Sermon for
Feb. 20, 2005
2nd Sunday in Lent
Series 3—Discipleship: A Reordered Life
Becoming “Cross-Wise”
I Corinthians 1:18-31; Matthew 5:1-12
It just doesn’t make sense, does
it? This faith of yours…discipleship….it just doesn’t make sense. If you
want to be a disciple of Jesus Christ, your life must be reordered. Your
fundamental understanding of life must be turned upside down. The life of
discipleship, no longer ordered by the ways of the world, is reordered by
the ways of the kingdom of God. Does that make any sense at all?
Discipleship demands a reordered
life. Two weeks ago we discovered at the top of the mountain of
Transfiguration that the first step in discipleship is to be where God is,
right where Jesus can touch you; not “up there” in the spiritual heights
but right here, right now in the valley of everyday life—that’s where God
is. The first step in discipleship means you have to look for God in the
right place. Last week in the three temptations of Jesus in the
wilderness we learned the second step in discipleship is to be a child of
God. A child of God discards all worldly notions of provision,
prominence, and power and follows God’s way of conversion, sacrifice, and
love.
Does any of this make sense? It just
doesn’t make sense, this faith of yours…discipleship.
This morning in this
very elementary teaching of Jesus in the Gospel Lesson today, we discover
the third step in discipleship. What does the Gospel Lesson say about the
poor, those who mourn, the meek, the hungry and thirsty? Jesus says that
the poor, those who mourn, the meek, the hungry and thirsty are blessed!
Now that certainly doesn’t make sense. Now the last time I checked the
prevailing opinion in the culture in which we live it’s the rich, the
joyous, the proud, the full who are blessed…and very few are blessed at
that! Now most people in the world today are poor, in mourning, meek,
hungry, and thirsty, and that feels like anything but a blessing. Is
there anything more absurd than to say to someone in any of these
circumstances, “You know, Jesus says you’re blessed.”? It’s foolish. It
just doesn’t’ make sense. But that’s exactly what Jesus says and you
better believe in the crowd that day there were folks who deeply
identified with those life circumstances that he described.
The Corinthians
thought much the same thing about the message of the Gospel. They were
Gentiles and of the kind of community that prided itself on gaining
knowledge. Knowledge and understanding was the key to the truth for
them. So they came to the Gospel in their day much the same way we come
to the Gospel in our day. The message must somehow make logical sense of
the world in which we live. For it to be true the message must follow a
logical argument and come upon a conclusion that results in a new
intellectual truth. New knowledge, new wisdom—that’s what is vitally
important. It has to make sense—a light bulb must go off up here (in your
mind) for the message to get through and have any meaning at all. That’s
what the Corinthians expected of the message of the Gospel in their day.
That’s what we expect of the message of the Gospel today.
You see, the
Corinthians in their day and we in our day were and are very
culture-wise. To be culture-wise is to know what works and what doesn’t
work in getting the most out of life. The Corinthians were culture-wise
and you’re very culture-wise—you ought to be because you have been
schooled in the wisdom of this culture all your life. It makes sense to
every one of you that success in life is measured by how much you
accumulate, what you own, the more you have defines how successful you
are. It does not have to be explained to you, for example, that Bill
Gates gets the most out of life. You already understand that. It makes
sense to everyone of us, doesn’t it, that success in life is measured by
your social standing—the influence and power and celebrity you have in the
community. It does not have to be explained to you, for example, how
Arnold Swarzenegger gets the most out of life. You already understand
that. It makes sense to every one of us, doesn’t it, that you get the
most out of life when you’re young, healthy, full, and satisfied. That
does not have to be explained to you. You already understand that. You
know this wisdom well. Our children learn all this very early. At a very
young age they become attracted to celebrity. At a very young age they
develop an almost visceral reaction to having money—our children seem to
understand money’s magic long before they understand how to transact it,
don’t they? It is because our children are raised in a culture, a
powerful culture that permeates all of us, that says wealth, celebrity,
money, power, health, and youth are what what’s most important in life.
We who guide our children do not have to set up a careful curriculum for
them to learn this—it’s all around them every day. We are all very
culture-wise. This all makes perfect sense to us. It does not have to be
explained to you. We have understood this for a very long time.
In the midst of this
kind of culture, Paul has come to Corinth. Corinth is full of culturally
wise people. He has proclaimed to them a new truth, something they had
not heard before. He has gotten their attention. He has proclaimed to
them the story of one who came with a message from God. He has told them
how Jesus of Nazareth taught this message from God in very plain
language. Jesus said things like,
It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle
than for a rich person to
enter the kingdom of
heaven.
He has told them how Jesus stood against the powerful and influential
of the day. He has told them how Jesus often met the needs of the less
important and least prominent folks in the community first. He has told
them that Jesus said,
You can have only one master—you cannot serve God and wealth
at the same time.
He has told them how Jesus of Nazareth by this kind of behavior had
stirred up such controversy around himself that it got him killed on a
cross—executed like a capital criminal. He has told them that on the
third day God raised Jesus from the dead and in this very letter Paul will
soon tell them that upon his resurrection Jesus appeared to the disciples,
to more than 500 brothers and sisters at one time and, “Last of all,” Paul
says,
as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me.
