Easter 5 C

Rolling Down the River

Introduction

If you write stories, or tell stories, you know there is more than one character… if there is a good guy there has to be a bad guy… to oversimplify it.

But in most good stories there are many characters, and some of them are really unexpected. As an aside, you don’t have to be alive to be a character… ever read Huckleberry Finn… It is the story of a boy, a runaway slave, and a raft… the raft is as much a character of the story as Huck.

Moby Dick is as much about a whale as a sailor…

A more modern example would come from the movie Titanic… sure, there are the main and supporting actors and actresses…. But one of the characters, with its own personality and storyline, is a giant boat… the Titanic.

I’m just trying to say that sometimes we see the story from only one side… we don’t take the time to think about what it all means from the point of view of the minor characters, or the bystanders.

We have been talking about Disciples, about Apostles, about Followers of Jesus, be they the more famous like Peter and Paul, or the less known, like Dorcas… But throughout our storytelling we have not focused on the other side, on the crowds, on the people who were watching this all unfold before their very eyes.

What would it have been like to see the world through the eyes of a Jew in Palestine, or through the eyes of a Roman Gentile living in a foreign country, when there was a religious movement taking over… what would you notice first? What would draw your attention? What would it mean?

With the Kids

Passing Love (pennies) even the smallest thing can make a difference….

Fleshing Out the Pennies

One of the things that really got to people, and we cannot stress this enough, was Jesus’ message of love. Think of it this way, these people all went to church every day… whether they were Jew or Greek, Roman or Babylonian… and the main thing that they heard said over and over is… God is with you.

God loves Romans, God will help us conquer the world, God is Roman… God loves Jews, God rescued us from Egypt, God will rescue us again… The Gods love Greeks, the Gods have always been with us….

You get the idea… Religion was just like human nature… it was based on the idea that God loves me more than you, and if I do what God wants, God will reward me… plain and simple…

No one ever went out and said, you know what, God does love Romans, and Jews, and Greeks, and Samaritans, and Women, and… and… and… And what God really wants from you is not obedience, it is not national pride, it is love… go love each other, help each other, pray for each other, heal each other, comfort each other, feed each other…

Now, we have heard this for a few thousand years so we forget… I want you to just for a second, put yourself in the mindset of someone who has been told their whole life that they are better than everyone else and that God only loves them…

Can you see how interesting it would be if all of a sudden this stranger did something nice for you? Or someone from a different tribe or race all of a sudden helped you? You would want to say, why did you do that? And they would tell you…. And it would make you think!

The Banquet

So Peter is off cavorting with some Romans… well, maybe he is preaching to them, and healing them, and baptizing them… and he gets back to town and there is a session meeting; and the session says, what are you doing? How could you even talk to those people? Don’t you know what they have done?

But Peter has had a vision… he has all of a sudden been able to see it from the other side… he gets what the Romans are all about, why they are like they are, and, more importantly, he is finally convinced that Jesus is right… God loves everyone.

Ever have this happen in your life? I have… I have met someone who I find really annoying… I get angry at the way they do things, I cannot understand why they would do it that way… all kinds of things… and then all of a sudden something clicks… I start seeing it from their point of view… and everything changes… I get it….

I don’t really know what the Romans who were in Palestine thought, or the Greek traders that sailed the Mediterranean… but I do know that they had never thought about things the way Peter and the Gang were teaching… and the apostles had been hanging out with Jesus for so long they just took this stuff for granted….

And not everyone was on the same page… we see that in the fact that the other apostles are not really happy with Peter…

Sometimes it takes seeing things differently… sometimes we have to be able to get outside of ourselves… there is probably a lesson in here for us, eh?

Miramichi Presbytery meets on Saturday. How many 30 year olds want to give up a Saturday off and leave their kids and go to a day-long volunteer meeting? There is an example of the church not seeing the world through someone else’s eyes…

And there are a ton of them…. Like a million things we all do every day that we either take for granted or assume that everyone sees just like us… but it simply is not true.

This Jesus guy came and changed things so dramatically that it woke everyone up and made them pay attention. I wonder what we would have to shake up to get the same reaction.

Blessing by The Buddha

May every creature abound in well-being and peace.
May every living being, weak or strong, the long and the small
The short and the medium-sized, the mean and the great.

