Leaving Boats, Nets, and Dad

Mathew 4:12-23

Ordinary 3

January 26, 2020

William G. Carter

Now when Jesus heard that John had been arrested, he withdrew to Galilee. He left Nazareth and made his home in Capernaum by the lake, in the territory of Zebulun and Naphtali, so that what had been spoken through the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled: ‘Land of Zebulun, land of Naphtali, on the road by the sea, across the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles—the people who sat in darkness have seen a great light, and for those who sat in the region and shadow of death,  light has dawned.’

From that time Jesus began to proclaim, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.’

As he walked by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon, who is called Peter, and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the lake - for they were fishermen. And he said to them, ‘Follow me, and I will make you fish for people.’ Immediately they left their nets and followed him. As he went from there, he saw two other brothers, James son of Zebedee and his brother John, in the boat with their father Zebedee, mending their nets, and he called them. Immediately they left the boat and their father, and followed him.

Jesus went throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and curing every disease and every sickness among the people.

Back in graduate school, I had a next-door neighbor from Egypt. He stayed to himself, for the most part. Perhaps it was the language barrier or the cultural difference, but he has a pleasant smile and dark, wise eyes. In the four months that our dorm rooms were next to one another, we had a nodding acquaintance.

There was only one conversation that I can recall. It was dinner time, and both of us emerged at the same time from our rooms to head over to the cafeteria. “Ibrahim,” I said, “tell me about your family.” He broke into a big smile and said, “I have six brothers and four sisters.”

What do they do? “Oh,” he said, “we have a family business. We run a corner market.” That’s interesting, I replied. How long has your family been running the market? He paused on the sidewalk, thought for a minute, and said, “About three thousand years.” Here he was, leaving all of them to study and do something different with his life.

That’s what strikes me about this well-worn story of Jesus calling the four disciples. The local economy was well-established. One of the fishing boats had a hand-painted sign on the side of it: “Zebedee and Sons: Purveyors of Tilapia and Other Fine Fish.” Jesus comes along and disrupts a family business.

It's the immediacy of Matthew’s account that I’ve always found so striking. Jesus collects two sets of two brothers: Simon and Andrew, James and John. All four of them are working the water. When Jesus walks by, Simon Peter and Andrew are hurling a net into the sea. Jesus calls out to them, just as the net leaves their hands, and they leave it in the water. As far as we know, it’s still there.

A few steps beyond, James and John are in the boat with their father Zebedee, mending the broken strands of their nets. Jesus calls, and James and John immediately walk away from their father, leaving him behind to keep fixing their nets. “Follow me,” he says. He doesn’t say where. He doesn’t offer a map or any directions. So far as we can tell, all five of them stick around Capernaum for a while. It has become Jesus’ home base.

But that day, for whatever reason, four professional fishermen walked off the job.

As a kid, the story was explained to me by Wilma Caswell, our favorite Sunday School teacher. She said, “They left their work as fishermen to go into the ministry.” As a second grader, I thought long and hard about that. I was glad I didn’t like to fish because I was sure that I never wanted to become a minister.

My dad was an impatient fisherman. He never stuck to much fishing, so he became an engineer. And the pastor of our church – I don’t know if he liked to fish, but he had come to town on a motorcycle. My parents hated motorcycles and said I could never have one, so I was pretty sure I would never ever become a minister. I could breathe easily!

All of that may sound like garbled reasoning, especially given my present occupation. But it struck me at the time as a garbled story. This was the call of the first four disciples. What did it have to do with the rest of us?  It is a particular story about a particular foursome of men. It’s not about us.

In fact, I’ll bet one of the people in the story – old man Zebedee – was a good bit annoyed that Jesus the woodcutter kidnapped his two hardest workers. We don’t know. File that under “Zebedee: The Untold Story.” It does make me wonder why Zebedee himself was not invited to come. We don’t know!

And to be clear: Simon Peter, Andrew, James, and John were not called into the ministry, whatever that is. They were invited to follow Jesus. They didn’t know where he was going. Maybe back to his hut in Capernaum, maybe wandering around the region to preach and heal. He didn’t tell them up front, he just went – and then he invited them to come with him.

He didn’t say, “Let me get my clipboard and make assignments. Simon Peter, you take crowd control. Andrew, you go ahead of me as my publicity coordinator. James, you serve as my lead usher when the crowds show up. John, you handle the t-shirt sales in the lobby.” But Jesus never said anything like that, so far as we know.

