Open Enrollment
It caught my attention that the lectionary reading from Romans for today is a benediction. Actually, I was so engaged by that fact that I didn’t notice I was looking at next weeks reading. So, that’s my confession for those of you who keep track of such things. I’m a week ahead, a feat I can seldom claim. Paul commonly ended his letters with benedictions, many of which are used by clergy in worship services. “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. (IICorinthians) “Peace be to the brethren, and love with faith, from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Grace be with all who love our Lord Jesus Christ with love unending.” (Ephesians) Here’s one that Paul didn’t write. “Now to him who is able to keep you from falling and present you without blemish before the presence of his glory with rejoicing, to the only God, our Savior through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion and authority, before all time and now and for ever. Amen. (The letter of Jude) And from Romans, this benediction. “Now to him who is able to strengthen you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery which was kept secret for long ages but is now disclosed and through the prophetic writings is made known to all nations, according to the command of the eternal God, to bring about the obedience of faith – to the only wise God be glory for evermore through Jesus Christ! Amen.” Paul was the master of the run-on sentence. If you look up the word “mystery” in the Bible concordance, you will discover that Paul uses it more times than the rest of the biblical writers combined. To both the Colossians and the Ephesians he speaks of a mystery that had been hidden from them but has now being made available to the Gentiles through the Grace of the Lord Jesus Christ. That doesn’t mean that the mystery is now fully understood and the riddle solved, the enigma made clear. It means rather that everyone is now invited into the mystery, to be engaged by the mystery – the mystery of God’s working for the salvation of the whole world through Jesus Christ. The idea of extending God’s grace to all people and not just the “Chosen” was not a divine afterthought, and Paul didn’t invent it. It is as old as the prophets. Isaiah reports what God declared to him, “It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and restore the preserved of Israel; I will give you as a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.” (Is 49: 6) “It shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the Lord shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and shall be raised above the hills: and all the nations shall flow to it. (Isaiah 2: 2) That was the ancient prophecy, now Paul is announcing that the time for open enrollment has come. Jesus began his ministry in Nazareth by pointing to that same prophecy. Remember that story in the first part of the Gospel of Luke – Jesus after his baptism going to preach at his home church. He chooses for his text, Isaiah 61: 1-2, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord’s favor.” Everyone was pleased when he chose that lesson but the mood soon turned ugly over his interpretation of the text. (That happens to me sometimes) The final straw that almost got him lynched was when he reminded them of the story of the Prophet Elisha healing Naamon the Syrian leper. No not Elijah, he was last Sunday. This one is Elisha his successor. As a matter of fact, let me digress and lead you through yet another mystery. Mark the place where we are in the sermon and we will come back to it – I promise. (And you can’t dock me for the time either) Remember last week when we talked about Elijah being taken up in a whirlwind in a chariot of fire? Well there was more to that story. Elisha had been Elijah’s apprentice, sort of learning the prophetic ropes from the master. When Elijah announced that he was going to be taken up, Elisha was understandably upset. He was in no way ready to take over as head prophet. So he made a desperate request of Elijah, that he (Elisha) might be granted a double portion of his spirit. Elijah said that his wish would be granted if he saw him when he went. Now let me read what happens next. Here’s the mystery. “And as they still went on and talked, behold, a chariot of fire and horses of fire separated the two of them. And Elijah was taken up by a whirlwind into heaven. And Elisha saw it and cried, (saw what?) ‘My father, my father! The chariots of Israel and its horsemen!’ And he saw him no more.” (II Kings 2: 11-12) Now most interpreters of this event think Elisha saw him go, that the whirlwind and the chariot of fire were one and the same. I don’t think so. I think the Chariot of fire was a distraction which Elisha was watching while Elijah went up in a whirlwind - and he missed it! The story goes on to say, “Then he took hold of his own clothes and rent them in two pieces.” Now perhaps that dramatic act is an expression of grief that his master is gone, but I don’t think so. I think it is an expression of exasperation because he missed it and he would never live up to the high standard of Elijah his master. And he never did. Spent his whole life in his long shadow. He did a lot of great and powerful things which standing alone would have singled him out for greatness – but Elijah’s legend was too overpowering. Same reason most Vice Presidents of the US never get elected President. Plus there was that problem with name confusion. I think his massive inferiority complex is what turned him into