262 A New Life in Jesus

   (Note: This blog entry is based on the text for “A New Life in Jesus”, originally shared on April 19, 2023. It was the 262^nd video for our YouTube Channel, Streams of Living Water (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCB7KnYS1bpHKaL2OseQWCnw), co-produced with my wife, Rev. Sally Welch.)

   What is the opposite of faith? Here’s a hint: it’s not doubt. Today we’re going to find out why.

   Chinese President Xi Jinping was in Moscow recently for a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin. A video shows 18 bags of Kentucky Fried Chicken food being dropped off just after the delegation arrived at the hotel where he and his delegation were staying in preparation for his meeting.

   What does it mean? Was it some kind of a signal, or is it nothing at all. Did he even order the food, or did some other group order it and it was just a coincidence that it came just after his delegation arrived? Just because events seem to be connected, doesn’t mean that they are.  Correlation does not equal causation. There are facts, but what they mean is a mystery.

   That’s not what we mean by mystery in the Christian faith. A mystery in the Christian faith is not like a mystery that we can figure out, like in a novel or a play.

   It’s a mystery in the sense that we can’t understand it unless it is revealed to us from outside of ourselves. That is the mystery of salvation. The gift of God that we celebrated on Easter Sunday.

   The first Easter weekend began with the Jesus’ death and ended with his resurrection. He had given his life and he had taken it back again.

   It was the best news in the history of the world, yet we come to know it in the presence of doubt. How does God deal with doubt? Today, we’re going to find out.

   The Second Sunday of Easter is the time by which Easter Eggs are turned into egg salad sandwiches. The Sunday after Easter Sunday is sometimes called “Low Sunday”, or what could be called the Sunday of Disappointment! It’s the Sunday when we all look around and ask, “Where is everybody?”

   The Second Sunday of Easter is known by some as the First Weekend in the Coachella Music Festival.

   In Western Christianity it’s also known as Divine Mercy Sunday, the Octave Day of Easter, White Sunday, and Quasimodo Sunday.

   Yes, that’s right, “Quasimodo” Sunday, the name of The Hunchback of Notre Dame so named in the Church calendar because he was found at the cathedral as a hunchbacked infant on “Quasimodo Sunday”, which was named after the first words of the antiphon of the Latin introit in the Mass for that day, found in 1 Peter 2:2, “quasi modo geniti infantes…” or “Like newborn infants…” It’s also the name of a surfing position. But I digress. 😊

   The Sunday before last, The Sunday of the Resurrection of Our Lord, aka Easter Sunday, our churches were as full as they get. Christ is Risen! He is Risen, Indeed! We celebrated that, and last Sunday it was almost like it never happened.

   There are some people who don’t keep the sabbath holy every Sunday. But if there is one when they do, it will be Easter. Others are dragged or guilted-in by insistent friends and relatives. Some are bribed with the promise of candy and, for adults, food afterwards. Some come just because it’s what they and/or their family have always done and has become part of their identity. They, as Steely Dan said, “suit up for a game they no longer play”.

   Our churches will have put out their best everything in the hopes that some will come back. And maybe some did but, if you had never been to a church and you were there on Easter Sunday, and you came back last Sunday, you were probably just as flummoxed as everybody else.

   The Gospel text that we read last Sunday, however, is even more disappointing!

   How do you witness the resurrected body of Jesus, after he had told you he was going to rise from the dead, and not know what to do?

   The disciples are gathered on the evening of the Resurrection.

   They are still processing what happened in the morning. They had heard from some women that he had risen, but they had seen him die. Then this happens in John 20:19-23,

¹⁹ When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” ²⁰ After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. ²¹ Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” ²² When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. ²³ If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”

   The disciples were afraid of the Jewish leaders. The Jewish leaders. Remember that all of the disciples, and Jesus, were Jewish. They were afraid that what had happened to Jesus could happen to them. Yet, it’s been said that the Bible says “fear not” or “don’t be afraid” or something like that 366 times, one for every day of the year plus one for a leap year! Jesus said these or similar words many times.

