The Labyrinth of Job (Sermon)

 “The Labyrinth of Job”

Job 1:1, 2:1-10 and Romans 8:22-23

Allen Huff

Jonesborough Presbyterian Church

4/28/24

 

There was once a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job. That man was blameless and upright, one who feared God and turned away from evil.

One day the heavenly beings came to present themselves before the Lord, and the accuser also came among them to present himself before the Lord.

²The Lord said to the accuser, “Where have you come from?”

The accuser answered the Lord, “From going to and fro on the earth and from walking up and down on it.” 

³The Lord said to the accuser, “Have you considered my servant Job? There is no one like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man who fears God and turns away from evil. He still persists in his integrity, although you incited me against him, to destroy him for no reason.”

⁴Then the accuser answered the Lord, “Skin for skin! All that the man has he will give for his life. ⁵But stretch out your hand now and touch his bone and his flesh, and he will curse you to your face.”

⁶The Lord said to the accuser, “Very well, he is in your power; only spare his life.”

⁷So the accuser went out from the presence of the Lord and inflicted loathsome sores on Job from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head. ⁸Job took a potsherd with which to scrape himself and sat among the ashes.

⁹Then his wife said to him, “Do you still persist in your integrity? Curse God and die.”

¹⁰But he said to her, “You speak as any foolish woman would speak. Shall we receive good from God and not receive evil?”

In all this Job did not sin with his lips. (NRSV)

 

²²We know that the whole creation has been groaning together as it suffers together the pains of labor, ²³and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies. (NRSV)

 

         Job: History or legend? A flesh-and-blood human being or an amalgamation of human experience in general and of Jewish experience in particular? What we’re asking is whether Job WAS real or IS real?

In his book Messengers of God: Biblical Portraits and Legends, Jewish scholar and holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel included an essay entitled “Job: Our Contemporary.” Wrestling with the stories around the story, he says, “Once upon a time. When? Nobody knows. [Job’s] name is mentioned by Ezekiel in passing, along with those of Noah, and Daniel—was he a contemporary of one or the other? Possibly. Other legends link him alternately to Abraham, Jacob, Moses, Samson, Solomon…and…the Babylonian exile. He would thus have lived…more than eight hundred [years].”¹

Later in the same essay, Wiesel describes Job as one who “was everywhere and everything at the same time…[a man characterized by] peregrinations through provinces and centuries.”²

So, to ask, “WAS Job real?” means arbitrating nearly a millennium of conflicting stories. It becomes a kind of maze, a complicated playground with only one entrance and only one exit and lots of dead ends in between. The point of a maze is simply the entertainment of getting lost. The experience leaves you essentially unchanged.

Now, the question, IS Job real? asks something entirely different. It brings the question into the moment. It acknowledges unmerited suffering, and dares to ask, Does God cause our suffering?

To ask if Job IS real is to enter not a maze, but a labyrinth. And a labyrinth is a spiritual practice in which one walks a set course of twists and turns that seems maze-like, but a labyrinth is about surrendering to Mystery, not becoming mystified.

When walking a labyrinth, one follows the pathway, shedding distractions, pretensions, and fear. That single, trustworthy path leads to a center—a place of stillness, reflection, and divine encounter. It also becomes a place of metanoia—of turning and new beginning. To leave the labyrinth, one simply retraces your steps and exits exactly where you entered. Assuming due discipline, which includes regular trips through the labyrinth, one becomes a transformed pilgrim who can help transform the world—or your little corner of it.

To ask if Job IS real is to enter the story as if walking a labyrinth. At the center of this story-labyrinth, we encounter God in, of all places, a gut-wrenching experience of human suffering. When traveling with Job as a path of divine encounter, we discover that regardless of whether or not he existed as a particular individual, Job most certainly IS real.

On the path of discovering the immediate IS-ness of Job, we walk shoulder-to-shoulder with all of the characters in the story. In the first curve in the path, God brags on Job’s righteousness. Irked by God’s boasting, “the accuser” dares God to test Job.

Make anyone miserable enough, says the accuser, and they’ll turn on you quicker than you can say Jezebel.

And then…What?! God accepts the accuser’s challenge? For the second time! (Job 1:6-12)

Do your worst, says God, just don’t kill him.

(The word of the Lord. Thanks be to God?)

Who wants to walk justly, kindly, and humbly with that God?

Then we meet Job’s wife, and she reminds us that it was not just Job who lost everything. Her family and fortune are gone, too. Furious, she dares her husband to test the faithfulness of God the way the accuser dares God to test the faithfulness of Job. And a long, bitter standoff begins.

