Doubt: A gift for faith development

Hi,
Haven't posted for ages, so thought I'd pop up the sermon I preached this morning at Hastings Uniting Church. They're such a lovely bunch down there, and made us very welcome.
Please feel free to comment!
Catch you round,
SB
Easter 2B: Text John 21: 19-31

A week or so ago I drove up through the fire ravaged Kinglake National Park on my way up to Mansfield to visit my family. I was struck by the devastation; the once lush, green forest now destroyed, the earth, the trees, charred black. It was hard to get my bearings as I drove along a road that I have travelled many, many times; the familiar points of reference along the way were gone. As I drove I thought about and prayed for the families who had lost homes and livelihoods, family members and animals. Just under two months on from 7th February, emotions are still raw, people still homeless, decisions about rebuilding homes and communities still being made. For the people living in these areas the process is going to be a long and painful one, some scars taking years, even decades to heal.

My thoughts as I drove through the forest ring strangely true as we look at this week’s gospel reading. For us as we commemorate Easter, 2000 years or so after the fact, the triumph of Easter day and the resurrection seem obvious. The extraordinary effect of Christ’s death and resurrection on the world, on the lives of Christians for the last 2 millennia can be seen and felt. We are living in an era in which we have been able to make at least some sense of the events from the safety of distance and time.

But imagine how it was for the followers of Jesus immediately after his death on the cross. Only a week before, Jesus had entered Jerusalem triumphantly to the adulation of the crowds (albeit riding on a lowly donkey.) Only a couple of days before, Jesus had broken bread and drunk of the cup with them, and, in John’s gospel, had washed the feet of these very disciples. Events had escalated quickly after that and now, according to all reasonable evidence, Jesus was dead. In the evening of the first day of the week, they are meeting in the home of one of the group. We are told that the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jewish authorities.

Earlier that very morning, Mary Magdalene, Peter and the Beloved Disciple went to the tomb and discovered that the stone had been rolled away. Now, in that room with the locked door, the three tell the community about the empty tomb - and Mary speaks of her strange meeting with the man she mistook for a gardener and then recognised as “Rabboni,” her beloved teacher, Jesus. Until this point, the disciples had feared for their lives. Their revered leader has been killed as a criminal and they were surely terrified that they would be next. Imagine what their conversation must have been like as they tried to make sense of the amazing stories of Mary, Peter and the Beloved Disciple in this climate of fear.

Suddenly Jesus appeared in this fear filled upper room. Jesus, the Messiah has returned. What does he say? Does he tell them how he’s going to get revenge, to destroy the Jewish authorities who handed him over to the Romans? You can imagine it as the plot of an action film: Jesus the wronged hero is back. He’s mad. And he’s going to get even. No need for fear disciples: Action Man Jesus has returned and is out for Justice. This time it’s personal.

But that’s not how this story plays out is it? Instead, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” Then he showed them his hands and his side. Jesus spoke into their fear and terror with words of peace and hope which are consistent with the message of his entire ministry. What an amazing transformative effect these words of peace and hope had on his disciples. We are told that they “rejoiced” when they saw the Lord. They were transported from a place of fear into a world of hope. Once injected with this sense of peace and hope Jesus speaks to them of what their mission will be saying again: “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”
When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.” The disciples are given the gift of the Holy Spirit, the advocate who will remain with them to guide them and encourage them in the work which Jesus is leaving for them. From this point on the disciples are transformed. No longer looking back at what had gone before, but looking forward to the possibilities for new life and growth which lay ahead. As we learn in the book of Acts, many of them underwent great trials and sufferings for the sake of the gospel. How very different they become from that fearful, terror stricken bunch we first meet behind locked doors at the start of today’s reading.

However, one disciple is not present in the upper room and misses the action. Poor old Thomas! The other disciples tell him, “We have seen the Lord.” And he responds: “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.”


Thomas has received an extraordinary amount of bad press for this response over the years. In everyday speech we call a person who doubts something unless they have direct physical evidence a “doubting Thomas.” However Thomas’ response to the disciples is spoken honestly, and from the place of fear with which the disciples were all too familiar. We disparage Thomas because we think that doubt is something which is alien to faith. On the contrary, a faith which allows questions of doubt in is one which is open to challenge and ultimately to growth. And this is what we see happening to Thomas in this story.