No, the invitation to follow is an invitation into a relationship, to stay with him, to listen to what he teaches, to watch what he does, to come close enough to see that God is ruling over heaven and earth, that God is coming close enough to heal and renew. That’s what it means to follow Christ – to stay with him, to take on the habits that help us to stick to him. As Jesus invited the first four fishermen to come, they chose to leave their nets behind. That sounds so dramatic . . . but there’s more to the story.

We know a bit more about Simon, Andrew, James, and John. For one thing, they got back into the boats. Jesus goes with them on one boat ride after another. All through the Gospel of Matthew, he insists on going back and forth across the Sea of Galilee. For every day they spent on the sea, they needed something to eat; you may recall Jesus was not one for turning stones into bread.

One day, in fact, a huge crowd showed up as he taught and healed. There were five thousand people, as far as the eye could see. Jesus asked, “How are we going to feed them?” One of the disciples said, “I have a couple of fish.” (Matt. 14:17) Well, of course he did. Just because he once got out of the boat doesn’t mean he didn’t go back into it. Just because he once dropped the net doesn’t mean he didn’t take it up once again.  

I have known people like that.

• I remember the oral surgeon who shut down his office and went to seminary. When he graduated, you know what he did? He went to West Africa to pull out broken teeth.
• Or the attorney who closed down her practice to study the Bible. When she re-emerged, she started the practice again and took on death row prisoners who were unjustly condemned.
• Or there I was, a few years ago, in a remote New Mexico monastery. At dinner, I discovered one of the monks had been the director of development for the Santa Fe opera. It’s one of the biggest opera companies in the world, and he was their fund raiser. Now he raises money for the monastery and its mission work among the poor.

All of them dropped their nets and picked them up again. All of them used the skills they had developed for years to bring the Kingdom of Heaven ever closer. They did the spiritual work of getting closer to Christ – prayer, study, spiritual formation - and then they picked up their fishing nets again. Their lives were not about making money – they were about making a difference. They were finding a greater purpose for themselves, for the greater purpose of bringing God closer to a world in pain.

They were following Jesus, who was teaching and feeding and curing and preaching and healing every disease.  Matthew’s favorite description of Jesus is “authority.” He has authority over everything that damages us. When we follow him, he has authority over us. When we continue the work that he does, especially out in the world, we see his authority slowly spreading over those we care for.

When we follow Jesus, do we have to leave our nets behind? Maybe or maybe not.

There’s that man on Keiser Avenue during tax season, dressed up like a green Statue of Liberty. He’s out there in front of a tax preparer’s office, and he must be freezing. That job can’t pay very well. People pass by and honk and gesture and laugh. If Jesus were to come along and call that man to leave that job behind, would he do it? I hope so. A lot of us remember jobs that we would never want to do again.

But sometimes we leave the job behind because we believe it is not worthy of God or the kingdom. Some years ago, we had a seminary student spend a year with us. Roger was a second career student, sensing Christ’s invitation to serve the church. One day over coffee, he said, “So how do you get away with it?” Get away with what? “How do you get away with playing jazz as a pastor?”

I said, “It was killing me not to do it, so I tried to find a way to integrate who I am with what I do.” He was most curious. Then I discovered he had an electric bass, that he used to play at the pavilion at Harvey’s Lake, that his band would often back up the traveling rock stars who passed through this region. That’s how Roger Griffith played the bass for Chubby Checker!

“Roger,” said, “why aren’t you playing the bass?” And he said: “It never occurred to me.” Within a few months, he put his rock band together, and they have been playing ever since.

What I’m saying is this: When Jesus invites us to follow him, he invites the whole person to follow him. The whole person, the whole package.

• If God has given you a family, they are as important as any work you do, and probably more so. Caretaking our loved ones is part of our calling.
• If you have a brain, use it.
• If you can sing, sing like a bird.
• If you can tutor a child to read, find a kid to teach.
• If you have a heart for people in need, give your heart to them.
• If you have any special skills or abilities or super-powers, there’s a very good chance that God gave those abilities to you for a really good reason. After all, if Jesus wanted to go back and forth across the Sea of Galilee, it was a good idea to befriend some fishermen.

Beneath it all, there is often a difference between the work that we get paid for and the work that we were put on the planet to do. Sometimes they overlap, and that is a blessed gift; sometimes they do not, but life is always more than that. I have known people who had well-paying jobs that they hated, but their daily work made possible the other work that they are really here to accomplish.

