The Way, Pt. 3

Okay. So here’s one final idea about Jesus as “the way.” After we see Jesus as the way to understand God and after we surrender to Jesus as our salvation, we can then see Jesus as our way to action. Sometimes we get this backwards and start here instead of with the first two points. We plunge people into service at church when they are really struggling to connect with God on a personal level. That’s too early. It’s only when we find our bearings in relationship with Jesus that service to others flows naturally.

Now, lots of people think they have to do something “special” for God. Christians say stuff like that pretty often. Do I think God has specific things that he wants us to achieve as his sons and daughters? Sure. But there’s a flip-side to that equation. What I think God really wants from each of us is to live a life daily that reflects him. It doesn’t have to be super-impressive. It doesn’t have to be amazing or conspicuous. The Christian walk needs to be only two things: consistent and true. The responsibility of the Christian is to live life consistently in each of life’s scenarios. Through each season of life. Here’s why. You only get the chance to do something for God that will be categorized as amazing our life-changing in life once. Maybe twice. And even then that doesn’t mean anyone will recognize what you’re doing. But if we live life consistently in regards to our families, finances, occupation, and relational choices, then we will be in a position to risk something out of the ordinary because the other areas of our life will be stable.

You don’t have to be a Bible scholar. Simply start by memorizing a Bible verse or two. If you desperately want to raise funds for missions, try paying off your credit card first. Guys, if you want to be the world’s greatest dad, start by simply leaving the office earlier each night. And if that goes well, then start emptying the dishwasher without any fanfare. Want to do something amazing for God? Do the basics. Draw your sword, raise your battle cry, and charge up the hill to conquer the obvious and the insignificant. Small is the new big.

Jesus did things for others that were radical and counter-cultural. But he also did them simply and effectively.  And that the true mark of Christian service: simple acts of grace and kindness that reflect the love of God for others. Simple acts of generosity that bring much attention to God and very little attention to us. One of the best ways to do this is in a small group. Or in your Sunday school class. Find out what God is leading your group to do. Here’s how you know: it’s something that comes up over and over in conversation.  God may be teaching your group about mercy or faith or financial responsibility. And then think of simple ways that you could impact someone’s life for the better. Nothing over-the-top. Just something simple that reflects the heart of God.

One of my favorite stories from church history revolves around this idea. There’s this Roman historian named Tacitus who said something interesting about Christians around 100 a.d. Rather than calling them “Christians” he named them “Chrestians.” Now, that may look like a spelling error but when we find our way back into the original languages of the Bible it makes something very clear. Chrestotes is the Greek word for kindness, benevolence and goodness.

You see, the first century Christians were known for two things happening when they were around: something miraculous and something kind. When a Roman historian wrote about the early Christian movement, he was much more impressed with the generosity and simple acts of goodness than with their theological accuracy. Now, know that the theology was sound and that their beliefs were strong. But what interests me about that is how a deep relationship with Jesus can translate into a wide-ranging impact for good in a community.

When Jesus is the “way,” he not only meets our individual desire for relationship with God, he also empowers us to reach people in a profound and meaningful way. I confess that sometimes I find myself back at the first point: still trying to understand God by understanding Jesus. And other times, I end up at the foot of the cross overwhelmed by the revelation of God’s love for me in the sacrifice of Jesus. And then, the love of Christ compels me to do what I can for others as the Holy Spirit leads me. All are essential to the Christian walk. And they all flow from the strong son of the living God: Jesus Christ.

The Way, Pt. 2

Here’s another idea about Jesus as “the way”: Jesus is the way of salvation. Jesus exchanged death for life on the cross. Paul says in Romans 5 that it was while we were still sinning left and right with little regard for what we’ve done that Jesus dies for us. It’s through the blood of Jesus and in the power of his resurrection that we are even here at all.

Sometimes we forget this. We treat the sacrifice of Jesus like it is some math equation…you know, sin + sacrifice = eternal life. As if we only get in the restricted area if we punch in the right “code.” But it’s more than that. It’s a revolution in how we approach God and how we live life. Part of the Christian walk is understanding that giving Jesus our heart means more than filling out an attendance register. It means more than working to better our community. It means more than dropping some money in the offering plate. It means completely turning over our lives to honor God.  Of course, those other things follow but they are not the goal. Surrendering to Jesus is the goal.

