RESURRECTIONS, MOMS, AND THE HOLY SPIRIT

The Seventh and last Sunday of Easter in 2016 is Mother's Day, May 8, in American culture.  The next Sunday after that is Pentecost, a day in history that rocked the world, the day God poured out His Holy Spirit on His Church.  Resurrection … Mothers … Holy Spirit. 

Quite a combination, don't you think? But then, the story of Jesus' earthly days begins with His mother giving birth to Him in the little town of Bethlehem.  It was a supernatural conception, a very natural delivery, and a bewildering and staggering event, gone unnoticed in a world that didn't yet have social media.  Did I say "staggering?"  Martin Luther said, "The mystery of the humanity of Christ, that He sunk Himself into our flesh, is beyond all human understanding."  Maybe "staggering" isn't a strong enough word. 

Yet, this is our story.  God came into His world and initiated a journey that would lead to the death of the child whose birth we celebrate at Christmas.  But babies don't stay babies, and little boys grow up.  Thirty years later Jesus takes His place in the world of the Middle East, and inundates the life of God into the very fiber of humanity.

As the Church moves through the Easter season on Her way to the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, we do well to remind ourselves that what God does He does in our very real world, and of His own initiative.  He was born in a very real manger, to a very real mom.  He suffered on a very real cross.  He was placed into a very real tomb.  A very real rock was moved away on the morning of His resurrection.  He revealed himself to a very real and bewildered woman at the tomb.  He drew near His very real disciples and showed them His very real wounds.  When He ascended back to heaven He poured out His very real, and Holy, Spirit.

Now we are called to live in our world, filled with Holy Spirit.  We take what has been given us in our times and we yield it all back to God.  The life of God takes up residence in us, and forever after this indwelling begins, we live and move and have our being in God.  The natural stuff of our lives is baptized in the Holy Spirit, and we offer up our lives to live in light of the magnificent and life changing grace of God. 

The world is still real, life is still dangerous, and suffering still finds ways to raise its ugly head in a thousand ways.  Yet, God's lavished grace comes into our stories and establishes a stronghold in our lives, a stronghold built upon the cross and resurrection of Jesus.  A thousand times the mountains may slip into the heart of the sea, a thousand times the waters of the sea may roar and foam, and a thousand times the devastation may be so real that it can be said, "the mountains quake."  Still they do not destroy us because, "God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble" (see Psalm 46:1-3).  How safe a refuge?  How strong a strength?  The kind of refuge and strength revealed when Jesus was raised up from the dead, and then shares that resurrection power with His people, in the abiding presence of the Holy Spirit.

He is risen and He is Lord of all.

HE LIVES WITHIN MY HEART

On this fifth Sunday of Easter I am wondering if the full meaning of Jesus' resurrection has dawned in on us yet.  I am wondering if the full meaning of the resurrection can even be realized by our minds in a broken and splintered world. 

Talk about a mind-bender, ""He suffered death and was buried, and rose again on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures" (Nicene Creed).  The apostle Peter said it this way, "Jesus…you nailed to a cross by the hands of godless men and put Him to death.  But God raised Him up again, putting an end to the agony of death, since it was impossible for Him to be held in its power" (Acts 2:2-4).  The apostle's Creed reads this way, "Jesus Christ…suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried; He descended into hades; the third day He rose again from the dead…"

How does one truly get one's mind around all this?  That Jesus suffered, died, and was raised again is a mammoth size declaration.  It's a game-changer.  If it is true then every other truth in the world is subjugated to this one truth.   If it isn't true then, with the apostle Paul, we must say, "Our preaching is vain, your faith also is vain…your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins" (I Corinthians 15:14, 17).  If it is true then, with Thomas, We must bow before Him and declare, "My Lord and my God!" (John 20:28)

Many of us have chosen the way of Thomas.  We've seen the risen Jesus at work in our world, at work in our lives, and everyday the words that roll off our lips are, "My Lord and my God."  The anthem of our lives is,

I serve a risen Savior He’s in the world today.

