When the Going Gets Tough…

Kevin Gasser

8/23/09

John 6:56-69

56Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them. 57Just as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever eats me will live because of me. 58This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like that which your ancestors ate, and they died. But the one who eats this bread will live forever.” 59He said these things while he was teaching in the synagogue at Capernaum.

60When many of his disciples heard it, they said, “This teaching is difficult; who can accept it?” 61But Jesus, being aware that his disciples were complaining about it, said to them, “Does this offend you? 62Then what if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before? 63It is the spirit that gives life; the flesh is useless. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. 64But among you there are some who do not believe.” For Jesus knew from the first who were the ones that did not believe, and who was the one that would betray him. 65And he said, “For this reason I have told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted by the Father.” 66Because of this many of his disciples turned back and no longer went about with him. 67So Jesus asked the twelve, “Do you also wish to go away?” 68Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life. 69We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God.”

 

            I was walking into the hospital the other day and I met a man who was walking in the same directions.  The man said in a loud voice, “Where are you going today?”  I responded, also in a loud voice, saying, “I’m going to see a friend.  They just had a baby.”

            As we continued to walk along together he looked at me briefly and repeated himself, “I said, Where are you going today?”  So I repeated myself, “I’m going to see a friend.  They just had a baby.”

            As I yelled out that last line I looked over at him and I noticed that he had one of those Bluetooth earpieces in.  He was talking to someone on the telephone.

            Where are you going today?  That’s a good question for many of us Christians to be asking ourselves.  Are we moving in the right direction or are we moving in the wrong direction?  Are we moving closer to Christ or further away? 

            In our scripture for this morning, Jesus gives some difficult teaching to his followers and many of them choose to stop being his followers and to go back home.  And today I would like to look at two reasons why people sometimes stop following Christ, though I admit that there are many more reasons than I have listed here.  The reasons that I want to look at are 1. because of a misunderstanding and 2. because of the expectations of Jesus.  We will start by looking at the misunderstandings.

Misunderstandings

            Our scripture for this morning begins with Jesus inviting those that have been following him to eat his flesh and drink of his blood.  Doing so will allow the eater/drinker to truly live.

            Eating flesh and drinking blood sounds weird to me and I hope that it sounds weird to you also.  If there is anyone here that doesn’t have a problem with eating human flesh and drinking human blood please let me know.  Because if that is the case, I believe that we should institute a mandatory ingredient labeling for all foods at carry-in meals. 

This should sound weird to us.  Eating human flesh and drinking human blood is not acceptable in our society, nor was it acceptable in Jesus’ day.  And if we think that this action is a bit of a taboo today, try putting yourself in the sandals of the first century Jews hearing Jesus’ words live and in person.

            Jews didn’t eat other people.  We call that cannibalism.  Now as far as I know there are no laws in the Torah forbidding cannibalism, but I am pretty sure that it was looked down upon.  And I’m not going to take a lot of time to discuss why eating other people is a bad thing.  I guess that I am just assuming that we can all agree that eating other people is not a good habit to get into.  However, why was it wrong for the Jews to drink blood?  Who doesn’t like a good bit of blood pudding every now and then, right?  Well there is a law in the Old Testament against drinking blood; any kind of blood.  Leviticus 17 clearly instructs that the Israelites and any alien living among them must abstain from the drinking of blood. 

Blood was considered the life source of an animal and of humans.  I have heard it said that because blood was considered the life source of an animal and of humans that certain pagan groups would drink animal blood as a way to gain strength before a battle or competition.  It was like you were consuming the life of the animal and that you would gain the strength of the animal from whom that blood came.  The person that I heard this from (Shane Hipps) likened the drinking of blood before battle in the pagan world to having a Red Bull energy drink.  The caffeine, the sugar, the millions of other ingredients that surely are good for you which I can’t even pronounce give you energy to do things that you normally couldn’t do.  The television commercial would even have you believe that Red Bull will allow you to break the laws of gravity and fly. 

So this is the mindset of the pagans surrounding the Israelites in the Old Testament.  The mystical power of drinking blood was to give them the strength to defeat their enemies.  And God’s people were to abstain from doing the things that the pagans did.  This seems to be consistent with a lot of the purity laws of the Old Testament in that the diet and daily lives of those that are a part of God’s covenanted group sets them aside as clearly different from the rest of the world around them.

            So now we have Jesus coming in to this group of Jews in the synagogue and telling them that whoever eats of his flesh and drinks his blood shall abide in him and he in them.  Imagine hearing this for the first time.  How confusing this must have been.  This man that they thought just might be the Messiah, the one that they have been waiting on for all of these years is coming in to their synagogue and telling them to do something that they all knew very well was against the Jewish Law.  To eat of his body and drink of his blood would be breaking the Torah.

