Turning back to be re-born

  At the heights of Charismania and even today we shudder, or at least I do, when someone asks "Have you been born again?" asking of course if you had accepted 'Jesus' into your life. For any Christian of faith this is undoubtedly the most inane and disrespectful question to ask. In the end it becomes boring and embarrassing, perhaps because of the overly enthusiastic manner of the asking or maybe at the end of the day thinking 'I am a Christian, why do I need to be tagged by these embarrassing invitations to a charismatic event I know I will just shrivel up and die at?' or some other similar thought. I always felt that their tag along lines were fatuous and boring not really portraying the reality of Christian life. Rather it appeared to be a summons into a frivolous and superficial life that had little to do with the way of Christ and more to do with their understanding of what a Christian was. Yet, Christ asks us to be 'Born again' and as Nicodemus asks 'How can someone be born when he is old?' (Jn 3.3-4).

If we are to think of these things in any manner of depth we start to realise that what puts people of from the question "Have you been born again?" is the earnest frivolousness of the poser of the question and the embarrassment felt for their misunderstanding of the question.  The question is real and needs to be thought about especially when Christ is surprised at Nicodemus' ignorance. The real response that Christ is trying to elicit is a turning or rather a re-turning towards God, in essence being born again to God. A conscious movement of metanoia, the re-establishment of God's commandments in our hearts so that we can live them rather than mouth them.  Looking back towards the end of the age of Charismania  the turn off was with regards the embarrassing debacles that many found themselves trapped into and what in reality turned out to be major scams, which lacked any real re-turning. All that it created was a hit in terms of negative publicity for faith in and of itself and in reality turned people away from God and not a re-turning to God. The failure of so many is in the misunderstanding that the call to be born again is a one off singularity that bears no relation to our lived lives.  This is not true because our lives are only human the call is a constant one that is repeated every single day.

The blind lead the blind like lemmings off a cliff but Christ leads us to re-turn to God and new life 

The call of 're-turning' is a long and hard journey as Abram found out (Gen. 12ff).  All that Abram had was a promise from God.  All that any of us has is a promise from God.  God does not promise us an easy life all that God asks of us, in return for his promise, is faithfulness.  God knows that we are only human and have the failings of all humanity. Christ is our example of a life that is to be lived in God, re-turned to God and lived with God; born again.  All we have to do is follow.  We follow where God leads this does not mean that we are lemmings following blindly as we run off the cliff.  Our paths are not always paths that are conducive or even easy but so often we are pulled from what God calls us to by our own petty minded wants and wishes.  It is when we focus on these that we are again reminded that we need to re-turn to God.  In focusing on God we begin to live lives that are filled with the Spirit and bring hope into the lives around us.  If we begin to believe that it is 'our' ministry or 'our' leadership, or 'our' sermon that is changing lives then sadly we have missed God.

Lent is a time for us to re-turn to the path that God calls us to.  It is a path filled with struggles, low places, high places, places of sadness and places of joy but it is a journey that God calls us to.  It is the journey to the resurrection and new life.  It is a journey that calls us to be 'born again' and 'again' and 'again'.  Each time we turn from God's purposes we turn from new life, each time we go our own way we turn from new life.  Just as our initial birth is both a joy and hard labour so our re-birth is joy and hard labour.  Lenten journeys ask us to reflect on who we are, what we have become and to re-turn to Christ-likeness on the long path to God.  Too often we indeed act as lemmings rather than as intelligent beings made in the image of God rushing after this saviour or that only to find disappointment.  God constantly calls us to re-turn and a new birth.  A change in our lives so profound that we ourselves are changed.

Christ calls us into the future

Just before we enter Lent many churches celebrate the Transfiguration of Christ with his three disciples. We can see that the disciples act as unbelieving clots when they think about saving the world by building buildings to celebrate the wonderous event that has just occurred (Matt. 7.4). This event that has initiated the ultimate change and Christ's turn towards the cross. In a manner of speaking we are just as guilty when we are confronted by difficult decisions. This is a turning point in the Gospel narrative for both Christ and the disciples. At any peak time of decision making we come to a crux, a decision point both as disciples and as leaders. Do we rest on our laurels and celebrate with protective structures or do we allow ourselves the more difficult path of facing an uncertain and difficult future?