Instead of eating the toxic apple of vengeance his wife offers, Job lies in an ash heap, scrapes his oozing sores with a potsherd, and cries, “Let the day perish in which I was born and the night that said, ‘A man-child is conceived.’…Why did I not die at birth?...I loathe my life.”

Utter despair is not exactly where one expects to find God, is it? Indeed, many people dismiss the very notion of God when caught in the grip of suffering that seems to have neither purpose nor end. And hasn’t the tantalizing but tormenting influence of the prosperity gospel conditioned many of us to interpret a lack of physical pain and a surplus of material wealth as signs of God’s presence and favor? From the sale of indulgences in the medieval Catholic Church to the Protestant work ethic of rewards and punishments, the Church has infected countless generations with such dis-grace. It has funneled people into a kind of doctrinal maze. Turn here, now there. Memorize this and that. Do not trust experience. Just believe and repeat what you’ve been taught. While there may be some comfort in that kind of certainty, it makes us look more like lab rats in a maze than disciples on a journey.

While the labyrinth of faith does lead us toward gratitude and joy, it also leads us toward suffering. And we encounter God in both places.

When Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio was elected Pope in 2013, he chose the name Francis because of his concern for those who suffer. And during one of his first Holy Weeks as Pope, he famously washed and kissed the feet of prisoners. Since then, he has spoken boldly things like climate change and the death penalty—issues of human suffering. He has also declined invitations to dine with a host country’s leaders in order to eat with the homeless in the streets outside.

While Pope Francis is far from perfect, he often demonstrates what it can look like to walk the labyrinth of faith rather than to wander the maze of theological convention. When he does, he helps us to remember that Jesus—who is more eager to have followers than mere “believers”—leads us into a labyrinth where we encounter God’s most amazing grace in the midst of the world’s deepest pain.

Remember what Jesus says in Matthew 25: “Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food or thirsty and gave you something to drink…[or] a stranger and welcomed you or naked and gave you clothing…[or] sick or in prison and visited you?’ ⁴⁰ And the king will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did it to me.’” (Matthew 25:37-40)

Maybe this is why Jesus often seems more authentic in the projects than the palaces.

We’ll return to Job over the next two weeks. In the meantime, I encourage you to spend time with this remarkable story. And as you read it, trust it. Let a very realJob take you by the hand and guide you to a place of very real suffering, your own or someone else’s. Be honest with any feelings of anger, betrayal, bewilderment, or despair. And if you find yourself in that dark and lonely place, sit still. Open your heart and your mind, and both give and receive the grace of the Living God.

Then may you turn and begin your journey outward—retracing your steps toward healing, transformation, and hope.

 

¹Elie Wiesel, Messengers of God: Biblical Portraits and Legends, Random House, NY, 1976, p. 188.

²Ibid., p. 190.

God's Gracious Yes (Sermon)

God's Gracious Yes

Psalm 121 and John 3:1-17

Allen Huff

Jonesborough Presbyterian Church

4/21/24

 

¹ I lift up my eyes to the hills—
    from where will my help come?
² My help comes from the Lord,
    who made heaven and earth.

³ He will not let your foot be moved;
    he who keeps you will not slumber.
⁴ He who keeps Israel
    will neither slumber nor sleep.

⁵ The Lord is your keeper;
    the Lord is your shade at your right hand.
⁶ The sun shall not strike you by day
    nor the moon by night.

⁷ The Lord will keep you from all evil;
    he will keep your life.
⁸ The Lord will keep
    your going out and your coming in
    from this time on and forevermore. (NRSV)

 

Now there was a Pharisee named Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews. ²He came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with that person.”

³Jesus answered him, “Very truly, I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above.”

⁴Nicodemus said to him, “How can anyone be born after having grown old? Can one enter a second time into the mother’s womb and be born?”

⁵Jesus answered, “Very truly, I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit. ⁶What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit. ⁷Do not be astonished that I said to you, ‘You must be born from above.’ ⁸The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”

⁹Nicodemus said to him, “How can these things be?”

¹⁰Jesus answered him, “Are you the teacher of Israel, and yet you do not understand these things?

¹¹“Very truly, I tell you, we speak of what we know and testify to what we have seen, yet you do not receive our testimony. ¹²If I have told you about earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you about heavenly things? ¹³No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man. ¹⁴And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, ¹⁵that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.

¹⁶“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.

¹⁷“Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world but in order that the world might be saved through him. (NRSV)

 

References to John 3:16 show up everywhere, from Sunday school classrooms, to billboards, to bridge abutments, to eye-black on athletes.

However, when divorced from the words of the verse itself, the citation, John 3:16, tends to devolve into a secret handshake, a smug cryptograph. And when the verse appears out of context, it can be used with manipulative intent, saying, in essence, God may love you, but if you don’t say out loud that you believe in Jesus, God will still send you to hell. Have a nice day.