            With this in mind, verse 60 really doesn’t surprise me.  It says, “When many of his disciples heard it, they said, ‘This teaching is difficult; who can accept it?’”  And then in verse 66 we find out that many of the disciples turned back and no longer went about with him.

            The disciples listed here were not the twelve disciples but the multitudes of followers that had been chasing after Jesus for some time.  Now let’s just look at the headings in your Bible for this chapter real quick.  These would have been the same people that were a part of the feeding of the 5,000.  These followers probably heard stories about how Jesus had walked on water in order to cross over the Sea of Galilee.  These were the same people that saw Jesus heal the sick and perform other signs (v. 2).  And now, after all that they had seen and heard, they were turning back.  They were giving up on following Jesus

            Obviously Jesus was not instructing people to literally eat his flesh and drink his blood.  This was a metaphor.  In fact if we read through the New Testament to Acts 15 we find the Council at Jerusalem where the early church decides that Gentiles do not need to undergo circumcision but that they should, “abstain from things polluted by idols and from fornication and from whatever has been strangled and from blood.”  Blood drinking was clearly not advocated by the early church and I think it is clear to us that Jesus was not advocating it, either.

            So the people left Jesus.  Verse 66 says many people turned back.  And it seems to me that they turned back because of a misunderstanding.  They were expecting something and they heard something else all together so they gave up and went home.  A misunderstanding of Jesus can be a cause for why some people stop following Jesus.

            Following Jesus is hard.  Just understanding Jesus is hard sometimes.  And I think the fact that Jesus rarely gave a straight answer only makes thing more difficult.  Jesus used parables, metaphors, hyperbole, similes, and allegories.  And I think that was brilliant!  By speaking and teaching in such a way Jesus was able to reach people in ways that he probably wouldn’t have been able to had he just handed out a list of things to do and not do.  So I am thankful for the way that Jesus taught, but I also realize that it leaves a lot of things up to interpretation and that not everyone is going to interpret them the same.

            In our pastors’ lunch this week I heard a story about a Mennonite pastor that was working on a degree at a seminary in the south.  This seminary was in a rural, mountain area with a large number of small churches that couldn’t support a pastor.  So often times seminary students would get some practice and a little money by going around these small, southern, mountain churches and preaching on a Sunday morning. 

            One Sunday, this Mennonite pastor-in-training went into the home of one of these mountain folks and they had prominently displayed on the wall of their home a picture of Stonewall Jackson and one of Jefferson Davis.  The pastor asked the home owner about these pictures and the man said, “I firmly believe that we were doing the will of God by succeeding from the Union in the Civil War.  The only reason we lost is because we were not being faithful.”  So they prayed harder and more fervently.  They repented for their mistakes and they sought after God’s forgiveness so that they could once again rise up and leave the Union.

            I’m sorry, but that is bad theology.  That is a huge misunderstanding of the Gospel and continuing on with this misunderstanding may lead to people losing their faith in God all together.  I hear people saying that God wants us to fight and kill these people and to fight and kill those people.  I hear people saying that God wants to give us a bigger house and a fancy car.  God wants to bless us with money beyond our wildest dreams and if we only pray hard enough we will never get sick, our grandmothers will never get cancer, our families will never split apart, women will never have miscarriages, children will never die, nobody will go hungry.  That is just wrong.  The first followers of Jesus Christ were instructed to lay down all of their possessions and follow Christ.  The first followers of Jesus Christ were told to expect persecution and they were killed for their faith.

            I believe that our theology is vital to the longevity of our faith.  When we have these misunderstandings about God, that God wants us to have riches beyond our wildest dreams and that we will always be healthy, and then that doesn’t happen, what will happen to our faith?  Down the toilet it goes.

            Yeah, I see someone driving a Lexus through the city of Staunton and I see a Jesus fish on the back of their Lexus and I might ask them, “Did Jesus give you that Lexus?” 

            Yes, Jesus gave it to me.

            Well then, I want Jesus, too!

            John Piper says that this is not the Gospel, that is idolatry.  That is elevating the gift over the giver.  Yes, God may heal us when we are sick, God may provide us with vast amounts of wealth, but God doesn’t promise this to everyone.  So what happens to my faith when I don’t get that Lexus or when my crops die, my grandmother gets cancer, or I get cancer?  Those things rock the foundation of your faith and your faith will fall like a house built on the sand.  All because of a misunderstanding.

