The Revised Common Lectionary Notes June 4, 11, 18, 25, and July 2 by the Rev. Dr. Harry Wendt, Founder of Crossways International

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1 Copyright 2017 by H. N. Wendt Crossways International Minneapolis, MN USA The Revised Common Lectionary Notes June 4, 11, 18, 25, and July 2 by the Rev. Dr. Harry Wendt, Founder of Crossways International June 4, Pentecost Sunday: John 20:19 23 (or 7:37 39) Some preliminary thoughts: At Passover, the Jewish people remembered and celebrated the events of the Exodus from Egypt. In Luke s transfiguration narrative (9:28 36), Moses and Elijah, both of whom had met with God on Mt. Sinai (Mt. Horeb), spoke with Jesus about His coming exodus (lifelong rescue event) that He would soon complete on a cross in Jerusalem. The Israelites spent 40 years in the wilderness before entering the Promised Land. According to Acts 1:3, Jesus spent 40 days with His disciples prior to ascending into the Eternal Promised Land. The Jewish people celebrated the events of Sinai 50 days after Passover (hence Pentecost, fifty days ). In the Pentecost event recorded in Acts 2, the Risen Lord through His Holy Spirit takes up permanent residence among His people, and seeks to teach them to know and do His will throughout their wilderness journey in this world while on their way to the Eternal Promised Land. Those present at the Pentecost described in Acts 2 were Jews and proselytes (converts to Judaism). The Holy Spirit falls upon Gentiles for the first time in Acts 10 (cf. 10:44 48). Note also 11:1 3 where two women, Martha and Mary, share their insights concerning Jesus authority over the powers of death. Vv : Jesus meets with ten disciples in a room with a locked door. (Thomas was not present.) He greets them with Peace be with you, and shows them His hands and side. They rejoice! He says Peace be with you a second time (again, no rebukes!), and commissions them to undertake a mission to the world on His behalf. V. 22: Jesus breathes on the disciples and gives them the Holy Spirit. In Genesis 2:7 we read of God breathing into Adam the breath of life, and the man became a living being. The parallels are profound. 1

2 Jesus ministry brings about a new beginning to creation and humanity! V. 23: Faith never creates forgiveness; it merely lays hold of what has been there all along. Note well that we can say to anyone in the world, God loves you and has forgiven you all your sins. Some will believe and rejoice. Some will frown and perhaps dismiss us as a little crazy. Even so, the forgiveness that we proclaim in the name of Jesus is true. How people respond to our proclamation has profound implications for them in this life and the life to come. An Alternative Pericope: John 7:37 39 The setting is the Feast of Booths or Tabernacles (7:1 2). This festival was held on the fifteenth day of the seventh month (September October). It commemorated the wilderness wanderings (Leviticus 23:39 32; Deuteronomy 16:13 15). During this celebration, water was carried in a golden pitcher from the Pool of Siloam to the Temple as a reminder of the water from the rock in the desert (Numbers 20:2 13) and as a symbol of hope for the coming Messianic deliverance (Isaiah 12:3). The setting is that Jesus is traveling around in Galilee. He did not wish to go to Judea because Jewish leaders there were looking for an opportunity to kill Him. However, His disciples encourage Him to go to Judea so that people there might see what He is doing and hear what He is teaching. Although Jesus does not go to Judea, His disciples do. However, some time later Jesus also goes to Jerusalem a rather secret visit to reveal His presence and to do some teaching. Jesus is the true water of life who turns the symbol into reality (Isaiah 44:3, 55:1). Believers become channels of life to others through Christ s Spirit given at Pentecost after His ascension when He was glorified (crucified, risen, ascended). The gift of the Spirit is a mark of the breaking in of the Messianic Age (Joel 2:28 29; Acts 2:14 21). June 11: Trinity Sunday: Matthew 28:16 20 Our world is a different from the world of Pentecost. After Peter preached the sermon recorded in Acts 2, the people asked, What shall we do? Today when the service is over, some merely ask, Where shall we eat? Sad to say, some see the Bible s contents as a menu from which they can select the items that please them. If back in the 7th century AD, someone had succeeded in explaining the doctrine of the Trinity to Muhammad, today there would be no world of Islam. Muhammad could not understand (and thus rejected!) what the New Testament writings reveal about the Persons of the Trinity and their relationship to one another. The result: Today we have the Qur an, and more than one billion Muslims hundreds of millions of whom take their faith much more seriously than do many Christians. The early church struggled for hundreds of years to produce an adequate statement about the doctrine of the Trinity. It was not until AD 451 at Chalcedon that a confession was produced that finally expressed to 2

