“Take your Bible and take your newspaper and read both. But interpret newspapers from your Bible”

“Take your Bible and take your newspaper and read both. But interpret newspapers from your Bible”

 Every Good Gift is From God; How we use them is up to us 

Theologian, Karl Barth is quoted as saying, “Take your Bible and take your newspaper, and read both. But interpret newspapers from your Bible. (Time Magazine, 1961) Today we might add, “and take your hand-held device, your television, your online news services and even social media and watch and read them. But interpret them from your Bible." 

As I look at and read, in one form or another, the news of this past week relating to Afghanistan, especially the accounts of the bombings at the Kabul airport and those killed and wounded there, I want to first read part of the Bible and then look at the news through the lens of Holy Scripture. 

I begin with Psalm 15, looking at an important question asked by the people of Israel between 1000 and 500 years before the birth of Jesus: “who are your people? How do I become one and live in your presence?” The question and response follow.

 “Lord, who may dwell in your tabernacle? who may abide upon your holy hill?

Whoever leads a blameless life and does what is right, who speaks the truth from his

heart. There is no guile upon his tongue; he does no evil to his friend; he does not

heap contempt upon his neighbor. In his sight the wicked is rejected, but he honors

those who fear the Lord. He has sworn to do no wrong and does not take back his

word. He does not give his money in hope of gain, nor does he take a bribe against

the innocent. Whoever does these things shall never be overthrown. “ (Psalm 15:1-7) 

The Psalmist gives answers that are just as important and valid for us today as they were 3000 years ago: those who abide in my presence are the ones who are truthful, who do not use their words to destroy the lives and reputation of other people, who do no evil to friend or neighbor or stranger. Those who love their neighbor because they have promised God to do so are included in that number, and those who do not base their decisions on “quid pro quo,” or sellout or destroy the innocent, ordinary people. This covers a lot of ground as will the next passage from James, the brother of Jesus, I want to read together before we look at the news from yesterday through these very important lenses. 

James writes, “Every generous act of giving, with every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change. In fulfillment of his own purpose he gave us birth by the word of truth, so that we would become a kind of first fruits of his creatures.

You must understand this, my beloved: let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger; for your anger does not produce God's righteousness. Therefore rid yourselves of all sordidness and rank growth of wickedness, and welcome with meekness the implanted word that has the power to save your souls.

But be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves. For if any are hearers of the word and not doers, they are like those who look at themselves in a mirror; for they look at themselves and, on going away, immediately forget what they were like. But those who look into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and persevere, being not hearers who forget but doers who act-they will be blessed in their doing. 

If any think they are religious, and do not bridle their tongues but deceive their hearts, their religion is worthless. Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to care for orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.” (James 1:17-27) 

Now we look through the Bible at the news of bombings and killings and woundings, and just as important, we must look at our reactions toward this news and how we speak (myself included) to and about each other and the leaders of our nation and former leaders of our nation.

The news these past two weeks out of Afghanistan has has been truly horrible and frightening. The take over of the government by the Taliban, the airlifting of over 100,000 American citizens and the effort to bring home the rest of the Americans who want to return as well as many of the Afghan people who worked with and aided the United States over the past twenty years. 

Ending a war is never easy, emotions are high and climb higher as many of us express differing opinions as to what should have been done, or could have been done differently, or done differently by a different person or administration. Many of these questions can never be answered nor can the statements be proven. It is not unlike former New Orleans Saints football coach, Jim Mora said, “no more coulda, shoulda, woulda.” 

We start with what is and we work to be good enough to make it better. This is true in football; it is even more true in life. We don’t know what coulda happened with a different president, we all know what we believe shoulda happened, and we don’t know what woulda happened if we had used plan B or started sooner or from a different perspective. 

What we do know is what happened yesterday, and how horrible it was; how sad and angry it makes us. We cannot control, “coulda, shoulda, woulda.” What we can control is howe we communicate our feelings about what happened and what we believe could have happened. What we can do is listen to peoples’ opinions, knowledge and beliefs, about our relationship with Afghanistan, especially the people with whom we disagree, and do our best not to over react (sadly I have failed at this already), to realize that we are, in fact, on the same team. 