The High Expectations of Jesus

Many other people leave Jesus for other reasons as well.  After delivering his sermon on the mount, I am sure that a lot of people turned back and said forget this.  When Jesus meets up with the Rich Young Ruler and Jesus instructs him to sell all of his possessions and follow him, the young man turns around and heads back to his riches because he wasn’t ready to give it all up to follow Jesus.  In Luke 9 we find the story of three would-be followers of Jesus.  The first one comes up to Jesus and says that he will follow Jesus wherever he goes.  Jesus replies to him that foxes have dens and birds have nests, but that he has nowhere to lay his head.  To the next person Jesus gives a direct invitation to follow him.  And Jesus replies with a seemingly heartless and impossible response, “Let the dead bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.”  The third would-be follower makes a seemingly reasonable request: Let me say goodbye to my family back home and I will follow you.  And Jesus says “Nobody that puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”

            Jesus requires absolute priority in our lives.  You can’t put money, social responsibilities, even family before him.  If you do you are not fit for the kingdom.  The point is that it is tough following Jesus.  And he wants you to follow him.  Don’t doubt that for a second.  Jesus is described as a shepherd that leaves the 99 other sheep to find a single lost sheep, as a woman that searches diligently for a lost coin, and as a father that rejoices at the lost son that finally returns.  You might hear these stories of how Jesus made being his disciple so difficult and think “Well he doesn’t really want us to follow him then.”  But that is not true.  Jesus wants you as a laborer in his fields, a laborer for the kingdom of God.  But he isn’t going to force you to do anything you aren’t willing to do.  And he isn’t about to compromise his expectations of all of those that would call themselves Christians.

            But they don’t tell you this when you first become a Christian, do they?  This might seem like an attack on some people, but I feel a little bit uneasy about the way we try to sell Christianity sometimes.  We go around preaching grace and forgiveness.  We tell people that there is nothing that they need to do to get into heaven except pray a little prayer and then you are in.  Then once someone prays that prayer and starts coming to church we pull out this great-big list of things that a Christians can and cannot do.  It’s the old bait and switch routine where we dangle something attractive in front of someone and then once they commit to it we switch it with another product.

            I’m not saying that salvation is by anything other than grace.  But being a Christian is not easy.  Jesus didn’t sugar coat anything when he invited people to follow him.  Jesus says in Matthew 16 that whoever wants to save their life must lose it.  Jesus isn’t just an add-on to what you are currently doing.  Jesus wants your entire life.

            You have probably all heard the saying, “When the going gets tough, the tough get going.”  That means that if times take a turn for the worst, you will power through them.  But it seems to suggest that when things get tough, you will up and leave, you get going.  If you are in a difficult marriage, does this mean that if you are tough you will get out of that marriage, to get going in a new direction?  If you have a hard time relating to someone at work, maybe you have some differing opinions on politics, sports teams, or whatever else, does this mean that you get going and find a different job.  That’s probably not what this saying was originally meant to mean.  But I am going to throw a new suggestion at you.  How about, “When the going gets tough, the faithful stick it out.”  If you are a strong follower of Jesus, you don’t run when things get tough, you work through it.  You ask the difficult questions, you seek counsel from others.  You read your Bible, you pray and you have others pray for you.  But you don’t quit.

            In our scripture this morning, after the multitudes that have been following Jesus, the same ones that have seen him feed the 5,000, heal the sick, perform miracles, and maybe even walk on water, turn around and head back to their homes, Jesus addresses his twelve core disciples.  He asks them, “Do you also wish to go away?”

            Peter, always quick with an answer, replies, “Lord, to whom can we go?  You have the words of eternal life.  We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God.”

            Think of all of those would-be followers of Christ.  Think of the many disciples that chose to not follow Jesus because of a misunderstanding when his teachings got a little too difficult to understand.  Think of those that couldn’t accept Jesus’ teachings because they put their money, their family, their expectations before following Christ.  When the going got tough for them, they got going alright.  They got the heck out of there.  But the twelve disciples didn’t get going.  They stuck with Jesus.

            Friends, there will be times when we stumble.  There will be times when we don’t understand what Jesus wants of us and there will be times when we do understand, yet we fail to do the things that are asked of us.  My suggestion to you today is to stick it out.  Because when the going gets tough, the faithful stick it out.

            When you stop and think about the first Easter day and you realize that people don’t just come back to life, don’t lose your faith.  Stick with it.  When you are challenged to give 10% of your income to those in need, to spend time with the “least of these”, the tax collectors and the sinners, don’t give up.  Stick with it.  When the things that you had hoped for, like riches and fame don’t come your way, don’t give up.  Stick with it.  Stick with your faith; stick with Jesus.  For, like Peter, we too have come to believe and know that He is the Holy One from God.

Restoration and the role of the Church

Kevin Gasser

Staunton Mennonite Church

9/7/08

 

Matthew 18:15-20

15“If another member of the church sins against you, go and point out the fault when the two of you are alone. If the member listens to you, you have regained that one. 16But if you are not listened to, take one or two others along with you, so that every word may be confirmed by the evidence of two or three witnesses. 17If the member refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if the offender refuses to listen even to the church, let such a one be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector. 18Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. 19Again, truly I tell you, if two of you agree on earth about anything you ask, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven. 20For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.”