   When Jesus suddenly appears in a locked room with them, the first words out of his mouth are “Peace be with you”, sholom aleichem, a common, even casual greeting.

   Then things get weirder. He shows them his wounds, on his hands and on his side. He commissions them with a mini-Pentecost, just for them. The words “ruach” in Hebrew, the primary language of the Old Testament and “pneuma” in Greek, the primary language of the New Testament, both have the same three meanings: wind, breath, and spirit.

   He breathes on them. Does that seem strange?

   What else began with a breath?

   Genesis 2:7,

⁷ then the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and the man became a living being.

  This is revealed to us in the Bible, which is filled with the power of God in the Holy Spirit.  

   What is the authority of the Bible?

   2 Timothy 3:16-17,

¹⁶ All scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, ¹⁷ so that everyone who belongs to God may be proficient, equipped for every good work.

    Other translations replace “inspired” with “God-breathed”. The word “respiration” has the same root. The Bible’s life comes from God. It is the means by which God comes alive for us.

   But one disciple, who had ventured out, was not present when Jesus breathed life and power on the disciples. We see it in John 20:24-29,

²⁴ But Thomas (who was called the Twin), one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. ²⁵ So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord.” But he said to them, “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.”

²⁶ A week later his disciples were again in the house, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were shut, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” ²⁷ Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe.” ²⁸ Thomas answered him, “My Lord and my God!” ²⁹ Jesus said to him, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.”

   So there’s a doubter? Jesus moves forward to send the disciples out anyway. Remember how the Great Commission at the end of the Gospel of Matthew is set, in Matthew 28:16-20,

¹⁶ Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. ¹⁷ When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. ¹⁸ And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. ¹⁹ Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, ²⁰ and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

   “When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted.” First of all, how could they doubt him. They had seen him die. They had seen him do miracles! They had seen him dead. They had seen his side pierced with a spear and the water from the by-then separated plasma flow out. They had seen his legs broken. They had seen his burial, and he had appeared to them on the evening of the third day.

   Some doubted, yet they worshiped him. How could that be?

   We live in an increasingly secular age. We live in a time when people have been isolated and estranged and, I believe, are hungry for the real community that God gives.

   Pastor Will Willimon is a Methodist pastor who has also been a seminary professor, university chaplain, the Methodist equivalent of a bishop and is a fine preacher. He tells the story of a young woman who was a member of a congregation he served who made an appointment to see him during the week. She came by his office and said, “Pastor Willimon, I just wanted to say that I won’t be coming to church anymore. I’ve been struggling with my faith for a while, and I just realized that I can’t do it anymore. I appreciate everything that you and the church members have done for me, and I didn’t want to just drift away. I just came to say goodbye.”

   Pastor Willimon tried to address her struggles and encourage her to continue, but she was having none of it. And, the next Sunday she was back at worship. And the Sunday after that. And the Sunday after that.

   Finally, Pastor Willimon asked if she could stop by his office again, and she agreed. Pastor Willimon said, “Aren’t you the same person who came by and said that she no longer had faith and wouldn’t be coming to worship anymore?” She smiled and said, “Yes.” “Well then, I’m happy to see you, but could you tell me what happened?” he said.

   “Well,” she answered, “It came to me that sometimes, if you can’t believe for yourself, you have to be with people who will believe for you.”

   So, when people tell me that they are having doubts, I ask them to be consistent in their doubting and to question their doubts as well. Doubt their doubts.

   Thomas came to belief because he saw the risen Christ and put his hand in his wounds. That’s not something that happens to us. “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe,” Jesus said.

   How do people come to believe?

   According to The Barna Group, 94% of people who come to Christ do so before their 18^th birthday.

   Study after study has shown that 80-85% of all people who come to Christ do so because of the influence of a friend or a relative.

