Believe

Sermon by Pastor John Torgerson - April 11, 2010

Summary - Believing in Jesus gives us real life.   Believing involves giving up what we think is real and living in the realty that Jesus presents to us.

John is not a very good writer or preacher.  The current wisdom in preaching is that you get to your point early and you repeat it often in your speaking.   Here John is just about done with his gospel and he finally gets around to stating his main idea. His purpose for writing is that we believe and that by believing we have life.

I suppose he could have started his Gospel with a purpose statement.  But instead there is a prolog beginning with, "In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the word was God."   In the first chapter he quotes John the Baptizer as saying "Behold he lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world".  Also, he quotes Nathaniel saying, "…you are the Son of God".    In the second chapter he, alone, records the "first of the signs" - Jesus changing water into wine.

If John would have talked about believing at the beginning of his book, then readers, not knowing the whole story, could have been happy with believing in a God who rescues us from disasters such as running short of wine.  

And maybe he will give us some morality along the way – some how to’s.    Surely if God tells us how to be moral, we will snap to it and do it!   I am joking here.

No, we have to walk with Jesus all the way through Good Friday and Easter to make sense of John 20:31.  

³¹ But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.

So the word for today is believe.  And believing is important because by believing we have life – today – not just pie in the sky in the great by and by.  What do we believe?  How can we even presume to believe? Can we come to a point when we say we believe enough?

Let's look at this passage from the beginning.

    ¹⁹ On the evening of that first day of the week, when the disciples were together, with the doors locked for fear of the Jewish leaders, Jesus came and stood among them and said, "Peace be with you!" ²⁰ After he said this, he showed them his hands and side. The disciples were overjoyed when they saw the Lord.

I am sure there is a great deal of selectivity in what John wrote here.  Here is Jesus’ first meeting with the disciples on Sunday night.  Probably more stuff took place.  So John, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit wrote what is important to the Holy Spirit.

    ²¹ Again Jesus said, "Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you."

Wow!   Do you believe that?   Jesus talked often about being sent by the Father.  Now he says, "As the Father has sent me, I am sending you."

It's presumptuous for any of us to say we believe that enough.  But perhaps the best we can do is treat this as a multiple-choice option of two choices. 

A.     I am not sent to do anything by any entity outside me, and my reason for living only comes from within - within the neurons of my brain.

B.     As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.

If you are a stickler for philosophy and logic you might say it’s immature of me to limit you to two choices.   You might want to say, “I am sent according to how Mohammed defines ‘sent’”  – or maybe Buddha.   I don’t have time to get into detail, but only the God revealed in the bible offers his benefits out of true unconditional love.   The benefits offered by other philosophies have conditions.  And even Christians, despite our preaching that salvation is not dependent on works, often present a God who saves us “if” we do something.  Did God forgive your sins because you prayed the prayer of confession this morning?   No.  We expressed our sins and our need for forgiveness and acknowledged that the only source of unconditional forgiveness is God.  The forgiving was done on Good Friday. 

So we really do only have two choices - being sent from within or being sent from without.

B does seem presumptuous.  But A is far more presumptuous.   The only people that Jesus was mad at were presumptuous people - those who presumed they offered life and held the keys to life.

Jesus was sent to show who God is.  Are we sent to show who God is?  An impossible task.  But John earlier records, "I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you."  (John 14:8)   Being sent to do God’s work is an impossible task for wandering orphans, but we must believe that we are not orphans.

And so Jesus   ²² … breathed on them and said, "Receive the Holy Spirit."   You are not orphans. 

Do we believe that we are not orphans?   Again I don't see much except a two part multiple-choice here.

A.     I am an orphan.  Every personal joy depends on me.  If I believe in sharing that joy, that belief came from me.   If I belief that my joy is more important than someone else’s joy, that's ok, because that's the way the neurons in my brain are wired.   

B.     I am not an orphan.  And there is help from outside us.

Again A is far more presumptuous.  The only people that Jesus was mad at were presumptuous people.   Those who presumed they offered life and held the keys to life.  So the choice is B.

 ²³ If you forgive the sins of anyone, their sins are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven."

 What can we say about that verse?

In my Good Friday sermon I hammered the point that Jesus died once for all.  It should not be a new message for this church.  It is the reality of Good Friday.  It is the reality of who God is.  We are to have life in his name.   What is the meaning of name?  Who God is.  Good Friday is who God is.  Easter, our new life in Christ, is who God is.

