Trusting the Hurricane

This story I’m about to tell has appeared in a couple of different places. A piece of it was adapted for the Restless Hearts curriculum I worked on. Originally I wrote it for a group of students getting ready to leave UVA and go out into the world. I also wrote it for me as I was getting ready to make a big transition in my life.

Since the youth have had to reschedule their Sunday for leadership, it gave me a chance to revisit the story for this place and time. Easter is a time of transition. For the disciples it was a transition from the way things were to the way things are in light of Jesus’ rising from the dead. For us, it is a time to think about what it means that Jesus is alive. If that is so, then what changes about our lives?

I also know that change often feels like impending disaster. There are so many things going on in our lives that make the future seem like a threat instead of a promise. So what does it mean that all things are being made over or made new? I invite you to listen to those questions in this story, entitled “Trusting the Hurricane.”

The voice on the television was clear. “What you need is the new Triple Cheddar Monster Thick Burger Deluxe with Bacon.” As the deep, urgent voice spoke the camera lovingly panned a huge, dripping cheeseburger that looked like it was just asking to be caught up in a steroids scandal. “What you need is a visit to Hardee’s.”

Gabriella threw a wadded piece of paper at the screen. “No,” she said, “What I need is some help with these stupid quadratic equations! What Einstein thought these up?”

Vera looked over at her friend. “Wasn’t it Einstein?”

“Very funny, Vera. Very funny.”

Gabby and Vera were sitting in the Cavalier Laundrette in Charlottesville trying to multitask their way to the end of their first year at UVA. While their clothes were spinning in the noisy, hot dryers and the TV blared overhead, they were poring over books and notes and trying to pretend to be ready for the next morning’s exam. Even though they could have used the laundry rooms at the dorms, they felt more like the strong, independent women they were when they got to get off grounds. So they lugged their clothes and books over to the Laundromat.

“What I need is a break,” said Vera. “I think if I spend one more minute trying to understand Shakespeare I’m going to lose my capacity for coherent thought.” She looked down at her notes scribbled on a hundred little pieces of paper and index cards. “This is out of control, Gabby.”

Gabby looked down at her own collection of numbers and formulas. “Tell me about it. But hey, looks like load number 76 is done.” She jumped up and walked over to a dryer that was just spinning to a halt.

Just then the door of the Laundromat flew open and a young man ran in, out of breath and with a wild look in his eye. He scanned the room quickly and when he saw Vera he ran to her and plopped down in the seat right beside her. “So, Vera, are you ready for a break?”

Vera smiled. It was Grayson. They had met during the first month of school when Grayson was playing Frisbee golf on the Lawn and nailed her in the head while trying to make a par two off of Homer’s rear end. (Homer is a statue in the middle of the Lawn.) Since then he had been her muse and prophet with his free spirited ways and disarming questions. Grayson had a way of appearing just when Vera needed him to. In a year when so many things had changed for Vera, when she had been challenged in so many different ways, Grayson was her touchstone for understanding what was real. He was also becoming her boyfriend, though neither one of them had yet said that aloud or broached the DTR conversation (“Defining the Relationship”).

“How did you know, Grayson? I just told Gabby that I needed a break.”

“Excellent! Do you remember how I tried to get you to bungee jump off the Rotunda last month?”

Vera was nervous. “Grayson…”

“Chill out, Vera. I still haven’t found the right bungee cords for that. But I did find somebody who can get us on to the upper balconies around the Lawn. Are you interested?”

“Absolutely.”

“Cool. Well, meet me in front of Pavilion VIII at midnight.”

“Grayson?”

“Yes?”

“Will I be facing an honor trial after this?”

“No way, Vera. Trespassing charges at the most. Oh, and by the way, I need to collect for the plane tickets soon.”

“Right. Grayson…I don’t know about that. Is it too late to get your money back because my folks are really freaking out about this beach week trip.”

“Vera! You have got to go! You’re headed back to that strange little place you call home for 13 weeks. You’re going to work at an Eckerd’s and become a slave of the establishment. You’ve got to take this week before you go. Gabby’s going. Ike’s going. Beebo and Nimrod.”

“Yeah, Grayson…no, see I want to go. I think it will be great. But remind me again why we’re going to Nicaragua?”

“Vera, everybody’s going to Nicaragua these days.”

“No, they’re not, Grayson. They’re going to the Outer Banks.”

“Yeah, sure. NOW they’re going to the Outer Banks, but after they hear about our week at Puerto Cabeza de Cabra, it will be da bomb.”

“Grayson, you are not going to get 21st century people to go to this place if you keep saying da bomb. Nobody says that anymore.”

“Right, so you’re going?”

“Yes, I’m going. I’ll bring you the check at midnight. Pavilion VIII. I’ll bring some bail money for you, too.”

“Awesome. Thanks, Vera. You’re da bo…you’re great.” And with that Grayson bounced back out of the Laundromat while Vera smiled.

Vera was right about her parents. They did freak out when they learned about Nicaragua. On the plane ride down she wondered again why she had agreed to this crazy trip. She didn’t even know any Spanish! Her 200-level French was not going to help her here.

What she hadn’t anticipated was how everything seemed to change for her after her last exam. The semester had felt like a huge steamroller bearing down her so that she had to keep running every second to avoid being flattened. There wasn’t much room to think about the summer, her parents, the beach trip, or even how she was feeling. But as she turned in her last blue book and walked out of New Cabell Hall, a strange mixture of relief and apprehension settled in.

She was definitely feeling better with the steamroller fading into the distance behind her. Whatever grade she got on that Russian History exam, it wasn’t going to be bad enough to sink her semester. But in the pit of her stomach she also felt a sense of foreboding and instability that she hadn’t had since her first days at UVA when she was wondering if she had made the right choice in coming to school here at all. Back then her mom was having health issues and her old friends were back in Mattaponi, seemingly doing fine without her. But as she had learned to embrace the roller-coaster ride of college life, that feeling had passed. Now that she was going back to Mattaponi, it was coming back.

Gabby, who was sitting next to her on the plane, noticed that Vera was a little preoccupied. “Hey, Lady, what’s up?”

“Gabby, do you know what you’re going to do when you grow up?”

“Hey, what’s to say I’m not grown up already?”
“O.K., yeah, but I mean, what next? After UVA.”

“No clue, Vera. But you’re not supposed to answer my question with a question. Lets’ try again. Hey, Lady, what’s up? (Here’s the part where you say, ‘Thanks for asking, Gabby. I’m looking worried and unsettled because…’)”

Vera smiled. “Because…because, Gabby, I don’t know who I’m supposed to be. I mean in Mattaponi I never thought about it. I never had much of a goal besides going to college. When classes are going it’s easy--I’m a student. But here I am going to another country and I’m going to hand over my passport and they’re going to say, ‘Welcome, Vera Allen,’ and I don’t know who that is!”

“So, it’s about going to another country…”

“No, Gabby it has nothing to do with another country. I don’t know who Vera Allen is in the United States! I don’t know what I’m doing or where I’m headed. I don’t know who or what to trust. I don’t know who God wants me to be. And it feels like freedom, but it also feels like really scary.”

“Vera,” Gabby said. “Before you take on life, the universe and everything, just try enjoying one day on the beach. Can you promise me that?”

But even that didn’t work out. They landed without incident in a small, one runway airport at the edge of a vast jungle. The customs official hardly glanced at Vera’s passport as she walked through. It was a little disconcerting to see how easy it was to get it, but a little bit thrilling, too.

The group boarded a taxi to head to the hotel where they were staying. Well, I say taxi, but it was really more like the bed of a pick-up truck. In fact, it was the bed of a pick-up truck with rough wooden benches fixed over each wheel base. Only the word ‘Taxi’ written across the pick-up gate gave away what it was. Ten of them squeezed together with their stuff for the short ride.