   Each of us has a story of how we became a Christian or why we remain a Christian.

   This passage from John ends by describing the purpose of the whole Gospel of John with what I think are two of the most important verses in the Bible, in John 20:30-31,

³⁰ Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. ³¹ But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.

   Some of those who were at worship in Christian churches on Easter Sunday were not doubters. They weren’t even interested. They were (Is it too harsh to say it?) spiritual tourists. They are like the young woman who sat next to one of my colleagues on a plane who, seeing her Bible, described herself as proudly “spiritual, not religious”. In reflecting on their conversation the pastor said, “I am always interested in people who find ancient religion boring, but who find themselves endlessly fascinating.”

   What we offer is neither religion nor self-affirmation. We proclaim Jesus, crucified, risen, and coming again. We proclaim that belief is a gift from God and leads people to life that truly is life in a living relationship with the one true living God. God doesn’t abandon us in our doubt. God gives us something to do for others, in response to what he has already done for us on the cross. God inspires us with a living relationship!

   There are many good reasons to believe in the physical resurrection of Jesus Christ:

1. The evidence of death.
2. The sixteen Roman guards stationed to prevent any trickery.
3. The seal of the punitive authority of the Roman Empire set upon the stone.
4. The disciples were in shock.
5. There was no body and no benefit to steal the body.
6. The witness of women at the center of events in a time of Patriarchy.
7. The martyrdom of the eyewitness.
8. The martyrdom of the early Christians.
9. The experience of Christians of the risen Christ to this day.
10. The change in the sabbath from the seventh day to the day of the Resurrection as the day of worship for the Church now begun, a radical change.
11. The lack of details
12. The testimony of hostile witnesses who became Christians, i.e., St. Paul.

   And yet, over the years, people have not come to believe because of reasons. It is because they have received a living relationship with the one true living God in Jesus Christ.

   Jesus Christ has overcome sin, death, and all the forces that defy God. He is Risen. He is Risen, Indeed.

   What Jesus has done for us in his death and resurrection is not mystery. It is revealed in our Gospel reading for today, in John 20. We have been reconciled to God. We have been given life in Jesus’ name, his true self.

   The opposite of faith isn’t doubt. It’s certainty. If we had certainty, we wouldn’t need faith. We wouldn’t need anything, including a living relationship with God.

   And we would have a very small god.

   God, the creator of the universe, the liberator of his people Israel, the savior of all who believe and are baptized, the one who hears our prayers and forgives our sin, and makes us holy places fit for the one true holy God to live in, is big. We have received Jesus; we have received life in his name.

   And blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.

   He is Risen! He is Risen, Indeed!

262 This Is Your Life

   (Note: This blog entry is based on the text  for “This Is Your Life”, originally shared on April 12, 2023. It was the 261^st video for our YouTube Channel, Streams of Living Water (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCB7KnYS1bpHKaL2OseQWCnw), co-produced with my wife, Rev. Sally Welch.)

   The Resurrection of Jesus Christ is all about your life. Today, we’re going to find out how.

   People of a certain age, such as I, might remember a TV show (which had previously been a radio show) from the early days of TV called “This Is Your Life.”

   It was a show where guests would be surprised and ushered onto a sound stage, where they would hear the story of their lives, often accompanied by in-person visits from the people who had been influential and important to them.

   The show featured the challenges as well as the high points of the guest’s life, and they had the chance to say “Thank you” to some of the people who had helped them along the way.

   Today we will hear the story of the most important event ever in the lives of all human beings. And it’s a beautiful day!

   We’ve had a lot of rain this year. The Sierra snowpack is 300% of normal. The reservoirs are almost full. Watering restrictions have been cancelled, though we are still advised not to waste water.

   The snow in the mountains was 12’ feet deep in some places and still may still be coming. People were trapped in their houses. Local grocery stores were closed because the snow had compromised the integrity of their roofs, but many people weren’t able to get to them anyway.