3 everyone s satisfaction what the Bible has to say about the issue. The early Church was forced to formulate this and other creeds because most of the heresies that plagued the Christian movement had to do with the issue of defining the Trinity and the Person and work of Jesus in relation to the Trinity. The New Testament itself does not sharply define the doctrine of the Trinity. Perhaps the most inspiring statement about the Trinity is in Ephesians 1:3 14. In the original Greek, this passage constitutes one unbroken sentence. The Revised Standard Version breaks it down into six sentences. But it is easy enough to understand the message of that long Greek sentence. It is a hymn to the Trinity. In English, verses 3 6 are a hymn to the Father. Verses 7 12 are a hymn to Jesus Christ. Verses 13 and 14 are a hymn to the Holy Spirit. In this hymn, Paul does not set out to define the mystery of the Trinity. He merely lists what each Person has done for us and calls us to believe in, praise, and respond to each Person. Several unfortunate things happened in the early church. First, it spent so much time discussing and debating the nature of each Person of the Trinity and their relationship to each other that it neglected Paul s approach to the matter. Second, it focused so much on salvation in the narrow sense that it paid insufficient attention to God as the One Who made and owns the universe, Who came among us as the Servant Son and is still among us through His Spirit seeking to have us believe in the Person of Jesus the Messiah and to conform to His servant lifestyle. Some who study at a seminary memorize Latin terms such as opera ad intra and opera ad extra. These terms are not references to the discovery of some hitherto unknown opera by Verdi or Mozart. They refer to the relationship of the Persons within the Godhead (opera ad intra), and to the involvement of all three Persons in the external works (opera ad extra) of creation, redemption, and sanctification. These days, people say things like, God has been so good to us in this country. He has given us a wonderful land to enjoy. There are so many opportunities to achieve success here! Yes, God has indeed been good to us in this country. However, He has not given it to us. No nation owns the land it occupies. It all belongs to God. Nor has God placed us within this land so that we might enjoy ourselves. He has placed us here to live responsibly and usefully for the good of all on a global scale. Success is never measured by what we achieve for ourselves. It is measured by what we do to the glory of God in the service of others. This view of success is radical but biblical! Perhaps the time has come to call another church council to change the First Article of the Creed so that it reads, "I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker and Owner of Heaven and Earth." The implications? There is no such thing as Christian giving. There is only Christian management, and Christian distribution. The problem in the Church at large is not Christian giving. It is unchristian keeping. The cure? It is not to encourage people to give more, but to inspire them to rob less. After all, the problem is not the high cost of living. It is the cost of high living. We are beginning to realize that we have not treated creation with the respect that it deserves as God s property. Among many other things, we have regarded the oceans as the ideal dumping ground for a variety of deadly wastes. We would do well to ponder what God the Father Almighty, Maker and Owner of Heaven and Earth, thinks of all this. Let s try a question about God the Son. Some years ago, an important church leader writing an important article in an important publication of a major denomination wrote: Christmas is a wonderful season. It is 3

4 that time of the year when we reflect on the fact that God is now reconciled to sinners. However, the Bible nowhere speaks of God being reconciled to sinners. It only speaks of God reconciling sinners to himself. In relation to salvation, God is already for us. The Bible never gives us advice about how to get God to love us. God already does. God is like that waiting father in the parable of the two lost sons, longing to welcome back the younger of the two (Luke 15:11 32). And when God persuades us to come back to Himself, His desire is to inspire us to love Him by loving those around us. Unfortunately, the Apostles Creed jumps from the crib of Jesus to the cross of Jesus with only a comma in between. It makes no reference to Jesus life and ministry, to Jesus walking the way of a Servant-without-limit, and calling His disciples/followers to do the same. Some Comments about the Holy Spirit Many Christians do not clearly understand the Person and work of the Holy Spirit. After all, we can understand God