Nicaragua is a desperately poor country and Puerto Cabeza de Cabra (in English: Port Goathead) showed the effects of the poverty. Their hotel was a collection of cinderblock cabanas with one wall of each consisting of a bamboo screen facing the Pacific that could be pulled back. A larger cinderblock building with a timber roof behind these cabanas served as the office, restaurant, and local health clinic. It was the most substantial building in a very small city. A friendly, elderly couple had showed them their rooms and then left them there.

Grayson looked at the modest digs and immediately pronounced them “Awesome!”, but no one else was ready to make that claim. The students threw their bags down and headed straight for the beach. It was warm and wonderful--very different from the oddly cold spring they had left behind in Virginia. A stiff wind was blowing off of the ocean and the setting sun was soon obscured by a raft of dark, billowy clouds on the horizon. Before dark the atmosphere was as unsettled as Vera felt.

When Vera called home a little while later to let her parents know that they had made it safely, they had some more unsettling news. They had been watching the Weather Channel and they talked about a hurricane headed straight for Central America. “Dad, are you sure? It’s too early for a hurricane, isn’t it? It’s only May.”

“It’s very unusual, but I’m sitting here looking at it on the screen right now, Vera.”

By noon the next day things had turned even more ominous. Though the local weather reports said that the main storm would hit north of them, the hurricane was large enough that it was going to cause some major problems in Puerto Cabeza de Cabra. Rain began to fall in the early afternoon and the winds became fierce. The hotel evacuated all of the guests to the main building where there were few windows. Around sunset the electricity went out. When Vera peeked out at the ocean it was seething and tossing huge waves at the cabanas they had left. Somehow the thought of it encroaching on them in the dark was even worse.

She leaned up against a wall as one of the hotel owners handed her an oil lamp. In its flickering light she could see Grayson walking toward her. He put his back up against the wall beside her and slid down into a sitting position, just as he had done dozens of times before when she was studying in the hallway at Bonnycastle dorm.

“So…want to play some cards?”

“No, Grayson. Thanks, but I just don’t think I could concentrate.”

“So, I guess bungee jumping off the roof of…”

“Don’t even try it, Grayson. It’s lame.”

Grayson looked away for a minute, pretending to be interested in a joke Ike was telling Beebo across the room. When he turned back to Vera he said, “You know, hurricanes are great.”

“Grayson…”

“No, really. It’s true. I took this Environmental Science course last semester and we talked about how they are one of the most efficient forms of heat transfer from the tropics to other areas.”

Vera looked mildly interested so Grayson kept going. “You see, the tropics get way more solar energy than they need and all that excess energy gets stored in the ocean water. Currents take some of it away, but hurricanes are like the bullet trains of heat transfer. They just take all that energy and chug straight on up to the northern hemisphere. It’s da bomb…I mean, it’s pretty nifty.”

“O.K., Grayson, I don’t know if this is true or not. I don’t think you even took an Environmental Science class last fall. But hurricanes are not ‘pretty nifty.’ They’re big and scary and they knock lots of stuff down while they’re transferring heat so efficiently. So if that’s supposed to make me feel better, it’s not working. I still hear the wind. I’m sitting in here in the dark wondering if the roof is going to blow off, and I think the whole world is coming apart around me. I need something more substantial than a stupid lecture to make me feel better.”

“What do you need, Vera?”

“I need to get out of here. I need to go home. I need to pray. I don’t know. What do you need?”

“Vera,” Grayson said, “Look at me.”

Vera turned her head to look into Grayson’s green eyes. He held her face in his hands as he had done once before in the time she had known him. The lamp cast strange shadows around his face, but he seemed remarkably calm. “Vera,” he said, “I don’t have a way to get you out or to take you home or to tell you that everything is going to be alright. I don’t know why we’re here. But I do have this to give you. You are God’s child. You need to trust the hurricane, and you need to dance.”
Dance? Dance? How ridiculous the words sounded in the middle of a hurricane! The world was blowing away around them. Vera’s life was an absolute uncertainty. She didn’t even know why she was in this odd little corner of the world. But strangely, Grayson’s words were enough. The character of the wind changed. It was no longer fierce and menacing, but mighty and musical. The huddled forms of people gathered around faltering lamps didn’t seem like helpless, small lights in the dark; they were people finding strength in each other. Even the darkness did not seem dark but somehow comforting. And within herself, Vera felt the deep, dark questions that absorbed her on the plane, melting into insignificance. Dancing. Yes, that’s just what should be done.

But before she was able to consider what this meant, there was a ferocious gust and the building shook and the simple timber roof shuddered and then lifted up into the air, floating away into the night sky like Dorothy‘s house in the Wizard of Oz. Suddenly rain poured in on them and the winds howled overhead. It was terrifying and yet amazing. Most of the oil lamps blew out immediately.

Then an old woman staggered to the center of the room and looked up at the raging heavens above her. She gestured to an old man to join her. Vera recognized them from check-in the day before. It was the owners of the hotel who had now lost everything. Or so it seemed. The old woman and the old man looked at one another and as if they had been practicing for this moment for some time. They began to raise their hands into the air and then to stomp their feet and then to shout in a loud voice and then…o my…and then to dance.

Vera looked over at Grayson, who was sitting, shocked, against the wall. She said to him, “Grayson, look at me.” He looked. “Grayson, it’s time to dance.”

They joined the couple in the middle of the room in a dance that was at the same time primitive and glorious. As they danced the winds began to die down. The rains came to an end. The clouds parted to reveal a sky full of diamonds and a crescent moon. The rebuilding had already begun, and for Vera it was as if she had taken her first step. There were many things yet to do, many questions yet to answer. But she no longer needed a passport to tell her who she was. She was a child of God.

I don’t know if a hurricane is the best metaphor for a time of transition, especially for people like us who know what hurricanes do to coastal places, but I know it feels that way sometimes. When we move into a new stage of life, nothing seems stable. Nothing seems sure. Will I have what I need? Will I have people around me to assure me that I’m loved? Will I feel God’s presence in this new time? Will I know who I am?

But we have old stories to tell us what it should be like. In the early Church, shortly after Jesus’ resurrection and the huge transition and tumult that the disciples went through…Soon after the hurricane that was Pentecost, Peter and John confronted a man who had not been able to walk since birth. He lived an entirely passive life, being carried to the Temple each day to receive gifts from passers-by. When Peter and John see him, that’s how he is--sitting and asking for alms.

Peter is not content to toss him a coin. He doesn’t even have a coin to toss. He tells the man, “Look at us.” And the man does, expecting to get something from them. But Peter says, “I don’t have what you think you need or what you’ve come to expect. But I do have this: In the name of Jesus of Nazareth, stand up and walk.”

This man is not content to walk, though. He has not moved on his own since birth, so his first move away from passivity, his first act, is to praise God and to dance. The Bible says he jumped up and went walking and leaping and praising God. He began to dance.

I don’t know what transition you are going through in your life, but I do know that God is not through with you yet. There are things for us to do and we should never accept complacency when God gives us choreography. I don’t have much to give to you today, but I do have this: You are a child of God. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, don’t just walk; dance with me. Thanks be to God.

Acts 3:1-10 [NRSV]

One day Peter and John were going up to the temple at the hour of prayer, at three o'clock in the afternoon. And a man lame from birth was being carried in. People would lay him daily at the gate of the temple called the Beautiful Gate so that he could ask for alms from those entering the temple. When he saw Peter and John about to go into the temple, he asked them for alms.

Peter looked intently at him, as did John, and said, "Look at us." And he fixed his attention on them, expecting to receive something from them. But Peter said, "I have no silver or gold, but what I have I give you; in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, stand up and walk." And he took him by the right hand and raised him up; and immediately his feet and ankles were made strong.