 

            This past Monday, I took the opportunity in the late afternoon to go for a bike ride outside of the city limits on the north side of town.  I took Spring Hill Rd. way out into the country where I didn’t need to worry about traffic.  Now this was no easy ride.  Staunton and the surrounding area are not overly bicycle friendly because, if you aren’t familiar with Staunton, it is a little hilly around here.

            So I would pump my legs as hard as I could to climb a hill only to reach the top and a sharp decline, leading up to the next hill.  I started to figure out that if I put the bike in high gear and really tried to gain as much speed as possible while I went down the hill, I could save a little energy going up the next hill because of all of the momentum I had gained from going down the previous hill.

            So I was going down a steep hill out in the country.  And I was loving it.  I had farms on my left, green pastures on my right, and I was gaining enough speed to break the speed limit on most of our city streets (25 mph is pretty fast on a bike).  And as I was nearing the bottom of the hill I noticed a trail of mud crossing from one side of the road to another.  I was a little surprised by this because it hadn’t rained in a number of days.  But I decided at the speed that I was going that it would simply be better to drive through the mud.  However, as I drove through the mud, I realized it was not mud at all.  It was a special, stinky kind of mud.

            Sure enough, this stinky, farm fresh mud stuck to my tires long enough to be flung into the air, some landing directly on the face of an unhappy bike rider, not to mention his arms, legs, and clothing.

            What could I do?  I was ten miles from home, no money, no cell phone, and only about a half of a water bottle of H2O.  So I chose to do the only thing that I could do; I ignored my speckled arms and I kept on going.  But by the time I got home, you can believe that I stunk and nobody wanted to be anywhere near me.

            Well sin can be a lot like the “mud” I drove through that summer day.  Sometimes it can look different depending on your point of view.  Sometimes it doesn’t look that threatening, other times you know just how bad it really is, and there are even other times when you need someone else to tell you just how bad you have gotten yourself into it.  But the one thing we can probably all agree on this morning is that sin should be avoided if at all possible, because like the stinky mud I biked through, it not only affects you, but it can affect everyone you come in contact with.

            Today I want to look at Matthew 18 to see how we are to bring someone that has fallen into the pattern of sin back out of their destructive habits.

            We don’t like to talk about sin in our society today.  Maybe I shouldn’t say “we”, but I don’t like to talk about sin.  It is an ugly word, and hey, the Bible tells us not to judge others, lest we be judged ourselves, or something like that.  And who are we to tell someone about the speck of sawdust in their eye when we have a plank in our own eye?  But there is sin in the world.  A lot of it.  Perhaps it would be best to begin by defining sin so that we can all be on the same page and so that you can understand how I am using the word.

            To sin means literally to miss the mark.  We often use the metaphor of an archer shooting arrows at a target, missing the mark, and that is a sin.  So to put this in a Christian context, anything that we do or do not do that misses the target, anything that we do or do not do that detracts from God’s restorative plans for creation and most notably for humanity is a sin.

            Sins can either be sins of commission or sins of omission.  We usually think of sins as those things we do with our own bodies that come between us and God, the pleasures of the flesh that Paul lists for us; fornication, drunkenness, idolatry and the like.  But sins also take place outside of our bodies and can be sins against or fellow human beings.  Failing to give to those in need when it is so clearly commanded by Jesus is a sin, a sin of omission.  Contributing to a system of oppression which keeps the poor poor and the sick sick is a sin of both commission and omission.

            So when I use the word sin, I hope we don’t just limit that to what we did and did not do with our bodies today.  Sin abounds in this world, and there isn’t a one of us who is without sin.  As Jesus rightly pointed out in the case of the woman caught in adultery, there were none in his presence that had not sinned, and I assure you that there are none in my presence now, myself included, that is without sin.

            Biblical scholar NT Wright defines sin as falling into two different categories; idolatry or dehumanization.  Sin, according to Wright, is either failing to reflect the image of God, or failing to recognize the image of God reflected in others (Surprised by Hope, 179-180).

            So we look at our scripture for today, and this is directed to the church as a way to deal with church members that have sinned, that have missed the mark, which we are all guilty of doing from time to time.  And if one of the other members of the church sins against you or you witness them sinning, what is our first step to be?  We are to go and point it out to them in private.

            This one on one conversation is so important because it can prevent so many problems and misunderstandings.  For example, we would probably all agree that there would be something wrong with me, a married man, to go out on a date with someone who was not my wife.  But almost two weeks ago, I could have been seen having lunch with a woman who is not my wife.  Someone could have seen us laughing over a steaming hamburger and gone and told other people that Kevin is going out with women that aren’t his wife.         

But if you had approached me, I could have explained that this meal was in no way inappropriate.  I was actually doing my job by providing pastoral care for someone from the church over the lunch hour.

