St. John Studies

Words come and go.

By that I mean that the times we live in can create words, the technology, the culture, the politics of the time. Today, America is going through a time when people line up against each other, democrat vs republican, liberal vs conservative, Fox viewer vs MSNBC viewer.

Tribal

That’s the word that is so popular today. The word “tribe” has been around since Roman times. It meant a division within a state. Over time, tribe came to mean a social group existing before the development of a state, distinct people who depend on the land for their livelihood, self-sufficient to the point that they were not part of a national society.*
Today, it has taken on the meaning that a person belongs to a tribe and all people within that tribe are without fault. Folks belonging to other “tribes” are wrong, misguided, dangerous to be around, illogical etc.etc.

Mark Labberton addresses tribes in his book The Dangerous Act of Loving Your Neighbor. He cites Philippians 2: 10-11: “At the name of Jesus every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, every tongue should confess that Jesus is Lord, to the glory of God, the Father.”

Every knee should bend. Did you get it?

There is no group that is right or wrong. God supersedes all the divisions that man creates.

None of us is perfect. None of us have the view that God has. We all get caught up in the happenings of the day. We all forget that for Christians, the name of Jesus is what names us. We forget that our true identity should be all wrapped up in Jesus Christ. For people who don’t identify with Christianity, that is ok. They can claim that their identity is not wrapped up in Jesus and if they are not believers, their point is well taken. But what about the tribes that are occurring today in the Christian community, Christian pitted against Christian according to “tribal guidelines.”

Labberton states “the Jesus of the Gospels transforms lives by truth-telling….The biblical purpose of the revelation of this ultimate reality is not to breed passivity now but to shape life today in light of the fact that this is creation’s kingdom future.” This is the mission of the Christian; to love the Lord with all your heart, soul and mind and love your neighbor as yourself. This tells us what matters in life. Labberton has written a book several years before today’s cultural climate but he states his case in the words: “our mission…distinguishes the tribe from the kingdom” and makes loving God and our neighbors a top priority. This mission helps us “recognize the urgent and define the essential.”

“Tribal” behavior in our culture is a word that has come and I hope the current meaning goes. Life is too difficult for our society to be divided up into pockets of like-minded people who denigrate other groups. I live in a state in the United States that has a motto which encourages cooperative behavior. Kentucky’s motto is “United We Stand; Divided We Fall”. I wonder if the same motto should be adopted by all people in the Christian community.

Hold on, maybe we have a motto already, one that fits perfectly with the first and second commandment.

It is found in John 13:34 and it goes like this: “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.”

Enough said…

*Wikipedia “The history of the word tribe”

It’s that time of the year. The days are longer, the temperatures are warmer and the dirt has a rich aromatic smell. I find myself drawn outside, wanting to make things grow in the yard. I want to make things beautiful but to get them beautiful, I have to get dirt and mud all over my legs, arms and hands. I have to get dirty and not mind it.

Pastor Labberton* says as much about the Christian. The Christian has to be able to get dirty and not mind it.

Recently, my adult Sunday school class has been studying the Sermon on the Mount. We often take Biblical occurrences and put a twenty-first century spin on them. I think most of my class envisions Jesus going to the Mount, surrounded by some believers and some curiosity seekers and He is preaching His message to change the world. He speaks with authority which is a surprise. The people do not expect his message to be so strong. “When Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were amazed at His teaching, because He taught as one who had authority, and not as their teachers of the law” [Matthew 7: 28-29].

Then Jesus came down from the Mount and did something very unusual. He talked to a leper, He touched the leper and the leper was healed. We picture Jesus as a Holy person, special in His words, His appearance and His ways. Yet here He is, touching an untouchable person, crossing the great divide to help one who really needed a healing.

In the process, He got His hands dirty. He behaved in a way that challenged the status quo of His society. Everyone knew not to touch a leper. Leviticus 13 has extensive regulations regarding leprosy, 1, 843 words. The bottom line is this: “Now the leper on whom the sore is, his clothes shall be torn and his head bare; and he shall cover his mustache, and cry, ‘Unclean! Unclean!’ He shall be unclean. All the days he has the sore he shall be unclean. He is unclean, and he shall dwell alone; his dwelling shall be outside the camp.” The life of the leper was the life of an outcast.

When Jesus did this, He was sending a strong message, that if there is a need you should meet it. It is Jesus acting out what He has stated in Luke 14:5. When your son falls in a well or your ox falls in a well, won’t you get it out? The answer is yes, even if it is on the Sabbath.