A week later when the disciples are in the house, although apparently not behind locked doors this time, Jesus appears to them again. This time after greeting them: “Peace be with you.” he immediately addresses Thomas’ doubt. Jesus says to Thomas, “Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe.” Thomas answered him, “My Lord and my God!” Thomas’ doubt and questioning lead to an opportunity for the growth and development of his faith. Thomas, who had doubted, is, like the other disciples who are locked behind closed doors that first Easter day for “fear of the Jews”, greatly transformed. It is said that by around AD50 he had reached India – indeed, the Orthodox Church in India, one of the oldest in the world, traces its roots back to Thomas the Twin. Quite something, that a church should claim as its founder, one who is often derided for having doubts!

But so, too, it is with us. We are often lead to believe that doubt damages our faith – that we must believe unquestioningly and blindly. Instead of seeing doubt as the enemy of faith, we should think of it as an opportunity for dialogue with God, an opportunity for the growth and development of our relationship with God. From crisis and turmoil comes growth and change.

Indeed, as I drove through the Kinglake National forest on my way home from Mansfield, I noticed a riot of new growth on the trunks and branches of the trees. Not only that, the beautiful, majestic tree ferns were sprouting new fronds, stretching up towards the light. How extraordinarily resilient is the Australian bush - not two months on from such a horrific fire and there is already regrowth. Even after the devastation and destruction of the Black Saturday fires, signs of new life are beginning to emerge!

Signs of new life amongst the human inhabitants of the fire effected areas are also starting to appear. Last Sunday night, ABC news reported on Easter church services around the state. In Marysville, site of the greatest destruction on Black Saturday, the Catholic and Anglican congregations, having lost their church buildings, met together in a marquee for a joint Easter service. The news reported people who were still lamenting the loss of loved ones, homes, and all they held dear, but who, at the same time, were able to see the green of new growth around them: grass on the football oval, new shoots on the trees that surrounded them. Signs of hope for the future.

Survivors were interviewed and they reported that although they are still reeling and trying to come to terms with the losses they have suffered, nevertheless, they were beginning to be able to look forward, to think about rebuilding their lives and their communities. Of course there will be tough times ahead as people continue to express their doubts and ask the difficult questions, just as there will be for all of us as we continue to try to make meaning of the difficult times we currently find our selves in.




But just as Jesus met the disciples in the upper room with the greeting: “Peace be with you,” so he meets us in our times of need. And just as this greeting in the upper room was able to lift the disciples out of their fear and trepidation at what lay ahead, so can the Christ who greets us in the Holy Spirit give us hope and strength for the tasks which lie ahead of us.

In the centre of today’s reading, after Jesus greets the disciples in the upper room, we have John’s version of the Pentecost narrative: Jesus giving the spirit to the disciples.

Earlier in the gospel, John explains the purpose of the paraclete, the Holy Spirit whom he will leave with them. The spirit is to be a guide, an advocate, one who will intercede with God for them on Christ’s behalf - Christ’s intercession enacting his giving and forgiving love for us. As Christ meets with the disciples in the upper room he breathes on them, leaving the Holy Spirit with them as a companion and support on the road ahead.

And this leads us to the final important point in today’s reading. Where are the disciples to go from here? The disciples are being sent out by Jesus, just has he himself was sent by the father right at the beginning of John’s narrative. This is the premise for discipleship for John’s community and indeed for ours. It sets our agenda by directing us to do what Jesus did: to share his love and forgiveness with others. Jesus offered light and life and truth through relationship with himself, through
relationship with God. Therefore it is our role too to offer light and life and truth through a relationship with God to those we meet. As Jesus was God's representative, so his disciples are to be ambassadors, handing on Christ’s light of hope, to the generations which will follow. We are not left alone to pass on this light in our own strength, but we do it with the help and guidance of the Holy Spirit, breathed into our very lives.

Having at last reached the end of John’s gospel, the task is clear. Although we may still at times have doubts and fears, as the disciples did, although we will still struggle with the situations we find ourselves in, Christ has given us a task to do and has breathed the Holy Spirit as a guide and advocate for the journey as we go forward to continue Christ’s work in the world. As the gospel ends it seems to be opening up a new vista ahead of Christ’s first disciples, and ahead of us too, a journey that we might have life, and life in Christ’s name. Amen.