the Father as the One who made and sustains the universe. We can understand the reality of God the Son as the One Who once lived, died, and rose again on Planet Earth. But what ideas concerning the Holy Spirit reside in our mind? First, the Holy Spirit has been referred to as the shy member of the Holy Trinity. The Spirit has no desire to be noticed. The Spirit desires only that we notice and know Jesus the Messiah as forgiving Savior and Servant Lord. The Spirit is like someone standing in the wings to the side of a stage urging the audience to look at the One in center stage Jesus the Messiah and believe in and follow Him. Furthermore, the work of the Risen Jesus and the work of the Holy Spirit are one and inseparable. The Holy Spirit simply continues to teach God s people what the Risen Jesus would teach them if He were still among us visibly. It is wrong to think of the risen and ascended Jesus as having flown off to some distant corner of the universe. The risen Jesus is still here, and the Spirit merely wants to empower us to understand what that means and to believe what it implies and to respond! The Spirit wants us not merely to believe in the invisible Jesus, but to make that invisible Jesus visible to the world. The Holy Spirit is never going to call us by phone, send us a text message, or talk to us out of the blue sky. The Holy Spirit speaks to us through the means of grace: the Bible, Holy Baptism, and the Lord s Supper in particular through the Bible. This means that if we do not regularly grapple with the message and meaning of the Bible, we are simply not giving the Spirit any opportunity to speak to us. Listening to an occasional sermon and sitting in on an occasional Bible class just won t do it. We are called to get beyond sitting, standing, and singing to studying, sharing, and serving on a global basis. Years ago while conducting a seminar in Columbia, South Carolina, I heard about an Episcopal priest who was conducting workshops around the United States and telling churches that we Christians need to rethink a few things. One thing he pointed out was that we have put a lot of time into studying stages of learning and moral development in relation to children. However, we have neglected to do the same thing in relation to adults. Many adults begin to take Jesus seriously only when they reach 70 or 80 years of age and finally become aware of the imminence of death and their uncertainty in relation to eternity. 4

5 Many testimonies from people who use Crossways International s materials indicate that he is right! Some English translations of The Great Commission (Matthew 28:19 20) are misleading. The opening words in English translations are usually, Go and make disciples of all nations, teaching them, etc. However, in Greek the first word is not an imperative. It is a participle. The passage should be translated, As you are walking/going through life in this world... The message does not have to do with sending missionaries to distant places because we ourselves cannot go. Jesus message is, As you, all My brothers and sisters, go through life in this world, teach all those around you, teach all with whom you come into contact, teach people of all nations. All of life is to be a teaching-about-jesus, showing-jesus experience non stop! It follows that those who wish to teach about Jesus need to be taught (not just preached at) about the real Jesus and inspired to embrace His forgiving grace and reflect His servant lifestyle. Jesus closing words in Matthew point to the fact that He will remain with His brothers and sisters until the close of the present age. In the ascension, Jesus did not withdraw His presence; He transformed it. He remains with and among us invisibly. We wait for His final reappearing! While we wait for that reappearing, we are to devote life to revealing His presence to all those around us in all that we think, say, and do. We are to show people the Jesus we want them to believe in. We are to live now as we shall then! While we wait for Jesus Final Reappearing, we need the Holy Spirit s help to deal with a non-stop challenge. C.S. Lewis wrote, There is no neutral ground in the universe. Every square inch is claimed by God and counterclaimed by Satan. How utterly true and a reason second to none for thinking through what we believe about the Person, work, and presence of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. June 18, The Second Sunday after Pentecost: Matthew 9:35-10:8 Ch. 9:35-38 consists of the closing verses of chs. 8,9, the narrative section that follows the Sermon on the Mount. It describes Jesus visiting some of the towns and villages in Galilee and teaching in their synagogues. Note that Matthew says that Jesus taught. He did not preach. The Gospel writers make no reference to Jesus preaching but many references to Him teaching. An important insight that we professional church workers need to ponder! Jesus not only taught. He healed