When the leper approached Jesus, he said “Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.” Jesus reached out His hand and touched the man. “I am willing,” He said. “Be clean!” There was no hesitation. Jesus acted.

Earlier in the Sermon, Jesus told the multitude that we are to be holy, perfect as God is perfect. That admonition is such a challenge. Most of us know we fall short of perfect and even if we worked hard to be perfect, what does perfect look like? Perfect looks like Jesus touching an unclean person.

Sunday a lay speaker preached at our church. Over the years she has been on many mission trips to Costa Rica. She has described her trips, the rough terrain, the poverty, the lack of clean housing. She has taken her time to go there to help those less fortunate. She has chosen to leave her clean environment, running water, air conditioning and all the comforts that we have and go to a place where people are struggling to better themselves. Where people have a hunger for God.

Labberton comments on missionaries, feeling that they are not afraid to get dirty. “They encounter God in the dirt of it all. When they show up for forgotten people, it may not smell good. When they develop honest enough friendships in such settings, they learn that the aroma of their own life isn’t neutral or savory all the time either. Sometimes it takes being in the smelliest or dirtiest place to discover human dignity despite our biases. God’s presence amid the poor” [198].

God’s presence amid the dirt.

*author of The Dangerous Act of Loving Your Neighbor

As we get closer to finishing the discussion of Mark Labberton’s The Dangerous Act of Loving Your Neighbor, Pastor Labberton begins to call us to imagine what God sees when He looks at us.

Maybe this is the beginning of transformation: “taking stock”.

Maybe for us to adopt God’s view, it can be compared to that sideways look in the three way mirror in the clothing store when we see an angle that is not the straight-on look we are used to seeing. It can be a bit of a shock but it is the truth nevertheless. We are seeing parts that we are not used to seeing and we may not like what we are seeing, but those parts are there.

Labberton has written throughout his book about our distorted view of ourselves, that view that excuses our inaction to help our neighbors, that view that looks right into the mirror and “good Christian” looks back at us when maybe that is not quite the image we should be seeing. The problem is that without the inspiration from Jesus and God, “Left to our own devices, human beings feebly and anemically reflect the heart of God” [Labberton, 191].

Yes, we have reached the point in the book when we have to be honest. Maybe you are feeling like you don’t do enough to help your neighbors. What do you need to do to get that passion for helping others? What do you have to do to have just a small part of the heart of God? What do we need to do to “do justice, love kindness and walk humbly with our God [Micah 6:8]? You see, God’s ways are not our ways; God’s heart is not our heart. Sadly, our heart is horribly distracted by the world; we most often move toward those who have stature and away from those who do not. What can we do to feel the passion and fight the distraction?

Labberton states that first and foremost, we must know that we have a God who deserves to be worshipped and we need to worship Him. Worship of God is a “central catalyst” in making our heart mirror God’s. Labberton says that “placing ourselves in contexts where we deliberately seek God’s transforming, renewing grace is a vital spiritual exercise. [Worship] means the Holy Spirit can come into our hearts and minds, replacing the mirror by which we see ourselves, one another and God” [193]. The new mirror may be more accurate.

The second place to find passion for helping our neighbors is regular reading of God’s Word. God’s Word can do so much for us. It can inspire us, it can inform us, it can regulate our behavior and yes, it can transform us. Labberton writes about the many stories of Jesus’ effect on those around Him, the fact that His Disciples had hearts that were not like His. They were “scandalized, argumentative, embarrassed, clueless, offended, adamant, dismissive, and distracted” [192]. They were just like we are. But what happened to these men over time? Their hearts moved toward the hearts of the powerless, toward giving grace to those who suffered. The woman with the flow of blood got attention, when they really wanted to run on their way. The tax collector’s invitation was accepted even though he was a socially undesirable man. Jesus spoke truth to the scribes and Pharisees because He was redefining what really matters to God in this world, not the countless man-made rules.  But Jesus was stating practical commandments that made sense in the world of His day, commandments that reflected the grace of God.

Worship and study of God’s Word may inspire people who are already Christian but what can we do to get people who are not Christian see our ways and understand? What can we do to help others to transform from our transformation?

It is our actions. The people of God, filled with the Spirit, seeing and naming the world in God’s compassionate ways can take action. It is our service that will convince others that we are “real”.  Becoming people who help those less fortunate is the biggest action we can achieve. This will convince them that our calling is real.