May every living being, seen or unseen, those dwelling far off,
Those nearby, those already born, those waiting to be born,
May all attain inward peace.

Let no one deceive another, Let no one despise another in any situation,
Let no one, from antipathy or hatred, wish evil to anyone at all.
Just as a mother, with her own life, protects her only son from hurt,
So within yourself foster a limitless concern for every living creature.

Display a heart of boundless love for all the world,
In all its height and depth and broad extent,
Love unrestrained, without hate or enmity.
Then as you stand or walk, sit or lie, until overcome by drowsiness,
Devote your mind entirely to this, it is known as living here life divine.

Buddha Heart

Jesus lived at what has been called the Golden Age of Religion. He was not alone, Buddha, Mohammed, Confucius, all of them lived at a time when everything was changing… and they saw that God had always been different than most people understood… that God was bigger than any one nation, any one people… and that God wanted us to see the world from the point of view of love, acceptance, and understanding.

Now, as I have said before… this is not an easy path. Buddhist Monks give up everything, and go live in the ice covered mountains of the Himalayas so that they can focus on this stuff and get it right…

But it is the path we are all on. We are the ones who are supposed to move beyond lies beyond hurt, and see everything and everyone as loved by God.

The people in India, when Buddha came out with these things, didn’t get it any more than the Romans… I want you to know that… but there were still those who were surprised… who heard the message and saw the followers and knew there was something different going on here.

There is something different about us too…

Conclusion

So you want to know where we are? We are that small group of people who believe in the message of Jesus. We are the minority who think that God works through love and not through forceful power. We are the ones who the world looks at and is surprised by.

But if we are truly going to live out our role as followers of Jesus’ Way we do have to start realizing how different our way of thinking is, and we have to start seeing the other people out there for who they really are… they are not wrong, they are not the enemy, they are loved by God for exactly who they are…

So what do we have to say to them? How do they fit into our story? Where is our vision of the future leading us? These are the questions we all need to explore.

Easter 2 (B)

I Want You to Get Excited About Your Life

Introduction

The worst day of my year has to be Boxing Day. How about you, what do you think the worst day is? I think Boxing Day because you put so much effort into Christmas, it means so much, and then, like all of a sudden, there is nothing. The stores have moved on to Valentine’s and people are putting away the lights.

Sigh. So what about Easter, that was so last week, right?

There is a line in the opening of Doctor Phil, now I am not saying I watch Doctor Phil, but you know, on occasion in a doctor’s office or something… and he says, “I want you to get excited about your life!”

I happen to think that is something Jesus might have said on the day after Easter to his disciples.

Story Time – Holy Humour Sunday

I've got the joy down in my heart.

“Bright Sunday” - Sunday after Easter – day of joy and laughter

parties and picnics to celebrate Jesus rising from the dead

Laughter Sunday or Holy Humour Sunday

Jokes

Q. What did the baby corn say to the mama corn?
A. “Where’s pop corn?”…

Q. What did the pony say when it had a sore throat?

A. I apologize, I am a little horse!…

Q. Why did the clown go to the doctor.

A. He was feeling a little funny.…

Q:  Where do snowmen go to dance?

A:  A snowball!

Q:  What kind of lions do you find in the park?

A:  Dandelions

It's important to be joyful all the time, isn't it? It's important to laugh and be happy and silly and play games. Did you know that in Old English the word “silly” has the same root as the word “holy”? So we are being holy and doing what God wants us to when we're filled with joy. 

1John from the Message

 1-2From the very first day, we were there, taking it all in—we heard it with our own ears, saw it with our own eyes, and verified it with our own hands. The Word of Life appeared right before our eyes; we saw it happen! And now we're telling you in most sober prose that what we witnessed was, incredibly, this: The infinite Life of God himself took shape before us.

 3-4We saw it, we heard it, and now we're telling you so you can experience it along with us, this experience of communion with the Father and his Son, Jesus Christ. Our motive for writing is simply this: We want you to enjoy this, too. Your joy will double our joy!

Walk in the Light
5This, in essence, is the message we heard from Christ and are passing on to you: God is light, pure light; there's not a trace of darkness in him.
 6-7If we claim that we experience a shared life with him and continue to stumble around in the dark, we're obviously lying through our teeth—we're not living what we claim. But if we walk in the light, God himself being the light, we also experience a shared life with one another, as the sacrificed blood of Jesus, God's Son, purges all our sin.

