B, Post Pentecost 18 Proper 20 - Mark 9:35 "Wisdom in the Wind"

Mark 9:35 (ESV) “And he sat down and called the twelve. And he said to them, ‘If anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all.’ ”

Imagine you are walking in the dark.  Your light is fragile, a candlelight, a burning wick, that’s easily snuffed out.  It’s not a battery-driven, weather-proof torch that continues to burn after taking a beating, dropped in the mud, submerged in water.  No! It’s a flame that requires three things in perfect balance to exist: oxygen, heat, and fuel.

The fuel is the wax of the candle, or the oil in the reservoir.  Oxygen too is needed, but not too much, especially with such a small flame!  And heat is the third.  But because the flame is so small and its heating qualities are limited, too much oxygen, too much air, will take the heat away in an instant and the flame is out, and the light is gone.

Now imagine you are walking in the dark, in a raging windstorm, just before the rain comes pouring down, or perhaps near the ocean where the waves are whipped up by the winds and freezing salt spray is soaking everything.  How do you keep your wick burning.  You have oil in your lamp; to light the way, how do you keep it burning?

In ages past various devices have been designed to protect the wick from the wind.  Glass was typical, or a metal mesh scrim was used to diffuse the air and protect the flame.  How fortunate we are today to have torches that recharge with electronic light sources such as bulbs or LEDs (light emitting diodes)! 

Nevertheless, a fragile flame in the wind is a good picture for understanding ourselves and our faith.  Our faith flickers in fragile vessels as we face furores along the way of life.  What sustains the flame of faith within, so we might withstand the day of judgement, and not be blown away like chaff in a windstorm?

You all know the answer is Jesus Christ!  He sustains the flame of faith within, so we might not be blown away in the wild storms of life and death.  But to our continual surprise, how Jesus sustains the flame of faith is contrary to human thinking, it’s opposite to human modes of operation, what we do and how we react, and Jesus’ way is the reverse of what we’re taught by the world.

Jesus was born into the fragile frame of humanity.  And within that frame he bore the same fragile flame, as do we all. 

James speaks of the qualities with which we should operate.  These are ultimately the qualities of Christ.  James asks, “Who is wise and understanding among you? By his good conduct let him show his works in the meekness of wisdom.” (James 3:13 ESV)

Meekness of wisdom or wisdom born in meekness is a quality misunderstood by most.  Where Jesus says, “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.” (Matthew 5:5 ESV) The modus operandi of the world is to put meekness aside in favour of assertiveness, self-confidence, and boldness as individuals and collectively with mob mentality!

But the structure with which the world operates is contrary to what Christ Jesus brought on behalf of God the Father, and how it was enacted and empowered, when he put aside the privilege of his divinity, humbled his spirit, was compelled by the Holy Spirit, and ultimately gave up his human spirit on the cross.  Within Jesus’ meekness was a wisdom far above the works of any other person.

When James asks, “Who is wise and understanding among you?” The answer is Jesus, and not me!

Yet what we find when the storms of life threaten the fragile flame within, our worldly way turns on the gas of the old Adam within, and the pilot light of Christ gives way to the heat of our fiery passions and pride.  And rather than being protected from the storms we face, we engage with frenzied force adding to the faithless fracases of the world.

We hear from James, “if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast and be false to the truth. This is not the wisdom that comes down from above, but is earthly, unspiritual, demonic.”  (James 3:14–15 ESV)

Our jealousy and selfish ambitions are no match against God, since “He yearns jealously over the spirit that he has made to dwell in us”? (James 4:5 ESV)

So jealous is God our Father over you, he sent Jesus to be the “blessed one”.  Jesus is the blessed one of the Psalms and is the blessed man introduced to us in Psalm one.  He is blessed or balanced in a way fulfilled by no other person.  His way is the blessed way, he does not walk with the wicked, he does not stand in the ways of sinners, nor does he sit to join with the scoffers.

