized as Christians in many of our
churches. We’re mostly just glad that they show up.
One of my
colleagues once confided that when people visited his church and told him they
were “church shopping”, he inwardly responded, “Well then, I hope you find a
bargain!” 😊 Because choosing a church today is often just another
consumer decision, and we want to remove any barriers and meet their needs. We certainly
don’t want them to think that there will be consequences.
We will not
likely be called to martyrdom, as continues to happen in other places around
the world even today, but we do face our own challenges. How long has it been
since you’ve read something, or seen something on TV or in the movies, or heard
something on talk-radio or in a podcast about Christians that was positive, or
at least was something that you would recognize as actual Christianity.
The early
Christians were required to be trained for three years before they could
receive Holy Communion. Many churches today consider themselves “welcoming”
when they announce that Holy Communion is open to anybody, including the
nonbelieving and the unbaptized. We don’t want to seem exclusive.
We are like
the parents who say they don’t force their children to go to church or even to
be faithful believers. They say that they have to pick their battles.
But they do
force their children to go to school, to eat healthy meals, to get enough
sleep, pick their friends carefully, take care of their personal hygiene, limit
their screen time, do their homework, etc.
And what
happens? Children aren’t stupid. The message they get is that Christianity
isn’t really all that important to their parents.
We need to
present a different message. The Christian faith may be costly for us, even
today as the world becomes more and more secular, but in return we receive
something much better: a sense of peace, an irreducible joy, humility, and
meaning in this life, and perfection in the life to come.
Living the
Christian faith may cost us friends today and even jobs and family members. And
we accept that, and we get better ones.
We may live in
distressing times, but that’s normal for Christians!
Paul writes
of this in 2 Timothy 3:1-5,
3 You must understand this, that in the last days
distressing times will come. 2 For people will be lovers of
themselves, lovers of money, boasters, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their
parents, ungrateful, unholy, 3 inhuman, implacable, slanderers,
profligates, brutes, haters of good, 4 treacherous, reckless,
swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, 5 holding
to the outward form of godliness but denying its power. Avoid them!
Does any of
that sound familiar? Does not “holding to the outward form of godliness but
denying its power” not speak to the state of many of our churches today?
Today, many
people hear Peter Paul and think, “Oh yeah, they made the Mounds candy bar.
Mmmm.” Or they think about St. Paul and St. Peter, two cities in Minnesota. But
we remember a pair of apostles who were bunker busters through whom God changed
the world.
God still
works to bust the bunkers people make of their human hearts. God works through
us, through our stories, and we all have them.
Tell the story
called, “Why I Became a Christian” or the one about “Why I Remain a Christian
Today”, or “That Time When God Just Tore Me Up and I Became a New Person.”
Live the
Christian life for the renewal of the world. Be the means by which God restores
the relationship with God for which all people were created, Tell your stories.
Amen.
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