Now here’s something we need to talk about for a minute: what exactly is salvation? Well, it’s more than simply joining the church. It’s the decision to allow God to have access to every area of your heart. A lot of folks think that salvation is the end. But really, it’s just the beginning of learning to walk out life “Jesus-style.” It’s important for us to remember that we are on a journey towards sanctification. That simply means that the longer we walk with Jesus by surrendering our lives to him, the more we begin to look and act and think like him. That’s what abiding in Christ is all about: Jesus living life “in” us and “through” us on a daily basis. So, salvation is not a one-time event to be forgotten or placed on a shelf – it’s the constant process of turning our face toward God and saying, “Not my will, but yours be done.”

Now, we are a socially conscious group of Americans…and rightfully so – it’s our responsibility to meet the needs of our community and the world as best we can. But what I’m talking about here has little to do with anyone but you and God. If we are experiencing salvation to the fullest – the way God intended – our relationship will progress. We will see ourselves grow more comfortable with prayer. We will begin to desire to open the Bible simply to gain advice on how to live. We will carve time out of our schedule to be in God’s presence. Not because someone told us these are the things we are supposed to do…but because we want to do them! There should be something dynamic happening in our hearts regardless of the work that is done otherwise. One comes before the other.  God has to work in you before God can work through you. From the overflow of our relationship with God comes the ministry to our community.

The Way, Pt. 1

I like Jesus…so I thought I’d blog about him for a bit…

I want to talk for a while about what Jesus said in John 14 – that he is “the way.” Whatever that means. Sometimes when we are familiar with a passage of scripture we assume that we know what it means. But I’d like for us to try and unpack this verse and see if we can think about it in a way that we may have never done before – some way that can speak to us currently and practically.  What did Jesus mean? What does that mean for us? So, that’s what we’re gonna explore together for a few posts.

So, first off, let’s do a little word study. The word “way” means more than just a particular direction. It means a natural path that is obvious to everyone. Have you ever seen a sidewalk that made right angles or took the “long” way around to get to a destination? What do people do? They make their own path…and as people wear down that spot in the grass (ignoring the “do not walk on the grass” signs) a path shows up. And then others take that path too because anyone with a lick of sense knows that’s the shortest route to their destination, right? Occasionally, you may see a person who likes to follow the rules stay on the sidewalk. But really, they are the exception, aren’t they? It’s like that Staples advertisement: we’re gonna punch the “easy button” if we can, right? We want an easy way to understand or navigate our lives. We are willing to follow directions…but more often we follow people. People we know and have relationships with. We follow crowds. We follow the leader. Once a leader has cut a new path, people are willing to follow.

And that leads me to the first point: Jesus is the way to understanding God. He cut a new path to understanding. You see, people in the Bible were having problems with this. Kind of like we do today. In fact, up until Jesus, the entire biblical story was the story of people struggling to understand who God was and the proper way to relate to him. In the books of Joshua and Judges, some related to him through military conquest. In the books of Samuel and Kings, some related to him through a king or ruler. In the book of Leviticus, people related to him through a sacrificial ritual. And all the while, you have the prophets screaming at the people that they are missing the heart of God. Here are some passages where God is pleading through the voice of the prophets. Listen to the frustration in their words:

Isaiah 29:13

And so the Lord says, “These people say they are mine. They honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me.
And their worship of me is nothing but man-made rules learned by rote.

Hosea 6:6

I want you to show love, not offer sacrifices. I want you to know me more than I want burnt offerings.

Hosea 10:13

But you have planted wickedness, you have reaped evil, you have eaten the fruit of deception. You have depended on your own strength and the strength of your chariots and on your many warriors. 

Jeremiah 25:3-4

For twenty-three years, the word of the LORD has come to me and I have spoken to you again and again, but you have not listened. And though the LORD has sent all his servants the prophets to you again and again, you have not listened or paid any attention.