However, Jesus who delights in the law of God, sits with sinners to teach them God’s way, he does not stand in the way of sinners, but he stood for all sinners on the cross, having walked the way of the cross. 

In meekness and humility, he took what was earthly, unspiritual, demonic, on himself on the cross and gives you what the world cannot.  He allowed his separation from the Father and the Holy Spirit and descended into hell, so we no longer have to go there, or be separated from God.  But in the wisdom of his meekness, he won victory over death. 

When Jesus sat down with the twelve disciples, he sat down with sinners, not to join them in their sin but to teach them the way of the cross.  Their lesson was a bitter lesson learnt.  They were the first to learn through their bitterness when they deserted Jesus at the cross.  Yet eleven of them were reinstated in the forgiveness they received, and the blessing Jesus bestowed on them when he breathed the Holy Spirit on them.

They were the first to learn the lesson, and the lesson continues for us, through the bitter experience of sins exposed by God’s Word of Law.  But the blessed reinstatement continues too, with the breath of the Holy Spirit keeping the flame of faith burning, so we receive and believe the forgiveness of our sins.

Jesus sat down to serve sinners, to balance us with his blessedness, to straighten our crooked ways with his blessedness.  He took his stand and hung on the cross for the forgiveness of your sin, and he walked the way of the cross for your salvation.  Jesus’ meekness led him through death to the resurrection. This was a meekness that allowed his flame to be snuffed out.  But the wisdom in his meekness meant death had no control over him.  He could not stay dead!  This wisdom is meek, but it’s servanthood contrary to the ways of the world, you and me, who daily struggle to allow the Holy Spirit deal with the pride and passions of the old sinful spiritual self. 

The world does not understand what Jesus teaches you and me.  That, “if anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all.”  In fact, Jesus is the only one who understands this in a practical way, having willingly experienced not just meekness, but the weakness of death, to be last of all and servant of all.  Having done so, he is the firstborn of the dead, the glorified head of the church.  Even so, he continues to serve us now, interceding for us before our Father in heaven.

Unlike the world, the church lives under a servanthood structure.  Where structures in the world are triangular with the base at the bottom, where servants serve the person at the pinnacle, the pinnacle of the church is on the bottom and serves the base at the top. 

Undergirding this upside-down triangle is the Trinity that bears the church.  The upside-down pinnacle of the church is balanced on the cross of Jesus’ death and resurrection that connects it with the Triune God.

This balance defies all human pride and passions that struggles under the folly of the world’s frenzied faithlessness.  This balance and level in the church comes from Christ who balances our frailty and fragility with his wisdom won through being the eternally begotten firstborn of creation. But also, because he is the Servant Head of the church, the firstborn of the dead (Colossians 1:15-20).

You now have this wisdom within.  Despite the fragility of your frame, within is Jesus’ faithful flame, that has not only weathered the storm but has conquered the raging storm of death so you can take you stand, straight and balanced in Christ, anchored in his blessed wisdom in the wild windstorms of life and death.  Amen.     

B, Post Pentecost 17 Proper 19 - Mark 8:27–38 "To Identify with Jesus"

Mark 8:27–38 (ESV)  And Jesus went on with his disciples to the villages of Caesarea Philippi. And on the way he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that I am?” And they told him, “John the Baptist; and others say, Elijah; and others, one of the prophets.” And he asked them, “But who do you say that I am?” Peter answered him, “You are the Christ.” And he strictly charged them to tell no one about him. And he began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed, and after three days rise again. And he said this plainly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. But turning and seeing his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, “Get behind me, Satan! For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man.” And calling the crowd to him with his disciples, he said to them, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel’s will save it. For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul? For what can a man give in return for his soul? For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the Son of Man also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.”

Jesus is on the way to the cross.  Without any coded language, Jesus bluntly and openly teaches his disciples, “that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed, and after three days rise again.”  (Mark 8:31 ESV) In other words the way of the Son of Man is the way of sacrifice and servanthood. 