            So we can see one reason why it is so important to go to the person first if you believe that person to have sinned against you or against the church.  Sometimes we just flat-out misinterpret a situation.  And by going to that person we can try to avoid what can be a huge problem in most churches today; that is gossip.

            Now men, we often accuse our female counterparts of gossiping, but I think it is safe to say that we all contribute to this problem.  I know I like a good juicy piece of information.  And I can justify it by saying, “Oh, as a pastor I need to stay informed on what is going on in the lives of people from the congregation.”  But gossip, like the things we mentioned earlier, is a sin and therefore something we all need to avoid.

            So if you come to me and say, “Kevin, did you hear what so-and-so did?”  I should stop you right there and say, “Have you gone to them about this yet?  Have you spoken to the offender?  Because if you haven’t, I don’t want to hear about it.  It is your biblical obligation to first go to the offender first, not to the pastor.”

            And when you go to the offender, maybe they would have a good explanation for why they did what they did.  Maybe you just saw something from a bad angle or you didn’t see the entire context in which something occurred.  Or maybe they were doing something that was sinful, idolatrous, and not recognizing the image of God in others.  Maybe they will admit to doing something sinful and repent for it right there.  And if they have, then you have won that person back to the flock of believers.

            This brings us to a good time to look at the purpose of ever coming to a sinning person in the first place.  One could be tempted to come to a sinning person to show their spiritual superiority over the sinning person, “Johnny, I have noticed that you have been doing so and so.  I don’t have that problem and I wish you would stop it.  For Jesus, of course.”  Maybe we come to the person because we believe that they need to repent for their sin and be punished for what they have done.  But if we look at the context of our scripture for this morning, we can see that the reason we come to a person who has sinned against us or against the church is so that they might be able to renew their communion with God and with the members of the church. 

            Leading up to our scripture for today we have Jesus telling us the Parable of the Lost Sheep.  In this parable Jesus tells of the shepherd that will leave his 99 other sheep to go and bring one lost sheep back into the fold.  And Jesus gives clear teaching on this matter that it is the same way with God and the people that God has created.  God’s desire is that none should wander away and stray from the flock.  It is dangerous out there.

            Then following our scripture for today we have Peter asking Jesus how many times he should forgive a member of the church that sins against him.  Peter even makes a suggestion that seven times might be about the maximum.  And to that Jesus replies, “Not seven times, but seventy-seven times.”  And this is in no ways meant to limit forgiveness to 77 times, or 70 times 7, depending on where you read this.  Jesus’ answer is that we must forgive.

            So our scripture for today is not simply about punishing someone that sins.  It is about restoring someone that has wandered away from the flock, someone that has strayed from the church, back into God’s good graces.  This isn’t punitive, it is restorative.  That’s not to say that restoration might not involve some penalty, but that the point of approaching a church member that has sinned is always about rebuilding relationships between that person, God, and the church.

            So we tried to point out to the erring church member how they went astray.  And they don’t repent, they don’t apologize, the don’t seem to think that there is anything wrong with the way that they acted.  So what is the next step?  The next step is to take one or two others along.

            Now while this might sound like you are ganging up on the person who has been in error, I don’t think that is what Jesus is suggesting here at all.  No, we are not in the business of strong-arming people into straightening out.  That isn’t very consistent with our believers’ church tradition, now is it?

            First we have to ask ourselves why the person didn’t apologize when one person approached them.  Let’s come back to the example I used earlier of me joining a church member for lunch.  You approach me and tell me that you think I should not be going to lunch with women that are not my wife.  If I don’t agree, I won’t repent or apologize.  But if after hearing my explanation, you still feel as if I need to change or repent, this is when you are to bring one or two others along.

            Now you are not to go to those others first and present the case as you see it to them before they have a chance to hear my side of the story.  Then the one or two other witnesses are to decide if I am or am not in error.  If the two other witnesses deicide I am in error, and I still don’t repent, then it goes before the church.

            Now verse 18 comes into play, “Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”  It is the church, the gathered group of believers that has the authority to interpret scripture, this is what we call the hermeneutic community.  Together the church decides if I am in error or not.

            So we have done a lot of exposition of this text, but I haven’t touched on verse 17, which tells us to treat an unrepentant person as a Gentile or a tax collector if they still refuse to repent after the entire church has gone to them in attempt to restore them to good standings with God and the church.  This is where I differ in theology and ecclesiology from the first Anabaptist confession of faith, the Schleitheim Confession of 1527.  Article 2 of the Schleitheim Confession states that anyone that slips into temptation should be admonished twice in private and once in public, according to Matthew 18.  After this, they are to be separated from the fellowship of the community.

            We still see some of the more conservative Anabaptist groups, such as the Amish, practicing the ban or shunning those who refuse to repent for a sin.  I believe I told you about how my friend John’s family was excommunicated from the Amish church when they bought a car.  Family was not allowed to communicate with them, they were not allowed to come to the church or the fellowship gatherings of the church. 