Fishy Tales... or Jonah, the Reluctant Prophet

Epiphany 3B: Jonah 3:1-5,10 & Mark 1:14-20.

Hi all,

After a busy summer of placements and preaching I thought it was time to publish something... so here is the sermon I preached this morning at Ashburton Uniting Church. You'll find BB's sermon on the same reading here.

Enjoy... it's nose back to the grindstone from this week!
Blessings
SB

Today we have two rather fishy stories. Jonah, famous for being eaten by a fish answers God’s call to speak with the people of Nineveh. And in Mark’s gospel the call of the disciples to give up their fishing nets and become “fisher’s of men.” Two very different stories of God’s call and human response which contrast with each other in interesting and rather surprising ways.

Jonah, a very short book of only a page and a half is one which we don’t tend to read very often. I reckon if we took a poll around this and other Uniting churches people would recognise that it’s the story of “Jonah and the Whale” but what happens before that? Why does he end up in the whale’s belly? And what does Jonah do once he’s released? It’s a vivid and interesting story which definitely bears re-telling, especially if you haven’t heard it since Sunday school! It also holds an eternal message which is just as relevant to us today as it was to its ancient audience.
The story begins with Jonah being called by God to be a prophet to the city of Nineveh, to cry out against their wickedness. Jonah is not keen on the idea.
Instead of going east to the city of Nineveh, Jonah gets on a boat and goes west towards Tarshish, as far away as he can from the call. God sends a great wind and a mighty storm blows up. Jonah is asleep down in the hold of the ship and the sailors go down to wake him up. They beg him to do something. They discover that Jonah is fleeing from the presence of the LORD who created the sea and the waves and decide finally to throw him overboard in the hope that the Lord will then calm the sea.
Once overboard, Jonah is swallowed by a big fish. He stays in the belly of the great fish for three days and three nights during which time he prays to Yahweh acknowledging that God has responded to his plight and promising that he will give thanks on deliverance. At the end of chapter 2, just prior to today’s story, the LORD spoke to the fish, and, as the NRSV delicately puts it, the fish “spewed Jonah out upon dry land”.

After being saved from the belly of the big fish, comes the story which Andrew shared with us earlier. Jonah hears the call of the Lord a second time asking him to go to Nineveh. Jonah has been given a second chance. This time he heads straight off! We’re told that he walks across the city for three days and cries out: “Forty days more, and Ninevah shall be overthrown!” Instead of asking why this will happen, or indeed who is creating this catastrophe, we’re told that the Ninevites believed God, proclaimed a fast and put on sack cloth. The King on hearing the news proclaims that all should cry out mightily to God – and everyone, humans and animals should be covered in sackcloth. It’s hard not to see a comedic moment in all of this, the dogs, pigs and poultry of the town clad from head to tail (literally!) in sackcloth and parading about the town.

And God’s response? When he was what they did and how they turned from their evil ways, God changed his mind about the calamity he was going to visit upon them - he changed his mind and didn’t do it.

Now you’d think at this point that Jonah would be pleased. Mission accomplished! Job well done! But no. He became very angry at God. He knows that God is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and ready to relent from punishing. He tells God that it would be better for him to die than live, and goes and sits in a booth outside the city and waits to see what will happen. So the Lord creates a bush to grow up over Jonah so that he will have shade and be saved from the harsh heat. And this makes Jonah happy. But the next day at dawn God appoints a worm to attack the bush and it withers and Jonah becomes faint with the heat. Again he tells God that it would be better for him to die than to live. The story ends with GOD calmly and compassionately making his point to Jonah: that he has become blinded by his anger to the enormous graciousness of God and the forgiveness shown to the city of Nineveh, the same graciousness shown to Jonah when he was saved from the sea. The evil of the Ninevites did not bring punishment which they deserved: they are saved because of the sincerity and wholeheartness of their repentance: because of the way in which they turned to God.

It’s hardly surprising that the story of the Ninevites is re-told at Jewish festivals as an example of true and complete repentance. But we often respond to stories like this in the same way that Jonah did: with righteous indignation. So often we struggle with the concept that "good people" can suffer while "bad people" appear to get away with it. However this story reminds us that it is the very nature of God to accept our repentance without question and to invite us back into relationship with God.