Peter was ashamed of what Jesus said!  He identified Jesus as the Christ, but didn’t identify being the Christ, with suffering and death.  So, he took him aside to rebuke Jesus’ way.  But Jesus rebukes Satan within Peter for trying to lead him astray from the way.

This brings Jesus to another teaching opportunity that any way other than the Son of Man’s way, is not God’s way, but an evil deception as Satan’s way, saying, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.  For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel’s will save it.”  (Mark 8:34–35 ESV)

Here for the first time the cross is connected with suffering many things, rejection by the fathers and priests of Judaism, being killed, and then raised after three days!  This was not just a death of suffering and rejection; it’s the death of defilement, desecration and dreadful disgrace.  It’s  a shameful and humiliating way to die, for the convicted, and for anyone associated with the person being hung!  But three days after this death of shame, comes a resurrection?   What is this?

Moses taught in the law that, “A hanged man is cursed by God.”  They would have seen this Roman practise time and time again.  Cursed creatures hanging on crosses for days for all to see.  They would have heard the mocking words of those passing by, perhaps even mocked them themselves, albeit under their breaths!  Noone ever came back to life after this accursed death!  Now, they were confronted with Jesus’ call for them to carry a cross!  How could this be?

Imagine you’ve being accused of the most wicked crime, remained silent, not giving any defence, then stripped of all dignity, and left hung out to dry and die, as if you were the guiltiest grub ever to get what was wanted!  This is what Jesus became for every man, woman and child!

Jesus then gives a comparison between the Son of Man and man, that is humanity!  Here Jesus injects new thoughts into the hearts of the bewildered disciples in the wake of his rebuke of Peter, in front of them all!   He questions them, “For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul?  For what can a man give in return for his soul?”  (Mark 8:36–37 ESV)

This question is also for you too!  What can you give as a payment for your life?  What’s the point of getting everything you’ve ever wanted, only to find at the end of it all, you’ve lost your identity, your being, and your purpose in this world?

Jesus’ identity sits on this comparison between a person whose lost their identity, and the servant of humanity, the Son of Man, whose identity is built on serving our Father, whose purpose is to reverse the death and depression of our suffering due to sin!

Jesus fulfils the words of Psalm nineteen.  The Son of Man, the Servant King, was kept back from presumptuous sins.  Pride and presumption did not have dominion over him.  Jesus is blameless and innocent of all bad behaviour.  Everything he said, everything he thought, and everything he did, is acceptable before God the Father, his Rock and his Redeemer!

Jesus identifies with us as he walks to the cross and he is not ashamed to do so!  He walks there to bear the shame of your sin and my sin.  Imagine walking on the world stage with all your hidden sins there for all to see.  Your deepest darkest desires, naked for all to see, under the spotlight of social exposure.  This is the shame Jesus bore for you on the cross! 

The Son of Man gained the sins of the whole world and lost his life.  At the cross he breathed his last and gave up his soul for the profit of humanity!   What can you and I give for the return of our souls? What are you giving for the Son of Man’s suffering service for the redemption of your identity?

Recently I read that people rarely rise to the occasion when threatened with a crisis.  Unlike many of the superhuman feats portrayed in the fiction we watch on the screen.  Instead, what regularly occurs is people usually sink to the level of their training. 

United States Army officer, General George Patton of WW2 fame, said, “the more you sweat in training, the less blood you lose in battle.”  Similar is also said of sporting success!  But what about your training in identity?  Do you identify with carrying a cross?  What Cross-training do you fall back on in your life crises?

Last week we heard of Jesus healing the deaf and dumb man near Lake Galilee at the Decapolis.  We’ve also heard about hearing the Word of God and the deeds of faith that come as a result of the Holy Spirit working the Word within us. 

Perhaps like Peter you’re quick to rebuke those who call you to deny yourself, pick up your cross and follow Jesus!  Perhaps, you hear the call but quickly forget the minute you leave this place.  At the resurrection, at his return, will he find you deaf and dumb to his Word, to his Cross-training?  Your identity depends on what you hear and how you allow it to train you within.  The proof of what and how you hear is how you pick up your cross and follow Jesus.  When Jesus comes will he find you ashamed of this adulterous and sinful generation or will he find you ashamed of him and his Word?