And sometimes, we can work and work, putting in long years to labor at something that does not seem so exciting. In fact, it’s a long routine. But all that may be a rehearsal, preparation for the moment when we are invited to save somebody’s life or cure somebody’s pain. During all that time, perhaps God has been preparing us for that one defining moment. It’s too early to tell.

As Jesus walks by the fishing boats in the town where he lived, he invites two people to follow him. Then he invites two more. The spiritual life is always an invitation. Christ beckons us to draw closer to him. The church is here to help us do just that. We worship, we pray, we study, we serve, because our souls are at stake. We come to listen to the One who invites us away from the things that are diminishing our souls, and move toward the things that can give life to us and to the world.

Why did Simon, Andrew, James, and John drop everything? Why did they stop what they were doing and draw closer to Christ? Because they were ready.  Whatever was going on in them - or around them – was sufficient to prepare them. When the Lord came and said, “Follow me,” they went. They left their nets, they came back to their nets, and they were never the same.

For as they drew near to follow and spend time with Jesus, they saw with their hearts that God has begun a salvage operation in Jesus to save the world. His invitation was for their daily work to be part of that. It made all the difference. It still does.

Maybe Mark Twain said it best. "The two most important days of your life are the day you are born, and the day you find out why."

(c) William G. Carter. All rights reserved.

Finding What You Didn't Know You Needed

John 1:29-42

Ordinary 2

January 19, 2020

William G. Carter

The next day (John) saw Jesus coming towards him and declared, ‘Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! This is he of whom I said, “After me comes a man who ranks ahead of me because he was before me.” I myself did not know him; but I came baptizing with water for this reason, that he might be revealed to Israel.’ And John testified, ‘I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it remained on him. I myself did not know him, but the one who sent me to baptize with water said to me, “He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.” And I myself have seen and have testified that this is the Son of God.’

The next day John again was standing with two of his disciples, and as he watched Jesus walk by, he exclaimed, ‘Look, here is the Lamb of God!’ The two disciples heard him say this, and they followed Jesus. When Jesus turned and saw them following, he said to them, ‘What are you looking for?’ They said to him, ‘Rabbi’ (which translated means Teacher), ‘where are you staying?’ He said to them, ‘Come and see.’ They came and saw where he was staying, and they remained with him that day. It was about four o’clock in the afternoon. One of the two who heard John speak and followed him was Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother. He first found his brother Simon and said to him, ‘We have found the Messiah’ (which is translated Anointed). He brought Simon to Jesus, who looked at him and said, ‘You are Simon son of John. You are to be called Cephas’ (which is translated Peter).

The cartoon has made the rounds on the internet. A lady opens the door to see two earnest visitors in white shirts and neckties. One of them asks earnestly, “Have you found Jesus?” She doesn’t answer, but behind her, hiding behind a living room curtain, we see a figure with long hair and a white robe, sandals sticking out beneath the curtain.

Have you found Jesus? It’s a good giggle, a bit of good hearted fun at the expense of door-knockers who come to introduce us to their Lord and ours.

Some years ago, when the local Baptist university was larger, it was easy to tell when they were running a class on evangelism. A couple of freshmen might knock on the door and try to initiate a conversation about Jesus. To the consternation of those in my house, I always invited them in.

If they were Mormons or Jehovah’s Witnesses, I’d offer them a Coke or a cup of coffee, which often sent them scampering for the door. If they represented another brand of Christianity, they might agree to the Coke or the coffee, but pretty soon, they would want to get on to the sales pitch.

One of them might say, “If you were to die tonight, are you confident that you would wake up with God?” Well, of course I would. Where else would I wake up?

He would lean forward, press, and say, “Are you sure?”  Sure, I’m sure.

“But are you absolutely, positively sure?” he’d say. And I would look him in the eye, smile, and say, “Is that the only thing you’re concerned about? You don’t even know my name.” With this, the freshman might look over at his teammate for some support. The teammate would say, “Well, we’d like you to invite Jesus into your heart,” to which I’d reply, “That’s not going to work.”

They would look at one another. What’s this? And then I continued the thought, “Jesus is never going to fit into my heart. He’s too big. He’s the Savior of the Universe.”

With that, they looked at one another with a bit of terror. They hadn’t covered responses like this in class. And so, I kept going: “Listen, kids, we are on the same team. You didn’t know that because you don’t know my name, and you don’t know my story, so you certainly don’t know that I’m a Presbyterian minister. If I could ever reduce Jesus somehow and put him into my heart, I’m certain he would pop right back out again, because that has happened a thousand times.”