So, what’s going on here? If the prophets sounds a little ticked off, it’s because they are! Paul Newman in Cool Hand Luke sums up the Bible to this point nicely: “My friends what we have here is failure to communicate.” People were taking what they assumed God wanted them to do and turning it into something else. And that’s why Jesus is the “way.” He’s the final commentary on how God deals with us and how he expects us to live life in his name. Jesus shattered all the preconceived ideas of what God should look like and act like. He flipped the funnel. He said things like: “I’ve come to serve and give my life as a ransom for many.” He gave us a radically different description of power: “If you want to be first, be the servant of everyone you know.” Jesus is our way of understanding God.

More later…

The Heretic Next Door

Back in the first centuries of the Christian movement, a priest from Africa named Arius stirred up some trouble. Though Arius spent the majority of his days as a religious upstart at Alexandria, he was trained at Antioch. That’s an important bit of info. There were two main “schools” of thought in Christianity then: Antioch and Alexandria. Alexandria was known for interpreting the Bible in an allegorical fashion. Much of the Alexandrian writings are first year church history for seminary students. Antiochan giants like Theodoret of Cyrus, Theodore of Mopsuestia, and Diodore of Tarsus held to a strict literal interpretation of biblical passages. These are really important theologians who receive very little attention nowadays.

Arius began devoting his sermons to investigating the question: “Was Jesus really God or was he just a human?”Arius had trouble believing God and Jesus existed together prior to the incarnation. This really isn’t that surprising. Antiochian theology focused on the “humanness” of Jesus – it was only a slight misstep that would lead Arius toward a form of adoptionism. So, for roughly the next three centuries, Alexandrian-heavy councils dragged Arius and company through the mud in their writings using nasty words like “heretic.” And for most Christians, that’s all we know about him. Was Arius wrong? Sure. Jesus is God. But there’s more to the story.

People rarely ask why Arius struggled with the divinity of Jesus. His reasoning is not much different from many struggling Christians today. Most of us were taught growing up that God the Father was a sovereign despot concerned with protecting his image of magisterial omnipotence. Liberal Protestant preacher Lyman Abbot put it this way: God is a “kind of awful omnipotent police justice” and each of us is a “scared culprit who knows he is liable to punishment but does not clearly know why.”  And that keeps many Christians in line. Afraid of God…but in line.

There’s only one problem. Jesus looks very different than that…and in John 14, Jesus had the gall to say he was just like the Father. And that’s what bugged Arius so long ago. He had been taught that God was unfeeling (impassible) and Jesus seemed so different. And because God did not seem to possess the qualities associated with Jesus, Arius assumed they weren’t the same at all. He was protecting the Father’s impassibility over against the “human” suffering in Jesus. If God did not feel our pain, how could he become one of us? Arius’ answer was simple: he didn’t. Arius’ responded when asked if Jesus and God are the same: “No! I would never insult the majesty of God that way!” This thought pattern also affects how many view the cross today: good Jesus protecting us from bad God.

There’s a good lesson here. People’s actions make it in the textbook. But their intentions rarely do. And what’s important to note here is that a struggling priest was attempting to think outside the box when reconciling his ministerial training with what he actually read in the Bible. He’d been taught that God was a “police justice” and wasn’t sure what to do with the compassionate Jesus he read about in the gospels. No one else had a good answer either so he courageously took a stab at it and was branded a heretic for the ages. But really, he was just a man attempting to understand God a little better. Maybe we shouldn’t call him the heretic for the ages. How about the heretic next door?

We should be careful when reading our history books. While it’s important to oppose false doctrine, we need to be careful not to disdain the struggles, fears, and mistakes of people in the process. Arius was doing the best he could. May we have grace to do the same.

Empowered Humility

My understanding of humility growing up was probably similar to yours. It involved shunning accolades, making sure I gave honor to God, declaring my unworthiness for salvation, and the like. I felt as though the compliments of others were poison darts filled with pride that would pierce my spiritual armor. The only way to defeat it? Deflect them with a good case of the “awww…shucks” and a hearty soli Deo gloria.

