Genesis 12:1-4a
Romans 4:1-5,13-17
John 3:1-17
Re-Hearing the Promise
I had this sermon all worked out before I saw the flickering lights.
I had this sermon all worked out, all prepared. The background of each of the texts, the historical context laid out plain for you to hear. To appreciate. To use as a guide.
I had this sermon all worked out, all prepared, before I saw the flickering lights.
They were lights that flickered about 65 miles west of hear on Thursday night.
Valentines day.
We were listening intently to the radio as we drove to the restaurant. We listened intently to it after dinner as well.
On 780, on 91.5. And when we got home, on ABC, CBS, Fox. There it was. Those flickering lights.
You see, to dig at the heart of texts, you need to know the historical context. To hear a text as it was first heard, it is important to know that Genesis was written by at least five writers, most probably royal court scribes. It is important to know that Paul was writing to a church in the midst of a schism in
And it is important to know that the Gospel of John was written somewhere around 96 AD, almost 66 years after Jesus died.
These are important things to know to get at the heart of a text, to hear the heart of a text.
But on Valentines Day, I think it is safe to say that our hearts were not into knowing about 66 AD, or the Yawhist redaction of Genesis, or the impetus to Paul's letter to
Our hearts were in DeKalb, 65 miles west of here. Our hearts still are, in many ways.
And so, I had to relook at these texts. I had to revision them, re-hear them with my heart in DeKalb. After all, the historical context of a work is all well and good, it helps my mind to know many things. But how am I to go out of here working with my hands and my heart if these scripture readings don't speak to OUR context. To OUR hearts, in DeKalb.
And they do speak to it.
Because, as I re-read these text from that vantage point, I heard something that I didn't hear before. I re-heard the promise.
The first two readings are reminders for us again that God is in the blessing business. Hearing both about Abram, and about Paul, you will be reminded that God is faithful to us, bringing about blessing not because we have done what we were supposed to do, but because God remains God! And God blesses. And even as I would like to give you more on these two readings, I can't this morning. I can't because we must move forward to the Gospel. In these times, the Gospel is paramount, the Gospel must be heard, the Gospel is what truly speaks in these times.
In today's Gospel you will hear these words:
"For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him."
You know those words. They've been written on our minds from the days of Catechism, from our earliest years. But they speak powerfully today.
They speak powerfully today because, as I heard Matt Lauer say on the "Today Show" Friday morning, "The massacre at NIU is a sign of the times." And I disagree.
That killing is not the sign of the times, but that cross is the sign of the times. Trucks and cars with that cross were the ones cleaning up the mess. Candles, flickering lights, shaped in that shape were standing vigil on Thursday night and Friday night, and even today.
That, people of God, is the sign that we must look to in these times because it is the sign of the times.
You know, those words of John 3:16 and 17 are spoken to us, yes. But in the book of John, they are spoken to a man named Nicodemus. Now, Nicodemus is a smart man. He's a Jewish leader, a member of the Sanhedrin, the Jewish High Counsel, but he is confused. We know he is confused because John says he "comes to Jesus in darkness." This darkness is not only a time of day. It is also an indicator into his spiritual sense. He's spiritually "in the dark."
And so what does Jesus do? Jesus tells him about the ways of God. You see, Nicodemus thinks he knows the ways of God. He sees Jesus healing people, doing miracles, all sorts of great things and immediately assumes that these are the ways that you can tell if someone is from God. But Jesus flips his ideas.
"To know the ways of God," Jesus says, "you must be born from above." Literally, that phrase "from above" in Greek is "anewthay" simply meaning "again." "To know the ways of God, you must be born again," he says. You must let go of the natural ways that you think you know the ways of God, and look at them from a different perspective- the perspective of someone who has simply heard the promise and received it. The perspective of someone who has been baptized, the promise that God loves us even though we have yet to do one thing.
Now, this is important for us to hear today. It's very easy for us to believe that God is blessing us when we can see good things happening. It's very easy for us to believe in God as miracle upon miracle comes our way.
But what about now? We come in darkness, like Nicodemus. We come confused. This is no blessing. 65 miles west of here on Valentines Day hearts were ripped from their homes. No blessing. There may be blessings in the aftermath, there may be blessings in the cleanup, in the inevitable coming together of the community. But that act was no blessing, and God was not in that act.
And, so what we need to hear again is that reminder that physical signs are not the ways of God. Despite what the physical reality may present us, God's promise still stands. God's blessing stands, even now because God has been to see death before, and God has come out the other side.
For God so loved the world that God stood with us in our darkest days of death, that God broke the chains that death has around our necks, that God rose from the grave even as God promises the blessing of a resurrection. God gives eternal life, even today. That is the gospel, and that is what we need to rehear again today.
Condemnation, destruction, these are not what God has in store for creation, despite what it might seem. And therefore they should not be what we as a people are about. Instead, God has in store for us new life. A new life found in the promise we hear in the waters at baptism.
Therefore, people of God, as Moses raised the bronze serpent in the desert to provide healing for those dying of poison, look now upon the Son of Man risen on the cross, risen from the tomb, risen in our hearts and our hands as we reach out to those students and families in DeKalb.
The good news is that God stands with us in the face of death, and stands with us as we rise from our tombs.
And that promise, that promise that God continues to bless us, even as we see things fall around us. That promise that God has been here before, been at the footstep of death on this cross before us, and has promised a resurrection on the other side of that.
That promise, that blessing, that cross…that empty tomb. That is the sign of the times. Hear it again today.
Amen.