Jumping up, he stood and began to walk, and he entered the temple with them, walking and leaping and praising God. All the people saw him walking and praising God, and they recognized him as the one who used to sit and ask for alms at the Beautiful Gate of the temple; and they were filled with wonder and amazement at what had happened to him.

In the Silence

Of all the stories of the first Easter morning—and there are four of them, in Matthew, Mark, Luke & John—it is the story from Matthew that is the most Hollywood. Jerry Bruckheimer, the producer who makes big, loud movies like Pearl Harbor and Armageddon and Pirates of the Caribbean, would definitely choose Matthew if he were doing a movie of the life of Christ. Steven Spielberg? Matthew. Because it is so cinematic.

Matthew wants you to know that this is a dramatic story. He’s the gospel writer who tells you that on the day of Jesus’ crucifixion, when he breathed his last breath, there was an earthquake and the curtain in the temple was torn in two, and tombs were blasted open and people who had been dead were walking around the city. He doesn’t want there to be any doubt that when Jesus died, it was a big deal. The whole world should know that this Jesus, who lived a simple life, who was a simple carpenter and who traveled with simple fishermen and women, this Jesus was God! And when God dies on a criminal’s cross—things happen. The earth shakes. Rocks split. Curtains rip. Tombs open.

But then there is Jesus’ tomb. Jesus’ body is taken down from the cross. A rich man from Arimathea, named Joseph, offers to place the body in a rich man’s tomb. This tomb is massive—hewn out of rock, sealed with a heavy stone that takes many people to put in place. This is a place intended to hold a body in security for many long years. That’s where they put the lifeless body of Jesus.

But even now the drama doesn’t end. Those who had tried Jesus and put him to death want to make sure that nothing happens to that body—that it stays in the tomb. They go to the Roman governor, to Pilate, and they ask for a guard to watch the grave. And so Pilate posts a guard and they seal the rock in place so that it cannot be disturbed.

Now here’s where the real Hollywood comes in. Picture this. A quiet garden at dawn. The tomb is still there with the stone in place. Two of Jesus’ most faithful disciples, Mary Magdalene and another Mary, who were there when the body was placed in the tomb, come quietly on the scene to see the tomb. Then—we need some CGI effects here—another earthquake! The earth trembles. An angel comes down out of the skies and rolls away the stone. He’s dressed all in white and he looks like a lightning bolt. He’s dashing and dramatic. I’m thinking Russell Crowe here.

And, oh, the guards who are supposed to be watching the tomb? They are terrified. We cut to a shot of several of them frozen in fear and then laid out on the ground like dead men. You catch the irony of this dramatic juxtaposition don’t you? The guards, who are supposed to keep Jesus from being alive, are dead. Couldn’t be any better, could it?

So there they are laid out. Russell Crowe is sitting on this huge rock he’s just moved out of the way. And he looks at the women and says, “Don’t be afraid. I know why you’re here. You’re looking for Jesus who was crucified. But he isn’t here. He has been raised, just like he said he would be. Come, take a look around.” All this drama—all this stone-rolling, all the guards—and guess what? None of it was necessary for God to do what God was going to do. Jesus was raised before any of the fireworks started! Jesus didn’t need an earthquake. Jesus didn’t need to have the stone removed. Jesus was raised already! Cut to the women peeking into the tomb, feeling the stone where he lay, staring at one another in disbelief.

But wait, Russell’s not finished talking to them yet. “He’s been raised from the dead, but you have work to do. You’ve got to go tell the other disciples that Jesus has been raised from the dead and he is going ahead of you to Galilee, (the place where they had first met Jesus). You will see him there.”

So Mary Magdalene, being played by Kiera Knightley, and the other Mary, played by Julia Roberts, run from the tomb. We hear their pounding feet and their gasps for breath. We see the orange morning sun illuminating their faces and we can tell, because they are very good actresses, that they are running away with fear and great joy. What an incredible mix of emotions! We keep this extreme close-up on their faces as they keep running. If Jerry Bruckheimer is directing we might get a few random explosions in the garden as the guards wake up from their stupor and start chasing them with grenade launchers. If Spielberg is directing, the music is swelling. But none of that happens in the Bible story, so forget I even mentioned it.

What happens in Matthew is even more dramatic, because as the women are running from the garden they run smack into a strange figure that seems to waiting for them. It’s Jesus. Jesus is waiting for them! And they fall down in front of him and grab his feet and worship him. It is true. It is really true! And Jesus says, “Rejoice. Don’t be afraid. Go tell the other disciples to meet me in Galilee. They will see me there.” And now Kiera and Julia (or Mary and Mary) get up with tears streaming down their faces and we can tell, because they are very good actresses, that the fear is gone. There is only joy now because they were the first to see the risen Lord and to know the truth—that the message of hope and life did not die on the cross. Christ is alive and everything is new. Cut to the rising sun peeking over the nearest ridge. Raise the volume on the John Williams score and roll the credits. It’s a wrap!

But you and I know that the story is not over. As dramatic as Matthew’s version of the resurrection is—it’s not the end of the story by any means. In some ways it’s only the beginning. Here we are some two thousand years later and we’re still trying to grasp what it all means. What does it mean to proclaim that Christ is Risen? When we shout Alleluia! do we have any idea what we’re saying? Is Christ alive…still? And if he is then what does that mean for me?

And has the world really changed? The world we see around us on Easter morning seems a lot like the world we lamented at the cross on Friday. There are still wars and terror. I’ve been getting dispatches from a former UVA student I worked with who is now on a base in Baghdad. He lives in a world of concrete barricades with occasional explosions in the night. There are still bombings. The economy is taking a scary turn. Our schools are changing dramatically. Families are still in trouble. Relationships are still hurting. The natural world is polluted and dying. Addictions still strangle our souls. Violence still plagues our society. Religion seems a sorry salve. And deep inside ourselves…deep in here, we sense that something is missing—that we need something more—that we need to discover new life.

So I envy those women at the tomb. They got earthquakes and angels. They got to put their fingers in the place where Jesus’ body had lain. They got to feel the cool and empty rock shelf. Most importantly, they got to hear the risen Jesus call their names and they got to hold on for dear life to his feet. I want a resurrection experience like Mary and Mary had, so that I can know that Christ is alive. Where is that Easter experience?

Oh, I know what Jesus would say. Jesus had an American in his group of disciples you know. I mean he acted like an American. His name was Thomas and you have heard him called by his nickname—Doubting Thomas. I say that Thomas was American because he was one of these folks who said things like we tend to say. “I’ll believe it when I see it,” Thomas would say. “Seeing is believing,” he would say. “I’m from Missouri—Show me.” That’s how Americans respond to unbelievable things they can’t see. And what Jesus said to Thomas—after he had seen Jesus and felt the wounds in his hands and side—what Jesus says to him is, “You believe because you have seen me. Blessed are those who don’t see and yet believe.” That’s you and me--the people who can’t see and yet who are called to believe.

So, yes, I know what Jesus would say, but I don’t believe that’s all Jesus would say. Because Jesus also said that we would be able to see him even after he ascended into heaven. No, we don’t have an audience with Jesus like Thomas had. No, we don’t get to meet him in a garden encounter and hold on to his feet. No, we don’t even have photos. But the resurrection was something that was unseen. Despite all the special effects, no one saw the resuscitation of Jesus’ body. No one saw the actual act of Jesus rising from the dead. What there was to see and feel was an empty tomb. And where the real change took place was in the hearts and minds of the disciples.

Where did Easter happen? I believe that it didn’t happen in the place where Jesus was. It happened in the place where Jesus is—in the hearts of those who love him and who understand that they are loved by him. Easter happened in the fear and great joy of Mary and Mary. Easter happened in the dumbfounded disciples in the upper room as they encountered the risen Christ. Easter happened in the eyes of the disciples who broke bread with him in Emmaus. It happened in the breakfast they shared by the lakeshore. It happened in Paul on the road to Damascus as he was knocked off his donkey by the voice of Christ. Easter happened in Augustine and Catherine of Siena. Easter happened in Gregory and Hildegard in the Middle Ages. Easter happened in John and Charles Wesley centuries later. Easter happened in Martin Luther King, Junior and Mother Theresa. Easter happened to popes and beggars, to kings and peasants, to rich and poor, and young and old. And at last Easter happened to me.