The disciples' response, well Peter's response as the representative character, is to become not only protective but also in a conformist manner that hopes to build on what has always worked. Our first thought is to protect the territory in which we are the masters or at least that which we are familiar with. We put up walls and we wish to make sure that no one else can remove us from the land / power base / authority that we possess. These walls represent to us our limits and our inability to move forward with flexibility but rather to solidify our holding pattern. In uncertainty we prefer to ensure permanency by putting into place things that will stem the terror that is the future. It can be seen in our every day lives particularly within the Church environment. The need for something concrete to hold onto is to great for some. If it is not the position or placement of a pew it is our seat, if it is not the seating it is the building, etc. It does not matter where we start we will build a case for the structure to remain whether it is an actual structure or a way we do things. We have always done it this way or that way but sometimes if we change something we will find that we reap greater rewards. Ask Peter and he would probably have said that we need an established place of worship to understand what has just happened.

This cannot be moved and is not living

However, Christ is at a turning point in the narrative. It is at this point with the acknowledgement of God that he turns to face the road and trial of Jerusalem. The die is, so to speak, cast at this point. It is something that we to need to contemplate as we prepare for our own journey to Jerusalem and beyond. Christ does not wait to build he moves on and down the mountain. He takes up the challenge that is presented by change and his transfiguration. Instead of standing still to contemplate he moves into action. Just as Moses moves up into the cloud to meet with God (Exodus 24.12-18) it is with the understanding that an action will occur. Here is a challenge the covenant is to be written to bind the tribes to a single God and the commandments to lead them into the future. The written word is fluid and allows for interpretation to accommodate changes in society. So the law that is created must be fluid to make allowances for the future. However, the law becomes set in stone when we refuse to allow its varied nuances to shape us and allow God to move within us. If we build buildings we stagnate and do not allow ourselves to be accommodating for the future, Christ moved forward a fluidity of movement, the oral tradition became encompassed in stone but was still open for a new future.

In coming to this time of decision making we need to hold ourselves up to Christ and ask ourselves are we wanting to embrace the uncertainty of the future or are we content to live in structures which do not move or are unable to accommodate newness of life? This is the choice we make when we are confronted by Christ do we move with Christ or are we left behind living in a constricted space to worship something that is not God but our own imagination.

Not the law of man but of God

 It was all very well to suggest last week that we need to implement the Beatitudes into our lives and to walk humbly with God seeking truth and justice in the world. These lead us into new life yet, as with all pathways such as these, they are but guidelines that are meant to enable us to bring the light of Christ's light into the world (Matt 5.15). Following this easily repeatable saying from Matthew's gospel there is a hard piece of writing that enables us to deepen and brighten the light that we shine (Matt. 5.17-20).

Christ tells his listeners that he has come not to do away with the law but to, in effect, tighten its application. We must be very certain at this point what the law is that Christ is going to tighten the screws on. We know that law is a product of humanities need for some form of control or rather some way in which to order society for its benefit. The problem with this form of law is that it is subject to our own requirements and our own needs. Those who are powerful are more likely to ensure that the laws that ensure their continued control and power are maintained.  Those laws that are designed to ensure values that assist the community or a community or a minority or a despised sector are the lowest priority on the agenda. This is where we are at within our global community. We can not ensure that the powerful do not retain power nor can we ensure that laws which are detrimental to the greater good are not passed. Why?  In simplest terms because we are powerless within the building blocks of human law proposal and its enactment other than to obey or change the legislators in some way that the powerful have less of a voice.

Strictly by the book or by the Spirit

Christ wants us to take something that we have control over in our lives and live knowing that we do so not as a result of an external enforcement but as a result of us taking them to be part of our lives. We cannot look at the laws that Christ is talking about and place them on a parity with human laws. The laws that Christ will have us adhere to so strictly that we are better than those who suggest that they are obeying as opposed to what they seek to put in place for humanity, and you can discern that by all the laws that they in their power enact. The laws that God has placed on our hearts and has expanded in the Ten Commandments as well as its shorter derivative are the ones that Christ demands strict adherence to. Not in the human enforcement but in the spirit that is embedded within each. Isaiah calls out the Jewish population and the priests about behaviour in chapter 58 for just this type of behaviour that comes with legalising the commands of God. The commands that are embedded within our faith and are, or should be, the basis upon which we form community.

