Thirteenth Sunday After Pentecost Year A

13 Pentecost A 08
August 10, 2008

Romans 10:5-15
5 Moses writes concerning the righteousness that comes from the law, that "the person who does these things will live by them." 6 But the righteousness that comes from faith says, "Do not say in your heart, 'Who will ascend into heaven?'" (that is, to bring Christ down) 7 "or 'Who will descend into the abyss?'" (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). 8 But what does it say? "The word is near you,
on your lips and in your heart" (that is, the word of faith that we proclaim);
9 because if you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For one believes with the heart and so is justified, and one confesses with the mouth and so is saved. 11 The scripture says, "No one who believes in him will be put to shame." 12 For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; the same Lord is Lord of all and is generous to all who call on him. 13 For, "Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved."
14 But how are they to call on one in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in one of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone to proclaim him? 15 And how are they to proclaim him unless they are sent? As it is written, "How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!"

Star Sighting

How many of you have ever seen a rock star? Or a movie star?

I used to see them fairly frequently in New York. I remember finding myself pawing through a pile of Thrift Shop clothes next to Sigourney Weaver on Sunday afternoon. I once passed Christopher Walken out “walkin’” his dog. Bad pun, I know. I cleaned house for Kathleen Turner. I had dinner once with Deborah Kerr.

I remember when I was about six or seven years old. I looked up the date on the internet: September 13, 1964. We were living outside Baltimore and I went to the movies with my mom to see Mary Poppins. It had opened in August, and in those days there were not many movie theaters out in the suburbs where we lived and we had to drive into Baltimore to see it.
The theaters in those days were often huge, with balconies and very wide screens. It was awesome. Part of the fun was that my mother was still driving a really cool sports car. I don’t remember for sure but I think it was a very fine convertible Aston Martin. It was a warm night when we left and mom put the top down.

On the way back, my mother took a back way through Baltimore to avoid the traffic that was coming out of the stadium. Apparently, the Beatles had been playing that night and the show was just getting out as we were coming home. We pulled up to a red light and stopped on a dark and secluded back street.

Now you may not believe this, but while we were sitting at that light, a limousine glided up next to us. We looked across into the open window of the back seat, and there were the Beatles.

Apparently their driver had also sought an alternate and less-travelled route. They were sitting in a row not more than four feet away from me, looking right at us, no doubt at the rather cool sports car and the good-looking woman driving it. They may not have noticed the kid at first.
I think my mother shouted something. I seem to remember “Ringo!” who was her favorite. I stood up on my seat to get a better view. Ringo was sitting the farthest away, and he leaned forward and waved. I remember they were smiling.

Of course, we would not have had any such experience if we had not known how fab the four actually were, had we not seen a million pictures of the Beatles, or if we had not heard a thousand news stories on the TV and radio. People had to have gone to see them, gone out and talked about them, drawn attention to them.

And why did people spread the news about them? Why did the news media take off promoting them? Because when you encountered them, when you heard them sing, when you saw their smiling and youthful faces, they filled you with that amazement and joy and hope that you couldn’t even quite understand yourself. They gave you something you didn’t even know you needed.

That was why we were both on that secluded street in Baltimore on September 13, 1964. Because so many people wanted to be near them, see them in person, even if they were nothing but little specks on a distant platform, so many people, especially teen-aged girls, almost certainly had prayed all that week that they might have a chance to come close to them, perhaps even touch them. In that stadium that night, the audience could not even hear the music because the crowd was in such a frenzy simply to be there in their presence.

Were any of you there in the Baltimore stadium on September 13, 1964?

This was also why we were all so horrified to hear John say two years later, “We’re more popular than Jesus.” His point was not that he thought the Beatles better than Christ. He was instead simply amazed that in the modern world, people could worship a rock band. He confronted us with our own idolatry and we didn’t like what we saw.

The fact was and still is that many Christians will go to greater lengths and suffer more hardships for any number of people or things than they will for Jesus Christ. They will think about them more, chase after them more, consider their thoughts and insights more often, obey their rules far more readily.

And this is not new. The Old Testament tells story after story of just how difficult it was to get even God’s people to focus and remain focused on their God, even after he had showered miracle after miracle into their midst. Almost all of the practices of Judaism, and indeed our version as well, have to do with helping us to encounter God, to see him, to hear him, to be in his presence.

And even in the new testament, Jesus taught a number of parables about the many ways that people cannot seem to remain faithful, to keep their focus. Matthew’s story of Jesus walking on the water is transformed into a story about focus. When Peter gets out of the boat, as long as he is focused on Jesus, he was able to walk on the water. The moment he took his eyes off Jesus, he sank. As Peter Gomes, the chaplain at Harvard once said, “I sometimes get that sinking feeling.” Don’t you?

But this is not the focus in this chapter of Paul’s letter to the Romans. The focus Paul is bringing is not so much on the easy ways in which we turn away and forget God. His focus is on how those who have wandered off . As with the Beatles, we must first come into the presence of God. We must first encounter Jesus in some way. And there is no way to encounter him without coming into the presence of witnesses who tell us about him. I suppose if God wished to, he could walk into this room right now. But for whatever reason, he has chosen to manifest his presence in Jesus, and to manifest Jesus’ presence through witness.

It is not possible for us to climb into heaven and bring Christ down. It is not possible for us to descend into the grave and bring the risen Christ out. But God has made it abundantly possible for us to encounter the Christ.

It begins in the heart. And the faith of the heart is not just in the goodness of humankind or in being nice or in the awesome loveliness of creation. It is faith the Jesus is in fact one’s Lord, one’s ruler above all other rulers, one’s absolute focus, taking priority and precedence over all others, and it is secondarily that this Jesus is risen from the dead, never to die again. Why this second affirmation? Because his eternal life is also his eternal Lordship. There is no earthly power that can do anything to him or to anyone who follows him, even if they kill them. The kingdom of God as it is developing in the world needs no army, no prisons, no police. Those who believe are free from all such needs. Our defense system is God and God alone. To say that Jesus rose is to say that the people of God have the most powerful defense system in the world. We are unconquerable, unassailable, invulnerable. Christ is truly the prince of peace. This is the faith that sets us right and sets us free.

And such a faith, truly grasped and felt, is a greater joy than all the stadiums full of screaming fans ever felt.

But it is the witness that brings us into eternal life. When we witness from the heart, Christ becomes present in us. For those who experience genuine witness, the genuine sharing of what God has done in one’s life, the transformation he has effected, with real honesty and joy, it is as if Jesus rolled up right next to them and smiled and waved.

In the twelve step fellowships they have a term for the story members tell about their drinking or drugging. They call it their “qualification.” The story of the desperate struggle with addiction and the triumph of God in their lives is their qualification for membership in the fellowship. Do you have such a story? Do you have a story of the before and after?

You almost certainly do, even if you have never thought about it. If you do think of it, and you find a way to tell it, the eternally living Jesus Christ will become present in you to anyone you tell. You can give them the thrill of a sighting of the greatest star the world has ever known.

Amen.