Occasional Sermons

As much as I like to run and bike and swim, I must confess that I’ve never taken much of an interest in spectator sports. Since so many people have told me over the years that I’m crazy not to like them, I’ve given some thought as to why I don’t. I’ve formulated a theory that since I have a bad sense of direction and often mistake my left for my right that my spatial perception is impaired, and I can’t process properly what’s happening on the field or court. But in the last analysis, who can account for likes and dislikes? All I know is that spectator sports of whatever kind make me bored and restless, petulant even. So I don’t watch them, and no one expects me to any more. Some years back though I felt certain I’d have a change of heart. It turned out that a son of mine was pretty good at football and was predicted to make a sizeable contribution to his high school team. I wouldn’t so much be watching a spectator sport, I thought. Rather, I’d be watching my son, my own flesh and blood, my pride and joy. Surely this would override my impaired spatial perception. But by the first game, I discovered I was wrong. I guess there are limits to maternal devotion. Before the first quarter was over I was bored and restless, petulant even. But of course I could scarcely beg off of his games. What would my son think? Never mind my son, what would the other mothers think? There’s no peer pressure like the peer pressure of other mothers. So I determined to make a heroic sacrifice and attend his games. I learned quickly never to sit near the dads. They tracked every play and second guessed every call. They’d have zero tolerance for my like. I therefore sat with the other mothers, chatting occasionally to pass the time. One night, there was a lull in the chatting, and I happened to glance out on the field. Just then all the stars aligned. The opposing team was about to score a touch down and win the game. It was all but a done deal. They were on the 10 yard line, and there were two minutes left. They threw a pass to a player in the end zone, and suddenly from out of nowhere someone soared high into the air and intercepted the pass. It was my son. Before anyone knew what was happening, he was on the move, dodging and ducking, zigging and zagging. Soon he outmaneuvered the pack, and was running, like I’d never seen him run, down the field. Three players were in hot pursuit -- gaining and gaining, but just as they were at his heels he somehow widened the distance between them and then left them behind. By this time, I was on my feet. I was screaming at the top of my lungs. My eyes were bulging out of my head. I was jumping up and down. And I was not the only one. When he scored the touchdown there was rampant joy and hysteria. You’d think Christ had just numbered us among the sheep. When I went down to congratulate him he was talking with his coach. “I didn’t think you had it in you,” his coach said. “I didn’t,” my son replied. “The group spirit somehow carried me down the field.” I guess there was that one day I took an interest in spectator sports. All this was, as I said, some years back. My son lives on his own now in New York City. I think life is a bit tougher than he thought it would be. He lives paycheck to paycheck working very hard at a job he doesn’t like much, though he knows he’s lucky to have a job at all. Being at the epicenter of the economic meltdown, he has many reminders of the high unemployment rates. We spoke recently and happened to reminisce about that football game. “It was such a big deal to me at the time,” he said, “but in the long run it was nothing.” “It wasn’t nothing” I said. “It was an accomplishment.” “Maybe,” he said, “But it didn’t change anything for me.” It’s hard growing up, I thought, as I listened to him. At least when you’ve been grown up a long time like most of us, you accustom yourself to life’s limitations and disappointments. Though as I reflected upon his words later, I realized that, disillusionment aside, he had a point. Even if it had somehow changed something for him, it would have just deferred the question. Because if you think about it, how can anything that is IN the world and OF the world really change the world? In the last analysis, it’s always going to be the same old story, and the same old story will end the same old way. It’s like old Ecclesiastes from our Old Testament lesson realized. “A generation goes, and a generation comes, but the earth remains forever….What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done; There is nothing new under the sun.” There is nothing new under the sun. That’s how my son felt, and how we may be tempted to feel from time to time or all the time. But it’s not true. It’s not right, and it’s not true. There is something new under the sun. It began the first Pentecost, and the apostles prove it. Take the apostle Peter. There’s nothing in the record about it, but there’s no doubt in my mind that he was once in the spotlight. He was the leader. He was the one with the charisma. He was the one who took charge. But