I find that disturbing because, while the words of John 3:16 are, to many of us, as familiar as our own names, those 27 words (or so, depending on the translation) become deeply and permanently transformed when we read them in the context of the over 200 words of John 3, and the nearly 84,000 thousand words in the gospel of John. In context, John 3:16 swells from a soundbite about a life in the sweet by-and-by to a daring call to inhabit and embody God’s realm in the here-and-now. So, let’s review that context.

Nicodemus, a Pharisee of significance, creeps about under the cover of darkness. He’s looking for Jesus. Nicodemus recognizes that approaching Jesus for serious conversation almost certainly means public censure. Let’s remember, too, that the Jewish leadership is furious at Jesus since he has so recently and pugnaciously run the authorized moneychangers out of the temple. So, a censure could even mean some sort humiliating punishment or exile.

When Nicodemus finds Jesus, he says that he privately believes that Jesus is from God because it takes uncommon holiness to do the things Jesus does. Now, Nicodemus makes that as a statement, but he’s really asking a question. And maybe he’s afraid to come right out and ask it because a Yes from Jesus would change everything. Nicodemus’ question is the same fundamental question the incarcerated and doomed prophet, John the Baptist, sends his disciples to ask Jesus: “Are you the one who is to come, or should we wait for another?” (Lk 7:19/Mt 11:3)

Instead of offering a definitive Yes, Jesus responds with a cryptic comment about being either “born anew” or “born from above.” Scholars can debate which translation is more accurate, but it seems to me that, in John’s world of symbol and metaphor, they mean pretty much the same thing. That’s what makes those yard signs that scream “Ye must be born again!” so befuddling. It grieves me how casually some can forsake grace—which is God’s boundless Yes to us—and reduce the mystical faith of Jesus to a mandated regurgitation of an absolute derived from one narrow interpretation of one verse, in one chapter, from one book in the community library which is the Bible.

Then again, maybe it feels safe to declare that being “born again” is the exclusive criterion for salvation. After claiming to be born again, we can rest easy in the manufactured certainty that we have mollified God’s fury, and God will, thus, deign to allow us into heaven. Maybe that sounds like grace because it sounds so easy, but it also requires that one imagine God as resentful and violent, and human beings as little more than ten pounds of sin stuffed into five-pound sacks.

Now, I’m not saying that offering a Yes to God is unimportant. In John, though, Jesus is God’s loving and preemptive Yes to us, a Yes uttered not only before Nicodemus asks, but before the formation of the cosmos itself. That’s why John opens his gospel saying, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God…and without him not one thing came into being.” (John 1:1-3)

God’s Yes to us came long before there was an Us. And, maybe I’m wrong, but it seems to me that any god whose love is not fully available until weemancipate it by declaring ourselves “born again” is just a graceless idol. And grace is God’s essence. Grace is God’s character. Grace is God’s vision and legacy for the Creation.

Nicodemus is trying to live in an absolute and literal world. That’s why he asks the absurd question about a grown person returning to the womb and reentering the world with a second trip through the birth canal.

Jesus’ response again slips right past Nicodemus. He distinguishes between being born of flesh and born of the Spirit. He speaks of the Spirit blowing wherever it will, and poor Nicodemus just can’t follow. “How are these things possible?” he says.

I think John is using the Pharisee’s question to goad his readers into imagining what is possible in a world created by God’s eternal Yes. And God’s Yesis about more than the possibility of entering a post-mortem heaven. It’s about the possibility of living differently in this world now. I hear Jesus talking about living this flesh-and-blood-and-spirit human life more fully by living more deeply-connected to God who, as Spirit, moves about wherever and however God chooses. And while God is beyond our control and beyond our full comprehension, aren’t God’s movements always consistent with grace? With love? With peace and holy justice?

This blows-where-it-will Spirit is the energy that bears us, that births us into the new life through which we connect so deeply to God that our seeing, hearing, thinking, and interacting are transformed into signs and expressions of grace. Jesus implies that he is born of the same Spirit. And he says that “everyone who is born of the Spirit” can experience much of what he, as God’s grace incarnate, experiences.

Imagine that. Through the reverberating Yes of God in Christ, God bears us into Christ-mirroring holiness! That’s pretty wonderful—until we remember that Jesus experiences harassment, rejection, abandonment, and execution. That’s his earthly reward for committing himself to God’s grace.

“For God so loved the world [For God so Yes-ed the world] that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him won’t perish, but will have eternal life.”

To “believe in” Jesus doesn’t begin and end with voicing belief. For John, belief means living transformed and transforming lives of compassion and hope, lives bent toward justice and joy right here, in this imperfect yet God-infused reality.