God sees us and says we are “fearfully and wonderfully made.” Imago Dei is at the core of everyone’s life. Imago Dei means that God shines in everyone’s life. It can be the image that we glimpse in the three-way mirror, what Labberton calls the “marker that makes us unmistakably God’s and unmistakably ourselves” [193].

No one wants to suffer…

Yet suffering comes…

Life is going along, you are busy working, feeling ok about yourself, pursing your goals in life, maintaining relationships with friends and family and suddenly loss and pain enter your life.

Yesterday, I encountered a man who knows me and he inquired about my health. He said “I am glad to see you are up and about”. He knew I had one of those “suffering episodes” myself when I had an accident that resulted in serious fractures. I was fine one minute and the next minute I was damaged.

Loss and pain had entered my life.

Then the man shared with me his own episode. He had a horrible motorcycle wreck which put him in the hospital for six months. After being released, he had a long period of physical therapy, where he was confined to a bed and a wheelchair. Eventually he graduated to a walker and then to a cane. When you look at him today, you would never know that he was ever hurt. He is able to walk and functions like a perfectly healthy person.

Then he said something very important.

“I never see anyone now with a wheelchair, walker or cane, I never see anyone struggling with a mobility challenge that my heart does not go out to them. I know what they are going through.”

The Apostle Paul says something that relates in 2nd Corinthians: “The Father of mercies and the God of all consolation, who consoles us in all of our affliction, so we may be able to console those who are in any affliction with the consolation with which we ourselves are consoled by God.” Paul is saying that a life with Christ is not a life without suffering; indeed he affirms that to follow Christ means that we are going to have to take up our cross. This taking up of our cross means that we will suffer along the way. Pain and loss are just part of life.

The big question is, what are we going to do with our suffering?

Pastor Labberton writes about suffering and compares it to the resurrection: “Just as the resurrection teaches us that death does not have the final word, so we can learn in the midst of pain that it does not have the final word either” [188].

God is not only with us in the good times; He is also with us in the difficult times. When suffering occurs, it does not have to make us more alert to God, more awake to His presence and more sensitive to His working. It can easily go the other way. Some lose their faith in God in the midst of suffering. Someone has to be blamed so let’s blame God. The common question many have is “How can God cause this to happen?”

We can debate all day long about God causing suffering and pain. If you are determined to believe that God causes suffering, that is what you chose to believe. However, I would change the word cause to “allow.” God allows things to happen to us because He has plans for us beyond what we can see in the midst of our suffering.

Before we go any further, I don’t believe it is ever a good idea to say to someone who is in the midst of pain and suffering “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good” [Romans 8:28].

This is a realization that can come later, after time has passed and maybe wounds have healed. Then Pastor Labberton writes that we begin to realize that “what enables us to grow requires having our hearts break. . . .I want to learn from pain what I can, but I do not want to nurse it.”

As Christians, we pray for the cessation of pain and suffering. That is only natural. No one wants to hurt any more than necessary but if God does not take pain and suffering away, then maybe He is using it for a higher purpose. His view is not ours. Maybe He will use it for good in the long term. Maybe He has a plan that is ultimately for our good; we just cannot see it at the time.

John 1 5:14 says “If we ask anything according to His will, He hears us.”

We are so used to thinking that growth only occurs in the good times, but maybe it occurs in the bad. When others have loss and pain, maybe our hearts can go out to them. We can recall our experience and know what they are going through. We can recall our experience and offer them help.

No one wants to suffer…

Yet suffering comes…

The big question is what has God made of your loss and pain?

December 31, 2017…

I have blogged on The Dangerous Act of Loving Your Neighbor since then. That’s not that unusual. If a book has good content, it is easy to put my own personal “spin” on what the author writes about. Mark Labberton certainly has significant content. But chapter after chapter he keeps repeating himself, driving home the point that as Christians we don’t follow the second commandment, you know that one that comes after “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.”

These five months that I have written about helping my neighbor, I have had mixed feelings. Maybe if you have been reading some of my posts, you have had some of those feelings too.