It is not the law that we enact but the law that God enacts within our hearts, the words of wisdom the Paul speaks of (1 Cor. 2.6). It is not the wisdom of the world but the wisdom of God and those of faith who follow and adhere to those things that build community, justice, peace, love, etc. All of these things are impossible for us to fully grasp which is why we have difficulty with God's laws and their enactment. We need to try and understand what these concepts mean and as we delve into their meaning we begin to bring to the surface our own thoughts to impose on others, etc. God's requirements and law do not require interpretation they require us to do, to act, to be as Christ to our neighbour.

To walk humbly with God

 The Christian life is not an easy one. More often than not churches, parishes and individuals all feel as if there is no hope and are flapping their arms in despair. We can only see the darkness around us and not the light that is Christ. Like a Zen master we often stand around berating and striking our followers to bring them to experience the light of Christ as we become frustrated with the apparent lack of understanding being shown. Or else we fall back to erudite words to inspire and bring hope which only bring fleeting highs in a place of overwhelming darkness. We believe these highs to be the real deal and like an addictive drug continue to seek them rather than Christ's light. Paul writing to the Corinthians points out in his hymn to the cross as the foundation of our lives (1 Cor. 1.18-31) whilst Matthew's Gospel shows us the how (Matt. 5.1-12). However, in a single verse of pure poetry Micah spells out the essential attitude (Micah 6.8).

In Paul's first letter to the Corinthians there are some amazing pieces of rhetoric that reflect deep thought and understanding. In his hymn to the cross, Paul uses an understanding of both the Jewish faith and the Greek funeral oratory system of his era. In linking them within this passage he cuts through the ties of ethnicity that create division and seeks to build a magnificent edifice on the weakest foundation of the world at that time, a man crucified on a cross. In our day to day misunderstandings and our fears can we like Paul and the Corinthians lay our differences aside and start to build? The foundation, just as in Paul's time, is a foundation not of strength but of weakness. The Christian faith has been battered by the tides of rationality and a culture that sees only profit for profit's sake. If we think clearly about these things we are in a position that is no worse and no greater than found in Corinth. Paul's oratory appeals to both intellectuals and those who are faith believers not because they are beaten at their own game but because Christ offers a fresh approach. It is like being given two options both of which mean death and suddenly finding a new path that is inconsistent with everything that has been thought possible before. The cross turns everything upside down.

Is it possible to build on a weak foundation in the midst of nothing?

Christ gives us a way to live that life at the beginning of the classically named Sermon on the Mount at the beginning of chapter 5 of Matthew's Gospel. The Beatitudes are perhaps at first glance somewhat unusual and topsy turvy. The poor are blessed, the sorrowful are blessed as are the hungry, the gentle and the peacemakers. A far cry from reality one would think and does this mean that we have to become these extreme low end, despised people. Can't we be rich and free from hunger? Our rational and interpretive scholarly minds try to finagle our way out, putting spin on to interpretation so that we can be at ease. Yet, as Christians these are our living instructions these are our way of building on the weak foundation of the cross. Just to give some examples as to our own interpretive slant to these instructions.  Instructions, if you will, given not to erudite learned people but to the poor and the hardworking women and men of rural society. Who are the sorrowful? What are they sorrowful for? We automatically, I think, start with those who are mourning death but perhaps they are sorrowing / mourning something else entirely. Perhaps the mourning is not death but the recognition of sin and wrongdoing and so we are mourning what we have / have not done as a people?  In recognition comes understanding and an ability to stand in hope for our lives as we turn away from sin to embrace Christ. In doing so we build our lives centred on God and so we become blessed by God. We begin to think in terms of others and so seek after righteousness, more rightly translated as a just community. This becomes an action that is lived out into the world around us.

Micah sums this all up in the simplicity of one verse describing what God wants from us as we grow into his presence and take on a Christlike personna. We begin to give to God a contrite heart as we walk with a humbleness (poverty of heart) before God seeking to do justice and mercy with the loyalty expected by those who have formed a covenant with God, as we have through our baptism.

Committed and honest in change

 So we have been called into ministry, great, so what now? If I am to minister to God's people what precisely am I meant to do? What drove those that Christ called to become followers and disciples of this unknown man? We know that ministry can be small and simple but sometimes it becomes so big that we are challenged by the enormity of the task. At other times the very fact that we have a ministry goes to our heads and we believe that ours is the most important or that ours should have precedence or ours is the thing that will save the church. (Reminder: Our call is not only one of ministry it is one of following and being discipled by Christ). No matter what position we find ourselves in or at what stage in our call into ministry we are at we need to remind ourselves some core facts when it comes to being a disciple particularly a disciple of Christ.