Now, I understand that perspective as a form of false humility – attempting to create within myself a facade of good-natured humility when really I craved the approval of others. I was not authentic. I said the correct things but relished in the attention/compliments of others. I now understand humility as something drastically different. Most people’s view of humility involves a resignation to some form of inactivity/timidity for the sake of “preferring others better than oneself.” And though that has a place in the Christian walk, it’s not the whole story. Empowered humility is really the defining mark of a Christian. In Romans 12, we find a recipe for Christian behavior. From the outset, Paul spends his time using action verbs – examples of behavior that are anything but idle. Even the verbs describing the willingness to put others’ interests in front of our own are intense, purposeful, and focused. It reminds me of the time-honored industrious phrase, “If you’re waiting on me, you’re backing up…” Verse 21 describes it best: “overcome evil by doing good.”  

You know, God is good, too. Tucked within the definition of “good” in any solid Greek lexicon is the idea of being productive. God’s actions are what ultimately declare his goodness. God looked at all he created and said it was good – it was active, dynamic, and teeming with life…just like him. We are made in his divine image – in Christ, we possess that same ability to be “good”: productive, active, constructive, energetic, and vigorous. But our common understanding of humility seems to state the opposite as if humility or meekness involves inactivity. To me, empowered humility involves taking the initiative under the direction of  God. Humble people see the desires and wishes of their Maker and move to make them a reality. Humility is not standing in a corner. It’s submitting ourselves to God and following him into active battle. It’s placing your life in the hands of another to fight for their cause with your life.

Empowered humility also involves attentiveness to the Holy Spirit and a willingness to put aside our own agendas and live an active life under guidance of the Spirit. There are countless examples of this in the Bible – active heroes and heroines who caught the vision of their Maker and moved forward to advance God’s vision: Noah, Abraham, Deborah, David, Nathan, Daniel, Hosea, the Apostles, Priscilla and Aquilla, Phoebe…the list goes on and on. And don’t forget the certainty and strength of Jesus – humble resolve in the face of persecution, need, and death. We know these names because they acted with the certainty of God, not because they were “shrinking violets” and emotional “doormats.” They were not weak. They were strong. But they weren’t strong for their own purposes. They were strong for God.  Forward-motion humility, empowered by the Holy Spirit. If you’ve been waiting for God to move, you’re backing up…

Why You Should Listen to Your Father-in-Law

There’s this really great story in Exodus 18. Moses is leading the Israelites through the wilderness and his father-in-law, Jethro, comes to visit. Now, Moses to this point has acted in the formal definition of a judge – the same way you find Deborah or Gideon responding later in Israel’s development. Judge meant rescuer or deliverer – one who fights on the behalf of another. That’s why God chose Moses to act as his judge in Egypt.

Somewhere along the way, Moses reinvented what a judge should be. Starting in verse 13, we see Moses sit down in a chair and begin to settle grievances among the people essentially acting in a legal capacity. A “judge” becomes someone who renders decisions in a legal fashion rather than someone who rescues others. Look at Moses’ answer to Jethro in verses 14-15:

Moses answered him, “Because the people come to me to seek God’s will. Whenever they have a dispute, it is brought to me, and I decide between the parties and inform them of God’s decrees and instructions.”

Jethro, in his own father-in-law way, tells Moses this is a horrible idea. But Jethro doesn’t put his finger on the real issue either. He says that Moses will be overwhelmed by the administrative task of rendering legal decisions for everyone. He advised him to spread out the responsibility. Good administrative decision. But one that misses the bigger picture. The reason Moses was sitting there in the first place is because he had exchanged the God’s original idea of judge as rescuer and deliver for the human concept that a judge uses delegated authority to tell everybody else what to do.

I’m not big on symbolic interpretation or anything, but this story strikes me as relevant to Jesus’ death on the cross. The crucifixion is not really the issue. It’s our inability to interpret the cross outside of what we know and understand. Just as Moses traded in the original understanding of  a judge as deliverer for the belief that a judge renders a legal decision, we too throughout history have done the same thing. We’re the ones that based it on feudal honor (Anselm) and breaking the law (Calvin). We treat the death of Jesus as a “transactional” event. God was angry. Someone had to pay. Jesus took God’s punishment. Justice has been served. We came up with the legal model. Of course, now we are so used to talking about it that we can’t see the cross without it. The cross was necessary, though I’m not sure the reasons we have constructed are the reasons God initially intended. It takes only a cursory look at the verses preceding John 3:16 the know that the cross was about more than “breaking the law” in some cosmic courtroom - it was about reconciliation and healing. A point Moses makes clear a few pages over in Numbers 21 (I talk about that in-depth here).