Now, I just made up that last paragraph, because the visitors would never have stayed long enough to go that far. But just because I made it up doesn’t mean it’s not true, because it is. Jesus Christ is the Savior of the Universe. His power and presence are enormous. And a lot of times, it seems like he is hiding behind the curtains.

Have you ever felt that way?

The Gospel of John says the fundamental human hunger is to know God. No one has ever seen God, but we are hungry for that. We hear about God, we talk about God, we even tell jokes about God; but when there is a pause in all that chatter, there seems to be an absence of the very thing we’re talking about.

A lot of Christian writers have tried to to say this in a way others can hear it. I like Flannery O’Connor. She wrote stories about the people she knew in Georgia, about how they would be so self-assured in matters of faith, until something would happen to expose how shallow they are. All their talk about God is aimed at propping up their own faith. In a moment of crisis, it falls like a house of cards.

In one of her essays, she said, “I think it is safe to say that while the South is hardly Christ-centered, it is most certainly Christ-haunted. The Southerner, who isn’t convinced of it, is very much afraid that he may have been formed in the image and likeness of God.”[1] As she says about a character in one of novels, what if Jesus is hiding, not behind a curtain, but behind every tree, “a wild ragged figure motioning him to turn around and come off into the dark…” (from Wise Blood)

The point is, you think you’ve got him – and you don’t. You profess to find him and he slips away. There are many stories like this sprinkled throughout the New Testament, but nowhere does it become quite so sharp as the Gospel of John.

The baptizer sees him and says, “Here is the Lamb of God.” He says it twice, and causes some attention. And twice more he says, “I myself didn’t know him.” Listen to the paradox of that. He sees him and he doesn’t see him. This is John the Baptist. Luke’s Gospel says they were related somehow, but in John’s Gospel he says, “I didn’t know him… I didn’t know him, until the One who sent me to baptize said, ‘Watch for the Holy Spirit to come down on Someone and linger. That’s the one.”

How remarkable is that! With all his self-assured faith, proclaiming “the Messiah is coming,” John the Baptist had to have his eyes opened, if only for a brief moment. “I didn’t know him,” he says, “and the Holy Spirit showed me.”

This kind of instantaneous insight is often the way faith ignites like a spark. It is not something we have within ourselves. It’s a revelation, a gift from somewhere beyond. Some call it a gift of God’s Holy Spirit. The New Testament word is “apocalupsis,” the pulling-back of a curtain. Suddenly you see what is there all the time. And then it’s gone. That doesn’t mean it’s completely gone, just that for now you can’t see. Then you see it, now you don’t.

Faith has always been like this. Some of the great spiritual leaders have had their own doubts. Biblically speaking, that seems to be the way it is. So much so, that sometimes it’s tempting to believe that all we are going to have are doubts. I think of that line from Ecclesiastes, certainly the crankiest book in the Bible: “God has set eternity in our hearts, but we can’t know the beginning or ending of anything.” (Ecclesiastes 3:11)

That’s a grim view. When he taught Ecclesiastes, Professor Jim Crenshaw of Duke used to say it’s like an Easter egg hunt that goes badly. In the morning everybody heads out with baskets and enthusiasm. During the day, everybody searches frantically, grows discouraged. Once in a while someone may yell, “I found one!” and the search is renewed. But in the evening, most go home with empty baskets.

And yet – when you think it’s only going to be an empty basket, you never know when it might be your turn to shout, “I found one!” Or in the words of some of the people who populate the Gospel of John:

• “We have found the Messiah.”
• “We have found the one about whom Moses and the prophets wrote, and he’s from Nazareth.”
• “Rabbi, we know you are a teacher who comes from God, for no one could do the signs that you do apart from the presence of God . . . but how can this be?”
• “Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done. He isn’t the Messiah, is he?”

Now you see him, now you don’t. This is a recurring theme in the scriptures of this season, now that Christmas is over and put away. The Light has come into the darkness; did you see it? We were given a glimpse that Jesus truly exists; was the curtain pulled back long enough for you to see?

So we are left with one of two things: the residue or the search. Either we have the residue of what we’ve heard, what others have told us, what we ourselves might have said – or we decide to keep looking for the Christ, to watch with an awakened heart, to perceive where he is or what he might be doing. And I can tell you first-hand that the search is a lot more interesting.

