Established – this is one of the most dangerous words we can encounter as a church. 1 Peter claims that God will “restore, support, strengthen, and establish” us. Generally speaking, these are good things. Yet I believe that the past tense of the last part of that promise – to be established – can be as much of a curse as it is a blessing. Of course, I am taking the term “establish” completely out of context, so let me back up and fill in some holes before I go too much further.
All three of these readings were most likely written close to the end of the first century. To put it in perspective, scholars believe that Jesus’ death and resurrection were around 33 AD. Rome exercised total control over Israel and Judah, and tensions were rising that eventually spilled over into outright rebellion in 66 AD, with the result of the temple of Jerusalem being overrun and destroyed in 70 AD.
Around this time, or a little later, these letters and stories were written and began to circulate. The other Gospels, and some of the letters of Paul, are believed to have been written earlier, but these were all written after the fall of the temple. Rome had destroyed and scattered the Jewish state and the center of its religious authority. Followers of Jesus were finding it important to do two things: make sure the Romans knew they were different from the Jews that were in rebellion, and write things down before the generation that walked and talked with Jesus had died out. At the same time, they had an immense hope that the promises of Jesus about God’s judgment and their salvation were going to come true in their lifetime!
What’s interesting is that in the letters of Paul we find a greater emphasis on Jesus returning soon. But in these passages, we begin to see a transition. In Acts, the resurrected Jesus walks and talks and teaches the disciples for forty days, and they say, “OK, Jesus. We’re ready. Are you? Is this the time to take it all back?” And Jesus simply tells them not to worry about silly things like the timing of God’s redemptive action, but to wait in Jerusalem, receive the Holy Spirit, and then go share it with all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth!
I can’t blame the disciples for trying, though. Somehow it seems to be a part of our human nature to expect that God wants what we want. You find it throughout the Bible. Whether it is the cry for a King or because of one, whether it is a desire to build a golden cow for a made up God or booths for people made to represent God, we just can’t help but assume that saying that something is good means that, “it benefits me and people who are like me.”
I think that is why passages like 1 Peter are hard for us to understand. If my ability to understand is conditioned by my experience, and if my experience of good is related to my own comfort then how in the world am I to understand what the author of 1 Peter is saying about suffering. One might even get the impression that the God being described is at best cruel and at worst sadistic!
Seriously, this God expects us to suffer – even thinks our suffering is a good thing if it happens because of our belief in his chosen One? Taken out of context, these passages can then become a very convenient justification for some pretty bad behavior on behalf of some pretty selfish so-called followers of Jesus – things like picketing funerals and condemning others for disagreeing.
The context of 1 Peter is not – as far as we can tell – the outright persecution of Christians. That probably came a bit later. Maybe the author was reading the writing on the wall about coming problems, but most scholars agree that the issues have to do with acceptance or rejection. That may sound easy in the face of other horrors, but it affected every aspect of their lives – family, work, connection to community, and resources for basic survival.
So, how do we understand that kind of suffering while we live on 1 planet separated into 3 worlds – developed, developing, and undeveloped (whatever that means) – and we post problems and share articles on the internet such as, “my robot vacuum cleaner died” or “we are hurting our children by protecting them from everything”?
This is not to say that we do not have problems. Some in this room have suffered more than others, and all of us have had our trials. That is precisely why it still matters to hear and to say that there is a God who loves you – a God who loves you enough to let there be chaos in the world. There is a God who holds a final word, and that word is not suffering. That word is redemption. There is a God in whose love you are established, fixed, and made to last.
Now, here is where I will take the word established out of context and tell you why I think it is a dangerous word for the church. When we say that something is established, especially in the church, we expect that it is something that will never change. We expect that it will never need to be changed. We expect that closets and tables that have been named after people we love will always serve the same purpose, and that making changes is a waste of energy that is simply as productive as trying to re-invent the wheel.