Going forward I want to suggest to all of us, myself included, that we look through the lenses of Psalm 15 described above, and James 1: 

“You must understand this, my beloved: let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger; for your anger does not produce God's righteousness. Therefore rid yourselves of all sordidness and rank growth of wickedness, and welcome with meekness the implanted word that has the power to save your souls. . . If any think they are religious, and do not bridle their tongues but deceive their hearts, their religion is worthless. Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to care for orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.” 

Lord of all power and might, the author and giver of all good things: As we pray for all who have died in this tragedy, we ask that you graft in our hearts the love of your Name; increase in us true religion; nourish us with all goodness; and bring forth in us the fruit of good works. Amen.

 

Gathered Together in Unity by Your Holy Spirit

 I want to begin with a prayer, followed by Peter’s Proclamation at the end of chapter six of John’s Gospel, and see what happens.

The Prayer: “Grant, O merciful God, that your Church, being gathered together in unity by your Holy Spirit may show forth your power among all peoples.” And Simon Peter: “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.”

There we have it, the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. A prayer for Christian Unity in the midst of our many differences, a unity which can only be achieved by the action and power of God’s Holy Spirit. Followed by an affirmation of faith by Simon Peter.  

After five weeks of scripture (John Chapter 6) and sermons on Jesus the bread of life, beginning with the feeding of the five thousand with 12 baskets of leftovers, and ending with Jesus proclaiming that he is, the bread of life and that if we “eat him,” take him into our heart and souls, that we will never be hungry or thirsty.

This feeding of the five thousand people who are physically hungry, sets up what is to follow. First feed the body, then feed the soul with Jesus, the “Bread of life come down from heaven.”

When some remind Jesus that “Moses, gave their ancestors manna in the wilderness, Jesus says to them, “it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” They said to him, “Sir, give us this bread always.”

Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.” (John 6:31-40) I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live for ever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.’”

Because of this many of his disciples turned back and no longer went about with him. So Jesus asked the twelve, ‘Do you also wish to go away?’ Simon Peter answered him, ‘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.’” (John 6:66-69)

 

This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you

I have seen such a lack of love recently, especially as the Delta Variant of Covid-19 has increased and spread throughout the land and I see so many of us looking for someone (else) to blame rather than looking for a community of love and solutions and asking ourselves, “what would Jesus Do?”

So, I asked myself two questions: “What would Jesus do?” What would Jesus have me do.” To answer these questions, I turned first to the Gospel of John 15:9-14 in the section of the Gospel in which we are told that Jesus knows his end is approaching and he is giving his disciples instructions about how to live and teach and heal after his death. Jesus’ words follow and give me, and hopefully you, a place to begin to answer to two questions I have asked myself.

“As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.

‘This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you.”

Jesus proclaims that the answer is love, but not the easy, romanticized love that we often see in novels or movies, but an “its not all about me, lay down my life for my friends” type of love. The type of love in action that we see Jesus demonstrate not long after he gave these final instructions to his friends.

I sense and believe that this is the kind of love Jesus is calling us to live, not just believe, but live today. Let’s look more deeply at Jesus’ words. Jesus commands us to abide, to wrap ourselves, to rest in, to accept and live into his love, which he tells us is God’s love. Jesus tells the disciples, his friends, and through them, us, that if we abide in this love, that his joy will be in us and that our joy will be complete. I believe that joy is more than a feeling of happiness, I believe joy is a sense of wholeness, of completeness, of union with God and our neighbors. This joy, this connectedness will hopefully bring us back to loving one another as Christ loves us, rather than blaming one another for all our problems. It will not be easy. I believe Jesus knows this, based on his instructions to the disciples. I also believe it is necessary if we are to bring healing and wholeness: physical, emotional, and political, to our Nation and our World.

Jesus closes this teaching by reminding us that we are his friends if we do what he asks/commands us to do, and that, what he commands us to do may lead to death. That death my be physical when we attempt to save a person’s life, either from an accident or even a pandemic. That death my also be the death of an idea, or a long-held belief, either political or medical or even religious. All these deaths hurt someone; all of these deaths lead to the ending of relationships. But all these deaths also lead to resurrection! And maybe, just maybe, one of the things resurrection looks like is a renewed community founded on God’s love in which it is not all about us, but about loving one another as Christ loves us, and that in this community we are Jesus’ friends, so full of Joy that we must share that life of Joy with the world.