then life caught up with him, and before he knew it all that was left was a caricature of his former self; all that was left was his half cocked attempt to assert himself before those who now took little notice of him. All four gospels capture the same embarrassing portrait. Some of them even go so far as to make apologies for him. Look what spectacle he made of himself at the Transfiguration. Jesus went with some of his disciples to a mountain top. Suddenly he was transfigured and there appeared at his right hand Moses and at his left Elijah. Some great epiphany was at hand! What did Peter say? He said, “Boy it’s sure good that I’m here.” It was sure good that he was there? There stood the Son of God and standing in his midst the Father of Prophecy and the Father of the Law, and it was sure good Peter was there? And why? So he could build each of them a little tent. And he made a like spectacle of himself at the foot washing as well. It was the night before Jesus’ execution. The disciples were gathered together with Jesus in the upper room. Premonition hung in the air. The disciples awaited from Jesus some sign, some cue, some signal. Jesus arose and removed his outer robe. He poured water in a basin and began to wash their feet. He sought to symbolize in his actions what he before he departed wanted his disciples to learn -- that servants are not greater than their masters, nor messengers greater than the one who sent them. But when Jesus got to Peter’s feet, Peter refused to let Jesus wash them. Jesus assured him that he would come in time to understand what he was doing. Peter continued to balk. When Jesus insisted, Peter said he would permit it only as part of a full body wash. At this point I’m surprised that the evangelist John did not record the rolling of Jesus’ eyes. And these spectacles were nothing compared to the spectacle he made of himself after Jesus’ arrest. Just prior to his arrest, he proclaimed to Jesus, and I quote, “Even though I must die with you, I will never deny you.” And we all know what happened after Jesus’ arrest. He denied him not once, not twice, but three times. Jesus may have given Peter a special place of honor among the disciples, but it was not for any merit on Peter’s part. That wasn’t the way Jesus operated. It was because he looked at Peter and all people with compassion and forbearance. He saw that a special place of honor among the disciples was what Peter earned but needed. But then came Pentecost. The disciples were gathered again in the upper room when suddenly it was just as we heard described. There was the rush of a violent wind. Divided tongues as of fire rested upon each of them. We just heard it described, but we didn’t hear described what happened next. Peter had never been much of an orator, and that was probably for the best. What he said in private dialogues was bad enough; forget public speeches. But suddenly he was a great orator, and his words backed a punch. In his very first sermon, which is the very first sermon recorded in the Christian Church, he stood before the same crowds who had executed Jesus for a messianic imposter and declared to them that David himself had foreseen that the messiah would be the one that death could not hold. “Let the entire house if Israel know with certainty,” he concluded, “that God has made him both Messiah and Lord, this Jesus whom you crucified.” And that was just the beginning. Peter too was never known for his bravery. Just the opposite, he was known for his cowardice. But when questioned by the religious authorities about a miraculous healing he had performed, he stood before them his chest out, his head held high, and as brave as any man, and declared, “…let it be known to all of you, and to all the people of Israel, that this man is standing before you in good health by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified…The stone that the builders rejected has become the corner stone. There is salvation in no one else.” And when they demanded that he henceforth keep silent about Jesus Christ, he went on. “Whether it is right to listen to you rather than God, you must judge, but I cannot keep from speaking about what I have seen and heard.” The religious authorities were so confounded they let him go on his way. There was indeed change for Peter and change for his world. Into the degenerate Roman world there came through the apostles something new! It was not change from within which is no change at all, but change from above, change from the Spirit of Pentecost. It was in and of God’s world. It was the Spirit of the Pentecost. Friends in Christ, first the bad news. We don’t have it in us. We might think for a time that we do. We might hope for a time that we do. We might have our triumphs. But we don’t have it in us. We can make nothing new under the sun. But now the good news: But the Spirit of Penetcost has entered history. And by it and through it we do have it in us. We can make something new under the sun. We can do nothing less than bring heaven to earth. This is the good news for Pentecost. Amen.