A FAITH JOURNEY 2-17-08
Scripture: Gen:12:1-4a and John 3:1-17
One of the most meaningful times in my life as the pastor in your church is the meetings with prospective new members when we all tell our faith journeys, about what has led us to God, to Jesus, to Deering Community Church. In our Hebrew Bible lesson today we have the example of Abram being told that he had to leave his home and his country to go to a land that God would show to him. Already in our Call to Worship we heard the Psalmist assuring us of God’s protection: “My help comes from the Lord..,” He will not let your foot be moved…The Lord will keep you from all evil;… from this time on and forevermore.” (Ps. 121) I’m sure Abram trusted and believed in a God such as is described in this Psalm. In the Abram story, God calls and Abram responds in trust. Abram journeyed from what he knew to what he did not know; from the comfortable to the strange and the unpredictable.
Has something like this ever happened to you? Have you ever been called to go somewhere or to do something that was unfamiliar to you, maybe somewhat mysterious? Maybe the call left the final destination vague or unknown. Remember Jesus’ call to his disciples, “Come and follow me.” There was no way that they could have known in the beginning what they were getting themselves into. There was something special about Jesus that made people follow him with no questions asked. In my early 50’s I felt a call to go to Washington, DC to work with the homeless. I had a couple of places in mind but when I got there, I was drawn to visit another place—a place that I knew very little about, the place I decided to associate with. Most of you have heard me talk about SOME, how meaningful the work there was plus my meeting Neill and falling in love--a very special bonus. When I took an early retirement, gave away most of my things, stored my personal mementos and took off across the country in my old Camry, packed to the roof, I went with trust in God that I was to take this journey; it was indeed for me a faith journey. I did not know how it would turn out. The first night there my car windows were broken, and I wondered how this journey would work out; I was glad that morning that I had faith that God was with me on the journey. Yes, I had journeyed from the familiar and comfortable to the unfamiliar. I journeyed from living alone in a 3 bedroom condo to living with 6 others, my room being the smallest of the bunch, a small monk’s room where lying on my bed pushed up against one wall, I could almost touch the other wall. I journeyed from a white suburb of familiarity to a street where there were very few white faces and all kinds of drug deals and other crimes were taking place. Yet I have to say that I was emotionally comfortable and more spiritually alive than I had ever been.
For many Christians, their faith journey starts with being “born again”. This is a term that often irritates mainline Christians. It may remind them of things they have seen on television with the Evangelists. Or it may remind them of the time someone came up to them and asked “Are you saved?” Often times the one that asks the question seems to feel superior, exclusive, like if we don’t answer yes we are in danger of being damned to Hell.
In our Gospel reading Nicodemus, a Pharisee and a Jewish leader, comes to Jesus in the dark of night. Why did he come? He seems curious; it’s hard to know if he rally believes that Jesus comes from God or if he is just flattering him: “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do apart from the presence of God.” So before he has a chance to ask Jesus a question, Jesus starts talking to him about being born again. The Greek used can be translated both “born from above” or “born again” or “born anew”. Now Nicodemus is a bit of a literalist and therefore starts asking about how one can enter again into his mother’s womb after having grown old. Jesus responds with different words: No one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and spirit.” This makes more sense to us who are familiar with baptism by water and the Holy Spirit. Jesus continues his symbolism by saying “The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it.” As some of you may know the Greek for Spirit is the same as for breath and wind. As Marcus Borg says in The Heart of Christianity, “The breath of God, the Spirit of God is the source of rebirth. To be born again is to enter new life through and in the Spirit, a life centered in the Spirit of God.”[1]
So what Jesus is telling Nicodemus and us is that we all need a spiritual rebirth, a personal transformation. Borg points out that being born again as well as the notion of dying and rising with Jesus all relates to the same root image for the process of personal transformation. “It means dying to an old way of being and being born into a new way of being, dying to an old identity and being born into a new identity—a way of being and an identity centered in the sacred, in Spirit, in Christ, in God.[2] Although we are created in the image of God, most of us just in the process of growing up become more formed by the world outside than from the Spirit inside. We often live our lives in the world of estrangement and self-preoccupation; therefore we need to be born again as a way of recovering our true self, a beginning to living our life from the inside out, centered in the Spirit. This process of rebirth can be sudden and dramatic and many of our evangelical brothers and sisters can tell us the place and time as can Saul on the road to Damascus.