Perhaps the first thing, which is of most importance, is honesty. We no longer appreciate honesty within our lives. We create stories for ourselves of our lives and live them out within the bands of social media or our own little cliques. We need firstly to be honest with ourselves in terms of our call. If we are not struggling with being called into ministry and being a disciple then we have inevitably got something wrong. If we are unable to express our own doubts in an honest manner either to ourselves or to others then we are deceiving ourselves and are not true disciples. Just look at the stories of the disciples as they move and follow the Christ. From the first call we read in Matthew (4.15-ff) to the final scenes after the resurrection with Thomas.

Secondly, we have to be open to change. It is apparent from the first call of the disciples that eventually become Christ's apostolic messengers that they are expected to change their whole lives. They are asked to give up the occupations that they have and take on a significantly more challenging and different way of life. This automatically means a total upheaval in their domestic situation. Can you see Peter or John coming back from a day's fishing and saying to their wives and extended families "We can no longer support you. We have decided to follow this itinerant preacher through the lands of the Israelites." What sort of response do you think that got? Even if our call into ministry appears to be small...taking over as secretary...filling the role of treasurer...becoming a warden... it still means some form of change within your lives however small and however disruptive. Yet if we are true disciples of Christ, we must be prepared for change as the whole of Christ's message to us is a call to change from tradition into newness of life.

True discipleship changes our lives through honesty and commitment

Thirdly, there is a commitment that is made before God as we become disciples. I am not talking solely about our baptismal commitment but our commitment to God and to our community. If we cannot commit to being a disciple and to the ministry that we are called to then their is no point in answering the call. We may as well bury our heads in the sand and become rooted in place. Commitment means that we are prepared to sacrifice, we are prepared to ensure that there is no division within our community as a result of receiving a different call or a different understanding (1 Cor. 1.10- ff.). We are all called by God into discipleship and ministry on answering that call we should commit ourselves to Christ's presence in our hearts and lives. We cannot create division within our extended communities and say we are Christian and followers of Christ. Christ's call and our ministry is towards reconciliation between ourselves and between ourselves and God. It is a call towards a community that is built on diversity of skills and people who each are committed as disciples of Christ. This is the call that makes a community and a nation functional in looking after its people from the first to the last.

Only when we are prepared to change and be honest in our commitments towards God's people can we truly call ourselves disciples of Christ. Our issue is often a failure in one of these three areas.

Question for question a challenge

  John's Gospel has Christ asking the two disciples of John the Baptist 'What are you looking for?' with what appears to be a non-sequitur response 'Where are you staying?' (Jn 1.38). A question answered with a question with no real answer from the disciples.  Yet the question remains and is something for us to consider today and within the context of our own society.  I have moved multiple times and am intrigued by the disciples' answer. As I consider their response I remind myself that while I am sometimes removed from the flow of society around me I am still connected to the Church and the concerns of the Body of Christ. In being disrupted in our place of living we can perhaps bring to mind this question and focus on it in the context of where we consider our place of living to be.

The question posed is: what are you looking for? In life we are constantly looking for something to fulfil our needs.  If we were to answer this question then our answers would probably revolve around our needs and those perhaps of our families.  The you is personal it creeps into the spaces  of our need and highlights them to our mind.  We think of our housing, our work circumstances, our children, our social standing, etc.  We would consider these as our needs; we would think that perhaps these are the things we are looking for to fulfil our lives in the modern world.  What about the question in terms of our religiosity, our faith, our denomination / church / community in which we worship? Here we conceive of our mission in the world, our ministry to each other and those who are less fortunate.  We look at those less fortunate, the orphan, the widow, the exile, the immigrant and stranger; we designate an other who is not of us to whom we are called to bring our faith, our God, our ways of doing things to achieve fulfilment and the end of our desire.  Is this then what we seek, the perfect way to bring the Gospel to all people throughout the earth in fulfilment of God's commandment?  Is this the answer to Christ's question?