   There was a little water feature just up the street from the church I am serving on Garfield Avenue that was water draining out of a manhole cover for weeks! It’s still flowing out.

   And now people are dreading the snowpack melt which is projected to bring flooding that could last well into the year.

We might even get a little more rain and snow this Thursday!

   For people who had become almost accustomed to a drought, this has all been very unfamiliar territory.

   But, something we do know about is earthquakes.

   That’s how the first Easter Sunday began. With a display of the power of nature and of nature’s God, in Matthew 28:1-2,

¹After the sabbath, as the first day of the week was dawning, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. ²And suddenly there was a great earthquake; for an angel of the Lord, descending from heaven, came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. 

   What is happening?! The stone covering the tomb of Jesus, sealed by the Roman Empire, and guarded by battle-hardened Roman legionnaires, is rolled back by an angel and is used as his easy chair in act of power and defiance.

   What was this thing? Who was this thing?

   It was an angel of the Lord. God’s Seal Team Six. Matthew describes the reaction in verses 3-4,

³His appearance was like lightning, and his clothing white as snow. ⁴For fear of him the guards shook and became like dead men. 

   The biggest drama in our homes last Sunday morning might have been getting everybody dressed for church and out the door. At the first Easter, strong men were going catatonic with what was happening.

   The guards weren’t just terrified by the appearance of the angel. They were terrified because they knew what the stakes were. They could be executed for not doing their job. It sounds like they had passed out with fear.

   And what are the first words to the women out of the mouth of the angel of the Lord. What are always the first words out of the mouth of an angel of the Lord? “Do not be afraid.” Matthew continues in verses 5-7,

⁵But the angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid; I know that you are looking for Jesus who was crucified. ⁶He is not here; for he has been raised, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay. ⁷Then go quickly and tell his disciples, ‘He has been raised from the dead, and indeed he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him.’ This is my message for you.” 

   People usually see angels when they are there to deliver a message from God. That’s what angels do. They are messengers.

   The angel of the Lord had delivered the message of all time, “He is not here; for he has been raised, as he said.”

   Jesus had given his life and now he had taken it back again.

   The women rushed away to tell Jesus’ disciples the good news. They were the first evangelists. But the men had to know what had happened because the women’s testimony would not have been admissible. Yet the Gospel, the good news, was entrusted to them. Women.

   That’s one of the evidences for the reliability of the Resurrection. If you were making up a story in first-century Israel, or pretty much anywhere else in the world back then, the last people you would place at the center of an event would be women. It was Patriarchy. Their testimony was believed to be inherently unreliable. Yet there they were, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, at the center of the event, the first witnesses, entrusted with the most important news every told. What could possibly top that??

   Matthew continues with verses 8-9,

⁸So they left the tomb quickly with fear and great joy, and ran to tell his disciples. ⁹Suddenly Jesus met them and said, “Greetings!” And they came to him, took hold of his feet, and worshiped him. 

   The women are intercepted on their way. By Jesus. He says, “Greetings!” Remember that word from an earlier part of the story? It was in the words from the angel Gabriel to Mary, bringing the message that she would be the mother of Jesus. “Greetings, favored one!” Something was also about to be entrusted to the women at the tomb by God.

   This was not normal. You just don’t bump into people who you know are dead. Or were. Or aren’t. And what did Jesus say to them next? “Do not be afraid,” in verse 10,

¹⁰Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me.”

   Jesus instructs the women to do something: “Go and tell my brothers.”

   And what are they to tell the disciples to do? “To go to Galilee; there they will see me.”

   Why are they to go to Galilee? To get out of town? To return to familiar surroundings? To prepare for what’s coming? To be with their families?

   Who knows what the purpose of their visit was, but we do know the reason. “There you will see me.”

   At some point when I’m reading a novel or a short story, I like to peek ahead to find out how it’s going to end. The end doesn’t interest me as much as how the author gets there. Same with a movie. I’ll sometimes read the plot online before I see it.