many who were sick and diseased. Ch. 9:36 reports Jesus grieving because the people were harassed and helpless and did not know what to do. They were like sheep without a shepherd. The point is, most likely, that the people were being exploited by their political leaders, and what the religious leaders were teaching them was of little benefit. Jesus exhorts the disciples to ask God to provide leaders to cope with the enormous spiritual need that prevailed in the land. In 10:1, Jesus Himself summons and sends the twelve disciples to go out among the people to deal with the demons possessing them, and to heal them of every disease and sickness. We might note that Matthew contains no story of Jesus calling the twelve disciples. Most likely there is a link between twelve tribes in the Old Testament, and twelve disciples. 5

6 In 10:5,6 we read that Jesus told the disciples not to work in any Gentile region or in Samaria. They are to minister only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Perhaps the idea is that Jewish hearers will understand more quickly and deeply the witness the disciples give and will in turn bear witness to others in their communities. Interesting! The Gospels speak of Jesus Himself ministering to the Gentiles (Matthew 15:21-28), healing a Samaritan afflicted with leprosy (Luke 17:11-19), and speaking with a Samaritan woman at the well of Sychar, John 4. In 10:2, the disciples are referred to as apostles those sent forth. In this context, Matthew makes no reference to Jesus commanding the disciples to teach. The command to teach is given only after Jesus rises from the dead (Matthew 28) by which time the disciples understand more fully and clearly Jesus identity and message. After all, knowing that Jesus rose from the dead deepened their insights enormously. In 10:7, the disciples are told to proclaim that the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand. When Matthew makes reference to the Kingdom of Heaven, he is referring to the Kingdom of God. Being a good Jew, he no doubt wants to avoid any misuse or mispronunciations of the name of God. But note well! The disciples are not to proclaim that the Kingdom of Heaven is on its way to Planet Earth. Rather, it has come to Planet Earth and Jesus is the King of that Kingdom and its first Citizen, so to say. And Jesus lives a life radically different from the lifestyle taught in the synagogues of Jesus day. The disciples are to cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, and drive out demons. The first three things referred to reflect Isaiah 35:5,6: when the Kingdom of God breaks in, the blind will see, the deaf will hear, the lame will walk, and the dumb will speak. The disciples ministry will therefore declare: The Messianic Age has broken in! Jesus is the Messiah but a Messiah very different from what the people were expecting! He washed feet and calls His followers to do the same. And the disciples who have received freely are to proclaim these truths freely, 10:8. Finally, a quote from H.G. Wells: This doctrine of the Kingdom God, which was the main teaching of Jesus, and which plays so small a part in the Christian creeds, is certainly one of the most revolutionary doctrines that ever stirred and changed human thought. June 25, The Third Sunday after Pentecost: Matthew 10:24 39 Vv : Jesus calls his disciples, His followers, to share His profound message and to reflect His servant manner of life. He does not ask them to go beyond that. Seeking to do that is an enormous challenge! After all, if His foes address Him as Beelzebul, how will they address His disciples, His followers, His brothers and sisters? Note that in 9:34, Jesus foes link Him with the prince of demons. Vv : Our lack of fear is due to Jesus victory over death. The revelation of the hidden is God s work, to Whom it is already known. Much of Jesus teaching was given in private to His disciples, but it was certainly intended to be made public far and wide. Jesus teachings are not to be kept secret. V. 28 draws a contrast between God s way and people s way. People might be able to kill others, to kill bodies a thought that is frightening enough. However, of much greater concern is the truth that the demonic has the power to destroy both body and soul in hell! 6