There is much discussion amongst scholars about the form, the genre of this little book. One biblical scholar even lists 20 different genres he can find within the story! 20 styles of writing in 4 short chapters, 1 and a half pages, now that’s a lot! But one thing they do agree on is that the story has comedic elements. It is meant to be laughed at. And the theological point is expounded to us as part of the comedy.

We could berate Jonah for his lack of faith or courage, for not following God’s call and immediately setting forth for Nineveh. But in some ways I think we can identify with him. He was given a mission impossible. Nineveh was one of the greatest cities of its day. It was a city of conquerors, a commercial powerhouse whose rulers lived lives of comparative luxury and indulgence. The Ninevites were not Israelites, why would they respond to a call from God to repent? I can see how Jonah might have felt that God was asking for just too much.

That’s why the good thing about this story is that God is able to make use of Jonah the reluctant hero to save Nineveh even in spite of himself. The amusing comedic moment in the story where Jonah is swallowed by the big fish and spewed back up on the beach three days later is evidence of Yahweh’s enormous grace and compassion. Jonah mightn’t be a perfect prophet, but God is able to use him all the same. God doesn’t just make use of the best of us – “best”, afterall, is a human standard. Before God we are all inadequate, and even our “best and brightest” often don’t get it, often don’t respond in the way God wants us to. And yet God responds to us with grace and compassion, which, even though it points out our foibles and often seems to pull the rug out from under our feet, is nevertheless the love of God drawing us to God.
Jonah is the reluctant prophet - it takes him three chapters to get to Nineveh. By contrast, it takes a very short 4 verses for the fishermen in Mark’s gospel, our second fishy story for the day, to leave their nets, their security, and their families to follow Jesus. In true Markan style, the fishermen respond immediately. The author tells us nothing of their inner deliberations, whether the fishing was good or bad, if they were religious people or not, if they got along with their father or wanted to get out of their home town and go and see the world. Mark merely says, “And immediately, they followed him.”

Not surprisingly, this connecting phrase, “and immediately,” is the most common phrase in Mark’s Gospel, occurring 33 times in only 16 chapters. It is a powerful phrase because it draws our attention to who Mark says Jesus is: when Jesus speaks, people immediately follow him, demons are immediately cast out, the diseased and disabled are immediately cured. In this context, “immediately” is not a symbol of perfect faith or obedience – it is a symbol of Jesus’ power, of his capacity to draw people to him and respond effectively to human need. “Immediately” highlights the power of Jesus’ call to discipleship.

When Jesus is calling these first disciples to follow him, what is he asking them to do exactly? The answer is found in the first two verses of our reading today when Jesus proclaims the Good News of the Kingdom. He says: the time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God has come near, repent and believe in the good news.” This statement of Jesus, right at the outset of his ministry encapsulates for us the purpose of his entire ministry: to bring people to an awareness of the coming Kingdom, so that they can repent and respond to God’s gracious love. And the very action of Christ’s death on the cross is the action which makes possible our response, building a bridge across the chasm of human brokenness so that we can respond to God’s invitation into relationship that is the Kingdom.

If we think about the situations of our world right now, we can see all too clearly the need for God’s grace. Economic downturn, global warming, and war and chaos are but the most obvious examples. Everywhere, people seem to be in crisis – even our own Uniting church is facing difficult decisions concerning its life and mission. But instead of succumbing to despair or cynicism, or the perverse pleasure of seeing our predictions of doom come true, Jesus’ call to discipleship is a call to focus on working towards the kingdom, toward being “fishers of men”. The call to discipleship is a call to hope: the waters in which we fish may indeed seem troubled, but then, Jesus never said: “Come follow me to a life of ease and comfort”.

Of course, it can sometimes seem all too hard – I can understand why a swift boat to some nice desert island somewhere (Chrystal clear blue waters, clean white sands…. palm trees) might sound much nicer than confronting some of the harsher realities of our time and place. Just as Jonah was a reluctant prophet, not wanting to answer God’s call, so might we be at this moment in history. But if ever our world needed to hear this story of grace and forgiveness, of God’s great love for all of us, not because we are good enough, or because we deserve it, but just because God desires a relationship with us, then surely this is the time.