Here we go again. Yesterday I preached from Luke 12.35-38. In this section of scripture Jesus implies the journey will be long. Notice in verse 38 a blessing is pronounced upon those who wait until midnight, or even until dawn, for the master to return. Implied in that verse is the notion that the Christian journey can be long and difficult. I know, many of you have been told being a Christian is exciting. It can be; but frequently it isn’t. Most of the time, it’s hard, and rather undramatic. Just think about community life. Learning to live together as God’s new people isn’t easy. It can be very burdensome. It’s easy to see why many stop striving and others quit altogether. The journey we’re on—a journey shaped by the cross—is not easy. It can be very long.
But the good news is that God has not forgotten us. Creation is not in an endless cycle of sorrow and defeat; it has an end. That means we can participate in a great drama of redemptive history. Our effort is not in vain. We can embrace the future that is coming now. The master will return.
So the call of the text is, be ready, be about the master’s business.
But what does that mean? What does that look like? A few years ago, I used to try to think about it in terms of my own personal purity. Not anymore. For when holiness is reduced to my own personal purity, I become more narcissistic than most of my non-believing friends, constantly worried about whether or not I’m doing the right thing and therefore unable to really be present to those around me. So how can we be ready? The answer to that question is found in the “we.” I don’t know what it means to be ready on my own anymore. In fact, I’m coming to believe that there can be no holiness without the community. According to one writer, Augustine believed one can’t be a saint without others, because the quintessential virtue is charity. I agree, and I believe Paul pushes us in that direction. When he prays for his churches, he prays that they might be pure and blameless together, as a community: “And this is my prayer, that your love may overflow more and more with knowledge and full insight to help you to determine what is best, so that in the day of Christ you may be pure and blameless, having produced the harvest of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ for the glory and praise of God.” (Philippians 1.9-10, see also 1 Thessalonians 3.11-13; 1 Corinthians 1.8) In case you missed that, Paul is speaking to a church, not an individual. Paul prays that the church will be blameless on the day of Christ. In fact, Paul seems to imply in 2 Corinthians that we’ll stand together: “As you have already understood us in part—that on the day of the Lord Jesus we are your boast even as you are our boast” (2 Corinthians 1.14). Therefore, the question is not really how can I be ready, but is the community of which I’m part ready? Is it holy and blameless? And to what extent am I hindering or helping that endeavor? Now we have a concrete way to respond: build up the church! Together we live and perhaps together we’ll be judged. Peace.
2 comments:
Good morning Pastor David,
Another thought-provoking post on your blog, thanks! It seems to me that our whole understanding of everything is sifted through the grid of individualism. How can we possibly understand Jesus' call on our lives through something as foreign as "community"? And then to say that we will possibly be judged together is too foreign (not to mention overwhelming). How do we start?
What does it mean to "build up the church"? Add more people? Help those already in the church mature? Take care of those who belong to the church?
What are the beginning steps? How can we be truly concerned for our neighbor without falling into a paternalistic, critical, judgemental attitude?
Yes, the New Testament is overhwelming. But that doesn't mean we back away from what it's trying to teach us. We need to keep at it, because language creates reality. And Christian community is a phrase that is extremely radical and hard to grasp. But if we resort back to our individualistic notions of salvation, we'll keep getting the same results--an anemic church culture, a church that is more secular than even society at times.
What does it mean "to build up the church?" For starters, I believe it means we serve one another in love, forgive one another, care for one another, confront one another. Secondly, it also means that we create a community that is missional, that has been captured by God's sending love, a love that will send us into the world that God loves. Third, we need to realize that we are called to be a contrast society--a holy community, a community that embraces exclusive loyalty to Christ. In that way, we will be holy together. So perhaps build up the church is not a good phrase. How about BE THE CHURCH?
How do we express concern for our neighbor without falling into paternalistic attitudes? Let's narrow our focus onto the Christian Brother and Sister. Read John Howard Yoder's stuff on "Binding and Loosing." It's very interesting. One of the things he points out is that John Wesley accomplished this through small groups.
Bottom line, I don't have any answers. I hope, however, that the more we talk like this the more our congregations will start to think about it and eventually start to talk about it. Once that happens then we're on the right road.
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