Sermon - Christian Identity: Realizing We're Lost

 Luke 15:1-3, 11-32
Christian Identity: Realizing We’re Lost
James Sledge                                                                                                 March 27, 2022

Forgiving Father,
Frank Wesley, 1923-2002

Recently I spotted an article from the Religion News Service on The Washington Post website with a headline drawn from the piece that read, “If there is anything remotely ‘helpful’ about the Ukraine conversation, it is simply this: It has resurrected the concept of evil.”[1]

I only skimmed what turned out to be a blog post, but I had a pretty good idea where the author was going. The notion of evil, along with its close cousin, sin, fell out of fashion some time ago. For many, things once labeled as evil can be explained in terms of inadequate education and opportunity or perhaps mental illness. And much termed evil could be eliminated if all its causes were dealt with.

I’m all for addressing inequities in education and opportunity, and everyone should have access to mental health services, but I’m not so sure that evil is simply a problem to be solved if enough resources are brought to bear. Russia’s vile war against Ukraine cannot be blamed on one man’s mental illness or lack of adequate education and understanding. The actions of Putin and a whole host of Russian political and military leaders speak to a more fundamental, existential problem with the human creature, the problem of human sinfulness.

I had a pastoral care professor in seminary who like to define sin as distortion. All of us have a tendency to misperceive ourselves, others, and the world around us and so to act in ways that are not in our own best interests, those of others, or of the world we live in. This tendency is remarkably resilient and resistant to the cures we devise for it, and so we are prone to mess up in ways minor and ways spectacular. We are prone, in ways large and small, to live in a manner that is counter the image of God that lies buried within each of us.

Sermon video - Christian Identity: Trusting the Gift

 

Audios of sermons and worship available on the FCPC website.

Sermon - Christian Identity: Trusting the Gift

 Isaiah 55:1-9
Christian Identity: Trusting the Gift
James Sledge                                                                            March 20, 2022

Still Life with Bottle, Carafe, Bread, and Wine,
Claude Monet, c. 1862/1863, National Gallery of Art

When I was twelve years old, my family moved out to “the country.” It was old family land that had once been a farm. It had not been farmed in decades, but when we moved out there we were able to put up a fence so we could have horses. And we didn’t just have horses. We also had a pair of donkeys named Angelo and Annabelle.

How it was that we acquired those donkeys probably qualifies as one of those “It seemed like a good idea at the time,” moments. Somehow my father had found out about an elderly woman who had seven or eight of them. I think she was moving into a retirement home, and so she was trying to find good homes for her pets. We took two.

We tried to ride them a few times, with very limited success. They either just sat there, or they threw you off. And so they were little more than novelties or conversation pieces. They weren’t really good for anything. However, they could bray so loudly that you could hear them for miles. And they were quite good at escaping.

Our horses would occasionally get out, but they would normally just eat the grass on the other side of the fence. The donkeys, on the other hand, would go on excursions. I bet I’m one of the few kids who got pulled out of school to go home to help catch donkeys who were trotting down the road and startling drivers.

Sermon - Christian Identity: Urgent Questions

 Philippians 3:17-4:1
Christian Identity: Urgent Questions
James Sledge                                                                                                 March 13, 2022

The Apostle Paul
Rembrandt, 1633

   There is a famous quote from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. that says, “Life's most persistent and urgent question is, 'What are you doing for others?’” The quote pops up regularly on social media, and it always draws lots of likes and shares. But is that really our most persistent and urgent question?

I ask because I don’t know that I see very much evidence that people’s lives are driven by questions of what they are doing for others. Think about it. What are the most persistent and urgent questions in your life? For a young person they might be, “Where am I going to college,” or “What am I going to do with my life?” For others they might be about money. “Can I cover expenses until the next paycheck?” “Do I have enough in my 401k?” “What did the stock market do today?”

For some the most persistent question might be about raising children. For others about getting that new position at work. Some people might be focused on finding a life partner. I have questions about what I’ll do when I retire, whether we saved enough, and what sort of world my grandchildren will grow up in. I sometimes think about what I should be doing for others, but I’m pretty sure that’s not my very top, my most persistent and urgent question.

I started thinking about such questions when I was ruminating over today’s scripture passage and thinking about the theme of Christian identity that I’m exploring in my sermons as we work our way toward Holy Week and Easter. What sort of questions need to be near the top of your list if you’re going to have a legitimate, authentic Christian identity?

In the part of his letter to the congregation in Philippi that we heard, Paul contrasts two very different identities. One lives as an enemy of the cross of Christ, and the other has its citizenship in heaven. One’s god is their belly, a reference to a life driven by every want and desire, and the other lives in way that imitate the Apostle Paul.

Perhaps it would be helpful to say a little something about this first identity that has upset Paul to the point of tears. These people are Christians, but they seem to have misunderstood or misconstrued Paul’s basic proclamation.

Sermon video - Christian Identity: Being Truly Human

 

Audios of sermons and worship available on the FCPC website.

Sermon - Christian Identity: Being Truly Human

 Luke 4:1-13
Christian Identity: Being Truly Human
James Sledge                                                                                                 March 6, 2022

Briton Rivière, 1840-1920. Temptation in the Wilderness,
from Art in the Christian Tradition,
a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library

I think I was in ninth grade when the musical, Jesus Christ Superstar, burst onto the scene. It was a huge cultural phenomenon, with some of its songs becoming pop hits. I had the two-album soundtrack and played it frequently. At the time, there was a certain subversive quality to the musical that appealed to a young teenager.

One song that especially appealed to me was a catchy, comic number sung by King Herod when Jesus, freshly arrested, is brought to him for trial. The sarcastic lyrics Herod sings to an unresponsive Jesus include a verse that goes,     

So, you are the Christ, you're the great Jesus Christ
            Prove to me that you're divine - change my water into wine
            That's all you need do, and I'll know it's all true
            C'mon, king of the Jews! 

Another verse issues a different challenge to Jesus.   

So, you are the Christ, you're the great Jesus Christ
Prove to me that you're no fool - walk across my swimming pool
If you do that for me, then I'll let you go free
C'mon, king of the Jews!

I share these lyrics because there was a time when I saw today’s gospel reading as a similar situation. A smug, sarcastic devil, complete with horns and pitchfork, issues challenges to Jesus. “Come on, Jesus. Do a trick for me, and then I’ll believe you really are the Son of God.”

I suppose that my image of the devil became a bit more sophisticated as I grew older, but it was not until I entered seminary that I realized the devil never asks Jesus to prove who he is. His challenges are nothing like those of Herod in Jesus Christ Superstar. The devil in this story knows full well exactly who Jesus is. His challenges don’t ask Jesus to prove anything. Rather they force Jesus to wrestle with just what it means for him to be Son of God.