Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Palm Sunday 2012

Palm Sunday 2012 Mark 11:1-11
“Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the Name of the Lord.”

Sometimes people say the right thing at the right time for the wrong reason. Palm Sunday is one of those occasions.

The people of Jerusalem rejoiced to greet Jesus. They shouted out “Hosanna” Save Now! They knew the name “Jesus” means savior. They wanted him to be their savior.
Jesus had spent three years of public ministry in a very small territory. Most people in Jerusalem for the Passover preparations that day had actually seen and heard Jesus. They saw him heal the sick and feed the hungry. They heard the message that the Kingdom of God had come and was now in the midst of them. They heard but they did not understand.

People frequently see what they want to see and hear what they want to hear. The people who met Jesus wanted to be saved. They wanted to be saved from Roman rule. They wanted to be saved from a rigid inflexible and judgmental religious Court. They wanted to be saved from poverty, hunger and fear.

What Jesus taught was far less important to people than what he could do. He could heal with a word. His success rate in healing was 100%. He could take a few fish and a few pieces of bread and feed thousands of people. He could even call people back from death. Clearly, Jesus had the power.

It was the power the people noticed. It was the power people wanted. Some believed Jesus would use this power the way King David had used his power. Some believed Jesus would restore the political fortunes of Israel. Others believed Jesus would decide which of the dozens of sects of the Judaism of the time was the one true religion. Still others, those who followed Jesus as his students, expected to be rewarded with power, position, prestige and privilege. All believed that Jesus would follow in the footsteps of his ancestor David and destroy his enemies while he rewarded his friends.

Reward and punishment was the underlying belief that formed religion, politics and economics. It was such a pervasive belief that everyone accepted it and no one questioned it. No one questioned it except Jesus.

Jesus interpreted his own actions by his teaching. Jesus did not perform miracles from the place of knowledge or power. Jesus performed miracles from the place of infinite and eternal love.

The disciples, the students, heard the message of love and compassion and ignored it. They looked at each other with a wink and a nod that indicated they believed the teaching was a feint not a reality. It was a temporary tactic to catch the rich and powerful off guard.

Certainly, the enemies of Jesus thought the same. It was inconceivable to them that Jesus would not use his power to reward his friends and destroy his enemies. It was clear Jesus was not theirs to control. It was clear Jesus had some hidden agenda beyond all of his talk of divine love and compassion.

The crowds on Palm Sunday welcomed Jesus the Conqueror!

The religious and political authorities were too trapped in a rigid inflexible uncompromising view of God and humanity to be able to welcome Jesus the Beloved of the Father. They could not receive him for who he was so they branded him a traitor, a blasphemer, and in league with Satan. They missed the day of divine visitation.
And, eventually, so did the crowds and the disciples. There was no room in their narrow self-indulgent world view for the infinite possibilities of eternal love. When Jesus failed to meet their expectation and be Jesus the Conqueror they turned on him. Some simply walked away. Some ran away and hid. Others joined the opposition and demanded that Jesus be tortured and killed.

Jesus knew this would happen. He knew that people would not receive him for who he was. He knew why this would happen. And, he knew the inevitable outcome of crucifixion was the only way to solve the underlying problem that led to this terrible moment.

Pride led people to praise Jesus. National pride. Religious pride. Personal pride.
Fear led people to condemn Jesus. Fear of punishment. Fear of something new. Fear of losing control, Fear of self-responsibility.

The will to power motivated people to condemn Jesus for being who he truly was. The will to power states: I know what I know so don’t confuse me with the facts. Don’t even try to reason with me.

The pride of knowledge led people to arrest Jesus. The fear of power led people to condemn Jesus. The will to power killed Jesus.

The bad news is that this is a pattern of behavior in human beings that proceeds from the place of original separation from God. The better news is that as we become aware of this pattern of pride, fear and the will to power we become ready to hear God’s solution to the problem. The best news is that the solution is Jesus Christ.
Be wary of any one who declares they and they alone know the one right answer to any problem. Be wary of any one who states that because they have the one right answer they have no need to discuss, reason, evaluate or achieve consensus with other opinions.

The one right way is not a book, a religion, or a political ideology. The one right way is a person: Jesus Christ.