There are one-hundred and sixty-eight hours in the week.  When we give only one or two hours of that week to hearing, reading, and pondering God’s Word — Cross-training!  It’s reasonable to assume the other one-hundred and sixty-six or sixty-seven hours of worldly white noise competes to deafen and render us mute. 

The world without you and me bearing our cross, renders the world and those around us rudderless, like a ship without its steering.  Without the tongues of Christians trained in the way of the cross, the world runs wild like a horse without a bit in its mouth, like a wildfire out of control without water to douse the flames.  You are Cross-trainers in the world!

As Jesus asked his disciples, “who do you say that I am?”   He asks you, “In whom do you identify yourself before others?”  When the devil’s got our tongue, we’re like Peter whom Jesus needed to rebuke!  But like Peter whose tongue was freed by the Holy Spirit when Pentecostal tongues of fire rested on him and the other disciples, you too have been given an identity in Jesus’ Cross-training.  Jesus became Peter’s Rock and Redeemer, and Peter was identified as the rock on which Jesus would build the church.  In the same way, the Holy Spirit trains you to identify Jesus as your Rock and Redeemer!

Your Cross-training began in Holy Baptism, to identify Jesus as your Rock and Redeemer.  In Baptism the Holy Spirit’s given to Cross-train you, to pray for the will to share your “Jesus identity” with others!   If you sense this not to be the case, keep knocking on his door in prayer!  Jesus promises to identify your sin, forgive it, and lead you to open your mouth in confession and thanksgiving before him, each other, and the world.  It’s the Holy Spirit who exercises your Cross-training in Jesus.  Amen.

Dear Heavenly Father, replace our broken spirits with your Holy Spirit, so we might daily die to self, turn to Jesus’ way, identify with him, and with Holy-Spirited desire, pick up our cross and share his identity with others.  When Jesus comes with his holy angels, take us to be with you, our Rock and Redeemer. Amen. 

B, Post Pentecost 16 Proper 18 - James 2:8-13 "Mercy Triumphs over Judgement"

James 2:8–13 (ESV)  If you really fulfill the royal law according to the Scripture, “You shall love your neighbour as yourself,” you are doing well. But if you show partiality, you are committing sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors. For whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become guilty of all of it. For he who said, “Do not commit adultery,” also said, “Do not murder.” If you do not commit adultery but do murder, you have become a transgressor of the law. So speak and so act as those who are to be judged under the law of liberty. For judgement is without mercy to one who has shown no mercy. Mercy triumphs over judgement.

Mercy triumphs over judgement.  We all like it when others are merciful towards us.  Not so much when others are merciful towards those whom we condemn and not us.  So, the command of Jesus hits hard in the ears and hearts as you’re told to, “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven.” (Matthew 5:44–45a ESV)

Mercy triumphs over judgement.  This in James is the law of liberty or freedom.  The law of coming and going without restriction.  Judgement that doesn’t end in mercy lands sinners, who have received mercy, back into the same judgement they’ve used on others. 

Judgement is not necessarily a bad thing.  However, Jesus says, “Judge not, that you be not judged. For with the judgement, you pronounce you will be judged, and with the measure you use it will be measured to you.” (Matthew 7:1–2 ESV)

And again, he says, “Do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgment.” (John 7:24 ESV)

The Greek word “to judge”, krino, is the parent word for many English words such as critic, criticise, crisis, criteria, and hypocrite.  One half of our brain God created to make judgement, so judgement is in our DNA.  A right judgement will allow mercy to win the day, since to judge something is to discern, or assess, to resolve, and it can even mean, to believe rightly.  Yet the judgement in our fallen DNA, leads you and I to make bad judgements when we forget what Jesus did for each of us.   