So what do we do with verse 23, then?  ²³ If you forgive the sins of anyone, their sins are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven.

What is forgiveness?  It is not forgetting, unless we are blessed with Alzheimer's disease.   I met a former student recently.  It was several years since I had him in class.  He was a really likable and still is.   But after walking way I remembered that I caught him cheating once in a class I was teaching.  I administered justice in that I did not give him credit for the copied work.  I could have made his life miserable for the rest of the semester, but I didn’t try to get even that way.    Forgiveness is giving up our supposed right to get even, and may, or may not involve seeking justice.  It is not forgetting.

One way of saying it is, “Forgiveness is removing our hands from the offender's throat.” 

Let's take that literally.   I've got my hands around Joe’s throat here. Talk about body language!  It's not too hard to misinterpret this body language is it?   I am there to strike fear.  I am there to force my will.  I am there to give nothing, and get even. 

As I am partially cutting off the airway passage, I am cutting off any hope of Joe seeing God and living in the name of God.  I become the Jesus who doesn't make it to Good Friday. Remember what Jesus said on the night he was betrayed?   Do you think I cannot call on my Father, and he will at once put at my disposal more than twelve legions of angels?  (Matt 26:53)  With my hands around his throat I become the Jesus who DID send the 12 legions of angels and Good Friday never happened.

But when I let go, I give up a little of my life. I give up my presumptuousness of believing that I have sent myself.  I give up my presumptuousness of being a cosmic orphan finding my way by my own wits.   I go with Jesus to Gethsemane.  I possibly carry the cross with Jesus as I see people shouting to me, "What a loser".  But I participate in the victory of Easter, and Joe has a chance of participating in that too.  Easter is another word for our new life in Christ.

So I must believe ²³ If you forgive the sins of anyone, their sins are forgiven.  In a state of being forgiven Joe, too, has some chance of seeing the reality of Good Friday and Easter.  If you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven.  If I do not forgive I participate in blinding Joe NOT to the God of Good Friday and Easter, but to the god who gets even.  And Joe cannot live in the reality of Good Friday and Easter, even though Good Friday applies to him as well as me.

We can forgive if we believe in Good Friday and Easter.  Again it's an A or B Choice.

A.   I am smart enough to know how and when to forgive.

B. God has forgiven everyone and I must live in that reality with the help of God.

Again A is far more presumptuous.  The only people that Jesus was mad at were presumptuous people.   Those who presumed they offered life and held the keys to life.

Then we come to the familiar story of doubting Thomas.   He wasn't with them on that Sunday night.  He says, "Unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe."

A week later Thomas is there.  Jesus says, "Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe."

    ²⁸ Thomas said to him, "My Lord and my God!"

    ²⁹ Then Jesus told him, "Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed."

Thomas was confronted with Good Friday and Easter.  His evidence was visual.  He saw Good Friday and Easter.   And his response was "My Lord and my God!"

Are we cheated?   As the song asks,  "Were you there when they crucified, my Lord…Were you there when they nailed him to the tree…Were you there when they laid him in the tomb…Were you there when he rose up from the dead"  And we respond, "NO, WE WEREN’T THERE."  We did not see any of these things.  Two thousand years and thousands of miles of geography prevented the photons of these events from entering the retinas of our eyes to be sent by nerves to our brain so that other parts of our brain can say, "Yes I saw these things."

But look in the mirror.  Do you see a perfect source of love and life there?   Only the presumptuous would say “Yes”.  In saying "No", we are forced to acknowledge that perfect love and life is real and that it is outside ourselves.

I can command you to believe.  That would be silly.  To decide to believe is impossible.   But surrender is not nearly as hard.  We surrender our power to shape our destiny.   We surrender our independent orphan status.  We surrender our self-perceived right to have our hands around someone else's neck.   Then we will be “there”with Jesus carrying the cross.  And we will die with him and be resurrected with him, into new life that begins in a small way now. (Roman 6)  And we can say, “Yes I was there when they crucified my Lord.”   And we can say, “Yes I was there when he rose up from the dead.”

And John will achieve his purpose.  ³¹ But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.

And we will say with Thomas, "My Lord and My God."  And then real life begins.

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