Jesus is the co-eternal Beloved Son of the Eternal Father. Jesus is the infinite and eternal love of God in human flesh.

On Palm Sunday remember the shouts of the people: Save Now. Remember the demand for Jesus to give them what they wanted when they wanted it and how they wanted it. Remember that the demand proceeds from the place of celebration. And, rejoice that Jesus did not give them or us what we demand. He gave us what we need. He gave us himself.

And then repeat the shout of the crowd from the place of divine love and compassion: “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the Name of the Lord.”

Wednesday, March 21, 2012

Lent 5

Lent 5 (John 12:20-33) I, if I be lifted up will draw all people unto me.

The cross is the great scandal of our Heavenly Father’s Plan of Salvation.

The idea that God would permit His Son to die the terrible death of crucifixion was incomprehensible to people in Jesus’ day. It is horrifying to most people today. It only makes sense in the context of the way Moses and the Prophets describe the fundamental problem confronting the human race. And, it only makes sense if we understand who God is.

The problem Moses and the prophets describe in scripture is separation. Our species made an original choice to separate from God. The two major consequences of that separation are sin and death.

People sin because we have separated from God. The separation produces the sin. People die because we have separated from God. The separation produces death.
Most people and consequently most religion that people create reverse the order. Most religion teaches that our actual sins produce the separation. And so, if you tell a lie you separate from God.

Most people and the religions we create tend to describe God in terms of rewards and punishments. If we do good we get good. If we do bad we get bad. In this system death is either a punishment or simply part of the natural order of things. We can avoid the punishment and overcome the natural order by getting God’s attention and acquiring sufficient merit to earn God’s reward of an afterlife.

Moses and the prophets and the other Biblical authors have a very different perspective. Over the course of thousands of years of history the people who contributed their observations of human behavior to the Bible all come to the same conclusion. It is the original separation from God that results in people committing sin and experiencing death.

Neither sin nor death were part of our Heavenly Father’s Plan for our species. The Father planned for humanity to be the loving companion of God the Son through the indwelling real presence of God the Holy Spirit.

A soul in union with Divine Love and holiness does not sin.

A soul in union with Divine love and holiness does not die.

Our Heavenly Father designed our species to live and move and have our being in the active dynamic spontaneous creative and eternal life of the holy and blessed Trinity.
Separation plunged our species into darkness. Separation has produced a terrible and profound existential pain in the human soul. That pain distorts the way we think, feel and make choices. That pain eventually kills us.

God’s solution to this problem is Jesus Christ.

Jesus unites humanity with divinity in a single person.

Jesus never separated from God; but, Jesus experienced human separation from God on the cross.

Jesus never lived with the existential pain of separation; but, Jesus experienced that pain on the cross.

Jesus never sinned; but, Jesus became sin on the cross.
Jesus is the very source of human life; but, Jesus willingly experienced death on the cross.

The cross is central to the Plan of Salvation. It is on the cross that the love of God incarnate in Jesus Christ experienced human separation and transformed the consequences of separation. Jesus transforms sin back into love. Jesus transforms death back into life.

Religion cannot do this. Law cannot do this. Knowledge and power cannot do this. Only the Infinite and Eternal love of God incarnate in Jesus Christ and personally present in Jesus Christ can do this.

The Plan of Salvation is not a religion because the problem is not a religious problem. The problem is separation, pain, sin and death. The solution is reunification, grace, love and life.

No mere mortal can solve the problem. The only solution is the solution God Himself provides. The solution is the universal Savior of all humanity. The solution is Jesus Christ.

As it was in the beginning so it is now.

In the beginning our Heavenly Father invited our species to choose love. We chose power and in that choice separated from God and manifested pain, sin and death.
In Jesus God reunifies humanity with the very source of life. Once again we have a choice. We can choose love in Jesus. We can choose to receive reunification. Jesus did all of the work on the cross. He presents the gift of infinite and eternal love to all people everywhere. The gift is Himself.

From the horrific pain and suffering and death on the cross Jesus makes his appeal to all people everywhere. In that appeal he doesn’t just preach or teach salvation. Jesus is salvation.

The gift of God is Jesus Christ, the co-eternal Son of God.