Guilt

I have been confronted by my lack of effort to help people who don’t have as much as I do. It is worse than that. I see people who have needs. I hear of people who have needs. I do nothing. Labberton writes about the comfort level that many of us experience. We like our comfort; it insulates us from the anguish that others feel who don’t have enough resources to live. Some don’t have enough food. Some suffer injustice from our legal system and society. Some are used by others and they find themselves at a loss; they don’t know how to extricate themselves from a horrible lifestyle. When he writes about the needs of those in our world and I just burrow down into my comfortable life, closing my eyes to what is right in front of me. . . I feel guilty.

Do you?

Hypocrisy

God sent His Son to earth to show us how to live. During His ministry, He spent time with what we would call the “outcasts” of society; prostitutes, lepers, tax collectors… the list goes on and on. Jesus showed us what to do and He confronted the religious leaders of His day by His actions. They had self-righteous attitudes that kept “certain people” at a distance. Those people suffered subjugation so that the “religious leaders” could be seen as more Godly. Then Jesus arrived on the scene with His message “Healthy people don’t need a doctor — sick people do.” Then He added, “Now go and learn the meaning of this Scripture: ‘I want you to show mercy, not offer sacrifices.’ For I have come to call not those who think they are righteous, but those who know they are sinners” [Matt. 9:12-13]. One of the Pharisees was so bold as to ask Jesus “Who is my neighbor?” He left us with one more crucial commandment: to go into all nations to teach and baptize people [Matthew 28:19-20]. Not just those who think, dress, and act like us. All people, of all nations. As I examine my life and what I do, do I line up with Jesus more or do I line up more with the religious leaders of His day? I am afraid I feel like a hypocrite.

Do you?

I do this from time to time. Maybe you do. I think about my life and I wonder why I have been given so much when others have been given so little. I have had close friends tell me that I worry too much about things I should not worry about. “Just go with it…” or “play the hand you have been dealt” or “chill David, it will be ok” are some of the typical responses I get from friends and family who say I “overthink” things. But what if God has given me so much so I can help others? Am I failing in my mission in life if I am not using what I have to aid those less fortunate? Wealth is not something that comes to a person because they believe in God. God’s faithful people may be rich or poor. Wealth is also not a sign of God’s favor. In Jesus’ time, a rich man’s wealth was considered a sign that God had rewarded the person and poverty was a sign that God was punishing a person for sin. Jesus came to rebuke such thinking. What did Jesus advocate about wealth? Wealth is a gift that is to be used for service to the Lord. Read Matthew 25, 1 Timothy 6, Mark 10 and Luke 3 and see what the Bible says about generosity, the sin of arrogance, dishonesty and greed. Jesus goes further by saying that wealth can be dangerous. We all know the scriptures so I will just use the phrases that we know but many of us fail to heed: the eye of the camel, serving two masters, gaining the world and forfeiting the soul, and storing up treasures on earth. I feel fear that what I have has distracted me from what I am supposed to do. I use my money to make my life easier. I turn my back on the needs of others. I fear I am turning my back on God.

Do you have that fear?

No matter what your station in life, Pastor Labberton says the survival of the fittest mentality greatly influences us. We look after our own survival first. He admits that acknowledging our limitations is a reasonable approach to helping our neighbors. We can only do so much.

I am going to finish my thoughts about Pastor Labberton’s book. It won’t be easy. In fact it will be hard. Poor, poor David.

Thirty-one more pages of confrontation.

Thirty-one more pages of looking into my mirror.

Thirty-one more pages of not liking what I am seeing.

“Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly father is perfect” [Matthew 5:48].

Talk about pressure. That’s pressure.

I am going to make some “blanket statements” regarding Matthew 5:48. These kinds of statements always get me in trouble. Notable exceptions to my thoughts exist. Notable people exist and they come forward to poke holes in my statements.

But here they are anyway…

People in American society don’t deal well with the challenge put forth by Jesus in Matthew 5:48. When Jesus calls on us to be perfect, he is reflecting a big goal of God for man and it is what we call a “high bar”. When we think about what God wants, it seems impossible. “How long is it going to take me to get perfect?” “Is there some pill I can take to get that way or maybe some quickie diet that I can start?”