   Do you want to take a peek ahead? Do you want to see what happens when the disciples get to Galilee and see the risen Jesus? It’s not in today’s text. We will see it in our Gospel reading in about nine weeks, but let’s take a peek today, just a few verses down in the same chapter, in Matthew 28 (Spoiler alert!) 18-20,

18 And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

   There’s that word again, “Go.”. Go, where he calls you to be and you will see him. Go and share the Good News with the world!

   What’s the good news? Paul describes it in Romans 6:3-5,

³ Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? ⁴ Therefore we have been buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.

⁵ For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. 

   Newness of life here and now.

   Eternal life beginning now and extending forever in the resurrection to come!

   One of my uncles, Uncle Jimmy, was developmentally delayed. He lived with his parents, my grandparents, then with his sister, then in a home. He barely spoke, except in words of one syllable. I’d call him once a month or so and our conversations were usually always the same, “Hey, Uncle Jimmy” Hello. “This is your nephew David.” Yeah. “How are you doing?” Fine. “Are you getting enough to eat?” Yeah. “Are you getting fat?”  HaHa. No.” Are you keeping busy?” Yeah. “What are you working on?” Coasters. “I think the Packers are going to do pretty well this year.” Yeah. “Well, talk to you later” OK. Then he would call his sister and say, “Guess who just called me!”

   When his sister, my aunt, died, one of her sons, my cousin, told me a story.

   He said that when he went to tell Uncle Jimmy that his sister had died, he was quiet and looked out a window for a long time. Then he said, “But, who’s going to take care of me?” My cousin answered, “Ann (another cousin) will, and we’ll all look out for you. But, someday you and Barbara and all of us will see each other again in heaven.”

   My uncle said, “Won’t that be a wonderful day, when Jesus comes and opens up all the graves, and we’ll all rise and be with him forever.”

   That was the highest number of words I ever heard my uncle speak, and it was a statement of God’s promise and of our future hope. The outcome of the faith we have been given by God.

   It’s easy to say what Easter is all about. It’s not always easy to live it.

   Have you noticed that there have been a lot of train derailments in the news lately?

   I worked for the Soo Line Railroad in Manitowoc, Wisconsin, my hometown, during summers in college and seminary. We maintained the rails, and sometimes repaired them, in the same way and with the same manual tools that crews had been using for about 100 years. Trains go off track the same ways that lives do, including lives of faith.

   Sometimes the tracks go off balance. A side of our life has sunk lower, and we find that our lives are derailed.

   Sometimes the foundation below us has eroded and there’s a dip, and we wake up one day and find that our lives are a wreck.

   Sometimes we go too fast for the conditions, and we find that we’ve gone off-track

   Sometimes we find that our lives are on-track, but the spikes connecting us to our foundations are missing and we slide off-course.

   Sometimes, we find that the things that we have built our lives on are rotten and need to be replaced.

   Sometimes the rails have moved too far apart, and we just collapse into the gap in our lives.

   In all these things, the Resurrection of Jesus Christ brings an answer to all who are baptized and believe.

“so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.

⁵ For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. 

   Life is full of Good Fridays, but there is one Resurrection for all who believe.

   Tim Keller, the Christian author and pastor of a large Presbyterian church in Manhattan, once said, “When people tell me that they once were believing Christians but now have rejected it all-I often ask them (after long, close listening) why they originally believed Jesus rose from the dead and how they came to decide that he now didn't. They usually say it's a helpful question.”

   It is a helpful question, because whatever else the Christian faith is and however it is expressed and lived, it is built on three words, “He is Risen!”

   The cross is the main event. Jesus died to save us. But the resurrection tells us that he was who he said he was, not just another guy who died. He gave his life, and he took it back again. He is God. And he loves us. And he shows his love for us on the cross and in the empty tomb!

   This is what we know. He is Risen! He is Risen indeed! It is obvious to us, but not so to everyone. Go and tell the good news to somebody. Tell your story. Ask others, “Have you heard about Jesus?” Share how you became a Christian, and why you remain one.