We love to quote the old adage, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it!” yet we forget that “doing the same thing and expecting new results” is one way to describe insanity. The problem is that we often think that something works because it used to, and because it seems good to us. The result is a church with rock solid doctrine, declining membership, and no relationship with the community that surrounds it.
You see the same thing in the business community – only, people will pour money into a dying church a lot longer than they will a failing business. In 2008, after finding that only 16 of the 100 largest companies that were around in the early 1900's are still with us, Donald R. Keough’s wrote The Ten Commandments for Business Failure. The top four reasons were: 1. Quit Taking Risks 2. Be Inflexible 3. Isolate Yourself 4. Assume Infallibility.
On the contrary, scripture tells us to be humble, to let go of anxiety, to be disciplined, ready, and alert, and to expect God to be with us, to bear with us, and – ultimately – to keep us from failing.
To be established, or to expect God to establish us, truly has nothing to do with permanent structures. It has everything to do with a rhythm of life that expects God to be involved and is grounded in an eternal hope of life in God’s embrace.
The unique claim we find in John’s Gospel is that Jesus wants the disciples to know that he has truly revealed the identity and experience of God’s active presence to them. The proclamation about Jesus makes a dramatic shift in this prayer from a prophet calling for repentance to a person who demonstrates the very presence of God. Eternal life is not simply a prize at the end of the game; it is found in the knowledge of God as active and present. And so, in the way that God and Jesus are one, we are called to a more common unity – or perhaps an uncommon unity, uncommon in all the world because of our desire to love when it is least convenient to do so.
Interestingly, community as a result of our relationship with God is a place of common ground in these texts. In Acts there is a list of the disciples – the first church directory. The names matter, but the calling, the activity, and the discipline is a result of being joined together through faith in Christ. The letters of Peter were also written to a community, and they held the assurance that brothers and sisters in faith throughout the world were suffering with them.
Maybe misery loves company, but maybe the deeper meaning of this passage is something like, “If someone isn’t getting mad somewhere, then we must not be doing our jobs. And if people are pushing back against us all over the place, then we must really be doing something good!” Of course it isn’t that simple – just because someone resists you does not mean that you are in the right.
The reality is that the world is a self-centered place. To be God centered – or worse, to encourage other people to be God centered – is going to create conflict. Add to that the fact that sometimes life is difficult no matter what you do, and it becomes really important to know that you are not alone in this world. Add to that the fact that some people that claim to share the values and beliefs that you hold to be true will still reject you. Add to that the fact that you might want to reject some of them, and you can see how difficult the task of joining with others as Jesus joined with his heavenly Father can become.
It may sound trite, but I think that loving one another is a crucial task of this congregation as we grow. One of my first observations about this congregation was the way in which a wide variety of social classes and theologies are embraced in one place. A member responded to my observation matter-of-factly. She said, “We have no choice. We’re too small to lose anyone.”
That used to be true. As we continue to grow, the new normal is not that we have no choice but to love. It is that we must choose how to be a community grounded in love. As difficult as that can be, I saw something like it at my daughter’s ballet studio the other day.
Several classes gave presentations of the work they had been about. It wasn’t a recital so much as a window into their world. Most of the dancers were in sync. All danced beautifully. The few mistakes that were made were some of the more beautiful moments, in my opinion. A dancer dropped her hat during a jazz routine and kept on dancing, moving her hand as if the hat were there. A girl turned the wrong way in a ballet piece and giggled as she watched her friends and moved back in sync. There were one or two other minor mistakes. The important thing was the dance. Correct and purposeful movement in time with music and crafted by instructors was punctuated by simple mistakes and grand artistic gestures to create something unique in all the world and dependent on every piece to become complete.
That’s the church. As we bumble and glide toward our own Pentecost event, let us be humble, let us be disciplined, let us take the risk of an uncommon common unity established in the Holy Spirit, revealing the active presence of God – and to God be the glory, now and always. Amen.
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