Then it occurs to us that Jesus is not talking about quick; He is talking about a life-long process, for most of us, a lifelong struggle. Pastor Labberton* likes to talk about us getting to the point where we can see the needs of the less fortunate. This new vision does not come overnight, but it stems from a person taking on the title of Christian. Pastor Deron Spoo states that this is just the beginning. “The process of following Jesus daily and allowing His presence to transform our character into something more like His” is the biggest challenge that anyone will ever take on. “The process necessitates a lifetime of labor and unrest. Following Jesus is an out-and-out effort until we drive home the final spike–until we draw our last earthly breath” [243-44]**

It is hard work and let’s be honest; many of us don’t want to work hard. It is a commitment and that is a scary word for many. It also is a frustration because we continually fall short of our goal. One of the most quoted verses of the New Testament comes from Paul in Romans when he says “For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.” That is not a pleasant message. We won’t experience success at this “Christian thing” all the time. We will fail over and over again. Does that sound like something you want to commit to? I don’t know about you but when I think I have made some progress, I find myself falling back into old habits, committing old sins, thinking those same impure thoughts and doing those same ungodly acts.

The only way we pick ourselves up and move forward is the idea of grace and mercy, grace and mercy from our loving Father God.

If I have learned anything over the years, it is that I cannot live this life without God’s tender love. He knows me. He sees my every act. He is aware of my every thought and yet He loves me. When I fail, I am shamed, but he does not want me to remain in a failed state. He wants me to grow closer to Him. He wants me to do what I can do to further His kingdom on earth. He does not want me to grovel and be ineffectual due to my failure. He extends His loving hand to me to pick me up and get me going again.

Grace and mercy…

Labberton says the “only hope for [a] clearer and deeper vision is grace. But we receive such grace usually by acting, asking for it and taking steps to receive it. Admitting our need for a renewed mirror per se does not produce hope. . . .My life has changed and continues to change because of friends and others who are much further down the road than I am. . . .people I know call me into a new and different life.”

It works like that. God alone can inspire us but also God working through people inspires us to be better than we are.

I have been teaching my adult Sunday school class and lately we have been concentrating on The Sermon on the Mount. Jesus says “Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.” In Labberton’s book, he wants us to know that Christians need to “pay it forward.” As God shows us mercy, we should show mercy ourselves. Jesus speaks of the man in Matthew 18 who owes a staggering amount of money and his entire debt is forgiven. Despite this awesome act of grace on the part of his lender, he does not extend the same grace to someone who owes him a much smaller sum of money.
Grace seems to do nothing for him. It does not stimulate him to show grace, to grow, to transform from his greedy state.

He is stuck.

I don’t believe God works that way. I need His grace. I can’t follow His path without it. I need to learn to forgive. I need to choose an attitude of less judgement and more generosity. If He is growing in me, I need to understand the needs of others and put my needs aside.

As I get mercy, I need to show mercy.

Indeed, if I can do that, that is transformation, transforming grace.

*The Dangerous Act of Loving Your Neighbor
**Deron Spoo The Good Book

I moved to where I now live twenty-two years ago. It was a big jump. I moved from what I would call a more urban postage stamp yard to two acres in a more rural setting. In my postage stamp yard, I fell in love with the art of landscaping. There I found that I like making beauty with plants and trees. I like the design of landscaping, the theme of it, the joy I feel when I put a growing thing in the ground and then it starts to grow into a bigger, more attractive part of my overall landscape scheme. The plant literally begins to become part of my vision.

But it takes patience, patience that I sometimes don’t have.

When the seasons change, I sense an urgency to get things done. Each day that passes is a missed opportunity if I don’t make a decision about an area in my yard and begin to work up that area; if I don’t get the process of botanical beautification going.
God doesn’t work like that.

Pastor Mark Labberton’s book* at its core is a book about transformation. He calls all of the Christian community to get on board with helping those who are less fortunate. As I have blogged on the book, I have asked myself the same questions over and over again. What is wrong with me? Why can’t I feel a sense of need to help others? I know the needy people of the world are close to my location; why can’t I make a commitment to help them? Why can’t I love my neighbors? Why can’t I love my neighbor as I love myself?

Maybe I need to wait for God to show me; maybe that is how He works.

Labberton states “God does not. . .look at the human situation and see it with the same urgency that we do. We feel justified in crying ‘Fire! Fire!’ but God apparently does not. Our sense of timeliness, whether on an individual or global scale is baffled at times, angered by this approach to God’s part. . . Our instincts are to want God to take large, dramatic steps to eliminate the possibility of need and suffering…God does not work that way.”

God moves from the particular to the universal.

I have asked my pastor what our church can do to get people to come and worship with us, maybe on a regular basis, maybe to become members, active members. I am always bemused at her response. “They will come when their hearts tell them they need to come.”