St. Francis of Assisi said, “Remember that when you leave this earth, you can take with you nothing that you have received—only what you have given: a full heart, enriched by honest service, love, sacrifice and courage.”

A “full-heart” life births us into the eternal life of Christ—a here-and-now life that doesn’t condemn the world, but enters and embraces the world. A life of deep and intimate connection to God through deep and intimate connection to all that God has created. For God so loves all that God has created that, in the power of the Spirit, God enters the Creation to reveal the Son—the eternal, and the universal, reconciling Christ.

The Road to Emmaus and Back (Sermon)

 The Road to Emmaus and Back

Isaiah 35:1-7, 10 and Luke 24:13-35

Allen Huff

Jonesborough Presbyterian Church

4/7/24

 

The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad;
    the desert shall rejoice and blossom;
like the crocus ²it shall blossom abundantly
    and rejoice with joy and shouting.
The glory of Lebanon shall be given to it,
    the majesty of Carmel and Sharon.
They shall see the glory of the Lord,
    the majesty of our God.

³ Strengthen the weak hands
    and make firm the feeble knees.
⁴Say to those who are of a fearful heart,
    “Be strong, do not fear!
Here is your God.
    He will come with vengeance,
with terrible recompense.
    He will come and save you.”

⁵Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened,
    and the ears of the deaf shall be opened;
⁶then the lame shall leap like a deer,
    and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy.
For waters shall break forth in the wilderness
    and streams in the desert;
⁷the burning sand shall become a pool
    and the thirsty ground springs of water;
the haunt of jackals shall become a swamp;
    the grass shall become reeds and rushes.
¹⁰And the ransomed of the Lord shall return
    and come to Zion with singing;
everlasting joy shall be upon their heads;
    they shall obtain joy and gladness,
    and sorrow and sighing shall flee away. (NRSV)

 

         The more I wrestle with varieties of biblical texts, the more deeply I hear a single voice speaking at the heart of them all. Just as the language of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit affirms the presence of one God, the language of Incarnation, Death, and Resurrection affirms the same whirling mystery of grace.

         The Incarnation suggests that human beings are born out of an eternal union with the Creator. We can deny or mask our oneness with God, but we cannot destroy it. It is our “original blessing,” and it cannot be undone by any talk of “original sin.”

Taken seriously, the truth of humankind’s God-imaged selves can affect everything we say and do. It can move us toward excitement and delight. It can motivate us toward the blessed hunger and thirst for righteousness (Matthew 5:3-11) that leads us to work for God’s holy justice for all.

A healthy understanding of Incarnation can even help us celebrate things like birthdays and Christmas. When a gift reflects incarnate awareness, it reveals in both giver and receiver the eternally-beloved person God sees. So, maybe the gift of colored pencils and a sketch pad energizes a shy child for creative expression and self-understanding. Maybe a camera helps an older person to share the world as their eyes of experience and wisdom have learned to see it.

The best gifts tell you that the giver celebrates your existence and regards you, yourself, as a gift. And if God gives us life, what does that say about who God is and how God loves?

As the ultimate affirmation of Incarnation, Resurrection is a whole different animal. Resurrection completely rearranges our human being. As a gift given to restore our primordial and eternal union with God, Resurrection releases us into God’s realm of unbounded mercy and love. That’s why Resurrection and forgiveness are so intimately related. To forgive and to be forgiven is to shed a deadly burden that diminishes our lives, a burden that buries us in tombs of regret or vengeance.

Now, yes, it is easier to forgive when the other admits offense. The scandal of the gospel, though, is that God’s forgiveness in Christ is preemptive; it precedes our repentance. And while such grace is entirely loving to the one forgiven, forgiveness between human beings is also entirely liberating to the one who forgives. Preemptive forgiveness says, Regardless of anything you do or don’t do, I will not allow anything to impede my joy. So that at least I may live fully and freely, I forgive you.

I understand that there are wounds so deep that preemptive forgiveness can become impossible. In those cases, I think one starts by simply asking for the gracious strength not to seek vengeance. By saying No to revenge and Not yet to forgiveness, we acknowledge and live in the tension of the ongoing struggle between our destructive impulses and our elemental need for relationship.

Forgiving and being forgiven both involve the same painful death—the death of pride. Proud hearts beat with a living death, and can neither let go of grudges nor admit error. Nonetheless, I trust that the God of grace always sees those hearts not as lost causes, but as places of potential resurrection. Remember what Isaiah says: “The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad; the desert shall rejoice and blossom; like the crocus it shall blossom abundantly.”

         Incarnation, Death, and Resurrection have something else in common. They reveal the fullness of their transforming power not inside some tomb or sanctuary, but out there—in the world, in the midst of day-to-day life.