How do I know? How can I be sure? What can I point to that would prove that Christ is living? The old hymn “He Lives” says in its chorus: “You ask me how I know he lives? He lives within my heart.” That’s right. In here. In the same place where I sometimes feel that something is missing. Right here I also know that what is missing often is me. When Easter comes it is an assurance of deep joy that despite all the things that are happening to me, despite all the troubles of my life, despite all the real evil in the world, despite all the evidence—I and the world are held in the palm of God’s hand. That is an inexplicable joy. That is an unspeakable promise. That is a conviction that will not go away no matter how hard I try to run from it. Deep down, if you ask me straight out, I have to say that I know that Jesus lives because I feel him right here. In here I know that death cannot win ultimately. In here I know that God’s intention for me and the world is not despair but hope and life. In here I know that I and the world can be better and will be better and that I have not been abandoned. When everything else around me seems to be urging me to ask, “Where am I going and why am I in this handbasket?”, still I know in here that love will triumph.

You ask me how I know he lives? He lives within my heart. And I know it because of what I see in the Church at its best. I know this is a time of great cynicism about great institutions—particularly the Church. We have lived through a political week in which one of our presidential candidates – Obama – had to publicly struggle with an ugly side of his church.

But I know what the Church at its best does, too. At its best the church raises money for mosquito nets in Africa to save children from malaria. At its best the church builds wells for water and buys water buffalos for rice fields. In Mexico I saw the living Christ in a congregation that is vibrant in worship and stretching itself to start new missions among the poor. When I watch former students I worked with at the Wesley Foundation give their lives to a call to ministry or when they tell me about how they have found God in the unlikeliest places, I know that Christ lives. When I gather with folks around a fire, like we did last night here at Franktown, and we light candles and bring them into the sanctuary to remind ourselves of how the light overcomes the darkness. When I see our youth meet mentors they are going to spend the next 12 weeks with in the confirmation process. When we share some of the most important stories of our lives together, I know that Christ lives. In the Church, in the best of the Church, I see Christ.

You ask me how I know he lives? I know it because of what I don’t see. Because of what was not in that tomb on that morning. Because of what is not on that cross this morning. Because of who has been defeated and can no longer threaten us with death. All these things I don’t see tell me that Easter has come.

I hope that Easter has happened in here for you at some time. I hope that you, too, sense that inexplicable, unbelievable joy that contradicts all the evidence. I hope that you have had that powerful encounter with Christ and that you know that no matter how far you have run, no matter how distantly you have wandered, you have not yet escaped God’s love for you. And you can’t. Easter is ready to happen for you any day. And when it happens, nothing will ever be the same. Thanks be to God.

Matthew 28:1-10 (NRSV)
After the sabbath, as the first day of the week was dawning, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. And suddenly there was a great earthquake; for an angel of the Lord, descending from heaven, came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning and his clothing white as snow. For fear of him the guards shook and became like dead men. But the angel said to the women, "Do not be afraid; I know that you are looking for Jesus who was crucified. He is not here; for he has been raised, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay. Then go quickly and tell his disciples, 'He has been raised from the dead, and indeed he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him.' This is my message for you."
So they left the tomb quickly with fear and great joy, and ran to tell his disciples. Suddenly Jesus met them and said, "Greetings!" And they came to him, took hold of his feet, and worshiped him. Then Jesus said to them, "Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me."

Branches and Trees

So this is what it has come to. It starts with branches and it ends with a tree. We welcome Jesus on Sunday and crucify him by Friday. What in the world were they thinking in Jerusalem on that first Holy Week some 2,000 years ago? To hail Jesus as a triumphant king and then to execute him like some common criminal? What were they thinking?

But it’s not just about them. It’s about us. It’s about what we do to distance ourselves from Jesus. It’s about how we pay him lip service and how we keep him on the cross. The palm branches spread before the donkey? We cut those. The tree on which they nailed him? We did that. The song we sing each Holy Week? Were you there? We were.

I know we don’t want to admit it, but let me tell you about the dangers of plausible deniability. Ever heard that phrase? It’s a Washington word that describes the general stance of most politicians. Because the risks of acting overtly on any issue are so great, every action is taken in such a way that you can plausibly deny that you had a hand in any perceived negative consequences of the act. For instance, “There’s a rumor going around that Obama is Muslim? I didn’t start that.” “Yes, I voted against the $87 billion in reconstruction money for Iraq but that was after I voted for it.” “We never said that Iraq posed an imminent danger, we were always careful to call it a grave and gathering danger and I’m sorry if you got the impression that we were facing something more menacing.” “When I said that I never had sexual relations with that woman, I assumed everyone would know that what we did is not sexual and didn’t constitute a relationship.” You can add to this list of almost verbatim quotes from your own storehouse of memory.

So what’s wrong with plausible deniability? It’s for wimps. That’s what’s wrong with it. It’s for people who, when faced with clear evidence of failure, refuse to see it. It’s for people who are fearful enough that they believe they must always be seen as unflappable, imperturbable, and unassailable. It’s for people who come to a fork in the road and choose the fork. It’s for people who want to hit a home run without ever admitting that they once struck out or perhaps without even acknowledging that they had a bat in their hands. Plausible deniability is for wimps and I should know because I know that stance, too.

Have you been there? Trying to take the spotlight off yourself and what you might or might not think…what you might or might not have done? I’ve been there. And it’s not just you and me. It’s the Seinfeld world we live in. Do you remember the TV series Seinfeld? Remember how Jerry, George, and Elaine used to take strange comfort in being comfortably detached from all the strange people around them? The Soup Nazi was a great subject of conversation. The strange tics of Jerry’s new girlfriend. The constant question of “Isn’t it interesting how…” We are all commentators on the world. We all see ourselves in the booth calling the game, grateful that we don’t have to actually get out on the floor and reveal how stumbling and bumbling we are. Or if we do get out there, we wink at the crowd and say, “Look at me playing this role. I can’t believe I’m out here either!”

I got over one part of my plausible deniability a few years ago when, for the first time in my life, I stuck a candidate’s name on my coat and went out to staff the polls at my local precinct in Charlottesville. There I was at 6 AM…6 AM!…handing out literature and urging my neighbors to vote for my candidate…I actually called him my candidate! What were they going to think of me? Would they talk to me after knowing my allegiances? Would they go home and tell their spouse…“You know, Joyner down the hill was over at the polls this morning and you’ll never believe who he was supporting. Isn’t it interesting when people get so worked up about politics? I think I detected a maniacal gleam in his eye. Sure glad we aren‘t that passionate.”

Passionate. You know this Sunday is called Palm/Passion Sunday and it is a day when we begin to talk intensively about the Passion of Christ. And the usual way that people misunderstand the word passion is to think it refers to romance, and they giggle to think about Jesus in a romance. Well, they either giggle or they write The DaVinci Code, one or the other. But I want to misunderstand the Passion of Christ in a different way today. I want to think about passion as the fully involved, fully-implicated way in which some people live their lives.

Passion comes from a Greek word meaning suffering and that’s why we use it during Holy Week. But that same root tells us about the other ways we use that word. We burn with passion in romantic love. We are passionate about a cause or a faith. And we suffer because we put ourselves out on the limb. We burn the last bridge. We put all of our eggs in one basket. We throw down our nets and leave it all behind to follow. We leave the dead to bury their own dead. We say, “Here I am, Lord, send me.” And there is no turning back. Dietrich Bonhoeffer said, “When Jesus calls a person, he bids that one to come and die.”[i] And Bonhoeffer, struggling against the evils of Nazi Germany, did just that. It’s a dangerous thing to leave the sidelines and to become passionate about life.