Jesus’ judgement of your situation led him to absorb what you and I rightly deserve, which he paid for in full on the cross.  The cross is both the place of crisis but also profound compassion for us whose hearts are full of evil, defiling us before our Father in heaven.  Knowing this about ourselves we make right judgements, leading to our necessity to be merciful without partiality.

The book of James is a letter to the twelve tribes in the Diaspora, the Dispersion of Jewish believers in Christ.  These are those who in freedom, are called to come and go into God’s presence through Jesus Christ, now that the curtain in the temple at Jerusalem, has been torn from top to bottom on Good Friday.

Having been grafted into this freedom of entering God the Father’s presence through Jesus Christ, we Gentiles, together with believing Messianic Jews, participate in the law of liberty.  Through mercy we sinners are also saints.  We’re called to believe this mystery of the cross.  One hundred percent sinner, but at the same time, one hundred percent saint.  This is mercy triumphing over judgement.

Judgement needs to occur, but if mercy is not the completion of judgement, we stand under the judgement we make.  How much better is it for you and your enemies, for your judgement of self and others, to find your peace in mercy?  Your guilty verdict has been overturned with a pardon of freedom.  When you condemn others in their guilt, aren't you opening the way for your guilt to be reinstated? Why would you want your stay of eternal execution lifted? Why would you swap mercy only to be delivered once again into destruction and death?

Last week we heard Jesus judge the Jewish scribes and Pharisees as hypocrites when they question his disciples for eating with defiled hands, while their hearts were defiled with evils that break the commandments. 

Today we hear Jesus move amongst those, the Jews considered as “defiled Gentiles” of the Syrian-Phoenicians, and the ten cities of the Decapolis, where he heals the daughter of the Syrophoenician woman, and restores a deaf man’s hearing and speech somewhere to the east of the Sea of Galilee.

James calls believing Jews to, “…show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory. But if you show partiality, you are committing sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors. For whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become guilty of all of it.”  (James 2:1,9–10 ESV)

Having been grafted into Jesus Christ, these words in James are for us too!  In the same vein as Jesus speaks about the evils that come from the heart of man, he reminds us with the law, of our condemnation and the sentence or judgement of death too.  But as Jesus mercifully frees those with his healing word, we too are called to receive and believe the same law of liberty and compassion, having been forgiven, and pass it on to our enemies! 

James instructs, “So speak and so act as those who are to be judged under the law of liberty. For judgment is without mercy to one who has shown no mercy. Mercy triumphs over judgment.” (James 2:12–13 ESV)

Just as the beast of burden pulls a cart of produce, we are called to allow the work of judgement to be connected to the free-wheeling carriage of God’s mercy.  The cart needs to be connected to the horse!  But the cart always comes after the horse!  What I’m saying is that mercy comes after judgement, and once mercy is in play, judgement must always be merciful!  Mercy triumphs over judgement!

When you allow desire within you to entice you back into a judgement that puts the cart in front of the horse, so to speak, you allow the law of condemnation to mute mercy.  This judgement is doubting and double-minded. 

Here again the Greek word krino appears as the substance of the word “to doubt”, which is a hesitation, withdrawal, discrimination, or partiality in making a right judgement.  James says those who do lack wisdom, in making right judgements, are encouraged to pray and trust God will give.

“If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him. But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.” (James 1:5–8 ESV)

Asking in faith is in fact, the law of liberty at work.  Despite our lack of wisdom, we have the freedom to come into God’s presence and receive forgiveness.  We do so without doubt, knowing that judgement has fallen on Jesus and will not fall on us who continue coming in and going out from God’s presence having been forgiven and fed by Jesus Christ in word and sacrament. 

His word and sacraments serve a two-fold function.  Not only are we forgiven and fed for eternal life, but we’re protected with his impartial protection in this life.  The Holy Spirit works within you, despite your struggle with your sin and the struggle to forgive others as God has forgiven you, to reflect the mercy that has triumphed over your judgement!  Amen.