Getting Excited

I am sure if I was around to see my friend come back from the dead I would get pretty excited…

At least, I think I would, don’t you? Of course, when bad things happen, our mood plummets. Perhaps the disciples were a bit depressed after this whole Easter Weekend gone wrong thing. Perhaps they were feeling gloomy and Eeyore-ish and nothing would have cheered them up.

So when one of the disciples comes and says, rather excitedly, I have seen Jesus, he is back from the dead…. The response was probably pretty lack lustre. “Sure, good one, life is terrible, this is terrible, stop trying to make jokes.”

I bet a few of us have been in the same place, had something bad happen and then be sure it is just going to get worse…

It is hard, isn’t it, to pull yourself out of that feeling.

Well, this is where we get back to Dr Phil, as he would say, “how is that working out for ya?”

And then he would tell us, “I want you to get excited about your life…”

Jesus, in our passage from Mark, rebuked them for their stubborn unbelief.  Now, we don’t exactly know what the words Jesus used were…. But I am sure it was something like, “What are you doing?” “Why are you all locked up in this room? Do you think my death was supposed to end everything, was this all I taught you….”

No… that is not what he intended. And not what happens. There is something there that changes their minds, something that lifts their spirits and makes their hearts so full to overflowing that when he says a little while later – “go out there and spread the good news!” they do…

So… what would it take to get us that excited about Easter? About God? About Church?

You see, Easter is just the beginning, now, what will give us enough joy to become who we were meant to be…

And it can’t be half hearted.

There is this story Bruce Larson tells of attending a conference at a Presbyterian church in Omaha. People were given helium filled balloons and told to release them at some point in the service when they felt like expressing the joy in their hearts. Since they were Presbyterians, they weren't used to saying things like "Hallelujah,” or “Praise the Lord." And maybe this would give them a way to express their feelings. All through the service balloons ascended, but when it was over 1/3 of the balloons were unreleased.

I am new here…. Maybe you are different than me, but I suspect lots of us would not let go of the balloon…

So why not? Well, how about fear of what people would think. What if we were too excited, too emotional? Would people look at us funny?

I think there is the other side too, there are times when we are trying so hard to do the right thing that we suck all the fun out of it. We want to let the balloon go, we just don’t know if this is a good enough time, or if this is when the people meant, or whatever… and we are overthinking it.

“I come,” said Jesus once, “that you might have abundant life!”

Easter happened, so that we would know joy.

Want to hear the three funniest jokes of all time:

Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson were going camping. They pitched their tent under the stars and went to sleep. Sometime in the middle of the night Holmes woke Watson up and said: "Watson, look up at the stars, and tell me what you see." Watson replied: "I see millions and millions of stars." Holmes said: "And what do you deduce from that?" Watson replied: "Well, if there are millions of stars, and if even a few of those have planets, it’s quite likely there are some planets like Earth out there. And if there are a few planets like Earth out there, there might also be life." And Holmes said: "Watson, you idiot, it means that somebody stole our tent

Two hunters are out in the woods when one of them collapses. He doesn't seem to be breathing and his eyes are glazed. The other guy whips out his phone and calls the emergency services. He gasps, "My friend is dead! What can I do?" The operator says "Calm down. I can help. First, let's make sure he's dead." There is a silence, then a gunshot is heard. Back on the phone, the guy says "OK, now what?"

A woman gets on a bus with her baby. The bus driver says: "That's the ugliest baby that I've ever seen. Ugh!" The woman goes to the rear of the bus and sits down, fuming. She says to a man next to her: "The driver just insulted me!" The man says: "You go right up there and tell him off – go ahead, I'll hold your monkey for you."

… so is it good enough to sit around and tell jokes? Well… yes… studies have shown that mind over matter is a real thing. It seems that our attitude changes everything; and so, far more important than having someone say “Easter Happened” is the question, “How does it make you feel?”

And I want us to look at it in its most basic form – that Jesus came, and died, and lived on in those who come after simply to show us that life is meant to be lived no matter what happens. That love and joy and hope are more important than all the Good Fridays and crucifixions we might face.

Conclusion

Paul ends the 8^th Chapter of his Letter to the church in Rome with these words:

“For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God”

This, in the end, is the message of Easter, it is the “Good News” it is the joy that keeps us for another year.

Amen.