She is willing to wait for transformation.

Transformation is not dictated by man’s timing. Transformation is dictated by God’s timing.

Labberton has a wonderful grasp of the Bible. Of course I can’t claim such knowledge. He points to humanity and the promise that God made to His people to change the world. He made a promise to Abram that was based on His vision of what man could be. Abram eventually responded by trusting God, and not taking action on his own. He became Abraham and this began the story of a new people. If you know anything about the Bible, you know that this was the beginning of a tediously slow process of transformation. At times the steps forward were totally obliterated by huge leaps backward.

But God has a vision for man. God knows what he is doing. It is man who is confused. It is man who is frustrated. It is man who looks at the clock and says “When? Now! Just do it!”

Isaiah 55:8 is often quoted when we get confused about God. “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the LORD.” Indeed we don’t think like God. We can’t. From our perspective we may see need, we may feel moved to act, we may look for a way to change things, but all the pieces of the puzzle are not in place yet. God has not put them there for us.

We have to wait a little longer.

I sit at the kitchen table and the beautiful sun is flowing into the wide back door of my home, warming my back. I have the door open and I can hear the sounds of the world waking up. The many birds are singing their songs. A frog is chirping as he adds his melody to the mix. Outside beckons. The grass is growing, the soil is warming and it is time for things to be planted. I feel the itch to get outside and begin my “botanical beautification.”

I will wait. There are other things that must be done before I get there. It will be ok. God will provide opportunity if I just trust Him.

He is a great God, my God of transformation.

*The Dangerous Act of Loving Your Neighbor

I love to post every other day or every three days.  The post “Mr. Williamson” should have been on the blog three days ago but it went on the blog in an unusual place.  I am not sure that it was visible to visitors or followers.  My apologies.  I am putting it up today with the post I wrote this morning.

David Carter

I have been blogging on Mark Labberton’s book The Dangerous Act of Loving Your Neighbor since December 31, 2017 and it has been a challenge. The book constantly challenges Christians to act out our love for others; Jesus speaks so much about how we need to help the less fortunate, who are sometimes our neighbors.

Something very unusual happened in my church yesterday. Maybe it was meant to be.
It was a Sunday devoted to the youth of the church and the Youth Director preached our sermon. Her sermon was risky. It was about how our church needs to “be the church”; we need to invite all people in our doors who need to know Jesus, we need to get out in the community and help those who have needs. Like Labberton, the message challenged us, making a few of us uncomfortable. Get out of your comfort zone; don’t get hung up on traditions. Try new things. Do what is right.

The image she used to organize her message was the 1969 incident at the Cuyahoga River in Cleveland Ohio. The water in the Cuyahoga was so polluted that a tremendous fire accidently erupted in the river; the flames were huge and they were all from the polluted debris in the water. Historical accounts described how high and long-lasting the flames were. It is not every day that we see water on fire. Her message was that the church has polluted the living water of the Bible, the living water Jesus spoke so much about.
As a church, we need to clean up the pollution and get back to the living waters that we all need.

I sing up in the choir so I have a good view of what is going on in the church. I see all the people who are out there, the coming and the going, the ones who are attentive, the ones who are not. I see the visitors, the new faces.

This Sunday as the Youth Director was preaching, a man entered the church. I don’t recall seeing him before. He was an African-American man, maybe sixty years old. He had on a green sports coat and a light open-collared shirt and a light-colored pair of pants. I watched as he came in late and took his seat in a pew near the back. He looked ok but you could tell that his clothing was not the best. He kept drinking from a container in the worship service. I have to admit that I wondered how he would be greeted after worship concluded and it was my sincere hope that he would receive a nice welcome.

The Youth Director concluded her sermon and we began to prepare to take communion but before we got there, the man got up out of his seat and walked to the front of the church. My pastor met him at the front of the church and seemed to know him. She called him Mr. Williamson and said he was from across the street from our church. He had something to say but from my distance, I did not know what he was saying. He addressed the church. It sounded like unintelligible mumbling from where I sat. My pastor patted him on the back and eventually he returned to his seat.

I assisted with serving communion on the right side of the church and Mr. Williamson was on the left side so he did not come to my station. I don’t know if he came forward for communion but I know he could have; my church has open communion.

Of course, I have had service to the poor on my mind since December 31st. Then this sermon from the youth director and then Mr. Williamson. I don’t know why things happen; maybe this was meant to be.