            But how does Jesus say we are to interact with such unrepentant church members?  We are to treat them as Gentiles or as tax collectors.  And how did Jesus treat tax collectors?  He ate with them…regularly (admittedly, Jesus didn’t do this with Gentiles).

            Remember, the purpose of this entire section is restorative, not punitive.  We are not to punish someone, kicking them out of the church.  That is not our job.  Our job is to restore an erring brother or sister.  And I cannot see how cutting them off from fellowship with the church is ever going achieve that cause.  I believe that what Jesus wants the church to do with an unrepentant church member, a church member that won’t agree that he or she is in error, is to go back to the drawing board.  As Paul puts it elsewhere, these unrepentant church members need to go back on milk because they are not ready for whole food.  We don’t cut them off from the fellowship of the church, we include them as neophytes, newcomers to the church, or as outsides whom we are trying to evangelize.  The point is we want to restore them to God and the church, not kick them to the curb and say, “To hell with you.”

            It’s tough, I know.  It is tough to tell another church member that you think that they are living in sin.  Especially when we all know we have planks in our own eyes.  But when we stop looking at this as a way to make ourselves look better, to punish those that have been backsliding, and focus on the real reason for this passage, to restore people as citizens of the kingdom of God, then we should all be willing to help one another with the specks of sawdust in our eyes.  If I am sinning, please don’t let me continue to do so, alienating myself from you, the rest of the church and God.  I want to grow as a Christian.  And though growth can be painful, I hope that we will all agree that it is worth it.  It is what we are called to do.

            I wish that when I went on my bike ride last Monday that someone would have been able to warn me about the stinky mud that I was about to ride through.  After I had ridden through it, I wish that I had someone to help clean myself up.  Sin stinks.  It destroys our relationship with God and our relationship with others.  Let us help one another to stay out of sin, and let us continue to work to restore those who have wandered away from the flock.

Communal Discipleship

Kevin Gasser

Staunton Mennonite Church

1/27/08

Acts 2:37-47

37Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and to the other apostles, “Brothers, what should we do?” 38Peter said to them, “Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ so that your sins may be forgiven; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. 39For the promise is for you, for your children, and for all who are far away, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to him.” 40And he testified with many other arguments and exhorted them, saying, “Save yourselves from this corrupt generation.” 41So those who welcomed his message were baptized, and that day about three thousand persons were added.

42They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. 43Awe came upon everyone, because many wonders and signs were being done by the apostles. 44All who believed were together and had all things in common; 45they would sell their possessions and goods and distribute the proceeds to all, as any had need. 46Day by day, as they spent much time together in the temple, they broke bread at home and ate their food with glad and generous hearts, 47praising God and having the goodwill of all the people. And day by day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved.

            Every Sunday, I have a set routine.  I wake up at 6:30 in the morning with the best of intentions of getting out of bed and preparing myself for Sunday morning worship.  I grab my sermon, sit down on the couch, and try to stay awake while I read through the text a number of times.  It is always a bad sign when I can’t keep myself awake with a sermon.  If I can’t keep myself awake, how can I expect to keep you all awake?  Then at 8:00 I begin to get cleaned up and ready for church.  We try to hit the road by 8:30, and Sonya drives while I practice my sermon in my own head. 

            It takes us about 35 minutes to get to the church and the ride is pretty enjoyable.  We drive down 81, right through the heart of the Shenandoah Valley.  The view is amazing, with mountains on either side, trees in bloom in the spring, and magnificent colors in the autumn, snow on the treetops in the winter.  But as enjoyable as this trip is, it can be difficult along the way.  There are a lot of elevation changes with trucks creeping up the hill at Wyers Cave.  There are the dangers of wildlife running out in front of you, cars changing lanes, and State Highway Patrol officers nestled into the median (not that we ever break the speed limit J).

            On our journey to the church, we enjoy all of the good that surrounds us.  But we are also aware of the dangers that are out there as well.  We do not blindly travel up and down 81, but we rejoice in the beauty that God has surrounded us with while avoiding the dangers with one another’s help.  And the best part of the journey is that we don’t have to do it on our own.  Sonya and I have one another to help us to see the beauty of God’s creation, and help one another to avoid the dangers.

Last week I spoke with you about pointing people toward Christ.  But I want you to know that pointing someone to Christ is not the end of our Christian responsibility.  There is more, much more.  And unfortunately for those of us that like to get things done and finish them up early, this next step is a life-long engagement.  The next step is communal discipleship; walking with one another as we follow Jesus.  Today I would like to talk about communal discipleship.  And I would like to show you why we all need communal discipleship, and how to actually practice communal discipleship.