 

¹³Now on that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem, ¹⁴and talking with each other about all these things that had happened. ¹⁵ While they were talking and discussing, Jesus himself came near and went with them, ¹⁶ but their eyes were kept from recognizing him. ¹⁷ And he said to them, “What are you discussing with each other while you walk along?”

They stood still, looking sad. ¹⁸ Then one of them, whose name was Cleopas, answered him, “Are you the only stranger in Jerusalem who does not know the things that have taken place there in these days?”

¹⁹ He asked them, “What things?”

They replied, “The things about Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, ²⁰ and how our chief priests and leaders handed him over to be condemned to death and crucified him. ²¹ But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since these things took place. ²² Moreover, some women of our group astounded us. They were at the tomb early this morning, ²³ and when they did not find his body there they came back and told us that they had indeed seen a vision of angels who said that he was alive. ²⁴ Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said, but they did not see him.” 

²⁵ Then he said to them, “Oh, how foolish you are and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared! ²⁶ Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and then enter into his glory?” ²⁷ Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures.

²⁸ As they came near the village to which they were going, he walked ahead as if he were going on. ²⁹ But they urged him strongly, saying, “Stay with us, because it is almost evening and the day is now nearly over.”

So he went in to stay with them. ³⁰ When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. ³¹ Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him, and he vanished from their sight.

³² They said to each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?” ³³ That same hour they got up and returned to Jerusalem, and they found the eleven and their companions gathered together.

³⁴ They were saying, “The Lord has risen indeed, and he has appeared to Simon!” ³⁵ Then they told what had happened on the road and how he had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread. (NRSV)

 

         As Cleopas and his companion travel the road toward Emmaus, their destination is simply geographical. They have yet to experience their own transforming deaths—their own Friday. 

Enter the resurrected Jesus, who shows up as a random stranger.

         “We had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel,” says Cleopas.

         Wow, says Jesus. You sure are slow to die to that which blinds you to truth.

         Now, let’s be easy on Cleopas. It’s no small thing to die to the generations-long expectation that God’s messianic plan includes military conquest. Indeed, just two verses after speaking of the desert blooming, Isaiah says that God “will come…with terrible recompense…[to] save you.’” Cleopas represents everyone who expects shock-and-awe from God, and it’s hard to let that hope die in order to follow Jesus, who teaches non-violence, forgiveness, humility, and compassion.

         As the three men walk, Jesus reviews the story of God’s involvement in and for the Creation. In doing so, he gives these pride-bound disciples another run at Friday, another chance to die to all that their well-intentioned doctrines, and all that their years of frustration and suffering have led them to believe about God’s activity in the world.

         Then, when Jesus breaks bread with them, their eyes [are] opened, and they [recognize] him. They see him through the spectacles of community and grace.

         When Emmaus is our destination, geography defines our journey. And maybe it begins that way, but Cleopas and his companion don’t stay in Emmaus. After their burning-heart experience, and after the revelation of the elusive, here-and-there risen Christ, they hurry back to Jerusalem, giddy with wonder and excitement. So, the road they travel is The Road to Emmaus and Back—a seven-mile hike that ends at dusk, only to turn them around and send them back those same seven miles, in the dark.

         As a Friday-to-Sunday experience, the Emmaus journey is the perennial passage of Incarnation, Death, and Resurrection. The startling newness that begins in Emmaus returns us to day-to-day reality where we embody the news of Resurrection by sharing our own transformed selves.

         To share ourselves is to live in community. And the body of Christ lives, moves, and has its being in the world through community. As Trinity, God is community. Joining this holy and dynamic kinship, we enter God’s presence. We experience the guidance of the Holy Spirit. And newly-birthed into the sacredness of our God-imaged selves, we follow the risen Christ wherever he leads.

         One spiritual teacher says, “I believe that the Christian faith is saying that the pattern of transformation is always death transformed, not death avoided…That is always a disappointment to humans,” he says, “because we want…transformation without cost or surrender.”¹

         On the road to Emmaus, we try to avoid God’s death-transforming grace. And Emmaus can be anywhere—in front of some screen or other distraction, in our fears and resentments, at the bottom of a bottle.

In Emmaus, though, death is transformed through the sharing of fellowship, stories, and meals. And in that communion, God strips us of our comfortable but selfish assumptions, then turns us, and sends us back out to do what we could not do before—begin learning to live according the radical grace of Christ, from whom we were born and into whom, through the power of Resurrection, we are being constantly re-born.

 

¹https://email.cac.org/t/ViewEmail/d/E159479F503F99402540EF23F30FEDED/CAEF12FB6B3D7B5544D0DD5392A9C75A

Endings and Beginnings (Newsletter Article)

 Dear Friends,

         When one door closes, another one opens, says the old adage. And it seems as true as it does trite. Mostly.

