Introduction:
This is the Pastor’s Blog for the Service on Sunday Feb 8th at 10:45AM. Included here is the primary Scripture of this message and the Pastor’s notes. Prior to the service it will include an excerpt of the Pastor’s notes and following the service the complete notes will be added. Also following the service a link will be provided at the bottom to Replay this service. We hope you will join us in Worship on Sunday.
Scripture:II Corinthians 5.16-21
II Corinthians 5.16-21
16 So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. 17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come:[a] The old has gone, the new is here! 18 All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: 19 that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. 20 We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. 21 God made him who had no sin to be sin[b] for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
Pastor’s Message;
We’ve been unpacking the vows we take when we are baptized into the United Methodist tradition. As we’ve been doing this, we’ve felt the weight and seriousness of the language, of the holy and righteous life to which these vows call us. Even those two words – holy and righteous – can come across as unreachably lofty, preachy, and maybe a little old-fashioned.
Lest we are tempted to throw up our hands and give up, let’s consider some wise words from Paul Sampley, a professor emeritus of New Testament at Boston University: “People have value because Christ has died for them. People, whoever they are, whether they have responded to Christ or not – Christ died for everyone – are treasured by God…The problem is with us. We often want to establish hurdles that others must jump before we will grant them value.” (NIB, II Cor., p. 98)
If the problem lies with us, according to Professor Sampley – and I tend to agree – there’s a real risk of the words in our baptismal vows morphing into hurdles, one after another, in a long line.
And if some humans are putting hurdles out for others to leap over, those same humans are likely putting hurdles up for their own selves.
The vow before us today reads like this:
According to the grace given you, will you remain faithful members of Christ’s holy church and serve as Christ’s representatives in the world?
The vow begins with and is grounded in grace, which is never a hurdle or hoop to jump through, or an item on a checklist. Grace is a freely given gift that we sometimes only partially open. Professor Sampley reminds us that the grace that comes to us in Christ is for all – whether that grace is acknowledged or not, whether Christ is known or not.
This vow asks the one being baptized to not only acknowledge that grace, but to remain faithful to the community that is defined by grace. And in being faithful, grace-filled members of a community defined by grace, we are launched into the world as Christ’s representatives.
Christ’s ambassadors, as Paul puts it in the passage we just heard.
Paul describes for us what being an ambassador for Christ looks like. Perhaps we can consider this a job description of sorts.
An ambassador for Christ
- regards “no one from a human point of view”
- is a new creation, and sees others as “new creations”
- has been reconciled to God and through that reconciliation…
- …is called to the ministry of reconciliation
- And here’s a big one: an ambassador for Christ Is forgiven by God, and therefore will become the righteousness of God, just as Christ is the righteousness of God.
Paul’s description of what it means to represent Christ in the world is quite stunning when one considers that Paul was writing to the early church community at Corinth. Paul planted this community in his missionary travels, but at some point the relationship between the church planter and planted church became strained, and then downright hostile.
Elsewhere in II Corinthians, Paul refers to a “painful visit” and shares his decision to not visit the church at Corinth for a period of time so that he might be spared another painful visit.
But even in the midst of this pain and rupture in their relationship, Paul remembers his own call, the call of the Corinthian church, and the call of any person who has accepted the vows of baptism. He reminds the church at Corinth – and us – that the work of reconciliation is to continue, even in the midst of pain and disagreement. Especially so, in fact.
When we turn our attention and awareness to our own context, there are some striking parallels. Distrust. Pain. Ruptured relationships. Judgement. Cynicism. Suffering. Violence.
What an awesome, perfect time to be an ambassador for Christ!
But it seems to me that I can be an effective ambassador only if I give myself over to God’s grace that is already at work. Paul tells us that “everything old has passed away”, that “everything has become new.”
There is a new creation, now, right now, that God-in-Christ has brought about. It’s already done, already accomplished on the Divine watch. Because of that, we are called to change how we look at God’s good world, and all the beings in it.
The Church is at its best and truest when it bears witness to God’s new creation.
We are living out this baptismal vow when we point to that new creation with our actions and our very lives. This includes changing how we view others, and how we act toward others, because God-in-Christ has chosen to view all of us as vessels and conduits for divine grace.
My friends, this changes everything – the distrust, the suffering, the ruptured relationships.
This sends us directly into the business of reconciliation: individually, communally, globally. Our work will then be marked by a glittering path of repairing, harmonizing, peace-instilling activity, rather than an endless line of hurdles and referees pronouncing judgements. To quote Professor Sampley again: “Christ’s love not only claims us for God but pushes us out toward others. The rubric goes like this: We-who-are-loved love others. Love of others is not an option for which we may or may not decide. Love generates love.” (NIB, II Cor. P. 99)
Living out this vow and remaining faithful is grounded in the love and grace that got us here in the first place. Grace makes being an ambassador for Christ possible. Grace fuels our work in the world, and is the foundation which holds us steady, and provides the harbor in which we rest.
No hurdles. All love. All grace. Thanks be to God.
Let us pray:
O God, in you there is an infinite fullness of all that we can want or desire. May we all receive grace upon grace; grace to pardon our sins, to subdue our iniquities; to justify our persons and to sanctify our souls; and to complete that holy change, that renewal of our hearts, which will enable us to be transformed into the blessed image in which you created us. O make us all to be partakers of the inheritance of your saints in light. Amen.