If someone knocks at my door to ask, “If you were to die tonight,” I would want to know how I might live today. How can I live so completely in the presence of God that I have no need of someone trying to frighten me into heaven?

If they were to ask, “Have you found Jesus,” I would rather be prepared to report on the times when he has found me, and what a difference that has made in how I live and whom I love.

If someone were to press me for certainty, for absolute certainty, and say “Are you sure,” I would be ready to say there is something far better than certainty, something not as presumptuous as certainty, and it’s called “faith.”

And if someone were to dictate where exactly Jesus should be, and where he should go, I would have to shake my head and say, “You don’t know him.” Perhaps he does dart behind the trees, on his way to spend time with the broken-down and the broken-hearted, the disconsolate and the disconcerted, the overlooked and those otherwise deemed godforsaken.  He goes to them. This is where God sends him.

Have you found Jesus? He’s coaching the kid who stutters. He’s talking to the teenager who is not welcome at his own home. He’s pulling some blankets over the lady who slept under the bridge last night. He sits beside the man in the hospice unit who hasn’t had any other visitors. He’s ladling out baked beans in a church basement.

Want to find him? Look for him there. Maybe you won’t find him right away. But he will find you. And isn’t that what we want most of all? Not merely to find, but to be found.

(c) William G. Carter. All rights reserved.

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[1] Flannery O’Connor, “The Grotesque in Southern Fiction, in Mystery and Manners (New York: Farrar Straus & Giroux, 1969) p. 44.

Speaking Up During a Baptism

Matthew 3:13-17

Baptism of the Lord

January 12, 2020

William G. Carter

Then Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan, to be baptized by him. John would have prevented him, saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?” But Jesus answered him, “Let it be so now; for it is proper for us in this way to fulfill all righteousness.” Then he consented. And when Jesus had been baptized, just as he came up from the water, suddenly the heavens were opened to him and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him. And a voice from heaven said, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.”

Over the years, I have started to collect a list of Things People Say During a Baptism. Not the official words, but the words around the event. It’s surprising the range of things that you hear people say.

The most common expression is, “What a beautiful baby!” We hear that a lot, and it’s no wonder why. All babies are beautiful. I can’t imagine somebody saying otherwise. There’s something about the miracle of birth and the presence of child that defrosts the coldest heart.

Some months back, I had the privilege of walking one of the church’s newest children down the aisle. Usually we ask that task of a church elder, but for some reason, I was the one. About halfway down on the right, one of our most senior saints broke into a radiant smile as we approached, so I moved closer to introduce them. And the three-month old child wrapped her hand around the finger of someone 90-some years older.

It was a moment I will never forget, one generation touching another. And the senior saint said, “She’s beautiful.” We hear that a lot.

There are other comments, of course. Here’s one: “We love the dress.” That comes up sometimes, especially if it is a dress. Once it was a handmade dress of ivory satin. It was stunning. The mother said, “It was my wedding dress.” Her father said, “I don’t get it. Why is my grandson wearing a wedding dress at his baptism?” There’s no telling what you might hear people say at a baptism. 

The big day of 1992 was the day Herb was baptized. I didn’t want to miss it. Nobody did. Herb was well up in years. He had been coming here for years with his wife. In conversation, somebody discovered he had never been baptized. We asked, “Is this something you want to do?” And here’s what Herb said: “It isn’t too late, is it?” Of course not. You ought to hear what is said at a baptism!

I heard something at my own baptism. Well, it was spoken, but I don’t know if I understood it at the time. I was one of the Baby Boomer babies in Rev. Duffy’s office in North Springfield Presbyterian Church, Akron, Ohio. Six or seven of us baptized that day. It was no private affair; never is! Baptism is a sacrament of the people of God. It’s a public moment.

Apparently, the minister was getting acquainted with all the parents and admiring their babies. As my mother is holding me, my father blurts out that he had never been baptized. Rev. Duffy froze in his tracks. What? Dad blushed, and Rev. Duffy said (listen to this), “First things first.” Right then, they brought some water and Dad was baptized the same day as me, March 19, 1961. First things first.

Maybe there’s something about baptism that is so important that commentary happens. People talk about it, comment about it. As with Clarence, whom some of you remember. His whole family came literally from around the world when his three children were baptized. The family originated from Africa, but they gathered that day from all over the globe. It was a big day. We danced during the offering!