I often tell the story of my being born again by mistake, yet as the years go by I feel more and more certain that the Spirit was calling to me in a special way on that day. I was about 10 years old and had gone to a revival meeting with some friends of my family. Near the end of the service, the preacher said—or what I heard him say—was that all of you who love Jesus stand and keep your eyes closed. Our church had nothing like an altar call and like the obedient 10 year-old that I was, I stood and kept my eyes closed. Soon an usher came and led me to a back room, prayed over me and gave me a small gospel of John, stressing that I only had to believe that God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. (Jn 3:16)
Well I went home and read that whole Gospel of John and then went on to read the whole Bible by the time I was 11 or 12. What got started that day was a transformation that has continued to this day in my loving Jesus and sharing that love with others.
As Marcus Borg says for most of us mainline Christians being born again is not a single intense experience, but a gradual and incremental process that continues throughout our lifetime. This process is not automatic and many of us may thwart it or obstruct it, maybe returning sooner or later. As we get older, I believe more and more of us are more interested in deepening our centering in the Spirit. All of us are called on a daily basis to remember whose we are and why we are here. Following the way of Jesus involves a new heart, one centered in God. As a church I believe one of our purposes of our life together is to be a midwife and help others in the process of being born again. This new life is a reconnection with God. It is marked with freedom, joy, peace and love as Paul so often reports. And any of us that read 1st Corinthians 13 know that the greatest of these is love. Jesus also uses the word compassion, sometimes translated mercy. We are called to love each other as Jesus has loved us. Remember Jesus’ last appearance to Simon Peter? He asked him three times if he loved him and when Peter says yes Jesus tells him over and over to care and love his followers.
Where are you on your faith journey? When Abram heard the call of God to move to a new land, he did so, trusting in God to care for him, to protect him. What would it take to get you to move to a new land? Moving from an old place to a new place in your spiritual lives may be what God is calling you to do. Are you willing to follow the call? What will it take to get you to make that move? As we move deeper into Lent, it is time to intentionally journey on, journey deeper, maybe even begin a new journey, and who knows where it will lead? One thing I am sure of is that we won’t journey alone. God will be there, of course, and my prayer is that all of us here at Deering Community church will be there for each other, our old friends and our new friends as well as those new people that God will send to us. Bon Voyage and Amen.
[1] p.106.
[2] Ibid., 107.
One of the most meaningful times in my life as the pastor in your church is the meetings with prospective new members when we all tell our faith journeys, about what has led us to God, to Jesus, to Deering Community Church. In our Hebrew Bible lesson today we have the example of Abram being told that he had to leave his home and his country to go to a land that God would show to him. Already in our Call to Worship we heard the Psalmist assuring us of God’s protection: “My help comes from the Lord..,” He will not let your foot be moved…The Lord will keep you from all evil;… from this time on and forevermore.” (Ps. 121) I’m sure Abram trusted and believed in a God such as is described in this Psalm. In the Abram story, God calls and Abram responds in trust. Abram journeyed from what he knew to what he did not know; from the comfortable to the strange and the unpredictable.
Has something like this ever happened to you? Have you ever been called to go somewhere or to do something that was unfamiliar to you, maybe somewhat mysterious? Maybe the call left the final destination vague or unknown. Remember Jesus’ call to his disciples, “Come and follow me.” There was no way that they could have known in the beginning what they were getting themselves into. There was something special about Jesus that made people follow him with no questions asked. In my early 50’s I felt a call to go to Washington, DC to work with the homeless. I had a couple of places in mind but when I got there, I was drawn to visit another place—a place that I knew very little about, the place I decided to associate with. Most of you have heard me talk about SOME, how meaningful the work there was plus my meeting Neill and falling in love--a very special bonus. When I took an early retirement, gave away most of my things, stored my personal mementos and took off across the country in my old Camry, packed to the roof, I went with trust in God that I was to take this journey; it was indeed for me a faith journey. I did not know how it would turn out. The first night there my car windows were broken, and I wondered how this journey would work out; I was glad that morning that I had faith that God was with me on the journey. Yes, I had journeyed from the familiar and comfortable to the unfamiliar. I journeyed from living alone in a 3 bedroom condo to living with 6 others, my room being the smallest of the bunch, a small monk’s room where lying on my bed pushed up against one wall, I could almost touch the other wall. I journeyed from a white suburb of familiarity to a street where there were very few white faces and all kinds of drug deals and other crimes were taking place. Yet I have to say that I was emotionally comfortable and more spiritually alive than I had ever been.