A big question that was on my mind was why did he show up in church on this day? Another question I had was if God sent him on this day; did we do what Christians are supposed to do? Did we extend the warm hand of love and fellowship to this man who maybe did not “fit in” with our church?

What should we have done?

Get over our lack of comfort and be kind to our neighbor. Recognize that this man entered our sanctuary because he needed something, something that we talk about all the time; he needed Jesus. What better place to get closer to Jesus than a church full of Christians worshipping God?

What did he experience? Was it a message polluted by class consciousness? Was it a message polluted by racial division? Did we present him with the polluted behavior of a church gone wrong?

Maybe he received a cup of living water, that pure living water that Jesus spoke about in John 7: “Anyone who believes in Me may come and drink! For the Scriptures declare, ‘Rivers of living water will flow from His heart.’”

I hope so…

I hope we gave it to him and he drank it right down…

That dangerous act of loving our neighbor…

“Jesus relentlessly opens the shutters and says, ‘Look again . . . with my heart and mind.’”*

“You are the light of the world. A city situated on a hill cannot be hidden. No one lights a lamp and puts it under a basket, but rather on a lampstand, and it gives light for all those who are in the house.”**

How are we to make the world a better place? What if you bought in on the idea that our mission in this world is to be a “light”? Where do we start? What are we to do?

Certainly there are many pockets of darkness that need illumination and many people feel they can effect change but what does the Bible say about this subject?***

First of all, the Old Testament tells us the story of the nation of Israel that felt “their God” was the only God. To live apart from other nations was the only way to live. They felt God was only interested in Israel and no one else, or so they believed.

This view conflicted with God’s vision shared with Abram, to create a people who will be blessed and by whom the nations are to be blessed as well. I guess it is only human to focus on the first part of the previous statement because that means Israel is special, but was that God’s intent when the second part of the statement is “the nations are to be blessed as well”?

Labberton says “the particularity of God’s love for Israel is for the sake of the universality of God’s love for the world. . . .God does not shrink to fit Israel’s vision. Israel is called to see the world God’s way.”

In the Old Testament, Israel falls into the “nationalistic myopia” that a king was what they needed. If they could just find a person who could lead them, they could avoid all the distractions of their less-focused theocracy. What happened? God condescended to provide for them a king and they had periods of good fortune and bad fortune based on the vision of the kings.

Then other cultures tried to force their ways on the nation of Israel. Babylon had a set of deities and there was a conflict between the conquering power’s deities and Yahweh. The important question becomes would Israel see the world as Babylon sees the world or would they maintain the all-important focus on Yahweh?

This question was answered as Daniel provided answers to Nebuchadnezzar. “Yahweh alone is the One who could raise up kings and depose them.” When Daniel told this news of the end of Nebuchadnezzar’s kingdom, he was looking beyond the power of Babylon and its tyrant king.

Then another option arose: “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.” Jesus is the fulfillment of the identity of Israel, the blessing that is to be passed on to all nations, to Jerusalem, to Judea, to Samaria and to the ends of the earth. [Acts 1:8].

Jesus offended many people in his short life here on earth. He “ate, healed, named, loved, celebrated, listened, served and died for all the wrong people. The woman at the well knew it. So did Nicodemus. So did Joseph of Arimathea, So did the woman who touched the hem of His garment. So did Matthew. So did the man born blind and his parents. Jesus acted. And that was His problem” [Labberton, 171].

He could have hidden His light. When He lived His spiritual life, He could have had the attitude that God was only for Him and His chosen people. He could have assumed the trappings of “king.” Many in His nation wanted a king to come and overthrow Roman rule. He could have chosen to just blend into the culture, not “rock the boat” so to speak. After all (to use a common phrase) it is much easier to swim with the stream than to swim against it.

He did not do any of the above.

He decided to spend His time noting those who had been ignored by life. The age of people did not bother Him. The lifestyle of people did not bother Him. The circumstances of people did not bother Him. The spiritual conditions of people did not bother Him.
He just shined His light. . . . for all those who are in the house. . .

And He goes further . . .He opens the shutter of the house and says “Look again . . .with My heart and mind.

That’s His answer about how we are supposed to make the world a better place…

If we accept His mission in our life, that’s where we start.

*Mark Labberton, The Dangerous Act of Loving Your Neighbor
**Matthew 5: 14-16
***Apologies to student of The Word…this is a poor summary…