We hesitate to do it and we should! Think how ridiculous we might look! Think how many carefully laid plans we might have to put aside! Think how many committees of inquiry might call us to account for our actions! Think how many times I’ll say the wrong thing at exactly the wrong moment! Think how awkwardly I’ll move, how gracelessly I’ll appear! Think of what the neighbors will say! Think of how I’ll struggle. Think of what it will cost me. Think of how I’ll fail.

That’s the kicker. To live passionately means that we will fail at life, that we will be held accountable for things we never anticipated being responsible for. To live passionately means that we will disappoint others and ourselves. When we leave the sidelines to fully immerse ourselves in life we will fall on our faces. We may say, like the old commercial, “Help, I’ve fallen and I can’t get up.” And who wants to say those words?

I once passed a sign in front of a church during Holy Week that said simply, “We are all responsible.” What a strange thing to say. Especially in a culture of plausible deniability. We are all responsible? For what?

For Jesus’ death, I’m sure. One of the great controversies in Christian history is how Christians have sometimes held the Jewish people responsible for Jesus’ death. It’s a horrible history that has contributed to the persecution of Jews and even to the Holocaust. I want to say that the question of who is responsible for Jesus’ crucifixion is misguided. The question is not who was responsible for this act, but why do we find it so important to absolve anyone of guilt? Who is responsible? Who isn’t responsible? To not be involved in this story…this central story that Christians point to as the place where the whole universe comes together for them…this basic story that helps us understand what Jesus means when he says, “You must take up your cross”…this essential story that says that God came in a real human form and suffered with a real human body and died a real human death and still said, “Forgive them for they do not know what they are doing”…to not be involved in this story, even as one of the crowd chanting “Crucify!”, is the fate worse than death.

Who’s fully-implicated here? We all are. And there’s the passion. When we can sing “Were you there?”, not as dispassionate observers shaking our heads in sorrow over what those people did to Jesus, my Lord, but rather when we can sing “Were you there?” as people who really were there in the mobs who cheered on Palm Sunday and who jeered on Good Friday…people who really were there with the palm branches and then with the hammers and nails…people who really didn’t understand and still don’t get it. We still don’t get it. That’s passion.

It’s the end of plausible deniability as we know it. It’s the end of the bench warmer. It’s the end of the color analysis in the booth. Being real means getting our hands dirty. Being real means taking a chance at being who God has been calling us to be. It means being fully-implicated in life.

Which is why there is confession. Not because we need to feel bad. God knows we feel pretty wretched a lot of the time. We’re riddled with self-doubt and self-loathing. We’ve got plenty of tapes running in our heads that can make us feel bad. You don’t need confession to drag that out of you.

No, the reason we need confession is because God is calling us to be fully implicated in the plot. We are unindicted co-conspirators in a plot with world-altering consequences. We are guilty of not being content with the sidelines and of entering the fray and failing miserably. We may be headed for perfection, but we’re obviously not there yet. We may be God’s choice to be God’s people but we look pretty God-forsaken in the choices we make. We aim high hoping to bring heaven to earth and we wind up commingled with the forces of hell. It’s a long, long road and we can’t do it alone and we look ahead with a cross placed before us to remind us of how long and lonely the world can be.

But the good news in all this? The good news in all this is that we have something to confess. The good news in the passion is that we have started to live again even in the midst of a dying world. The good news is that we can be passionate because sinners is not all that we are…we are also redeemed…created in love, created in community, and raised up to something more than we have allowed ourselves to become. The good news is that I may be taking halting steps, but I’m taking steps! The good news is that I may be falling, but I’m falling forward instead of backwards! The good news is that I may be a fragile human body, but I am also some-body! The good news is that I may have no more wisdom than a child, but I am also a child of God! The good news is that I may feel like a motherless child, but I have mothers and fathers and sisters and brothers…they’re called the Church. The good news is that I may be up to my neck in troubles, but I am not high and dry.

Were you there when they crucified my Lord? I hope you were because I’d hate for you to be somewhere else. Were you there when they nailed him to the tree? Were you there when they pierced him in the side? Were you there when they laid him in the tomb? Were you there? It’s not a rhetorical question. Thanks be to God.

Matthew 27:25 (NRSV)
Then the people as a whole answered, “His blood be on us and on our children!”

Acts 2:22-23 (NRSV)
You that are Israelites, listen to what I have to say: Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with deeds of power, wonders, and signs that God did through him among you, as you yourselves know -- this man, handed over to you according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of those outside the law.

[i] Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Discipleship (1937), http://www.theopedia.com/Dietrich_Bonhoeffer

Emptying Tombs

So there was this little boy who brought his pet turtle to his dad. (By the way, I have it from a reliable source (the Internet), that this is a true story.) A little boy brought his pet turtle to his dad with tears streaming down his face and said, “Dad, my turtle died.”

The father looked down at the turtle and, sure enough, it looked dead. He saw his son’s tears and he tried to console him. “Well, Tommy.” (I don’t know what the little boy’s name was but most reliable stories on the Internet have little boys named Tommy.) “Well, Tommy, maybe we can give him a funeral.”

“What’s that?” said Tommy.

“A funeral. When someone dies there’s often a funeral. It’s a time to give thanks for the person or pet that’s died and to pray to God for comfort and for the one who has died. We could invite all of your friends over and then afterwards maybe we could have a reception.”

“What’s that?” said Tommy.

“A reception. It’s kind of like a party. We could have ice cream and tell stories.”

Tommy’s tears were beginning to dry. He kind of liked the idea of doing a funeral for the turtle. Then something totally unexpected happened. While both of them were looking at the turtle, it started to move. It wasn’t dead at all. Tommy looked up at his dad and said, in all sincerity, “Let’s kill it.”

What I want to say to you today is that I’m afraid that we’re afraid of living. It’s not that we’re afraid of dying. Anybody could tell you about how we approach death. What I want to talk about today is how we’re afraid of living. And if you don’t leave here today convicted that we’ve got some life-giving, tomb-emptying work to do, then I haven’t done my job. We’re going to go meet Jesus again in our gospel story today and the Jesus we’re going to meet has no patience for death and for those who accept it as the last word. The Jesus we’re going to meet today is all about life.

So let me take you back to the Bible…back to the story of Lazarus. This is a story of death and life. It’s the story of people who love Jesus, who follow Jesus, who claim to know what he’s about and where he’s headed, but who really don’t get it. Because it’s also the story of people who in the end think that death is stronger than Jesus. Even those who follow Jesus have a hard time believing that he really does bring life in the midst of the death. So what happens is totally unexpected.

Lazarus was sick. That’s where the story starts. Lazarus was deathly ill. He lived in Bethany with Mary and Martha, his sisters. Evidently they had a very close relationship with Jesus. They sent word to Jesus, “Lord, the one you love is ill.” “Surely,” they must have thought, “Jesus can do something.” He had fed the thousands. He had given sight to the blind. Surely he could heal his friend.

But when he gets the word, Jesus doesn’t drop everything and go. He and the disciples had fled from Jerusalem when a crowd had threatened to stone him for blasphemy. Going back to Jerusalem now, or even near it, was inviting death.

There were plenty of reasons for Jesus not to answer the appeal and go back to help his friend, Lazarus, but none of them were the reason he didn’t go. Jesus doesn’t go back because he knows what God is going to do. God is going to bring Lazarus out of the tomb and the purpose of this resuscitation is to reveal God’s glory so that people may believe.

So Jesus stays where he is two more days, long enough for Lazarus to die. Then he tells the disciples. “Come on, we’re going back.”

The disciples look at him in disbelief. “They want to stone you there and you’re going back?”