the grouchy old recluse he became. All that notwithstanding, one of the things he did, along with seeing to the fulfillment of Elijah’s prophecy about the dogs eating Jezebel, was to heal a Syrian general of his leprosy. Now, back to the sermon that I was in the middle of; do you still have the place marked. If anything should have raised old Elisha out of the dumps, albeit, posthumously, it was the fact that Jesus himself referenced him and that act as part of his first sermon at the beginning of his ministry – and that’s what got Jesus into trouble – prophets are always happiest when they stir things up. This is how it went down. After Jesus read from the Isaiah text, he said, “Today is this prophecy fulfilled in your hearing.” Well what did he mean by that? He meant that the time for the open enrolment of the whole world had come. The people didn’t want to hear that. When you have spent a lifetime being told that you are special, God’s chosen, it’s hard to hear that God loves everybody else just as much. Sort of like being an only child – then the new baby comes along. What Jesus said that enflamed the congregation and turned them into a mob was this, There were lots of lepers in Israel in the days of Elisha the prophet, but he healed none of them, rather he healed a foreigner. God is going to bring healing to the foreigners, perhaps even before you! Fighting words. The obvious message here is that we are part of that Gentile world that has been invited into the mystery of God in Christ, and for that are gloriously thankful. But, there is another message, a more sinister one. Perhaps after all these years of grace we have begun to think of ourselves as God’s favorites. In many ways the church behaves like the new Pharisees, righteous, of course, but sadly also deadeningly self-righteous. Some Christians are sure that God favors them over other Christians. Most Christians are sure that God favors them over people who embrace other religions – and Americans over other nationalities. And we are certain that God favors us over those atheists, agnostics and those indifferent to his existence. Paul said that the mystery that had been kept secret for the ages was now made known to all nations “according to the command of the eternal God, to bring about the obedience of faith.” Why is it that the church seems to always be looking for ways to make itself exclusive – to limit grace? If there is anything we know from both scripture and experience it is that grace is always more expansive and inclusive than we imagined – to people whose sins are less socially acceptable than ours, to people who deserve grace less than we do, and (can it be) in our own time, people with the wrong politics, theology and sexual orientation. Brothers and sisters, our self-assumed favored status is an affront to God’s grace! It’s open enrollment time for every nation. If grace is available to all God’s people, then it is ours to extend that grace – to-all-God’s-people. There are no lost causes. If amazing grace how sweet the sound can save a wretch like John Newton the slave ship captain, then why not the agnostic, the rabid atheistic church hater, the scientific minded scoffer, the foreigner, the enemy, you add to the list? Peter went to meet with the detested enemy, an officer in the Roman army that had conquered Israel and occupied it for centuries. He said of that encounter, “I perceive that anyone who fears, honors God and does what is right is acceptable to God.” Even if his definition of “right” is different than mine. Then Peter told Cornelius about Jesus and grace. And never doubt the power of grace to transform! There are no lost causes because the mystery is too all engaging to be resisted, even by the most dedicated skeptic and the proudest rational thinker. Isla and I like a TV show called The Good Wife, about two lawyers and their two teenaged children. The daughter has started hanging out with a Christian and has gotten interested. She asks her mother what she thinks of Jesus. She responds with disgust, “You aren’t becoming a Christian are you?” The daughter assures her mom that it’s not that bad, she’s just curious. So the mother says that she thinks Jesus is somebody who lived a long time age and has no relevance to our time. That’s what much of society thinks; there is nothing particularly wrong with religion, it just serves no purpose in today’s world. But, how is it possible that her daughter is somehow engaged by this nonsense. She is above average in intelligence. She has been raised in an intellectual environment with rationally thinking parents? Now she is engaged somehow by this myth about this person who lived 2000 years ago. Because that mystery that engaged the Apostle Paul, and St. Augustine, and Martin Luther, and John Newton, and John Wesley and Billy Graham and me, still is alive and filled with the power of the Spirit. Powerful enough to crack into a family of cynical agnostics and engage the mind and heart of their teenaged daughter. We are coming up to the season when the world will hear again one of the most powerful and transformative stories ever told. The angels told shepherds on the hillside. Foreign kings followed a star. Get it? Poor and rich – local and foreign. “Behold I bring you good news of a great joy that shall be to all the people.” What part of all is not clear? It is ours to tell that story to all the people, then stand back and watch the mystery draw them in – God in Christ, the highest of all the mountains, and all the nations shall flow to it. |