I think Jethro had a point. Most fathers-in-law do. He knew Moses had created a way of understanding  judgment far removed from God’s original calling. We do the same. How freeing would it be to embrace the cross as an avenue for rescue, redemption, and reconciliation?

“Windowless” Parenting

I am an anxious parent. Scratch that. Petrified parent. I read parenting books constantly. And the sole motivation for reading these books is the sheer terror I feel when I consider that the solutions to the problems I face as a parent are already solved in a book somewhere. And I haven’t read it yet. I have three daughters. They are all extremely bright and independent and beautiful. I’m sure they already intimidate the guys in their classes. Heck, they intimidate me! But I think I’ve already picked up on some things that will be foundation for my relationship with them. For example I have figured out that when raising daughters, the issue at hand is rarely the real issue. The meltdown over not eating vegetables has little to do with hunger. It’s usually a trigger for latent emotion stored up from a hurtful event earlier in the day (or week). I’m a guy so I assume it’s actually about vegetables. Guys, listen up: it’s not about vegetables. The next part of that process is to connect with your daughter in conversation so that she will eventually tell you what the real issue is. To me, that process is one of the most fascinating things about raising daughters…it’s kinda like a treasure hunt. I’ve got some good theories, too – things I won’t be able to test for a long time. For example, I have a hunch that the resistance I will feel from my children at age 16 will return to our relationship when they are 36 if I continue to treat them as I did 20 years earlier. So, I’m thinking about those things now as well…while I try to figure out what’s behind the vegetable “meltdown.”

One of the areas of ministry I oversee at my church is “discipleship.” That simply describes the process of people becoming more like Jesus. It’s a tricky business. I can provide “avenues” for others to engage God. But I can’t make people choose to deepen their relationship with God. Ultimately, I feel the burden for the spiritual well-being of our congregation. However, they are not my most important “calling.” The best place for me to help someone become more like Jesus is in my own home. My children are my ultimate disciples. People at church may get my ideas and programs. And I can counsel and give spiritual direction to them an hour at a time. But rarely can I be available to them like any true opportunity for discipleship needs. That side of me belongs to my children. They get my presence and my ability to teach in the moment.

Parents miss this. We fill our children’s lives with quotes and adages and morality tales as we whisk from one task to another. But we often forget about the most important thing: modeling the beliefs we desire to instill in our children.  We provide them no context in which to grasp our “wise words.” So our words fall flat. I call this “windowless” parenting. Children often have no context or “window” to see why parents feel the way they do. They see no action associated with what we tell them are our most cherished beliefs. We can tell our children to reserve judgment and refrain from gossip, but they listen to every phone conversation we have. We can tell them to be honest and authentic, but they hear how we mask our true intentions with others. We can tell them mom and dad love each other, but they rarely believe it until we ask them to not interrupt us while we tell our spouse about our day.

Be a window for your children. They are your disciples.

The Sin of Losing Hope

For those that follow this blog regularly, I posted about my personal devotional practices a while back. Part of that process has been to read through the monastic tradition of the Eastern Orthodox Church. Those writings are compiled in a series called the Philokalia. I love the theology of Eastern Orthodoxy. That may be strange since I work at a Protestant (Methodist) church. But much of Wesley’s theological flavor can be traced back to his love of the Eastern monastic tradition.  For example, in the Eastern Orthodox tradition, the term “theologian” had little to do with propositional truths and systematic theologies. A “theologian” was a guy who gave up his former existence for the chance to go pray on a mountain top for the rest of his life. A “theologian” was a person who could talk about God accurately simply because he spent all his time in prayer with God. Novel concept, huh?