Then Jesus answers with this cryptic saying about light and darkness. “Aren’t there twelve hours in the day?” he asks. “If a person walks in the day, that one doesn’t stumble because that person sees the light of this world. But anyone who walks around in the night stumbles because the light is not in that person.”

We’ve been listening to these stories from the gospel of John for four weeks now so maybe you hear what Jesus is trying to say here. Nicodemus came when? In the dark. What did Jesus tell the disciples and the blind man before giving him sight? “As long as I am in the world I am the light of the world.” [John 9:5]. The disciples still don’t get it. Jesus is the light of the world. There is work to be done while the light is present. The darkness cannot overcome the light. If the disciples keep doubting they will be like those who stumble around in the dark.

Finally it’s Thomas, the one who eventually gets the nickname Doubting Thomas, who gets the disciples geared up to go back. “Let’s go, too,” he says, “so that we can die with him.” The disciples are not expecting life. They are expecting death.

So Jesus comes and he has the same kinds of conversations with Martha and Mary. Martha meets him on the road in and says, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother wouldn’t have died. But I know even now that God will give you whatever you ask.”

Jesus says to her, “Your brother will rise again.”

Martha is polite. She says, “Yes, I know that he will rise again in the resurrection in the last day.” In other words she is saying, “Yes, I know. Down the road. In the sweet bye and bye. When we all get to heaven. Yes, my brother will rise again, but not now. I shouldn’t expect that.

But for once Jesus is speaking plainly. He really means that Lazarus will rise again on this day. He knows this because he knows who God is and who he is. “I am the resurrection and the life,” he says to Martha. “The one who believes in me, even though that person dies, will live. And everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.” This is the verse we use to start most of our funeral services. It is an affirmation of life in the face of death. Something is going to happen here. Jesus is going to do something unexpected.

Martha runs back to tell her sister Mary. She runs back and it doesn’t seem that Jesus has gone anywhere. He’s still standing there in the same place where he met Martha. Mary falls at his feet, which is just where we see Mary throughout the gospels. Mary sits at the feet of Jesus as he teaches, much to the annoyance of Martha who’s trying to get dinner on the table. Mary wipes Jesus feet with her hair and her tears, scandalizing the other table guests. Here she throws herself at his feet and says the same thing Martha said, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”

Now Jesus is stirred up. Your translation may say something like, “Jesus was disturbed in spirit and deeply moved.” But there is a hint of anger here. The Greek words have that connotation, too. And when Jesus weeps here, there is a sense that he is not so much moved by sorrow but by frustration that the people around him cannot yet see what is going on. Jesus has come to transform the world and the world can’t accept it. Jesus has come to bring life and they are captivated by death. Jesus is coming to change everything and they’re lingering in the tombs.

So, there’s some righteous anger in Jesus’ stride as he goes to the tomb. It’s a cave with a heavy stone rolled in front of it. The same kind of tomb that Jesus is going to vacate in a short time. “Lift off the stone,” he commands.

Martha protests, “Lord, by this time he will stink because he has been buried for four days.” She says this because by Jewish tradition, after three days a person was considered well and truly dead. There was no chance for resuscitation. Decomposition was starting to take hold.

Jesus turns and says, “Didn’t I tell you that if you believe you will see the glory of God?” This is what’s really important. It’s not just a man walking out of his own tomb that he wants them to see; it’s the glory of God. He wants them to see life. He wants them to know who he is and why he has come.

So he prays to God. “Father, I thank you that you have heard me. I know that you always hear me but I speak for the sake of the surrounding crowd so that they may believe that it was you who sent me.” Then he turns to the tomb and says, in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!”

Deep in the tomb something stirred. Something moved. Something was alive in the place of death. Someone was walking toward the light. Someone was coming out of the cave. Someone was walking. Someone was yearning to be free.

There he was! Lazarus come forth from the grave. His feet and his hands wrapped up. His face covered with cloth strips. Jesus has one more command, “Set him free and release him to go.” And the people believed.

Now what you need to know is that for John, the writer of the gospel, this was the most dangerous thing that Jesus ever did. It was right after this that the religious leaders started plotting to bring him down in a spectacular way. In fact, the Bible says that they also started making plans to kill Lazarus, which is pretty funny if you think about it. Jesus has already shown that he has power over death and that’s the only thing they can think to do to him and the one he raised.

Now here’s the thing I think I need to say: What’s the tomb you’re living in? Because this is not a story about life after death. Martha tried to make this that kind of story. She tried to rationalize the fact that her brother was dead and in the tomb and that Jesus was standing there telling her he would rise again. The only way she could deal with that was to push off the expectation of life to a time when it was reasonable to think it might happen. But Jesus rejected that interpretation. When he said that Lazarus would rise again he meant that Lazarus would rise again that day.

So I started to think: What are the ways that we are letting death determine our lives? How are we wandering around the tombs? How are we refusing to believe that life is what God really intends for us, not just down the road, but in the here and now? How are we expressing our disbelief in life before death?

This week we have been hearing some very discouraging news about the economy. In February we lost 63,000 jobs. You probably got your new tax assessment this week. The housing market is still tumbling. There are some reasons to feel a bit gloomy, aren’t there? There are some tombs we’ve been wandering around.

Our county faces some very big challenges. The state budget looks like it may be cut drastically. We have been praying for our schools steadily for a number of reasons. Our hospital is strained and Dr. Lingle got on the cover of USA Today because of the challenges of keeping medical staff. Those who have been living on the edge are in danger of being pushed over the edge. We see the growing needs every month at our food bank.

We’ve been here before. This is not the first time that we have faced crises like these. But how we respond depends entirely on the stories we build our future on. If we expect the tomb we have no way of seeing the new things that God has for us. But if we expect life…what a different place this world can be.

I wonder what we will say as Christians. Will we build our lives on the narratives the world has to tell us, or will we say that the future is assured because we know the one who said “I am the resurrection and the life”? Will we have a word of hope for our neighbor and a hand of help? Will we look into the darkness of despair, into the caves of desolation, into the tombs of despondency, and say with Jesus, “Lazarus, come out!”? And then we will pause at the door of the tomb and listen?

Something is stirring in the darkness. Something is moving in there. Something is alive in there. And it is coming forth because God commands it. Lazarus is coming to life and he is a bigger threat than the mummy. He’s a public danger because he refuses to accept the narratives of death and decay. He’s a wanted man because he looks into the face of the devil and says, “You cannot win. Jesus will always be the man.”

Jars of Clay, a rock group with Christian roots, has a song called “Dead Man” that came out a couple of years ago. In the song they say, “January 1, I've got a lot of things on my mind/ I'm looking at my body through a new spy satellite/ Try to lift a finger, but I don't think I can make the call/ So tell me if I move, 'cause I don't feel anything at all.”

That’s a great description of modern life. We can go on the computer to Google Earth and see our bodies from space but where’s the evidence of life? We want to believe that there is more to life than that. We want to believe there is life at all because the effect of so much of life is to make us feel dead. The chorus of the song says, “Carry Me,/ I'm just a dead man/ Lying on the carpet/ Can't find a heartbeat/ Make me breathe,/ I want to be a new man/ Tired of the old one/ Out with the old plan.”

Who are they asking to ‘carry me’? It’s Jesus. The man who makes all things new. Who brings the dead to life. Who stands at the door of the tomb and calls out, “Come out.” How long are you going to stay in the tomb? When are you going to stop being afraid of life? What have you got to lose except your grave clothes?

Thanks be to God.

John 11:1-45
Now a certain man was ill - Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and Martha, her sister. Mary was the one who anointed the Lord with oil and wiped his feet dry with her hair. It was her brother Lazarus that was ill. So the sisters sent word to him saying, "Lord, look, the one you love is ill."

But when Jesus heard, he said, "This illness will not lead to death but rather to the glory of God so that the Son of God may be glorified through him." Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus, yet, having heard that he was ill, he remained where he was for two more days. Then after this he says to the disciples, "Let's go to Judea once again."