Sometime after that, the congregation elected Clarence to serve as an elder of the church. He thought about it, prayed about it, and said, “OK, the time is right.” The date was appointed to ordain all the elders and deacons. And in conversation, I discovered that Clarence himself had not yet been baptized. He was a faithful member of the church. He was elected to be an elder. He and his wife had presented their three children for baptism. But not him. The echo from 1961 was still ringing in my ears: “First things first.”

When nobody else was around, I asked why not. And he said, “I never thought I was good enough.” That's when I could quote God, who spoke on the day of Jesus' baptism, and said, "This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased." You are beloved as you are. You are the Beloved of God.

Curiously enough, and according to the story, Jesus hasn't "done" anything yet. Not in the Gospel of Matthew. Oh, he has been born. His life has been raised in the bosom of Israel, learning faith, reciting scripture, taking on the traditions of prayer and the customs of charity - now, some say at age 30, he steps up to the baptizer and says, "It's my turn."

But it doesn’t proceed without a conversation. John the Baptizer didn’t want to do it. He said, “No, not you.” Jesus said, “Yes, me.”

John said, “That’s all wrong. I’ve baptized people to prepare for the Messiah, but here you are.” Jesus said, “Right now. The time is full.”

John said, “But this is backwards; you should be baptizing me.” And then Jesus said something that prompted John to baptize him. He said, “We must do this in order to fulfill all righteousness."

Now, this is the Gospel of Matthew, and that is a loaded term, especially for this book. Matthew never explains it, but he shows what it means.

It happens in chapter one. Joseph the woodcutter is "a righteous man." He knows the rules and he does what was right. If you remember the story, the rules said, "Dismiss Mary, 'cause she's pregnant." The Bible said that.

But the right thing to do was to listen to what God said through a dream: "Don't be afraid to hold onto Mary; her baby is my baby, the baby is the saving baby, the whole world's baby. Don't be afraid to take her and her baby into your heart." That's what he did. He knew the rules - but he did what was right.

Righteousness is more than keeping the rules. Righteousness is doing what’s right. That’s the life Jesus will pursue: a higher righteousness. Not long after the baptismal water dries, he stands tall on a mountain to say, “Unless your righteousness exceeds that of the merely religious people, you can't receive the blessings from heaven” (5:20). As soon as he said that, all the merely religious people said, “What do you mean by that?”

What does that mean? Oh, he could offer plenty of test cases. Here’s one: “You've heard it said, don't cross your fingers when you take an oath on a stack of Bibles. But I say to you, let your word be something that can be trusted. Mean what you say. Keep your promises. Be obedient to your own convictions.” (5:33-37) It’s not enough to say the word; You must do it.

Or here’s another one. “You have heard it said, draw careful boundaries. Live by putting up fences. This person is your friend. That person is your enemy. You’ve heard it said, keep those lines clear. Don’t cross them. But I say to you, God loves everybody. God creates everybody. So love the people who are not your friends; you don’t have to like them, but you must work for their benefit. Put them on your prayer list.” (5:43-48)

This is the higher righteousness. It is a life of generosity and whole-hearted commitment. It cannot be lived in half measures. We can’t dip in and dip out; it’s all the way in. For the sake of doing the right thing, the God-like thing, of moving beyond our natural inclinations as a human animal to do what is possible when God truly claims us and fills us with the Holy Spirit.

John Burgess teaches at our Presbyterian seminary in Pittsburgh. He’s written a book called After Baptism – and that’s the point of the whole book: what do we do to after we come out of the water. How do we live to show that we belong to God?

It’s no surprise that he has chapters on the Ten Commandments. Love God first of all, keep the Sabbath, honor father and mother, don’t steal or covet. God gives the commandments as a gift to direct our lives. After God claims us in the water, God says, “Here is how I want you to live. Here is how I want you to love.” If we don't listen to that Voice and live accordingly, writes John Burgess, baptism is merely a “sentimental ritual.”[1] There is an ethical life to be lived.

Now, this is shocking for some folks. It may have never occurred to them how God calls them to live once they have been claimed in the love of Christ. “Baptized? Sure, I was baptized, but that was a long, long time ago.” What does that baptism mean? It means that we are not only part of the Christian community, we are called to live the Christian life, a life of continuing growth, understanding, and devotion.

Sometimes when we see what God requires of our lives, it shocks us, disturbs us, even frightens us. I think of the parable that writer Brian McLaren tells. It unsettled me when I first heard it, so maybe it will unsettle you too. Goes like this:

“Please de-baptize me,” she said.
The priest’s face crumpled.
“My parents tell me you did it,” she said. “But I was not consulted. So now, undo it.”
The priest’s eyes asked why.
“If it were just about belonging to this religion and being forgiven, then I would stay.