In Jesus, God demonstrates to us that He loves us so much he is willing to allow the co-eternal son to suffer and die on the cross in order to give all of us a new life and a new way of living. It is the way of the original blessing God offered our species. It is the second chance to choose love.

Jesus says to all people everywhere: “I, if I be lifted up will draw all people unto me.” All means all. Everyone is invited to receive the gift. None are excluded. The gift is love. The gift is life. The gift is Jesus Christ.

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Lent 4

Lent 4 (John 3:14-21) “For God so loved the world..”

God just doesn’t have love. God is love.

This is the most fundamental teaching of the Bible. Moses knew this. The prophets knew this. It is the reality of who Jesus is. The human choice to separate from God stems from the human decision to redefine God.

Human beings have a tendency to define God as knowledge or power and to use love as a description of one of many attributes of God. God is not knowledge. God is not power. Knowledge and power are two of many attributes of God. God’s nature is love.
The challenge in understanding that truth is the corruption of human language. Our English language uses the word love to express desire, preference and sentiment.
The Greek language in which the apostles wrote the New Testament and Jewish scholars used to translate the Old Testament uses a very specific word for love. That word is agape. Agape has a very specific meaning.

Agape is steadfast, holy, unconditional, sacrificial love. No dictionary can adequately define agape. It includes the concepts of being open, non-judgmental, unaffected, willfully committed to the well-being of others for their own sake. Agape is infinite and eternal. It is in fact a transcendent principle and universal concept that can only be embodied. Jesus defines agape. Jesus is the love of God embodied. To understand divine love it is imperative to study the life of Jesus Christ.

The imperative is vital to our understanding of God and of human nature. The stakes include our ability to live well in this life and to live at all in the life of the world to come.

It is important to consider that in his pre incarnate form Jesus is the co-eternal Beloved of God the Father. The Beloved is the eternal expression of the one who is eternal love. The Beloved freely chose to surrender all of His divine attributes to come to earth and to become a particular man at a particular time and place.
The only aspect of divinity the Beloved Son of God did not surrender when he was incarnated is love. Love is the very essence of who God is.

It is by love not power or knowledge that Jesus was able to heal and perform miracles. It was that love that enabled him to endure the unimaginable physical pain of crucifixion. It was that love that enabled him to bear the unimaginable spiritual pain of human separation, sin and death. And, it was that love that reunified humanity to divinity, sin back into love, death back into life.

Jesus is the universal gift of Divine Love to the human race. Divine love is universal. That is why Jesus is the universal savior. That is how Jesus is our Heavenly Father’s Plan of Salvation, Pattern of Salvation, and Purpose of Salvation.
In Jesus God rescues us from separation, sin and death. In Jesus God offers us the gift of a new life (eternal life) and a new way of living (the path of transformation). The new life is eternal solely because the source of that new life is eternal. The new way of living is the path of transformation because the source of that path is infinite.

The infinite and eternal love of the infinite and eternal God flows to us, in us and through us from Jesus Christ.

Humans chose to separate from God. Separation produces pain, sin and death. God chose to reunite with humanity in Jesus Christ. That union produces faith, hope and love. Salvation is God’s initiative and God’s gift.

The question of salvation is not which is the true religion? The question of salvation is not even in the category of right law, right knowledge or the human right to define God as we choose. The question of salvation is: will you receive the transforming gift of infinite and eternal love God offers you and everyone on this planet through the co-eternal Beloved Jesus Christ?

God just doesn’t have love. God is love. That love is steadfast, holy, unconditional, sacrificial, infinite, eternal and transforming. That love is Jesus Christ.

For God so loved the world….

Lent 3

Lent 3 (John 2:13-22)
“Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up.”

God only ever authorized humanity to build one temple. That one temple was only ever a symbol of the true temple.

God revealed to Moses the pattern of the proto temple, the Tabernacle. The tabernacle was a moveable temple for a nomadic people. The design for the tabernacle was very detailed and very precise.

Four hundred years following the death of Moses, God authorized King Solomon to build the Temple in Jerusalem. Once again, God gave very specific and detailed instructions to build the temple.

