Jesus’ Claims About Himself
48 The Jews answered him, “Aren’t we right in saying that you are a Samaritan and demon-possessed?”
49 “I am not possessed by a demon,” said Jesus, “but I honor my Father and you dishonor me. 50 I am not seeking glory for myself; but there is one who seeks it, and he is the judge. 51 Very truly I tell you, whoever obeys my word will never see death.”
52 At this they exclaimed, “Now we know that you are demon-possessed! Abraham died and so did the prophets, yet you say that whoever obeys your word will never taste death. 53 Are you greater than our father Abraham? He died, and so did the prophets. Who do you think you are?”
54 Jesus replied, “If I glorify myself, my glory means nothing. My Father, whom you claim as your God, is the one who glorifies me. 55 Though you do not know him, I know him. If I said I did not, I would be a liar like you, but I do know him and obey his word. 56 Your father Abraham rejoiced at the thought of seeing my day; he saw it and was glad.”
57 “You are not yet fifty years old,” they said to him, “and you have seen Abraham!”
58 “Very truly I tell you,” Jesus answered, “before Abraham was born, I am!” (TNIV)
"From Ashes to Sunlight: The Phoenix Affirmations" Sermon Series, Week Five (All Saint's Sunday)
The swelling crowds filled St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome, during the spring in a season that is otherwise of rebirth and growth, and instead the flocks had converged upon the Eternal City to mark the passing of a man whom many Catholics have known as the only Pope they ever had—after nearly thirty years on the throne, Pope John Paul II had just passed away, and the crowds were shouting out, “Santo Subito!” “Sainthood now!” It is one of the most powerful memories of my college years, seeing the outpouring of grief that came from Christendom when John Paul died. And what a stirring metaphor for the Church itself—John Paul was by all accounts incredibly loving and charismatic, and on a very personal level, I have taken his teachings about violence and war to heart. But this also became a man whose legacy was tarnished in no small part by the scandals of abuse that were left behind, that the Roman Catholic Church struggles with still. A complicated legacy begun by love but shadowed by hurt—this sounds exactly like the church, especially as we wonder how to speak God’s love in this new, different world.
And so begins the fifth week of our sermon series together, “From Ashes to Sunlight: The Phoenix Affirmations.” This series is based on a book written by a United Church of Christ pastor, Rev. Eric Elnes, who has pastored a very successful church in Arizona, where they have made amazing use of a diverse array of tools and talents available to them in doing ministry. Eric then wrote this short book called The Phoenix Affirmations, after the town in which it was composed, but also because the image of the phoenix, being reborn out of the ashes. We began this series by talking about the role of Scripture in listening for God’s word and the importance of having a vibrant and artistic worship to attend. Then we talked about the need to include everyone into God’s family in a way that practices real hospitality instead of merely tolerance. Last week, we courageously tackled issues of justice that the church can perform mission in, and this week, our theme is one that is wonderfully appropriate for the Sunday leading up to All Saints’ Day—that in Christ, all things are made new and that we are loved for eternity.
On some level, I think we fundamentally know this, that God loves, that God is love, that God does love us somehow, in some way. That God loves is a fundamental truth of Christianity itself, for Jesus preaches God’s love for all over and over and over. So why do we even preach on it? Well, because it is one of only two sermons that I really know—God loves you, and be good, those are the two sermons I know! I just have learned how to give them a hundred different ways (bet you didn’t know that when you called me). No, I think the need to preach this theme, that God loves us, that God loves you, that need is so constant because the messengers God has given us to deliver that message change so frequently. First, it was the Patriarchs, Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, then Moses and Joshua and the Judges, all ordained by God to do His work. Then we had kings, Saul and David and Solomon, and prophets to go along with them, Samuel and Nathan, Isaiah and Jeremiah, and then after all these patriarchs and kings and prophets, the next messenger we are given is Christ Himself. But even then God will not let us be alone—later in John, Jesus promises us the Holy Spirit to be with us even after He has left, and that Holy Spirit, we see that delivered to us by people we would call saints, and not in the traditional sense of being beatified and then canonized, no, a saint as someone, living or dead, through whom, in whom, you have seen God. There are the big ones who we can all think of—names like Martin Luther King, Jr., Mother Teresa, Desmond Tutu, Dietrich Bonhoeffer—and if we are courageous enough to aim as high as the heavens, theirs are the examples by which we should be led. But how? As one prayer goes, God, thy sea is so great and my boat is so small.
The true calling of a saint, the how-to, is best summed up in what Mother Teresa said about her own ministry, “I am like the pencil in the hand of a God who is writing a love letter to the world.” Some saints have become famous for their ministry on behalf of a loving God, but many, many more do not, and they serve us all the same. And so the church created a day to honor them as well—All Saints Day—to honor the saints whose names we will never know, but who have acted as God’s latter-day messengers, performing the task that the prophets and the apostles once did of offering God’s love in both word and deed to a broken and hungry world.
And so God’s message has been carried throughout time—from patriarchs to judges and kings to prophets, from our Messiah to apostles and to the saints of today. It is the magnitude of this message that Jesus is impressing upon us in this passage from John—before Abraham was, Christ was. Before the saints were, Christ was. Before the prophets and judges and kings, before there were men, and women, and children, Christ was. And Jesus tells us why in His own cryptic way—he refers to himself as “I am—before Abraham was, I am.” He is using the divine name “I Am What I Am,” God’s name from the story of Moses at the burning bush to show how infinite His grace is—it is as infinite as the number of possibilities for what the divine name might mean. And this infinite Messiah, this Messiah that has lived forever, He exists for one simple, but awe-inspiring reason—only an infinite Messiah can offer infinite love—and that is what salvation is at is rawest, most pure, most wonderful form. As Eric Elnes puts it, salvation is discovering that we are loved infinitely, we are loved beyond our wildest imaginations and then, he says, determining to live our lives according to that discovery. The evangelist Billy Sunday once said the best thing that could ever happen to a person is to accept Jesus Christ as their Savior and to then immediately die—to be as pure as possible. And in fact, that is often how baptism was practiced way, way back in the day—folks would wait to be baptized on their deathbeds, so that as much sin as possible could be erased. But it completely misses out on the second half of the salvation equation—the first half is the reality that we are loved by God, but the other half is knowing it, and letting ourselves be transformed by it. And you know what? I love the sunset, the lake, natural beauty as much as anyone, and I can see God there, but when someone tells me how much I am loved by God—I know it in my bones that I am saved. Not because I chose Christ, but because I have no choice but to be loved by Christ. I know it, I know it because the saints around me tell me so.
And I wonder where our church would be without its saints. Because without us, without its people, the church is only an idea, an idea that exists in the imagination, this notion that God’s people might take it upon themselves to act spiritually, to form a holy community. But with us, and through us, the church is a reality, and one that has illuminated the world for the past two thousand years. To honor that is to not only honor the saints who have come before us, the saints who lived and died for the church, including Jesus Himself, though those are often who we think of first on All Saints Day. It honors living as well—the living who serve a loving God, a God fundamentally of love, not of hate. And it honors saints living among us, those who would inspire a roar of voices, from a crowd or even just a whisper from a lonely person, to cry out, “Santo Subito” on their behalf. Sainthood now—sainthood for those children of God across the pews, across the world, who know that they are loved and in response have said, as Mary Magdalene said to Christ in the garden, “Lord, here I am! What is it that you want me to do?” Thanks be to God. Amen.
Rev. Eric Atcheson
Longview, Washington
October 30, 2011
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