Why we need communal discipleship

Our scripture for today begins with a group of people that have been pointed to Jesus.  Peter has just delivered a message that Jesus of Nazareth is both Lord and Messiah and many of the hearers believe.  They have been pointed to Jesus, and they begin their journey to Jesus.  But this is where I get very confused.  I get confused because these new believers ask something of Peter and the other more experienced followers of Jesus Christ.  The new believers ask, “Brothers, what should we do?”

Now the only thing that I can figure out here is that there must have been more women present than men.  Because men never ask for directions.  And this is what these new believers were doing.  They were asking for directions.  They knew that they were beginning something new, they knew that they had been pointed to Christ, but they did not know how to get from point A to point B.

I would liken our lives as Christians to that of a journey.  All of us began this journey because someone else pointed us to Christ.  Whether it was our parents, friends, relatives, or neighbors, most Christians began this journey when someone else pointed them in the right direction.  I doubt that very many people ever begin this journey without anyone ever providing some sort of direction in their lives, though I suppose it would be possible.

But when we are pointed to Christ, in that moment when we first believe, we do not immediately arrive at our final destination.  We do not find ourselves face to face with Jesus in heaven.  We do not experience the kingdom of God in its fullness.  Instead, we become followers of Jesus Christ, we become his disciples.  That is why I suggest that we are on a journey; a journey to Jesus, walking in the footsteps of our savior.  Seeking to know him, seeking to see him face to face.

It is my belief that our journey to Christ as his disciples is best done in community.  This journey is made easier and more enjoyable by surrounding ourselves with other people that are on the same journey.  But before I get into that, I want to share with you something that I have been thinking about a bit.  I do not believe that the same person that points a person to Christ is necessarily the same person that needs to walk with that person on this journey to Christ.  The evangelist does not have to be the co-disciple to the person on the journey.  It would be nice if they were, but they don’t have to be.

Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 3, “I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth.”  Paul did not walk with the Corinthian converts each step of the way.  He pointed them to Christ, stayed with them for a time, and then moved on to another geographic location.  But he did make sure there was someone in place to walk with the Corinthians on their journey to Christ.  Apollos was there as a co-disciple to “water” the seed that Paul had planted.

That does not mean that Paul just pointed these people to Christ and then forgot about them.  We know he wrote to them at least three times.  And we know that he prayed for the Corinthians.  But because of the calling that Paul had been given, he was not able to stay and walk with the Corinthians on their journey to Christ.  But he also didn’t point them to Christ and say, “You’re on your own.” either.

We need other Christians on our journey.  We need co-disciples of Christ that can walk with us every day.  Like my drive down 81 with Sonya on a Sunday morning, we need others on the journey that can help us to appreciate the beauty of God’s creation that surrounds us.  Someone who can point out the flowering dogwood and the blooming wild flowers.  And we need others on the journey to help us to watch out for the deer running across the road and potholes that exist along the way.  We need others to help us with directions when we get lost, especially when we have not been to the place we are trying to get to.  Having someone on the journey with us can be a huge benefit when we get into new territory.

But all too often, we think we know where we are going and that we don’t need anyone else to help us on the journey.  Even when we get lost, we are too stubborn to ask for directions.  I am not at all immune from this conceited belief that I know where I am going all of the time.  I don’t think that I have ever stopped and asked for directions.  I fit the stereotypical male figure that doesn’t stop, no matter how lost I get.  And it isn’t as if I was ever told not to ask for directions.  I don’t ever recall my father sitting me and my two brothers down and teaching us, “Now boys, as men we don’t stop and ask directions.  We just keep driving past the same water tower and hope nobody else notices that we are lost.”  But somewhere along the line, this belief that it shows weakness if I stop and ask for directions has been ingrained upon my mind.  It is hard to admit when I am lost and in need of help.

I am afraid that this self dependency has crossed over into our journey toward Christ.  And I know that I am as bad as anyone else in this matter.  I remember in college, and I don’t even remember what the issue was, a person asking me if I minded if they prayed for me.  I remember clearly my reply, “Don’t worry about me.  I’ll be okay.  Pray for someone who needs it.”  It wasn’t even that I wasn’t asking for directions, I was refusing guidance. 

So when I read this passage from Acts 2, I am amazed by the new believers and their asking for direction.  So many of us have the attitude that we can get through this on our own.  We will find our way.  We can pull ourselves up by our bootstraps.  But looking back on my journey as a Christian, I can see that the single most important thing, outside of the guidance of the Holy Spirit, has been those on the journey with me.

I could probably go through this congregation and know something that each of you has had to struggle through in the last couple of years.  Whether it is the loss of a spouse, cancer in a loved one, sickness, injuries, temptations, each one of us has been afflicted with something.  And I know that most of you would give me the same answer if I were to ask you what helped you get through such a hard time.  You would tell me it was the church.  And when I say the church, you know that I don’t mean the building in which we are sitting right now.  I am talking about the people that make up the church.  Those who are on this journey with us.  It is our fellow disciples that keep us pressing on toward Christ.