The disciples said to him, "Rabbi, the Jews are looking to stone you and you want to go there again?"

Jesus answered, "Aren't there twelve hours in the day? If a person walks in the day, that one doesn't stumble because that person sees the light of this world.

But anyone who walks around in the night stumbles because the light is not in that one."

He said this and along with this said, "Lazarus, our friend, has fallen asleep, but I am going to wake him."

His disciples said, "Lord, if he's only asleep, he will be all right."

Jesus was speaking of his death, but they thought he was referring to actual sleep. So then Jesus said plainly, "Lazarus is dead. And I am glad for your sakes that I was not there so that you may believe. But let's go to him."

Then Thomas, the one called Didymus, said to his fellow disciples, "Let us go, too, so we can die with him."

Jesus arrived and found him already four days in the tomb. Now Bethany was near Jerusalem, less than two miles away. Many of the Jews had come to be with Martha and Mary in order to console them about their brother. Now when Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went to meet him. But Mary was sitting at home.

Martha said to Jesus, "Lord, if you had been here, my brother wouldn't have died. But I know even now that God will give you whatever you ask."

Jesus said to her, "Your brother will rise again."

Martha said to him, "I know that he will rise again in the resurrection in the last day."

Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me, even though that person dies, will live. And everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?"

She said to him, "Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, the one who comes into the world." Having said this, she went away and called Mary, her sister, secretly, saying, "The Teacher has arrived and has called for you." Hearing this she rose up quickly and went to him.

Now Jesus had not yet come into the village but was still in the place where he had met Martha. When the Jews who were in the house consoling the sisters saw Mary get up quickly and leave, they followed her, think she was going to the tomb to weep there. When Mary came to the place where Jesus was and saw him, she threw herself at his feet saying, "Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died."

When Jesus saw her weeping and the Jews who had come with her weeping, too, he was stirred to anger in his spirit and troubled within himself.

Then he said, "Where have you laid him?"

They said to him, "Come and see."

And Jesus wept. So the Jews said, "Look how he loved him." But some of them said, "Couldn't the man who opened the eyes of the blind man have prevented this man's death?"

So Jesus, stirred again to anger within himself, came to the tomb. It was a cave and the stone was laid across it. Jesus said, "Lift off the stone."

Martha, the sister of the one who had died, said to him, "Lord, by this time he will stink for he has been buried four days."

Jesus said to her, "Didn't I tell you that if you believe you will see the glory of God?"

So they lifted off the stone. Then Jesus lifted up his eyes and said, "Father, I thank you that you have heard me. I know that you always hear me but I speak for the sake of the surrounding crowd so that they may believe that it was you who sent me."

Having said this, he called out in a loud voice, "Lazarus, come outside!"

Then the dead man came out, bound feet and hands with wrappings and his face wrapped in cloth. Jesus said to them, "Set him free and release him to go." Then many of the Jews, who had come to Mary and had seen what he did, believed in him.

Suddenly I See

In the next few weeks you may see a new ad on TV. It’s a spot that the United Methodist Church is running for Lent and to reach out to people ahead of Easter. The ad features people going about their daily business but hanging from each of them, right over their heart, is a monitor that shows how they’re really feeling inside. There is a beautiful woman modeling clothes for a photographer with a smile on her face, but the monitor shows the same woman with tears streaming down her cheeks. There is a couple smiling and talking to friends at the bowling alley, but the monitors show them arguing with each other. A teenager sits down at his desk at school, looking normal, but there’s the monitor that shows how withdraw and alone he feels. Finally there’s a woman walking down the beach and on her the monitor is of a little girl. We’re supposed to get the idea that this is the woman as a child and she’s holding hands with someone we can’t see because the rest of their body is outside the frame. Here is someone who has found joy and security and connection to God.

I hope we can live up to these ads, because what they are saying about the United Methodist Church is that we are a place where it is safe to take those places inside us that are hurting. It is saying that United Methodist people, as followers of Jesus, are not afraid of those feelings. It is saying that we have a connection to someone who can make us feel as safe and joyful as that little girl, walking down a beach hand in hand with a trusted guide.

That’s a lot to live up to…especially since, most of the time, I think we are tempted to act like the religious leaders in the gospel lesson we had today. Can you believe those guys? Jesus comes and does something absolutely amazing – he gives sight to a man who had been blind from birth – and they want to know why Jesus was breaking the blue law and healing on the Sabbath. It’s kind of like going up to Ryan Newman and saying, “I hear you won the Daytona 500. Here’s a speeding ticket.” They just don’t get it. The disciples are not much better in this story. At the beginning they see this blind man and their first question is not, ‘How can we help this man?’ but ‘Jesus, who sinned to make him blind?’ They can’t SEE what’s really going on here. Ironic, huh?

Here’s what I worry about, though. I think we can be equally unable to see what’s really important. We can get so caught up in the ways things are and the way things are supposed to work that we can forget what’s truly important. Then when people come to us with their lives in a shambles, with pain in their hearts, with strife in their families, with too much month at the end of the money, with addictions that keep them down and sleepless nights that keep them up…well, then do we offer them ourselves? Are we people who have open hearts, open minds, and open doors? Or do we find some things too painful to acknowledge? Are some wounds too deep for us to take to Jesus? Are we just too caught up in making judgments that we can’t trust God to make things right? Because one day, not only might it be us, it will be us. We all find ourselves at moments when what’s going on on the monitor over our hearts is a cry to God. Who will walk with us in those moments? Will it be the church?

Over the last few weeks we have been hearing gospel stories about people who were looking for salvation and finding it in Jesus. Two weeks ago we talked about Nicodemus, a respectable man, who came under cover of darkness to meet Jesus because he suspected he was from God. Then last week we talked about the woman at the well, who met Jesus on the edge of town and at the edge of respectability, and how she discovered that Jesus was the savior of the world. But today Jesus brings it right into the light and right into the middle of the religious council.

It all happened because the disciples were who they were. You remember that last week they didn’t get what Jesus was telling the woman at the well because they were so upset that he was speaking to a woman at the well. They haven’t gotten it yet that they are living in a paradigm shift. They were getting ‘change they could believe in’ but they weren’t believing it entirely yet. They were hung up by their expectations of how they were supposed to behave and what they were supposed to say. So it probably seemed appropriate for them to ask, as they passed the blind man, “Jesus, who sinned so that he was born blind, this man or his parents?”

To them the man was a theological problem. But Jesus saw him as a theological opportunity. He was a child of God waiting for God to do a great thing in him. So Jesus rebukes the disciples and says that sin is not the issue here. The man’s blindness is an invitation for God to be revealed. It reminds me of the moment early on in the gospel of John when Jesus is asked by his mother to do something about the wine, which was running out at the wedding they were attending in Cana. Jesus seems a little resistant, but when he does respond and turns water into wine, it is an opportunity for God to be revealed.

Here Jesus is once again prompted to do a sign. He is the Light of the World. He shines in the darkness and the darkness does not overcome it. He is the true light enlightening everyone. While he is in the world he is the Light of the world. And he invites others to believe in the light, so that they can become children of light. These are all things that John says about Jesus. But he also says, “This is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light” [John 3:19, NRSV].

The people loved darkness rather than light. The resistance starts as soon as the healing happened. Jesus spits in the dirt and makes a paste of the mud and he puts it on the man’s eyes. Actually what the Bible says is that he anointed the blind man’s eyes with the mud and he tell him to go wash in the pool of Siloam. Once again there is water. Jesus told Nicodemus that you can’t enter the kingdom of heaven without being baptized by water and Spirit or wind. Jesus tells the woman at the well that he has living water to give. Now Jesus sends a man to a pool of water to wash. Each of these people is being invited to a baptism that will give them new eyes to see and sure enough, that’s what happened to the blind man. His eyes were opened and he can see. Then the troubles begin.