The incipient disciples answer strangely with an alternate question; where are you staying?  This appears to be a frivolous question in response to Christ. Let us come and see where your living, that's what we are looking for.  Just to see where this person is living, a cave, a hovel, a palace.  No great desires for food or fancy goods.  No desires for peace in the world or a community of love and acceptance.  This is really odd to seek a place of abode. Yet, if we look at it purposely and with deeper understanding is this not the absolute answer to Christ's question to us.  If we are truly looking for something within our own faith and religious journey is it not just this to find Christ's abode.  We are not looking for a trivial house or palace or campsite in the wilderness we are seeking where Christ is living.  We are looking for signs of Christ's presence in ourselves and in those around us as a community.  It is the presence of God in Christ that is our daily task to find and worship; to become a part of and not to become excluded from.

We are not looking for an ideal home but for Christ's abode in the community

In going out into the world as part of our faith journey we are perpetually sent to find Christ's abode. Christ shows his disciples where he lives through the scriptures and in our hearts as we interact with the people of the world.  In discovering where Christ's abode is we are discovering the end of the question that Christ asks us.  In finding Christ we are in finding that which we are seeking for fulfilment.  We often misinterpret what we are looking for to find fulfilment as we have been taught to find it within the auspices of modern society and life. Only when we truly discover what it is that we are looking for is when we truly find the hope of Christ in our lives.  We accept what we think we want without looking further as our needs are surface orientated.  Christian's seek for a deeper foundation that brings hope to a community.

Bringing hope to the world

  As we come out from the season of Christmas into the New Year what are we expecting and what do we wish for in terms of our Christian and faith journey? and are these the same?  This is perhaps a question that we do not often put to ourselves and indeed we automatically assume that they are the same.  The initiation of our faith and Christian journey is in baptism and on this last day of the Christmas season we celebrate the baptism of Christ by John. In doing so, we could perhaps see this as indicating the complete connection between the two events.  Yet, our baptism is the baptism in Christ who has died whereas Christ's baptism is the baptism of John who was re-initiating the covenant of God in the hearts of those who came to him.  Indeed, John sought Christ's baptism (Matt 3.14).  Christ's own journey into God's presence begins here with John's baptism, as it is Christ who sees and Christ who hears (Matt. 3.16-17), a journey that drives him into the desert places.  A drive outwards not inwards, not simply into the desert and the solitude of the self but also eventually into society.  Towards God in community not simply and only inwards towards God in solitude.

Let our faith journeys be lights in the world.

The community of the people of God are given a sign of hope in the coming of God's servant (Is. 42. 1-7).  A hope that extends not just to Israel as God's chosen people, but to 'all nations' (Is. 42.1b).  This is a journey that is extended away from the personal into the community of the world no matter where that belief in God is found.  This is perhaps the one thing that we tend to forget in our exuberance of bringing the Good News to the world.  We focus on baptising everyone rather than bringing the Good News.  Jesus asks for baptism, the child's parents ask for baptism of the child, the confirmation candidate asks for their confirmation.  We are commissioned by God to go out into the world.  The world came to Christ in the Magi and Christ went into the world to give and proclaim the good news.  Our focus is and always should be the demonstration and proclamation in all we do as to what the good news is rather than on proclaiming our own spiritual journey.  Christ's spiritual journey drives him out away from the crowds but his proclamation of the good news and God's Kingdom drives him in towards community.

We are reminded of this outward pull by Peter in Acts as he to comes to the realisation that God is not confined to the rules of man but to the compassion of God for all people (Acts 10.34).  Our faith journey is our discovery of God within ourselves while our Christian journey drives us into community accepting all as part of God.  It is in this realisation that we find the hope of God's kingdom.  In proclaiming our faith we need to involve ourselves with all people not just with those who are 'Christian'.  We misunderstand our role in God's Kingdom when we look just to bring our personal views into fruition.  It is God who enables those who want Baptism to come to God and ask as part of their spiritual journey.  As Christians we are called to set the example that will enable those not baptised to seek baptism not play favourites.  If we do not set that example how can we expect people to come to God and choose that commitment?  If we are unable to do God's works of justice, righteousness and peace in the community how do we expect people to see God?  In another place in scripture the disciples say that they should stop someone, who is not a part of them, who is doing good works but Christ says if they are not against us they are with us. Can we deny those who are not baptised their right to do what God has asked for in doing God's work? Perhaps they are closer to God then we are on our own journey.  We are asked to grow both as Christians and within our personal spiritual journey towards God, this may not be quite the same thing.  Let us bring hope not build divisions; cultivate love and not destroy in hatred.  Christ went into the world and so also should we.