 I came across a quote in the writings of St. John of Karpathos the other day that really got me thinking. He was writing to a group of monks in India who were struggling to keep the faith. He said this: “It is more serious to lose hope than to sin.” I stopped to absorb the quote…simply because it flies in the face of everything we are taught in Protestant Christianity. Sin is at the center. The cross happened because of sin. Guilt over sin is often used as a “motivator” for better living. And here’s this 7th century monk making sin take a back seat to losing hope. 

So, I began to cross reference conversations and actions of the past few months. And as I sat there, the common theme with many that I spoke with was hopelessness. People who had been “beat up” by life: co-workers, family, bosses, “the economy,” etc. Some of them had been viciously skewered by the church. And all around them they had well-meaning people cheering for their return – rooting for them to get up and dust themselves off and jump back in the ring of life. But all they wanted to do was lay there. They had lost their hope.

Funny thing is, all these people are really good people. They love God, they love their families, they are all accomplished, well-educated, and respected by their peers. Their problem was not some over-the-top sin or tragic character flaw. They would be the envy of many…they had done things “right.” Yet, it didn’t protect them for the hopelessness they felt. I told them the opposite of most of the other counsel they received. I told them to take their time. Heal their wounds. Regain their hope. Take as much time as you need. And when you’re ready, get up.

I think John of Karpathos is on to something here. He discovered something we rarely consider in Western Christianity. It is more serious to lose hope than to sin because hopelessness leads us to do things we would never consider otherwise. In many Christian circles sin is more important than hope, but the potential for sin lies in losing our hope. That’s why the Apostle Paul wrote things like this to the Ephesians: “I pray that your hearts will be flooded with light so that you can understand the confident hope he has given to those he called—his holy people who are his rich and glorious inheritance” (3:18). Find your hope first. The rest will follow.

Power or Character?, Part 2

Okay. The contexts of power and character go beyond Bible verses to the life of the believer (and non-believer).  Let me give you two examples from my life.

Before I went into vocational ministry about a decade ago, I worked for the credit union of a Fortune 500 company. It was a promising career (and sometimes I wonder why I left it for ministry!  ) . My boss would come by my office and chat a couple of times a week. He would ask, “What’s up?” or “How are you doing?”  I assumed that he wanted outstanding loan balances or delinquency percentages. My heart would jump every time he did this: Is he checking up on me? What does he want? He’s looking for something. What did I do wrong? I would say very little so that my words wouldn’t be “used against me.”

That’s the context of power. I assumed that our conversation was more of a chess match. Someone would win and someone would lose. I didn’t know any other way to operate. For the record, I was an idiot. My boss never intended for those conversations to go that way. He simply wanted to get to know me better – he simply wanted a good relationship with me. That’s why he asked how my day was or how my wife was doing. Then he would ask if there was anything he could help me with or offer advice about what that I may be struggling with. He didn’t do this so he could write it all down in a secret file. He wanted to work with me to solve the problems and grow my experience as a manager in the financial world. I didn’t get it…and it must have been incredibly frustrating for him simply because he was working from the context of character.

Here’s another story. A few years later after I had shaken myself free from that paradigm, I walked into a church service of a friend to visit. The service had started – I merely wanted to sneak in the back and listen to my friend’s sermon. A lady was in the foyer texting on her phone I had never seen her before. She stopped and said, “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be texting during the service. How about not telling anyone?” And then she laughed nervously. I said, “I’m sorry, you must have mistaken me for God’s policeman. I’m not the least bit worried about your texting.” I smiled and slipped in the back door. That lady assumed that I (a total stranger) worked from the context of power. She was caught. I would “expose’ her. I would win and she would lose. She may have assumed that God felt the same way…

The same is true with kids. Children become defiant. They get angry. They push boundaries. And when they do that they are imitating the power context of authoritarianism they see modeled for them in home, church, and at school. They feel the attitude of competition we bring home from a hostile work environment and listen to our words. And they began their own personal life of conquest. I know I’m in the minority here, but I have chosen to reject that approach. Occasionally I forget when I’m backed in a corner or seriously frustrated with my children’s behavior. But most of time, if my children become defiant I look for clues as to why my relationship with them is broken rather than force their obedience. Can I “make” them behave? Sure. But all that does is reinforce the importance of power in their hearts.

