Sunday, August 21, 2011

Sermon for 10 Pentecost 8/21/2011

 “Who do you say that I am?” Jesus asked his disciples,
and he also could just as well be asking you and me that question.
“Who do you say that I am?”

Jesus in this reading is having an intensive time of teaching with his disciples,
and he gives them, we could say, a mid-term exam.
Question #1  “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?”

Well, first we need to examine what the term “Son of Man” refers to.

Here Man is the Greek word that would be much better translated as
                         human being, or person, or humankind, humanity,
since whenever the Greek text is referring to man as specifically male,
that’s an entirely different word in Greek.
So Son of Humankind
– this phrase, as you may already know, referred to a title
used in the Hebrew scriptures
as one who is a servant to everyone else,
someone who serves all others,
someone willing to take the lowest position
so as to offer the greatest service.
It was a title picked up by prophets -
prophets bringing fiery messages of truth radiating
from the divine presence of God,
messages of revelation, judgment, and justice,
messages calling people into account.

So the question posed was,
“Who do people say that this servant, the Son of Humankind is?”
And the disciples dutifully mention the prophets,
and name Jeremiah and Elijah,
and they include John the Baptist as in that noteworthy tradition.

But Jesus also had been referring to himself by that title,
as he went about teaching and healing and feeding
and serving all who came to him.
He had taken on that title as the One willing to take the lowest position
so as to offer the greatest service to ALL of humankind.
“Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests;
but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.”
And he would later take off his cloak and assume the literal role of that servant
                        and wash his disciples’ feet.

Next Jesus says, “Who do you say that I am?”
And Simon Peter says,
“You are the Christ, that is, the anointed one, the Messiah,
the Son of the Living God.”
The Son of the Living God.

Not a dead prophet,
        but someone proceeding directly from the present, living God of NOW.

And Jesus zeroed in on this: “Blessed are you, Simon Peter,
because you didn’t think this up out of your own cleverness. 
This is a revelation that has come to you directly,
God’s Spirit to your spirit,
bypassing flesh and blood and brain.
You are nicknamed Peter; they call you a rock.
But here’s the rock-solid foundation, here in what you just said,
that is what I am building the Church on, Jesus was saying.
The Church, the gathering of the community of disciples.
The basis, the Rock, is the divine revelation of who Jesus is,
that then brings on realization of, recognition of the link between
Jesus and the Living God.
We Episcopalians say
that the rock on which the Community of Faith is built is not Peter,
as the first bishop of Rome,
but his confession of faith,
which we celebrate as a major feast day on January 18.

But we need to be careful not to get caught up
in patting Peter on the back, and saying,
“Nice going on that exam question; you get an A.”
The rock is divine revelation perceived and received by the open heart.

It is this realization enlightening our inner most being
that is what the gates of hell will not prevail against.
The Gates of Hades
as understood in that century
and widely throughout that world culture
                   were understood as that which nothing was supposed to be stronger.
Once the gates of death closed
nothing could open them again.
This revelation of Jesus radiating the Living God
would prove to be far stronger than the gates of death.

This is the key to the Kingdom of Heaven,
the ever abundant and ever present Reign of God breaking in among us,
                        breaking into our awareness,
the key with which we can discover that we have it within us
to bind up or release anything whatever,
restrain or let it go.
It’s all tied up in recognizing the revelation of the Living God through Jesus.

Peter had said, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God.”
But Messiah?  Ooh, be careful! 
            That was a loaded term, highly political in Peter’s day:
                        Messiah as liberator from Roman oppression,
            a mighty ruler then to whom the nations would come and bow down –
                                    a very limited and politicized understanding of Messiah.

So today’s Gospel ends with the these words:
“Then he sternly ordered the disciples to say to no one that he was the Messiah.”

Jesus, Son of the Living God.

Are we his disciples today?
professing the faith of the confession of Peter,
reciting the words of the Nicene Creed each Sunday.
Let’s examine our own individual experiences of divine revelation
            in which we could recognize that Jesus has radiated to us the Living God.

Let me tell you a personal story.

This was from when I was living in Duluth, Minnesota.
One evening I was giving a ride to someone
on our way to the International Folk Dancing group that we belonged to.
This was a young woman from China
who had come to the United States to study
and was now working in a highly technical job in a local plant.
She told me that someone from work had invited her to church,
and she had gone,
and had found that to be an interesting, mysterious experience,
that left her with many questions and confusion
because she did not know what it was all about. 
You see, she had never been to a church before. 
I, being the Episcopal priest, offered to answer some of her questions. 
So the first question she asked me, straight-forward and with all innocence
             was, “Who is Jesus?”

I had 10 minutes before we would arrive at our destination
in which to answer this simple, yet profound inquiry.

I think each one of us should have that sort of encounter,
that each one of us should be sent someone who hasn’t a clue
who will ask us point blank
in a situation in which we must reply to just this question.

Out of my experience with this young woman from China,
I came back to the congregations I was working with then,
and posed the same situation and question to them.

It is a school of discipleship lesson that I now would like to pose to you also,
a good refresher for those of you have dealt seriously with this question, and a direct challenge for all of us to express,
and give voice to the answer we would give,
that each of us could also articulate what is at the core of our spiritual lives.

So I’ll give you a homework assignment.
Find someone in your family, or some close friend,
and practice answering the question, “Who is Jesus?” with them.
Choose someone with whom you would feel comfortable
so that it will be easier to overcome any reticence you might have, but also someone who will help you examine your answer
and keep you honest.

Now in answering that question, “Who do you say that I am?”
speak to your own experience of Jesus,
what is current and living,
not what is history,
and certainly not what is theological book-learning!
If you have to explain or define any word that you use in describing Jesus,
             then this is moving away from the immediacy of experience and trust.

And if you find that you cannot answer the question at all,
            may this be a holy disturbance for you
                        stimulating some good introspection,
and I invite you into further discussion with me and others around this topic,
            because for now I’m not going to tell you what I said to that young woman!

The rock is divine revelation perceived and received by the open heart.

Jesus said, “Who do you say that I am?”
Unadorned with political and theological titles and vocabulary,
who is Jesus for you?