For many Christians, their faith journey starts with being “born again”. This is a term that often irritates mainline Christians. It may remind them of things they have seen on television with the Evangelists. Or it may remind them of the time someone came up to them and asked “Are you saved?” Often times the one that asks the question seems to feel superior, exclusive, like if we don’t answer yes we are in danger of being damned to Hell.
In our Gospel reading Nicodemus, a Pharisee and a Jewish leader, comes to Jesus in the dark of night. Why did he come? He seems curious; it’s hard to know if he rally believes that Jesus comes from God or if he is just flattering him: “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do apart from the presence of God.” So before he has a chance to ask Jesus a question, Jesus starts talking to him about being born again. The Greek used can be translated both “born from above” or “born again” or “born anew”. Now Nicodemus is a bit of a literalist and therefore starts asking about how one can enter again into his mother’s womb after having grown old. Jesus responds with different words: No one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and spirit.” This makes more sense to us who are familiar with baptism by water and the Holy Spirit. Jesus continues his symbolism by saying “The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it.” As some of you may know the Greek for Spirit is the same as for breath and wind. As Marcus Borg says in The Heart of Christianity, “The breath of God, the Spirit of God is the source of rebirth. To be born again is to enter new life through and in the Spirit, a life centered in the Spirit of God.”[1]
So what Jesus is telling Nicodemus and us is that we all need a spiritual rebirth, a personal transformation. Borg points out that being born again as well as the notion of dying and rising with Jesus all relates to the same root image for the process of personal transformation. “It means dying to an old way of being and being born into a new way of being, dying to an old identity and being born into a new identity—a way of being and an identity centered in the sacred, in Spirit, in Christ, in God.[2] Although we are created in the image of God, most of us just in the process of growing up become more formed by the world outside than from the Spirit inside. We often live our lives in the world of estrangement and self-preoccupation; therefore we need to be born again as a way of recovering our true self, a beginning to living our life from the inside out, centered in the Spirit. This process of rebirth can be sudden and dramatic and many of our evangelical brothers and sisters can tell us the place and time as can Saul on the road to Damascus.
I often tell the story of my being born again by mistake, yet as the years go by I feel more and more certain that the Spirit was calling to me in a special way on that day. I was about 10 years old and had gone to a revival meeting with some friends of my family. Near the end of the service, the preacher said—or what I heard him say—was that all of you who love Jesus stand and keep your eyes closed. Our church had nothing like an altar call and like the obedient 10 year-old that I was, I stood and kept my eyes closed. Soon an usher came and led me to a back room, prayed over me and gave me a small gospel of John, stressing that I only had to believe that God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. (Jn 3:16)
Well I went home and read that whole Gospel of John and then went on to read the whole Bible by the time I was 11 or 12. What got started that day was a transformation that has continued to this day in my loving Jesus and sharing that love with others.
As Marcus Borg says for most of us mainline Christians being born again is not a single intense experience, but a gradual and incremental process that continues throughout our lifetime. This process is not automatic and many of us may thwart it or obstruct it, maybe returning sooner or later. As we get older, I believe more and more of us are more interested in deepening our centering in the Spirit. All of us are called on a daily basis to remember whose we are and why we are here. Following the way of Jesus involves a new heart, one centered in God. As a church I believe one of our purposes of our life together is to be a midwife and help others in the process of being born again. This new life is a reconnection with God. It is marked with freedom, joy, peace and love as Paul so often reports. And any of us that read 1st Corinthians 13 know that the greatest of these is love. Jesus also uses the word compassion, sometimes translated mercy. We are called to love each other as Jesus has loved us. Remember Jesus’ last appearance to Simon Peter? He asked him three times if he loved him and when Peter says yes Jesus tells him over and over to care and love his followers.
Where are you on your faith journey? When Abram heard the call of God to move to a new land, he did so, trusting in God to care for him, to protect him. What would it take to get you to move to a new land? Moving from an old place to a new place in your spiritual lives may be what God is calling you to do. Are you willing to follow the call? What will it take to get you to make that move? As we move deeper into Lent, it is time to intentionally journey on, journey deeper, maybe even begin a new journey, and who knows where it will lead? One thing I am sure of is that we won’t journey alone. God will be there, of course, and my prayer is that all of us here at Deering Community church will be there for each other, our old friends and our new friends as well as those new people that God will send to us. Bon Voyage and Amen.
[1] p.106.
[2] Ibid., 107.
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