“In my end is my beginning,” writes E. S. Eliot in The Four Quartets.

         “If we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his,” says Paul to the Romans. (Romans 6:5)

         They’re all saying something similar. And this wisdom isn’t limited to our own spiritual tradition. Throughout the ages, humankind has shared the experience that endings and beginnings hold much in common.

         From the cross, as death engulfs him, Jesus says, “It is finished.” And with that, the earthly Jesus dies. His limp corpse is removed from the cross and placed in a tomb, which is then sealed with a huge rock. He is only thirty-ish. Not that old by first-century standards, and not old at all by today’s. So, it would seem that his life is cut short. But is it?

Scripture and the witness of 2000 years of disciples would argue that as short as Jesus’ life may have been, it is complete. And when something reaches completion, the implication points toward a deeper level of significance that if something is simply declared to be over. That’s why a given semester may be over, while one completes a degree.

When Jesus says, It is finished, both his ministry and his life are complete. His tomb, then, becomes a kind of cul-de-sac, a place of turning around. Or as one person said, Jesus didn’t come out of the tomb so much as he went slap through it. (I honestly don’t recall who said that, but it was likely Richard Rohr.) So again, Jesus’ end and his new beginning are, simultaneously, distinct and indistinct.

          With a fatalistic, tongue-in-cheek snort, some folks like to say that the only certain things in life are death and taxes. In matters of faith, we can’t claim much in the way of certainties, but with the fullest of trust, we call Resurrection our “sure and certain hope.” When making that affirmation of faith, we’re declaring that, finally, regardless of circumstances, the goodness, justice, and love of God will prevail. And this hope empowers us for living in the here-and-now according to those resurrecting attributes of God. They allow us to see in all endings, unexpected changes, or turns of events possibilities for God to reveal some new aspect of God’s realm of grace.

         While these are uncertain times, hasn’t every era been rife with its own triggers for grief, suspicion, and doubt? And through them all, the proclamations of Incarnation and Resurrection remain our sustaining hope. If God Incarnate overcomes death, we can overcome whatever painful realities life throws at us. For there is no end that God cannot transform into a new beginning.

 

Blessings and Peace,

         Pastor Allen

Terror and Amazement (Easter 11:00am Sermon)

Terror and Amazement 

Mark 16:1-8

Allen Huff

Jonesborough Presbyterian Church

3/31/24

Easter 2024

 

When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of James and Salome bought spices, so that they might go and anoint him. ²And very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb. ³They had been saying to one another, “Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb?” 

⁴When they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had already been rolled back. ⁵As they entered the tomb, they saw a young man dressed in a white robe sitting on the right side, and they were alarmed. ⁶But he said to them, “Do not be alarmed; you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been raised; he is not here. Look, there is the place they laid him. ⁷But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you.

 ⁸So they went out and fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them, and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid. (NRSV)

 

         The women “fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them.”

         I tried to remember the last time I felt genuinely seized by spiritual terror andamazement. And I couldn’t think of anything. I’ve been hearing the Easter story for 61 years. And I’ve been preaching it for fifteen days shy of 28 years. And when trying to come up with yet another Easter sermon, I identify far more with the women as they approach the tomb than when they run away from it.

Approaching this familiar story, I wonder who will roll away the stone of my increasingly unexpectant heart—a heart that often feels like it’s trying only to freshen up a corpse, trying to put spices on an old, old story entombed in an old, old book.

According to the ancient custom, women bore primary responsibility for swaddling the bodies of the dead with spices to fend off the stench of decomposition. And according to Mark, the three women tasked with washing and embalming Jesus’ body knew that they couldn’t get in the tomb on their own. So, why didn’t they bring someone to help them?

Well, embalming a body may have been a routine practice, but given the women’s love for Jesus, given their weariness from grief, and given the condition of Jesus’ body when he died, (I mean, Friday was a bad day, wasn’t it?) maybe they really wanted not to get inside.

Perhaps more pastors than will admit it approach the beloved texts of Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost with a similar weariness. Trying to preach these same stories year after year can be depleting. One possible problem, though, especially at Easter, is that we keep trying to say something inspiring, comforting, and “uplifting.” And what if we’re missing the point? What if a good Easter sermon actually causes “terror and amazement”?

Now, there are more than enough preachers who terrorize with condemnation. It seems to me, though, that being terrified not to believe in Jesus, for fear of going to hell, is as far from the terror Mark refers to as the love one claims to have for their favorite pizza place is far from God’s eternal love for the Creation.