7 Vv : A sparrow has little value. After all, one can buy two sparrows for a very small amount. Yet God knows when even one sparrow falls to the ground. And do remember that God knows how many hairs are on our head. So take comfort in the fact that each human is worth ever so much more than a sparrow! Vv : If we mere humans acknowledge to others our belief in Jesus, He in turn will acknowledge us to His Father. At the same time, if we do not acknowledge Him and bear witness about Him to others, He will not acknowledge us to His Father. Vv : Jesus did not come to establish a Kingdom that was sweet and sugary! Those who embrace Jesus message and lifestyle will have to deal with fierce opposition from those who reject His truth possibly even from the members of their own family circle. Vv : Jesus calls people to embrace His truth and only His truth. They are not to edit Jesus truth to fit their own desires! If they do that, they will shred any hoped-for relationship with God. July 2, The Fourth Sunday after Pentecost: Matthew 10:40 42 (or John 21:15 19) Matthew s Gospel contains five discourses: chs. 5 7, 10, 13, 18, and Ch. 10 might be outlined as follows: 10:1 4 The mission of the Twelve 10:5 15 The commissioning of the Twelve 10:16 25 Persecutions to be expected 10:26 36 Dealing with persecution 10:37 39 Conditions of discipleship 10:40 42 Rewards The meaning of 10:40 42 becomes a little more obvious if we are aware of the message that precedes it. The focus of vv has to do with the implications of acknowledging or denying Jesus. In v. 34, the term sword denotes pain and warfare, a world in conflict. God s plan and desires for the world confound and contradict human dreams and systems. Sinful human nature does not welcome Jesus kind of kingdom. As Jesus encountered strong opposition during His ministry, advocates of His real message encounter stiff opposition still today. After all, Jesus message constitutes a declaration of war against the powers of evil powers that humanity by nature is all too willing to embrace. In vv , Jesus quotes Micah 4:21. In doing so, He points to the impact that His message can have. It can shatter the relationships between father and son, mother and daughter, daughter-in-law and motherin-law, and those within family circles. In 10:21 Jesus quotes Micah 7:6 to make His disciples aware of the fierce opposition that they can expect to meet because of the message that they proclaim about the nature of God s true Kingdom. In v. 37, Jesus expands on Micah s message to point out that those who love the old world rather than the new world of God are not worthy of Him or the wonder of participating in the Kingdom of God that 7

8 has broken into history with His Person and ministry. In vv , the word cross surfaces for the first time in Matthew s Gospel. Those who refuse to take up Jesus cross reject the wonder and glory of God s true Kingdom. However, those who shoulder Jesus cross heed Jesus call to Kingdom life, and find true life a true, indestructible, eternal relationship with God. Vv : The coming of God s Kingdom does more than shatter and divide, and create dissension. Some receive and embrace the message with joy and welcome those who proclaim it with open arms. Those who demonstrate and practice that openness receive Jesus, and those who receive Jesus receive the God who sent Him! Who are the envoys of the Envoy of God the Father? They are the prophets, the proclaimers, who are endowed with the authority to heal the sick and cast out demons and yet are persecuted. They are the righteous ones, those who are obedient and who practice and teach the higher righteousness of God s Kingdom. They are the quite ordinary, seemingly ungifted members of the new community. All these are fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters in God s new community. The smallest act of encouragement or love done to any of them, to support them as prophet or disciple, has its reward. We would do well to note that Jesus instructions make no reference to issues of organization, administration, church offices, liturgy, and doctrine. All attention is focused on the singular authority of the Twelve to bear witness to Jesus and on the breaking in of God s Kingdom among all people residing on Planet Earth. The following verse, titled Show Me (in the public domain), deserves careful thought: I d rather see a sermon than hear one any day. I prefer to have you walk with me than merely tell the way. The eye s a better pupil more convincing than the ear. Your words may be confusing; your example s always clear. I d rather learn my lesson by observing how it s done. Conversation might be easy, but your tongue too fast may run. I may not fully understand the fine advice you give. But there s no misunderstanding how you act, or how you live! An Alternative Pericope for July 2, The Fourth Sunday after Pentecost: John 21:15 19 Although John s Gospel possibly did end initially at 20:31, ch. 21 describes the resources available to the post-resurrection community the continuing presence of a Jesus who dines with His brothers and sisters and defines their mission and responsibilities. The fact that these shepherds and fishermen gather a huge haul of fish points to the fact that the Messianic Age has indeed broken in (see Ezekiel 47:1 12; note v. 9) and that success will crown their witness. 8