I know that He is living, whatever men may say.

I see His hand of mercy; I hear His voice of cheer;

And just the time I need Him He’s always near.

He lives, He lives, Christ Jesus lives today!

He walks with me and talks with me along life’s narrow way.

He lives, He lives, salvation to impart!

You ask me how I know He lives? He lives within my heart.

("He Lives," by Alfred H. Ackley, 1933)

In the early 1920s Communist leader Nikolai Bukharin was sent from Moscow to Kiev to address an anti-God rally. For an hour he abused and ridiculed the Christian faith until it seemed as if the whole structure of belief was in ruins. Then questions were invited. An old Orthodox Church priest rose and asked to speak. He turned, faced the people, and gave the Easter greeting, "He is risen!" Instantly the assembly rose to its feet and the reply came back loud and clear, "He is risen indeed!"  (Today in the Word, September, 1989, p. 8.)

A TESTIMONY

At this late date in my life I have a confession.  To all you who are super saints and figured this out long ago, I apologize.  For those of you who might daily wrestle with what it means to be a follower of Jesus, and how to actually live at that level, maybe you will relate.  Here is the confession: Living in Jesus so that He actually holds authority in my life is a tricky business for me.  Actually being the person Jesus is calling me to be is a great mystery to this heart of mine. Getting out of the way so that Jesus can be the Way is easier for me to talk about than to do.

John the Baptist said of Jesus and himself, "He must increase; I must decrease." Paul wrote, "Be transformed by the renewing of your mind." A thousand times I have confessed that the "want to" is there.  I just have a weakness in knowing how to get it from "want to" to really doing it.

The apostle Paul said, "Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus," and, again, I say the "want to" is there but the doing it falls short.  Often I have prayed,

God help me.  How shall I actually live the life to which you have called me?  How do I let the Holy Spirit help me to set apart Christ as Lord in me?  How do I take what it means to be me and let "me" go to God?  What does it mean and how do I do it, take up my cross and follow Jesus to wherever it means to follow Him?

When Paul was wrestling with his own sin, brokenness, and humanity he said, "O wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from the body of this death?"  Then he said, 'Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord."

The truth is that I have decided to follow Jesus because of His extended grace and mercy to me, and I have absolutely no desire to turn back, turn away, or let go of the awesome thing God is doing in my life.  However, I refuse to admit to something that might make me appear to be more than I am.  To that end I confess my weakness and admit to my humanity.  I don't know how to pray except to say, "God, be God in me."  Your will be in me as it is in heaven."  This is all I know to pray, "Jesus be the Lord of all matters that pertain to me."

A wonderful thing about following Jesus is that there is never a need to beat up on your self.   In Jesus we see that God is not a "beating up" God. Rather, He is the God who, in great compassion and tenderness calls out to us, "Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give your rest" (Matt. 11:28).  A thousand times or more God has reached out into my life with these powerful and almost irresistible words, and every time I have found that God is my Advocate not my opponent. 

Thomas Merton has a wonderful prayer for folks like me, who are probably harder on ourselves than God is 

“My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it. Therefore will I trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.” -- Thomas Merton, Thoughts in Solitude

 

"I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you."  Is that the kind of God you serve?  He is not a measuring up God.  He is the God of all grace who captivates our imagination when He demonstrates His love for us by dying for us "while we were yet sinners" (Romans 5:8). What kind of God would do that?  In our world the gods don't die for people, people die for the gods.  That's just how it works.  Yet, in Jesus we see a way of being that calls the old order into question and manifests in the life of the folks, immeasurable grace and mercy.

I may not be perfect but in a grace I don't understand I am saved.  I am being redeemed.  I am in the midst of a new life created in the infinite imagination of God who raised Jesus from the dead and who dares give life to this old mortal body of mine.  Who would have thought it?

At this late date in my life I have another confession – JESUS IS LORD.