If it were just about believing this list of doctrines and upholding this list of rituals,

I’d be OK.

But your sermon Sunday made it clear it’s about more. More than I bargained for.

So, please, de-baptize me.”
The priest looked down, said nothing.

She continued: “You said baptism sends me into the world to love enemies. I don’t.

Nor do I plan to.

You said it means being willing to stand against the flow. I like the flow.
You described it like rethinking everything, like joining a movement.

But I’m not rethinking or moving anywhere. So un-baptize me. Please.”
The priest began to weep. Soon great sobs rose from his deepest heart.
He took off his glasses, blew his nose, took three tissues to dry his eyes.
“These are tears of joy,” he said.

“I think you are the first person who ever truly listened or understood.”
“So,” she said, “Will you? Please?”[2]

McLaren doesn’t answer her question. He just dangles it out there, waiting for a response. In so doing, all of us are prompted to ask, “How are we going to live?” If we belong to God, it matters how we spend out time, how we take care of one another and our world, and where we give our first allegiance.

For Jesus, the old “repentance baptism” of John is fulfilled and finished. To live forward is to live according to the love and justice of God. And that is his invitation for all of us, too. When we are baptized, what God says, “You belong to me. Nothing can ever come between me and you. I love you completely.” And when the baptism is over, we are called to love all that God loves.

This, I think, is what it means for us to “fulfill all righteousness.” To love all that God loves. To live as generously as Christ lives. To be courageous as the Holy Spirit gives us strength. To do the right thing. For it matters what we do after the water has dried.   

(c) William G. Carter. All rights reserved.

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[1] John P. Burgess, After Baptism: Shaping the Christian Life (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2005) p. 3.

[2] https://brianmclaren.net/a-poem-that-struck-a-nerve/

Guided By Dreams

Matthew 2:13-16, 19-23

Christmas 2

January 5, 2020

William G. Carter

Now after they had left, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Get up, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you; for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him.” Then Joseph got up, took the child and his mother by night, and went to Egypt, and remained there until the death of Herod. This was to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet, “Out of Egypt I have called my son.” …

When Herod died, an angel of the Lord suddenly appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt and said, “Get up, take the child and his mother, and go to the land of Israel, for those who were seeking the child’s life are dead.” Then Joseph got up, took the child and his mother, and went to the land of Israel. But when he heard that Archelaus was ruling over Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there. And after being warned in a dream, he went away to the district of Galilee. There he made his home in a town called Nazareth, so that what had been spoken through the prophets might be fulfilled, “He will be called a Nazorean.”

Today it would be easy for a sermon to go off the rails. It wouldn’t take much. I suppose a preacher could simply point out how the Bible reports an assassination attempt. A nervous ruler tried to eliminate someone he believed would be a threat. Say that, the congregation might get the shivers, and some may buckle their seatbelts for a bumpy ride.

But I’m not going to talk about King Herod. This is still the season of Christmas, and it’s not his time.

But it wouldn’t take much for a sermon to cause a ruckus. All it might take is for a preacher to mention the scholarly consensus about the three wise men. Where did they come from – and where did they return to? Details are scarce, opinions are mixed, but many believe the wise man traveled from a large area called Persia. It encompasses the present-day countries of Iraq and Iran. Just mention that, on a day like today, and good Christian folks may reach for their smelling salts.

But I’m not going to talk about the Magi. They have already gone home by another way.

No, this is church so I’m going to talk about Jesus. This is his church, his time, and his story. And if I talk about him, that might seem curious, because according to the Bible story, today he doesn’t do anything. He is a passive participant, taken by his parents to Egypt. He is hidden from his enemies among his enemies.

When the threat is over, his parents bring him out of Egypt. Yet there is the possibility of a continuing threat, so his parents take him somewhere else. They land up north in the Galilee district, far from the palaces of power, in a small town nobody will be able to find. That is where Jesus will be raised. He will be taught to pray in the synagogue, instructed in the promises of God’s scripture, and apprenticed in Joseph’s woodshop.

In two different ways, Matthew says this was the will of God. The first is that he quotes the Bible prophets, as he has already done three times in this story. Jesus is relocated in God’s witness relocation program so that “the prophets might be fulfilled, ‘He will be called a Nazorean.’” Never mind that we can’t find the verse that he’s quoting. The phrase “he will be called a Nazorean” does not appear in the Jewish Bible. But it is Matthew’s way of saying that raising the child Jesus in a small northern town was what God intended.