Mark helps us to understand the terror the women feel by adding amazement into the mix. The women’s terror and amazement well up from the same place. It’s not a selfish terror. It’s not a fear for their own lives or property. It’s the ecstatic terror of realizing that the Creation—even in all of its agony—is, nonetheless, saturated with the beauty, the holiness, and the feral creativity of God.

Perhaps the terror and amazement of the women on that first Easter morning accurately illustrates the truest and deepest sense of the word joy. Joy is so much more than mere happiness. And it is light years beyond feelings of personal comfort and satisfaction. While joy can be expressed in our shouts of Alleluia, it can also be expressed in the grief and tears of those who mourn for the world because deep in their hearts they trust that violence, hatred, apathy, poverty, and all other forms of suffering run counter to the loving justice and righteousness God reveals in Jesus. These very real evils must be confronted and defied. And, in the big picture, they can also be survived because, ultimately, they will be defeated. In his profound eloquence, Martin Luther King, Jr. affirmed this when he said, “Right temporarily defeated is stronger than evil triumphant.”

In that same vein, Resurrection declares that death is no ending. Indeed, death heralds the new thing God begins while defeating evil. Maybe that is what should terrify and amaze us: All that stuff Jesus said

about the kingdom of God having drawn near,

about forgiveness,

about losing one’s life to find it,

about feeding the hungry,

about clothing the naked,

about encountering greatness through humble service,

about loving God, neighbor, and enemy,

Jesus meant all of that! And that means that his disciples are to embody it in their lives. And Resurrection empowers us for living that truth.

So, the terrifying and amazing thing about Easter isn’t the resurrection itself, but the implications of Resurrection. If Jesus has been raised from the dead, then we really can, as Paul says, “walk in newness of life.” (Romans 6:4c) If we take Easter seriously, terror and amazement will seize us with joy because we are freed, here and now, to live a new and different life, a life of full kinship with Christ. A life of discipleship in which we fearlessly confront the daunting tasks of facing down all the violent Caesars who traffic in Creation-diminishing greed, waste, prejudice, and in the shameless and self-serving use of violent power—and the shameless and self-serving use of faith traditions! Resurrection life opens us to the holiness in ourselves, in the people around us, and in the natural world. It opens us to the hope of seeing the Creation transformed through the regenerating love of God.

We carry around with us all manner of “spices:” Our sanctuaries and furniture, suits and ties, theological degrees and doctrines, vestments and investments, policies and protocols. And how much of that stuff is just burial spice? How much of our attention do those things divert from the people Jesus cares for and calls us to care for? And when we enter worship, is there some stone that we secretly hope is still blocking the tomb? Still keeping a kingdom life at bay so we can remain comfortable and, frankly, un-amazed?

Brothers and Sisters, I hope this terrifies us: Whether we like it or not, the stone has been moved for us. Life is not what it was. It’s not measured in years. It doesn’t end in death. We won’t experience satisfaction, much less wholeness, by owning, dominating, or even knowing anything. When we follow Jesus, all of our “spices” are, ultimately, useless.

And let this amaze us, as well: There is nothing to fear. Come what may—tears and laughter, feast and famine, summer and winter—our lives are defined by joy. They’re defined by faith, hope, and love. They’re defined by what we share, not what we keep. God gives us our identities and purposes by calling us to follow the Risen Jesus. And wherever we go next, whatever changes we encounter, he’s already there, “just as he told [us].”

Go (Easter Sunrise Sermon)

 “Go”

Matthew 28:1-20

Allen Huff

Jonesborough Presbyterian Church

3/31/24

Easter Sunrise 2024

 

After the sabbath, as the first day of the week was dawning, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. ²And suddenly there was a great earthquake; for an angel of the Lord, descending from heaven, came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. ³His appearance was like lightning, and his clothing white as snow. ⁴For fear of him the guards shook and became like dead men.

⁵But the angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid; I know that you are looking for Jesus who was crucified. ⁶He is not here; for he has been raised, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay. ⁷Then go quickly and tell his disciples, ‘He has been raised from the dead, and indeed he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him.’

“This is my message for you.”

⁸So they left the tomb quickly with fear and great joy, and ran to tell his disciples.

⁹Suddenly Jesus met them and said, “Greetings!” And they came to him, took hold of his feet, and worshiped him.

¹⁰Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me.”

¹¹While they were going, some of the guard went into the city and told the chief priests everything that had happened. ¹²After the priests had assembled with the elders, they devised a plan to give a large sum of money to the soldiers, ¹³telling them, “You must say, ‘His disciples came by night and stole him away while we were asleep.’ ¹⁴If this comes to the governor’s ears, we will satisfy him and keep you out of trouble.”

¹⁵So they took the money and did as they were directed. And this story is still told among the Judeans to this day.