King Solomon began the building project with the enthusiasm of his youthful faith. His dedication prayer is a wise and passionate expression of that faith. Sadly, as Solomon aged his passion for God cooled. His faith eroded. At the end of his long reign he had set the pattern of sin for the nation that would continue for 400 years.
That pattern of sin is religious syncretism and economic injustice.

God brought the Babylonians to destroy Solomon’s Temple at the time of the prophet Jeremiah. Seventy years later the scribe Nehemiah began to rebuild the temple. Some two hundred years later, Greek armies desecrated and damaged Nehemiah’s temple. In Jesus’ time, King Herod was completely rebuilding the Temple.

Herod’s temple was one of the wonders of the ancient world. It was magnificent and massive. The pagan Romans held it in awe and considered it a symbol of their principle deity Jupiter, the father of the gods.

In Jesus’ day the Temple priests dominated and controlled the purpose of the Temple. Three priestly families ruled the temple as a personal fiefdom. They limited access to the Levites, the priestly tribe. They set the terms and conditions for the sacrifices.

First, they declared that the priest alone could determine whether an animal was acceptable for sacrifice. Since the Law commanded animal sacrifice as a offering for particular sins it allowed them to decide who could make a sin offering and who could not.

Second, they contracted the sale of acceptable sacrificial animals to a small group of merchants. They created Temple money that could only be spent in the temple.
Next, they declared Roman money was profane and unacceptable for use in the temple to buy sacrificial animals.

Then, they contracted professional money changers to convert Roman money into temple money.

The process was corrupt from beginning to end. It favored a select group of merchants who paid the priests for their monopolies.

The temple priests would never approve an animal for sacrifice that did not have a temple bill of sale. In order to buy an approved animal you needed to change Roman money for Temple money. The exchange rate was entirely arbitrary and unfair. Then, when you went to buy the approved animal the price was many times more than the market price. And, to add insult to injury, the quality of the animal was very poor.

The priests not only cheated the worshippers they cheated God. They created a religious system that favored themselves and their wealthy business associates. They oppressed the people and generated cynicism and resentment for an institution that God designed to be a symbol of Divine Love and Holiness.

Forty years following the resurrection religious zealots would seize control of the Temple, murder the priests and go on to drive out the Romans from the city. Rome would retaliate by destroying the city and the temple. That temple has never been rebuilt.

God only ever authorized humanity to build one temple. That one temple was only ever a symbol of the true temple. The true temple is Jesus Christ.

Jesus is the pattern from which the temple in Jerusalem derived. Jesus is the one pure perfect sacrifice for sin. The priesthood Jesus authorized serves the basic function of all priests: to stand at the altar to offer a sacrifice to God. The New Covenant priesthood offers the one sacrifice Jesus offered. That sacrifice is Jesus himself. It is a sacrifice Jesus offer only once in time. And, it is a sacrifice that transcends time and encompasses all people who have ever lived and will ever live.

There is no need for a temple since Jesus died as the one pure perfect and sufficient sacrifice for sin. There is no need for a temple built of wood, stone, and precious metals and jewels.

Jesus is himself the eternal temple manifesting in this world through the sacrament of Holy Communion. As people hear the call to reunification with God the Father through God the son, we become an extension of the true temple.

God only authorized humanity to build one temple. Through human sin, that temple was destroyed three times. That temple was only a symbol of the true temple. The true temple is Jesus. Human sin attempted to destroy Jesus as it had destroyed the Temple of stone and wood.

As the true Temple Jesus is the dwelling place of God with humanity. As the true temple, Jesus is the real presence of the infinite and eternal God. As the true temple, Jesus is the embodiment of a love that has no beginning and has no end.
The true temple is the eternal love of God manifest in the singular form of a particular human being.

The Babylonians, the Greeks and the Romans destroyed the temple of stone and wood. No one can destroy the true temple. The true temple is the fullness of the eternal in the person of Jesus Christ.

All religion has value only as it supports the relationship with infinite love and eternal life. This is what Jesus offers us at the baptismal font and at the altar of sacrifice. This is the gift that never ends and just keeps getting better.
This is why Jesus told the temple priests:
Destroy this temple, the true and eternal temple, and I will raise it up in three days. My life is mine to lay down on the cross. And, my life is mine to transform death back into life for all people everywhere.