9 In this closing incident, the risen Lord feeds seven of His disciples with bread and fish, an act symbolizing His continuing presence among them and His bonding with them (e.g., His feeding them through the Eucharist). Three times Jesus asks Peter, who had denied Him three times, Do you love me? (21:15 17). He tells the disciples that some will have to experience martyrdom (21:18 19) and that His reappearing will not take place as soon as some might wish (21:20 23). What follows is not an exegetical analysis, but the text of a sermon that I wrote some years ago a sermon based on John 21. Let s go back in spirit to that first Good Friday night in Jerusalem. Jesus body has been taken down from the cross. It rests in a tomb. We might wonder what some of the key figures in the biblical drama were saying and doing during that strange night in Jerusalem. Take Caiaphas, for example. Perhaps he was throwing a Passover party for his cronies. Perhaps he was urging them to celebrate and live it up a little. Drink to it, fellows! We re rid of that upstart from Galilee. What about Pilate? Perhaps he settled for a candlelight supper with his wife in the Fortress of Antonia. And perhaps he said, Governing this miserable little province is tough stuff! The quicker we can retire back in Rome, the better. Then we shall be able to draw Social Security, perhaps buy a townhouse in a good suburb of the city, and do a little skiing up in the Alps once in a while! Finally, the disciples! This little bunch of once-upon-a-time would-be heroes are huddled together behind locked doors and scared to death! Their conversation is hardly stimulating: Are we going to be next? What are we going to do now? Do any of you guys remember how to fish? To complicate matters, the disciples have to cope with some memories. They remember all those boasts that they had made about how they would remain loyal to Jesus no matter what happened. But when Jesus prays in the garden, they fall asleep. When the authorities come for Him, they run like rabbits. Finally, Peter denies Jesus, and uses a few nasty expletives in the process. The disciples are not rejoicing; they are remembering. Then comes Easter Sunday morning. While that day is still young, strange rumors start to fly. Some of the women from the disciples community are saying remarkable things. They are saying that Jesus is alive! Impossible! Things like that don t happen! But the women stick to their story. And then on that first Easter Sunday night, all hell or perhaps all heaven begins to break loose! The disciples are still behind locked doors. And suddenly, Jesus appears! What do they think? Perhaps, It s Jesus! How nice! I doubt that. They are terrified. They have difficulty breathing. Their hair stands on end. It s Him! Their minds are in a turmoil. One night in an Upper Room Jesus washes their feet. The next day He is on a cross. That same night He lies dead in a tomb! And two nights later, He shows up alive! Who is He? What do they say? Nothing! In the post-resurrection appearances, no one speaks to Jesus first. Jesus speaks first. What does He say? Where did you guys go last Friday? No! He says, Peace be with you! 9

10 And He says it twice (John 20:19, 21). The next Sunday night the disciples are together again. This time that giant of confidence, Thomas, is with them. Again the doors are locked. And again, Jesus suddenly just appears. Maybe this time He'll drag up their nasty little pasts, but He doesn t. Again He says, Peace be with you! (20:26). And we begin to suspect that all this is not human but in some inexplicable way, divine! The grand finale comes a little later. John tells us about it in the final chapter of his Gospel (ch. 21). It happens up in Galilee. Late one afternoon, just before sunset, Peter says, I m going fishing. Six other disciples say, We ll go with you. So out they go, about 100 yards from shore. They fish all night. They throw out the nets. They drag them in. Hour after hour throughout the night! But they catch nothing. How frustrating! And then God goes to work on the eastern sky. Deep blues become soft blues. Then a progression of other colors appear: red orange gold silver! The sea reflects the sky. While this is happening, the disciples see Someone on the shore. They don t know who it is. He calls out to them, You haven't caught any fish, have you? How did He know? Who is He? They reply, No! He calls out again, Try the other side of the boat! Use your imagination. You are a fisherman. You ve been fishing all night on the left side of the boat. There are no fish there. Now someone says, Try the other side of the boat! What would you have thought? (Perhaps, Those tourists again! ) However, the disciples try the other side of the boat. Immediately, their nets are full! They now ask themselves, Who is that on the beach? John realizes it first: It is the Lord! Peter jumps out of the boat, wraps some clothes around himself, and wades ashore. The others follow in the boat and beach it. They must now walk up to where Jesus is, look into His eyes, and wait for Him to speak. They bring no fish with them. But they bring memories of falling asleep, cowardice, and denials! And what does Jesus say this time? Ever so gently He