Paul preached to them the message of the cross. And the message of
the cross didn’t make any sense. This message from God is so out of sync
with the wisdom of the culture. In this culture don’t let anybody tell
you that wealth, celebrity, money, position, and power is not what life
really is all about. You know too well what works and what doesn’t work
in getting the most out of life. To accept this message from God
you would
have to believe that life is not measured by how much you
accumulate but by how much you give away
you would have to
believe that life is not about gaining all the power,
influence, respect, and celebrity you can and finish first
but it’s about finding the least powerful, the least influential,
those with the least respect and giving all of yours over to them and
finishing
last
you would have to
believe that real life is not the good fortune of
youth and health and the avoidance of pain and
loss—no, you
would have to believe that life real life is even
yours when you
grow old, or lose your health, or suffer the loss of
loved ones
and friends
you would even have
to believe that real life does not end for you at
death—you would have to believe that real life goes on forever.
And all of that is just foolish, isn’t it? You
don’t really believe any of this in this culture, do you? It just doesn’t
make any sense.
Paul says,
The message of the cross is foolishness to those who are
perishing, but to us who are
being saved it is the
power of God.
I believe that Paul in this letter to a church he has started and a
church he loves is trying to help the church no longer be quite so culture
wise. Paul is nurturing, nudging the church toward becoming
“cross-wise.”
It’s hard, so hard,
to be “cross-wise.” That’s because the wisdom of the cross is foolishness
to the culturally wise. It doesn’t make sense. It turns everything
upside down. But Paul says it well.
God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s
weakness
is stronger than human strength.
The fact is this will
never really make sense any to you up here (in your mind)—at least not
until you change in here (in your heart). The message of the cross is not
intended to be a mere intellectual exercise. The message of the cross is
the heart story of a God who will stop at nothing to let you know how much
you are loved. The cross is the place where God in Jesus Christ took on
everything in the culture that seeks power over you and wrenches life away
from you. That’s why you strive so hard in all the culturally wise ways,
accumulating all kinds of things, as much as you possibly can, longing for
position and influence and respect and celebrity; hanging on for dear life
to youth and health. Because you are so afraid that life, real life, will
never be yours unless you struggle and strive and hang on to every bit of
it that you can get.
The message of the
cross is that life, real life, every bit of it, is a gift—a gift of God to
you. God gives it to you. God loves you that much. And there is plenty
of it to go around. This gift of life, real life, is not limited to only
those who acquire wealth or power or influence or young or healthy. This
gift of life, real life, is yours now, just the way you are. This gift of
life, real life, is even yours in death.
This will never make
any sense to you up here (in your mind) alone. But when you receive this
gift of life from God in here (in your heart) then you are ready to
receive the wisdom of God up here (in your mind). You see, you only
really start to become cross-wise on the other side of love. Love, you
see, does not just change your mind; love changes your heart. When your
heart is changed by love then you no longer simply understand, you know,
then it doesn’t just make sense to you, it heals. That’s what
capture the hearts of the wise Corinthians and made them a church. That’s
what captures your heart and makes of you a community of faith.
The greatest
challenge that faced the Corinthians in their day, the greatest challenge
that faces the church in our day, is this process of becoming
“cross-wise.” It turns everything upside down. Your life must be
reordered.
That’s why these
steps in discipleship are so difficult for us. It just makes sense to us
to
first look for God in the
spiritual heights “up there” rather than in the
“muck and mire down here” in the valley of everyday
life;
expect of God the miracle of
instant provision rather than the miracle
of the conversion of hearts and systems;
expect of God spectacular
display of divine prominence rather than to
suffer and die;
expect of God divine
power to take back creation by force right now
rather than by love in God’s good time.
But to be a disciple of Jesus Christ your life must be reordered. Your
fundamental understanding of life must be turned upside down. Worldly
notions of the “way things are” and how you “get things done” must be
discarded. In other words, a life of discipleship is a life no longer
ordered by the ways of the world but by the way of the cross. The third
step in discipleship is to become “cross-wise.”
How do you know if
you’re becoming “cross-wise,” and beginning to get rid of all that
cultural wisdom? Here’s a few clues:
When you find yourself aware of the presence of God right here,
right
now in very surprising common places of everyday life
rather
than “up there” away and aloof, you are becoming cross-wise.
When you begin to trust the ways of God more than you trust the
ways of the world, you are becoming cross-wise.
When you find you’re
beginning to feel so much more personal satisfaction in what you
give away than in what you have, you are becoming cross-wise.
When you find yourself
beginning to have more genuine concern in your heart for the
welfare of another than for yourself, you are becoming cross-wise.
When you find yourself
beginning to ask God to lead you where you should go before
plunging head on, you are becoming cross-wise.
When you find yourself
beginning to sense more and more each day that God really
does love you, you are becoming cross-wise.
Jesus said the poor,
those who mourn, the meek, the hungry and thirsty, are blessed. Now
that just doesn’t make sense. This faith of yours, it just doesn’t
make sense. Discipleship….it’s foolish. But there is something
about this foolishness of God that is wiser than our wisdom. I have
good news for you today: you don’t have to be all that smart to get
this. You just have to be loved.