   By the power of the Holy Spirit, seek to live a life that demonstrates a superior alternative to the world, and to what the world only sees about Christians on the news. Express yourself through the arts. Embody holy living.

   You are a new creation in Jesus Christ. Because he lives, you shall live also. We celebrate Easter. The Resurrection of Our Lord. This is your life!

   Christ is Risen! He is Risen indeed! 

260 Commanded to Love

   (Note: This blog entry is based on the text  for “Commanded to Love”, originally shared on April 5, 2023. It was the 260^th video for our YouTube Channel, Streams of Living Water (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCB7KnYS1bpHKaL2OseQWCnw), co-produced with my wife, Rev. Sally Welch.)

   Can love be commanded? Jesus thought so. Today, we’re going to find out how.

   The L. A. County Covid state of emergency ended last Saturday. That means certain mandates, not all, will no longer be in effect.

   Many people have been concerned about mandates that require certain behaviors of them in order to take part in civil society.

   Each year in the Christian calendar, we celebrate Maundy Thursday. It happens during Holy Week, the week before Easter.

   Maundy Thursday marks the Last Supper, a meal Jesus had with his disciples on the night that he was betrayed to be crucified.

   Jewish people will be celebrating a seder meal during their season of Passover, commemorating their liberation from slavery in Egypt. That seder supper was not celebrated in its current form until many years after Jesus’ death and resurrection. But the Last Supper was held during Passover and had many references to that liberation, including the bread and wine presented as Jesus body and blood.

   And, the obvious reference that was to the last plague, the blood of the spotless lamb that was painted over the doors of all the households of the people of God in slavery in Egypt. The angel of death visited every home and the first-born son died, except in those homes where the blood of the lamb was painted over the entryway. Those homes were passed over. Hence, Passover.

   Only, Jesus is the lamb of the God, and we are freed from sin, death, and the forces of the devil by his blood freely given on the cross. Those references make the Last Supper the first celebration of Holy Communion, on the night in which Jesus was betrayed. It includes the washing of the feet of the disciples by Jesus as a witness to serve one another as we have been served by Jesus Christ, and the giving of a new commandment by Jesus.

   That’s where the word “maundy” comes from.

   “Maundy” is an Old English word rooted in the Latin word “mandatum”, which means “commandment”. “Mandatum” is also the root word for “mandate”.

   The whole text is in John 13:1-17, 31b-35, but Jesus gives the new commandment at the end, in verses 34-35,

³⁴ I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. ³⁵ By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

   Jesus announces that he is about to leave them. Thomas responds that they don’t know the way to where he is going. Jesus answers, in John 14:6-7,

6 Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. 7 If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.”

   This is how a Christian approaches mandates, from a relationship with God. We ask what is the best way to express our love for one another, not for ourselves. We start, not with an assertion of personal freedom, though we are free, but with an assertion of personal service.

   Martin Luther, the 16^th century Church reformer, taught that God rules the world through two kingdoms, the kingdom of this world, so that governments are to be measured by what God is calling them to do, and through the Kingdom of God at work in the Church, so that the Church is to be measured by what God is calling it to do. God rules in different ways, but God rules through both.

   So, the first question a Christian asks when given a mandate by the government or the Church is, “Is my government, or the Church, acting in accord with God’s will for the people”? That is, “How does this fulfill God’s vision for a good society”?

   In his work “On the Freedom of a Christian (aka “A Treatise on Christian Liberty”), Luther wrote, "A Christian man (or woman) is the most free lord of all, subject to none. A Christian man (or woman) is the most dutiful servant of all, and subject to everyone."

   Years ago, there was a restaurant/drive-through in San Dimas called “Bravo Burgers”. There’s still one in Pomona, but I still miss it here.

   Most of their food packaging had “Phil 4:13” written on it. Philippians 4:13 says,

I can do all things through him who strengthens me.