says, Come and have breakfast with Me. Perhaps they wonder if He ll rebuke them this time. But He doesn't! Perhaps they are tempted to ask, When are You going to rebuke us for what we did to You? Had they done so, I think He d have looked at His hands, smiled a little sadly, shaken His head, and said nothing. He merely asks them, Do you love Me? And when they insist that they do, He says, Feed My lambs; feed My sheep; feed My sheep. This, then, is the One into whose face each of us must look. This, then, is the One to Whom we must turn for answers to any questions we might have about life, death, and eternity. We who gather here have something in common. We agree as to Who this Person was and is. We believe that He was and is God Himself. We share a common faith with regard to His cross and resurrection. On the cross, He dealt with our sins once and for all. In the resurrection, He put His and our death to death for all time and eternity. I m thankful beyond words that I m a Christian. However, I sometimes get the uncomfortable feeling that we don t understand quite as well as we might that our Lord lived the life of a servant. To illustrate, on that fateful night before He went to the cross, Jesus took a basin, some water and some towels, and performed a task that only Gentile (non-jewish) slaves would be expected to perform: He washed His disciples feet. 10

11 Jesus servant action was not a flash-in-the-pan affair. It reflected the very essence of Jesus entire ministry. Servanthood constituted the total thrust of His life from beginning to end. And the cross was merely, but magnificently, the final working out of His walking the way of a Servant-without-limit. In one of the closing prayers that we use in our Eucharistic liturgies, we refer to Jesus life as the model of the godly life. In praying these words, we confess that we too are called to walk the way of a servantwithout-limit. Not just sometimes, not just when we are in the mood, but every second that we are alive. And the implications for our walk as Christians, and for our use of time, abilities, and material goods, are mind-boggling. In a few weeks we shall celebrate the Ascension of our Lord. Although attendance at mid-week Ascension Day services is hardly the current rage, preachers and teachers in the church need to work hard at teaching people what we Christians mean when we say, Jesus ascended into heaven and sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty. When Jesus ascended, He did not take off for some distant but pleasant corner of the universe. The truth is that when Jesus ascended, He did not withdraw His presence. He transformed it! In short, Jesus is here. And He always will be. That means we live out life in His presence. To be a Christian, then, does not mean that we merely embrace a set of doctrines. It is to know that we have been embraced by Jesus! It is to live out life in the presence of a Person who is still here! We should feel as awestruck about that continuing Presence as the disciples felt in that Upper Room and on that Galilean shore. Although we are no more worthy to live in that Presence than were the disciples of old, He looks at each one of us with a divine kindness and says, Peace be with you. Come and have breakfast. Do you love me? Feed My lambs. Feed My sheep. Incredible, but true. When we finally understand that we live out life in Jesus presence, we cannot but feel overwhelmed. He reaches out His hand to take hold of our hand. And we know He ll never let it go. Our hearts feel so warm, so full. We just know we re going to want to serve Him as much as possible. And eventually we get up and begin our walk out into the world with Him. We can feel His hand gripping ours. It all feels so good. Sometimes it happens that when, after worship, we get to the church door, suddenly... we can t feel His hand or presence anymore. We think, He s gone! We ask, Jesus, where did you go to? Nowhere! I can t see you! How can I serve you if I can t see you? I m still here. I ve been with and around you all time. I always have been I always will be. It s just that I m around you in disguise! I m that hungry one, that thirsty one, that stranger, that person without clothing, that sick one, that prisoner. That s Me in disguise! And He continues: See all those things around you that the world thinks so important? Those national flags, those different skin colors, those so-called symbols of success? They mean nothing in My Kingdom. 11

12 In the world, greatness is measured by how many people you can get to serve you. In My Kingdom, greatness is measured by how many people you serve! Think of life as though there are only two people in the world: you and Me! You want to serve Me with all your life? There I am all around you. That s Me. I gave you life so that you could give it to Me through serving others. Even as I gave Mine away for you! And the more we listen, the more we are overwhelmed and transformed! 12