The other way Matthew says this is by reporting on Joseph’s dreams. God has been directing the story by sending a series of dreams.

• Joseph discovers Mary is pregnant, and knows the baby isn’t his. He decides to fulfill the commandments by breaking off the engagement quietly, but God sends him a dream: “take Mary and the child as your own.” And he does it.

• The wise men arrive in Persia to ask, “Where is the king?” The current king says, “Find him for me, and report back.” They find him, but then they have a dream: “Don’t tell Herod nothing.” So they go home.

• Meanwhile, Joseph is pondering how to spend the gold, burn the frankincense, and what to do with the myrrh, when God sends another dream: “Get out of town! Run away to Egypt.” So he wakes Mary at midnight and off they go, far away from Herod’s soldiers.

• Sometime later, maybe a year or a couple of years, God suddenly sends another dream, “The coast is clear. Come home.” So they pack up and head north – until God sends another dream to say, “Head further north, not to Sepphoris, the big city, but to little Nazareth.” Once again, Joseph obeys what he hears God say.

Now, if you are keeping track, God sends four different dreams, not counting the wise men’s dream. That’s how God sneaks past Joseph’s conscious defenses – by speaking when Joseph is asleep, when he can’t defend himself, when he can’t shrug it off. Like another Joseph in the Book of Genesis, Joseph the woodcutter hears God speak and he does what he hears. In every case, he “goes the extra mile,” he pursues “the higher righteousness” that his son Jesus will teach some thirty years later.

On the face of it, it’s a miracle story, a story of how God rescues his own Son when the child is still defenseless. I’ve thought about that sometimes. Frankly, I wish God could have sent the same dream to the parents of all the other children in Bethlehem. The murderous brutality of King Herod should have been sabotaged by a few more dreams and a few more angels. That any other lives would have been lost is an enormous tragedy.

But then I reflect some more, and I realize that it’s because of Jesus, the grown-up Jesus, that I could ever name Herod’s actions for what they are. It’s because of Jesus that I could call “an enormous tragedy” the murderous events that happened far too often under a brutal empire.

In that time, life was cheap. Brutality was common. By birthing Jesus into the world, God was announcing an alternative. There’s another way to treat one another. It’s not a new way. God’s Law had taught for centuries to love neighbors, to welcome immigrants, to guard the vulnerable, to act with fairness, to work for justice. There’s nothing new about any of that. Yet the recurring human problem is the lack of moral courage to treat people the way God tells us to treat them.

So now the newness of the Gospel is that God’s very instruction – God’s Torah, God’s Word – becomes enfleshed in Jesus. And God is going to keep him alive until he is old enough to say:

·         “Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.” (5:5)

·         “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.” (5:6) 

·         “Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy. (5:7)

·         “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God. (5:8)

·         “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.” (5:9)

This is the Jesus whom God protects long enough for him to teach:

·         “You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I say to you, Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also…” (5:38-39)

·         “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven.” (5:43-45)

·         “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal; but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven.” (6:19-20)

·         “In everything do to others as you would have them do to you; for this is the law and the prophets.” (7:12)

Jesus comes to teach and embody the higher righteousness of the kingdom of heaven. And if all of this seems impractical and impossible, Jesus smiles at us and says, “All of you are the salt of the earth, but if you lose your flavor, you are good for nothing but spreading on the road.” (5:13)

From the beginning of the Gospel, God’s plan is to send Jesus into the world to teach, to heal, to love, to judge, and ultimately to give his life for the benefit of the kingdom of heaven. In our world, the ways of God have always been resisted. Yet today we hear the testimony of God’s persistence. It is heaven’s plan that Jesus should speak the Gospel, that all of us should hear it, and that a resistant world would be won back one soul at a time.

And even if the evil in the world should finally track down Jesus and threaten him with a cross, the Gospel tells us that he comes back from the dead, that he stays with us (whether consoling or nudging), and that he will live eternally until all enemies are loved, all wounds are healed, and all injustices judged and corrected.

So at the beginning of a new year, the invitation for us is to trust this is God’s dream for all of us. The world is not lost, not on your life – and not on God’s life! The light has come in Jesus the Messiah. No one will ever be able to snuff it out. God is God, and God sends the light.

 (c) William G. Carter. All rights reserved.