   The owner said that he put that verse on his packaging out of gratitude to God.

   But, he said, “There isn’t a day that goes by when someone doesn’t come in and ask, ‘Who’s Phil?”

   Philippians 4:13 is often seen and quoted as meaning that, in anything I want to do or don’t want to do, God strengthens me. But that’s not what it says.

   The context of that verse is this, Philippians 4:11-13,

¹¹ Not that I am referring to being in need; for I have learned to be content with whatever I have. ¹² I know what it is to have little, and I know what it is to have plenty. In any and all circumstances I have learned the secret of being well-fed and of going hungry, of having plenty and of being in need. ¹³ I can do all things through him who strengthens me.

   Paul is writing to the Church at Philippi to answer their concern for him by saying that serving Jesus Christ is all that matters, our personal need or lack of need is irrelevant to our service in Jesus Christ.

   How can that be?

   It’s because Christian behavior is not rooted in the requirements of the law, but in the new Creation we have been made to be in Jesus Christ. Our behavior is rooted in the love for one another that comes from our love for God.

   The mandate of which we are reminded on Maundy Thursday is that we live in love to serve one another, as Jesus came to serve us. This new commandment, or mandate, is to love one another.

   This is at the very core of what it means to be a Christian. Paul nailed this down in an earlier part of his letter to the Philippians, in chapter 2, verses 2-8, from a passage we read last Sunday, 

⁴ Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others. ⁵ Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus,

⁶ who, though he was in the form of God,
    did not regard equality with God
    as something to be exploited,
⁷ but emptied himself,
    taking the form of a slave,
    being born in human likeness.
And being found in human form,
⁸     he humbled himself
    and became obedient to the point of death—
    even death on a cross.

   Can love be commanded? Yes, but not in our behavior alone, but because we have been fundamentally transformed by the love of God in Jesus Christ demonstrated on the cross, the love that shapes us in the Holy Spirit, the streams of living water within us, and the love of the church for us and expressed through us.

   Jesus removed his outer robe and washed the feet of his disciples, the job of the lowest servant in the household, the job that nobody could mess up. He modeled who he is and what his disciples are to be to one another. Judas went out to betray Jesus to the authorities.

   The only way to go where Jesus is going is obedience to God, in response to and through Jesus Christ.

   Every religion has its wisdom and its wisdom traditions. They are everything in some other religions. They are the least important thing in Christianity.

   C.S. Lewis wrote, in his book “Mere Christianity”, “I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”

   The way of Jesus is the way of the cross. It is lived as an outcome of a living relationship with the one true living God. It is the relationship for which we were created.

   God made us for a living relationship but without making us to be simple robots. We needed to be able to say “no” to that relationship in order for our “yes” to mean something. And the first people disobeyed God, they said “no”, and evil entered the world.

   People only came back to God when they needed something. So, God set them free by coming to them, in the form of Jesus Christ, fully God and fully human being, to show His love by suffering and dying for us on the cross, so that we might know the abundant eternal life for which we were created in the beginning.

   What does that life as the disciples of Christ look like? How do we love one another in obedience to the command of Jesus? How do we serve one another sacrificially as Jesus did on the cross?

   Here are some lessons from building construction:

   We built two buildings when I served at a congregation in San Dimas. I was there for the last almost 32 years of formal ministry before I retired.

   Among the many things I learned in those projects, three stand out as instructive in living the life of a disciple of Jesus Christ.

   First, you can have it done well, you can have it done fast, and you can have it done cheap. Pick any two.

   If it’s done fast and well, it won’t be cheap. If it’s done cheap and fast, it won’t be done well, and so on.

   The life of the disciple of Jesus is similar. The life of a disciple is entirely built on the work of Jesus on the cross. We are sinners and therefore separated by Sin from the holy God. Jesus is God in flesh and fully human at the same time. He paid the penalty for our Sin himself. The canyon between us and God is bridged by the cross. To be a disciple and live a Christian life isn’t cheap or fast. It took the cross.