How do we practice communal discipleship?

So how do we practice communal discipleship?  Looking back at our scripture we can see a couple of themes that come up more than once.  Verse 42 reads, “They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teachings and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the fellowship.”  Then in 46, “Day by day, as they spent much time together in the temple, they broke bread at home and ate their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having the goodwill of all the people.  And day by day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved.”  The three practices from this discipleship community that I wish to lift out are the devotion to the apostles’ teachings, prayer, and the breaking of bread.

They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teachings.  These teachings were not original with the apostles, so where did they learn them?  Well, what other name do we call the apostles by?  They are also called the disciples.  The apostles’ teachings are really the teachings of Jesus Christ that the original disciples learned in their own community of 12 plus Jesus.  So a part of the communal discipleship of the early church was to study the teachings of Jesus.  But to say that they devoted themselves to Jesus’ teachings means more than they learned the teachings.  To be devoted means that they lived out Jesus’ teachings.  And memorizing the teachings isn’t the hard part.  Living them out is.

And this is where the discipleship community really comes into play.  To live out the teachings of Jesus requires help.  We need the guidance of others to watch out for the dangers along this pathway, much like Sonya and I help each other to watch out for dangers on the highway.  Now I know that it can be hard to take someone’s advice when we are driving.  I hate a backseat driver that tells me to slow down or to increase my following distance from the car in front of me.  But I need to know that it is for my own good.

And if someone in our discipleship community is giving us advice on how to live out the teachings of Jesus, we need to remember that they do it for our own good.  If someone tells you, “Maybe you shouldn’t be spending time alone with that attractive person of the opposite sex,” or “Maybe you need to forgive that person who hurt you,” we need to remember that they are doing it for our own good.  That is a part of what it means to be in a discipleship community.  It doesn’t always feel good to have someone point out our weaknesses as a Christian, but it is for our own good.  And when we devote ourselves to Jesus’ teachings, we need the help of others to help us keep the teachings of Jesus.

Both of these verses speak about the importance of prayer in our discipleship communities.  Verse 46 says they met frequently in the temple.  And I am going to guess that they didn’t just meet there for church league softball or another committee meeting.  They were meeting to pray with and for one another.  And I cannot emphasize the importance of praying for one another enough.  We need to be remembering each other in prayer.  That is why we have certain prayer requests listed in our bulletin every week.  Praying for one another reminds us of others struggles and helps us to connect with that person and with God simultaneously.

And the final thing that I notice in this discipleship community in Acts 2 is that the disciples devoted themselves to the breaking of bread.  Now it does not say that they devoted themselves to breaking bread together, but based on everything else that we find in this passage, I think it is safe to assume that this breaking of bread was in the presence of other disciples, other followers of Jesus Christ.

The biblical scholars do not agree on whether this passage is referring to them taking communion together or if it refers to a common meal.  But it is my belief that anytime the disciples got together to eat, anytime they broke bread, they did it in remembrance of Christ.

But what is really important to note here is where they broke bread.  They broke bread in their own homes.  And I believe that this is a huge step in the development of communal discipleship.  Pot lucks, carry-in meals, and the like are all wonderful.  Fellowship meals are great.  But if you really want to get to know someone, if you really want to let them into your life and be vulnerable with them, you invite them over to your home.

I am aware that many of you have never been to our home in Harrisonburg, and for that I apologize.  But when we move into our new place in Staunton, I plan to invite everyone over.  But it is scary to have people over.  And not just because you never know what to cook, or whether or not your house is clean enough.  It is scary because when people enter into your home they can see how you live and what is really important to you.

If space aliens were to come into our neighborhood and into our homes this night, what would they think about us?  Would they believe that we worship a 21” box with wires coming out the back of it because all of our homes are designed around this box?  Would they look at the books on our bookshelf and see that we are more interested in love novels and smutty books than in the Bible?  If someone from our own neighborhood came into our home, what would they think about us?

When we invite people into our homes, we invite people into our lives.  People can see that we are not perfect, well groomed and well put together.  People can see that we fall short of this Jesus Christ that we profess as Lord.  And that is scary.  It is scary to let people into our lives.  But it can be wonderful as well.  Inviting another to break bread in our homes is an invitation to join us in the dirt and dust, the dirty laundry and the stinky tennis shoes that make up our lives.  Inviting others into our home to break bread is saying “Let’s walk through this together.”  Inviting others into our home to break bread is an important part of communal discipleship.

I think it is possible to make this journey to Christ on our own.  It is possible, but why would we want to even try.  Let us be willing to ask for help, because none of us has all of the answers.  And let us devote ourselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.  Let us walk this journey together.  Jesus never said that this journey would be easy, but he never we would have to do it on our own either.