The people who had known him are upset. “Hey, isn’t that the blind guy who used to sit and beg all the time?” “It sure looks like him.” “It’s me,” the man says. “But you can see. What happened?”

So the man tells them about the mud and the anointing and the washing at the pool. The response of the people is to take the man to the Pharisees, the religious leaders. They ask the man the same questions. Once again he tells them about the mud and the anointing and the washing at the pool.

The Pharisees are upset that Jesus has done this on a Sabbath day, but they are also feeling threatened. A man who can use mud and water to change the world is a dangerous man. The blind man hasn’t called him the Messiah yet, but he has called him a prophet. Somebody’s got to repudiate Jesus.

So they call in the man’ parents and they refuse to stand up for their son because they are afraid of the leaders. They had heard the word that anybody who called Jesus the Messiah, the savior, would be cut off from the synagogue, which meant being an exile in their own community. So they say, “Ask him. He’s a grown man. He can tell you how it happened.”

The Pharisees call the man back a second time and tell him that he needs to praise God instead of Jesus. “We know Jesus is a sinner,” they say.

The man is not going to be drawn into their controversy. “I don’t know if he is a sinner or not,” he says. “The one thing I know is that I was blind and now I see.”

“Who did this? How did he do it?” they ask.

“I’ve already told you and you didn’t listen. Why do you want to hear it again?” And here he begins to put in a dig at them. This blind man is getting it. He can see and the Pharisees can’t. “Do you want to become his disciples, too?”

This sets them off. “You are that man’s disciple. We are disciples of Moses. We don’t know where this Jesus comes from!”

“You don’t know where he comes from?!” the man says. “He opened my eyes. A sinner couldn’t do that, could he? It’s unheard of, what he did. If this man weren’t from God he wouldn’t be able to do that.”

With that they go back to where the disciples started. “You were born in sin and you want to teach us?!” Then they throw the man out.

Jesus finds him and says, “Do you believe in the promise of a coming savior?”

“Who is he, Lord? Tell me so that I can believe in him.”

Here I imagine Jesus lifting the man’s face so that he can look – a blind man looking! – so that he can look in his eyes. “You are looking at him,” Jesus says.

The man says, “I believe.”

It’s all clear now. The blind man sees and the folks who think they are the clear thinkers, who can see things clearly, are blind. They think the man is a sinner but Jesus says that they are the ones entrapped by sin. This is the judgment. The light came into the darkness and we chose darkness. We loved darkness too much.

What would it look like if we gave up the darkness and tried to live in the light? What would it look like if we stopped hiding the pain and gave it to Jesus? What would it look like if we cared a little less about the rules of respectability and started living out of the law of love? What would it look like if the monitors that are hanging around our necks that show what’s really going on in our lives were on our faces? What if we believed that Jesus was not just a traveling teacher with a nifty bag of tricks, but that he really was the light of the world? That he really is the light of the world? That he is our light come to bring darkness. What would change?

This week I heard about a campaign that the campus ministry at the University of Richmond participated in. They have noticed, as many others have, that one of the ways youth and young people, especially young girls, have responded to the darkness of the world and the darkness in their lives is through cutting. It’s not suicidal, but they will draw blood by making marks on their arms or legs. Why? There are lots of reasons, but tied up in it is an unhealthy way of dealing with emotional distress and with spiritual pain. If you are a young person you have probably heard of people or know people who have done this. Maybe you have done it.

Well, some young people at the University of Richmond saw what was happening with their classmates and said, “We’re not going to let this go on in silence.” So they decided to work with a campaign against self-injury called To Write Love on Her Arms. The campaign asked people to literally write the word ‘Love’ on their arms or their hands, in a visible place. So they took Sharpie pens and wrote in the same places where people will sometimes cut themselves. And when people asked about it they could help connect people to resources for help but they were able to say that there is hope for those who are depressed, there is help for those who feel compelled to injure themselves, there is light in the darkness and there is love to cover us all.

That’s just one of the ways that Christians are confronting the darkness of the world with the light of Jesus. There are so many more ways that we are called to be a light in this world and to lift up Jesus. Why Jesus? Why, of all the names that we could call on, have we placed our hope and trust and belief in Jesus? Because in Jesus we have found light and life. In Jesus we have found sight. In Jesus we have seen God and known that God’s name is love. Thank be to God.

John 9:1-41
Now as he was passing by he saw a man who had been blind from birth. His disciples asked him, "Rabbi, who sinned so that he was born blind, this man or his parents?

Jesus answered, "Neither this man nor his parents sinned. This happened so that the works of God might be revealed in him. As long as the day lasts we must be about the work of the one who sent me. The night is coming when no one will be able to work. As long as I in the world, I am the light of the world."

Having said this, he spit on the ground and he made mud from the spittle and he anointed the eyes of the blind man with the mud. He said to him, "Go, wash in the pool of Siloam, (which is translated 'Sent'). So he went, washed and came back seeing.

Then the neighbors and the ones who were used to seeing him around, (for he had been a beggar), said, "Isn't this the man who used to sit and beg?" Others said, "This IS the same one." Others said, "It looks like him."

He said, "It's me."

So they said, "How were your eyes opened?"

He answered, "The man called Jesus made mud and anointed my eyes, saying to me, "Go to the pool at Siloam and wash.' So I went and washed and I could see."

They said to him, "Where is he?"

He said, "I don't know."

They brought the man who had been blind to the Pharisees. Now it was a sabbath when Jesus made the mud and opened his eyes. So the Pharisees asked him again how we received his sight. He said to them, "He put mud on my eyes and I washed and I can see."

Then some of the Pharisees said, "This man is not from God because he doesn't observe the sabbath." Others said, "How can a sinner do signs like this?" They were a divided group. So they spoke to the blind man again and said, "What have you got to say about him? He opened your eyes."

He said, "He is a prophet."

But the Jews would not believe this about him, that he had been blind and received his sight, until they sent for the parent of the man who had gained his sight. They asked them, "Is this your son who you say was born blind? If so, how can he now see?"

His parents answered them, "We know that he is our son and that he was born blind. But we don't know how he can now see nor do we know who opened his eyes. He's a grown-up. Ask him. He can speak for himself." His parents said this because they feared the Jews, for the Jews had already agreed that anybody who professed him as Messiah would be expelled from the synagogue. This was the reason his parents said, "He's a grown-up. Ask him."

So they called the man who had been blind for a second time and said to him, "Give God the glory instead. We know that this man is a sinner."

The man said, "I don't know if he is a sinner or not. The one thing I know is that I was blind and now I see."

They said to him, "Who did his to you? How did he open your eyes?"

He answered them, "I have already told you and you didn't listen. Why do you want to hear it again? Do you want to become his disciples, too?"

Then they went off on him and said, "You are that man's disciple. We are disciples of Moses. We know that God spoke to Moses, but we don't know where this man comes from."

The man responded to them, "This is a wonder! You don't know where he comes from and yet he opened my eyes. We know that God doesn't hear sinners but God does hear the one who fears God and does God's will. From the very beginning it's unheard of for someone to open the eyes of someone blind from birth. If this man weren't from God he wouldn't be able to do anything."

They answered him, "You were totally born in sin and you want to teach us?!" Then they threw him out.

When Jesus heard that they threw him out, he found him and said, "Do you believe in the Son of Humanity?"

The man replied and said, "Who is he, Lord? Tell me so that I can believe in him."

Jesus said to him, "You are looking at him. The one speaking with you is the one."

He said, "I believe, Lord." Then he worshipped him.

Jesus said then, "I came into this world for judgment so that those who can't see could see and those who see would become blind."

When they heard this, some of the Pharisees who were with him said, "We aren't blind are we?"

Jesus said to them, "If you were blind, you wouldn't have sin. But now that you claim to see, sin remains in you."