   The early Christians spent 3-years in instruction before they were welcomed as full members of a local church. If our desire to serve involves no cross-bearing and does not bring meaningful life transformation, it is simply a superficial nod to Jesus.  It will not be a life lived well, and so on.

   Second, everything takes longer and costs more.

   A building contractor, a member of our church advising our building committee during our worship-and-administration building construction, sent me a picture of a giant yacht with a small motorboat tied behind it. The name on the motorboat was, “Original Contract”. The name on the yacht was, “Change Orders”.

   Change orders are the changes to the original contract that are made once work has begun. They can drive up the cost of the project astronomically. But, sometimes, the client doesn’t know what they want until the project has begun, and sometimes they just get a new idea.

   The life of a disciple of Jesus is similar. Sometimes, people who become disciples of Jesus don’t know what they are getting into until God enters their true selves and their life transformation project begins. Maybe the word “sometimes” should be changed to pretty much “always”. God always accepts us as we are. Repentant sinners. But God never leaves us as we are. God makes us, by God’s grace, a place that is fitting for the one true holy God to dwell in. That involves basic transformation. We are imperfect sinful human beings.

   The thing about Christianity is not that God makes us better, but that we have a Savior. Our behavior improves not from fear but from faith, from our relationship with God. Our living relationship with God is what produces a desire to please God.

   The Christian life doesn’t end in perfection until the world to come. We don’t need perfection to be accepted by God. We need a Savior, and we have one in Jesus Christ. The cost of our ticket to heaven has already been stamped “Paid in Full”, by the work of Jesus Christ on the cross.

   We live not to get something from God, but in response to all that God has done for us at the cross.

  Third, anyone can hand you a bill. That doesn’t mean that you have to pay it.

   We frequently had bills handed to us during construction that we disputed. Things happened that were not our fault. Work was done that was not contracted.

   In the same way, when a person becomes a Christian, or goes through a renewed faith and begins experiencing again a life transformed by God, people will take notice. We are made a new creation. We are born again. When that happens, people will begin doing things to irritate you just to get a rise out of you.

   When some people find out you are a Christian, they’ll do the same things. They will try to get you to do things that are contrary to your new life. They will throw the “gotcha” questions at you, give you a demeaning nickname, distance themselves from you, accuse you of being “holier than thou”, or of thinking that you’re better than them. They will say they miss the old you and will try to draw you back to your old self.

   People did similar things to Jesus and worse. All the powers that defy God defied Jesus.

   The thing is that you don’t owe them anything, neither beliefs nor behaviors. Sometimes, in fact, it takes the hand of God for you to recognize who your friends and family truly are, who truly wants the best for you, and who wants to build you up and point you to a better future. Sometimes, it takes the hand of the Holy Spirit to guide us forward.

   We don’t have to fall back. We don’t have to live under anybody’s expectations but God’s, Paul writes, in his letter to the Galatians, the 5^th chapter, the 1^st verse:

   “For freedom Christ has set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.”

   Paul says a little further on, in Galatians 5:6b,

“the only thing that counts is faith working through love.”

   That’s the message of Maundy Thursday.

   Maundy Thursday reminds us of Jesus’ mandate, Jesus’ command, “that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.”

   The world thinks it’s impossible to compel someone to love you or to compel someone to love someone else because we first and primarily think of love as something romantic, or maybe patriotic, or directed toward our family. But the love that Jesus commands is something else: it’s selfless, it’s a kind of love that can only come from God.

   And it does, and it is who we are because it comes as the result of whose we are.

   We are not the people we want to be. We are all under construction. But we have also been made into a new creation because we have a Savior.

   On Maundy Thursday we see how we can be commanded to love.

   Jesus is both preparing us for his death on the cross and showing us how to live in response to it, transformed by the living relationship with the one true living God,

loving selflessly, as we have been loved.