God has called us to live life from the context of character. That means occasionally you find yourself on the losing end of some arbitrary contest that someone set up that you may not even know you are competing in. That’s okay. They created that contest, not you. Expose the context of power. And declare that you don’t play that game. It’s not for faint of heart, mind you. But it’s the one modeled by Jesus. Of course, they killed him for it.

I suppose that’s the risk you take.

Dual Citizenship, Part 3

Does that mean that we are called to abandon our civic duty or our allegiance to our great nation? Not at all. We need to embrace it. No, we must embrace it. But we also hold dual citizenship. We are citizens of the United States. But a deeper allegiance ties us to the Kingdom of God. And God has invited us to change the world through his kingdom by embracing a lifestyle and calling that moves beyond what national citizenship alone could ever do. The Apostle Peter makes this point in his first letter. He says that Christians are a “royal priests” and a “holy nation.” Our life’s goal as members of the Kingdom of God should be to reflect the desires of its King – Jesus. Peter also calls us “temporary residents and foreigners” – people who are part of this world but also find their truest identity in the eternal. You see, for Peter (and for us), we don’t have to choose between allegiance to America and allegiance to the kingdom of God. It’s not an “either/or” decision. It’s an “and/both” decision. We should be committed to our nation. But where our nation falls short of meeting the desires of God’s kingdom – that’s when the church rises to the occasion.

So, what does the kingdom of God look like? How do we know when we are acting out the desires of our King? Well, fortunately, the Bible has a lot to say about that! The kingdom of God is found where you see love in action. Listen to this scripture:

 Matthew 9:35-36: Jesus went through all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.

 I love that scripture. It gives us a glimpse of Jesus in action. What was important to Jesus? The things in this scripture: telling the good news, healing the physical and emotional needs of others. And then Matthew says something really important, he tells us exactly why Jesus did those things. Jesus did them out of compassion – a deep abiding desire to help others who are “harassed and helpless.” To help those who are wandering around like lost sheep and fending for their lives daily.

 Now, when we tend to think about images like that, we tend to think of people far off in another place that face overwhelming hardship. They certainly deserve our compassion. But really, the people we can reach most are the ones in our own backyard. Or maybe even in our own congregation…where the hurt lies beneath a thin veneer of confidence and pleasantries exchanged in the courtyard. We are all susceptible to that type of behavior. But here’s the thing. You see, people are more than a statistic. More than categories the government can record on a census. You don’t check a box for heartache, depression, or shame. To me, Jesus gives the ultimate example of how the Kingdom of God behaves in the story of the leper. Lepers were outcasts socially. They had to yell down the street where they walked, “Unclean!” over and over. In Luke 5, a leper falls down in front of Jesus and asks if “the Son of Man,” – the leader of the kingdom of God – is “willing” to heal him. Before he does anything else, Jesus displays one of the most remarkable examples of love in action in the whole Bible. He touches him. By doing so, Jesus says, “you are worthy of the human touch and compassion that so many people have denied you while attempting to keep religious rules.” Jesus said, “You are worth my attention, my time, my resources, and even the risk of disease. You are worth dying for.” In that moment, even before physical healing occurs, Jesus heals the leper’s soul. And those things are happening all around us – in this church.

When the Kingdom of God is in action, all types of healing and mercy and wholeness happen. When we act out our dual citizenship, the Kingdom of God invades the lives of those we come in contact with. A little yeast leavens the whole lump. That’s your part and my part.  And that’s all God has really called us to. Our role in bringing about his kingdom “on earth as it is in heaven” is to be open and to listen for the Holy Spirit. And when given the opportunity, to act with a compassion and love that changes the world around us. I believe it’s a privilege to be an American citizen. For that I am very grateful. But I am even more overwhelmed by God’s invitation to be part of his family and to advance his mandate of grace. As we continue to celebrate our national heritage, may we be that much more mindful of our spiritual lineage as well. May that realization take root and we come to the Lord’s Table this morning.