¹⁶ Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. ¹⁷When they saw him, they worshiped him, but they doubted. ¹⁸And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. ¹⁹Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit ²⁰and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” (NRSV)

 

         If Mark’s gospel ends more abruptly than the other canonical gospels, Matthew’s gospel comes in a close second.

Matthew follows his resurrection account with two vignettes. In the first, the guards report what they saw to the chief priests. In the second, Jesus makes his lone resurrection appearance to the eleven remaining disciples, during which he gives the Great Commission. Turn the page, and you’re in Mark’s gospel.

         In Matthew, as in Mark, there’s no reflection on the resurrection. Jesus doesn’t eat fish as he does in Luke, nor does he give Peter, the three-time denier, a chance to reaffirm his love and commitment, as he does in John.

In Matthew, the angel says to the women, Go to Galilee. Jesus will meet you and the others there. The angel’s command to Go sends the women and the disciples to Jesus who, himself says, Go. Go into all the world and make disciples.

         The Go spoken by the angel and the Go spoken by the resurrected Christ echo the Go that God says to Abram in Genesis 12. And Go means to pick up wherever some apparently-dead-end story has left off and keep following wherever the path of grace may lead. Go, because God calls you to go. Go, because God can be trusted. Go, because God is leading us deeper into relationship with God, with each other, and with the Creation.

         Make disciples, says Jesus. And there’s really only one way to do that faithfully. To make disciples, one must learn to live as a disciple because discipleship is less the words we say than the lives we live. So, disciples are made not by reciting catechisms but by emulating actions of the heart. Disciples are made not by imposing doctrine but by inviting participation in lives of trust, compassion, justice, and peacemaking.

         The two stories that follow Matthew’s resurrection account also set up an instructive contrast. In the first, the guards are justifiably afraid for their lives. All they could say, that their commanding officers would believe, was that the earth shook, a ghost appeared, and they fell asleep on duty. So, they sneak over to the chief priests and tell them the story first.

We got you, say the priests. Tell your superior officers that you fell asleep, and Jesus’ disciples stole the body. Here, if you take this money and promise to tell this story, we will make sure you don’t get crucified yourselves.

And that’s where that version of the story stops—with a logical, plausible, and comfortable dead end. Just sweep it under the rug and go back to the way things were.

In the second account, Jesus appears briefly to the disciples to say, in effect, The story is not over. In fact, it’s just beginning. And now, you are my hands and feet, so keep going. Keep doing what I’ve modeled for you. Keep living through love. Keep welcoming people into community—especially those whom no one else welcomes. Keep helping those who cannot help themselves. And wherever the work of discipleship takes you, just go.

Discipleship has brought us out here this morning where the sky is brightening, the birds are singing, the spring flowers are blooming, the pollen is driving many of us crazy, and life in all its overwhelming beauty and tragedy is happening around us as we speak.

This moment, though, is but a respite on a journey. We’re here not to end, and certainly not to complete anything. We’re here to be reminded that none of us have the final word on anything. “All authority in heaven and on earth” belong to the risen Christ. As his disciples, our purpose is always bigger than our own communities, always beyond the walls of any building, because, as Jesus says in Matthew 25, true discipleship happens out here, among “the least of these my brothers and sisters.”

Maybe the operative word for Easter isn’t He is risen! so much as it is, Go!

Think about it:

It was resurrection faith that sent Abram and Sarai on their way when God said Go.

It was resurrection faith that gave Joseph strength to overcome his brothers’ betrayal, then to forgive them and welcome them into Egypt.

It was resurrection faith that sent Moses back to Egypt for his Hebrew family, and resurrection faith that helped him to guide them through the wilderness.

It was resurrection faith that turned David from an adulterer and a murderer into a poet and a leader.

It was resurrection faith that gave Mary and Joseph the courage to parent their remarkable child.

It was resurrection faith that made Peter, James, and John bold enough to drop their nets and follow Jesus.

It was resurrection faith that gave Jesus of Nazareth the will to reject selfishness and fear during his temptation and, then, to Go and live a life that was truly divine.

And the resurrection on Easter actually follows all of those witnessing events and reveals itself as the authority behind all that is faithful, forgiving, loving, and real in this world. Resurrection is the cycle of beginnings, endings, and new beginnings. Resurrection is everything in every given moment that gives us courage and hope to keep Going.

At Easter, Jesus meets us, again—wherever our Galilee may be—and reminds us that there is no end that is not also, in some way, a revitalizing new beginning. And he sends us out, as disciples to make disciples, as ones who are being redeemed to live as signs God’s redeeming grace in the world.

And it is through our new and renewing resurrection faith that, on the authority of the risen Christ, we embrace his call to Go, to be disciples and to make disciples, in this world, right now, and to do that with his humility, gratitude, generosity, joy, and love.