A Pentecost Meditation on Acts 2

But this is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel;

 And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God,

I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh:

and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,

and your young men shall see visions,

and your old men shall dream dreams:

 And on my servants and on my handmaidens

I will pour out in those days of my Spirit;

and they shall prophesy:

 And I will shew wonders in heaven above,

and signs in the earth beneath;

blood, and fire, and vapour of smoke:

 The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood,

before the great and notable day of the Lord come:

 And it shall come to pass,

that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved.

In the modern contemplation of Pentecost, it is easy to sanitize it from its ancient Hebrew roots.  We are a society with different politics and laws, different public sentiments and technologies.  We do still have those who make their living by the sweat of their brow in the trades of their professions, laboring in fields of agriculture and construction and transportation, but the development of technological tools and industrial processes have shifted the balance of our population into other endeavors.  We are of the information age, where our correspondence travels at the speed of light across an electronic web of interconnected systems, or broadcasts at the speed of radio frequencies bouncing off global satellites to every corner of the globe.

And yet, we live on the same earth and under the same sky as our ancient ancestors did.  We can see phenomena in the heavens above and the earth beneath, such as moons turned to blood and the sun turned to darkness, explaining them as the simple orchestrations of physics upon celestial bodies in motion.  Our bias in the information age is to see everything in nature, including ourselves, as merely material elements working under the forces of energy and mass which govern the way we see things operate by the naked eye, the microscope, or the telescope.  And to be sure, our observation, hypotheses, theories, and laws, our testing and replication of processes in the natural world, have brought forth wonderful discoveries which have aided human endeavors from exploration, to industry, politics, and war.  We, in our age, have taken the same earth and the same sky as our ancestors lived in, and used them differently, learning through observation and test how to predict the weather, the markets, and even populations.  Our age describes what we see in ways intended to manipulate the heavens and the earth to our advantage, and much manipulation we have achieved.

Of course, achieving advantage from the heavens and the earth bring forth questions about who is to receive such advantages, and who will not.  For the entire season of Easter behind us, the western world and our nation in particular, stood in fear of the observed natural process of viral contagion, and used the tools available to give advantage to some deemed “essential” and took advantage away from those deemed “non-essential.”  Lock down orders affected some more than  others, while somehow politicians were able to get their hair styled even as they put community hair stylists out of work.  Various retailers and industries were allowed to function, while others where shut down, and as might have been expected in our materialist age, the Church was almost universally deemed not only “non-essential,” but a danger to public health worthy of extra penalty and restriction (all Constitutional protections to the contrary forgotten).  Over the last several days, violent riots of racial tenor have burned and looted various cities, where their participants have claimed to receive less advantage than they deserve, whether from law enforcement, politics, or industry.  The materialism of our information age is coming to full flower in our land, where various individuals and groups vie against each other in their will to power, seeking advantage taken from others by cleverness or force.  We are watching before our eyes the emergence of a Nietzschean landscape propped up on voluminous knowledge of the natural world, devoid of the wisdom necessary to use it well.

And yet, we live and move and breath upon the same earth and under the same heavens of the ancient Prophets and Apostles to whom the Word of the Lord came before us.  To them, the God of Heaven and Earth spoke wisdom and meaning into their lives, so that they might not just know the world around them by experience and observation, but understand why both it and they exist in the first place.  Knowing the why and the who behind heaven and earth infuse our knowledge with wisdom, allow us to see meaning in the course of history, our own times, and in times yet to come.  Our Lord taught us that we would see signs in the heaven above and on the earth beneath, before the great and terrible Day of the Lord—signs which actually did come in the days of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection, and which will come again at His final return.  On the day of Pentecost, the heavens blew forth upon the earth the Spirit of the Living God, a gift of power, wisdom, and life to all those who would repent of their wickedness and believe in Jesus.  Signs of fire and wonders of language poured forth, so that the Gospel of Jesus Christ might be heard and believed in every tongue under heaven.  In the days which followed, miracles of conversion happened by the thousands, as did healings, exorcisms, and resurrections.  These signs and wonders accompanied the Gospel of Jesus as His disciples carried His Word everywhere they went, knowing that everyone who believed on His Name would be saved from their wicked and adulterous generation.

So, too, in our day.  In our wicked and adulterous generation, where there is blood, and fire, and vapor of smoke, where people are deluded into prisons of knowledge without wisdom, fanned into mobs for the pursuit of advantage one over the other, manipulated by corrupt and Machiavellian politicians into perpetual slavery and abuse, the Gospel of Jesus Christ comes with the power of the Holy Spirit, that every soul which turns and believes in Him shall be saved.  Those who carry this Gospel of Jesus through their faith and baptism, are indwelt by the Spirit of the Living God to accomplish all things necessary to bear witness to that Gospel.  Still today, signs and wonders accompany the preaching of Jesus, where the miracle of conversion, faith, and repentance, is at times also accompanied by other miracles oriented to the same end.  Such preaching shows each and every soul that their meaning, their source and their fulfillment, is in the same God who made the heavens and the earth in which they now live, that the Cross of Jesus Christ has reconciled them to their Creator, and that they have been given the gift of the Holy Spirit that their new lives in Jesus would be marked by His power, wisdom, and truth.  For us today, as for our ancestors long ago, and for generations yet to be born upon this good earth and under this good heaven, the Gospel of Jesus comes with power to give life and meaning to those lost and enslaved to ways of death.

May the faithful arise today in faith and repentance, carrying forth the Gospel of Salvation in Jesus Christ, empowered by the Holy Spirit of the God of Heaven and Earth, to work the miraculous conversion of souls in our time, to flip this materialist information age on its head, and put all the powers of darkness to flight.  Amen.  

A Meditation on John 17, for the Last Sunday of Easter

Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.

 As thou hast sent me into the world,

even so have I also sent them into the world.

And for their sakes I sanctify myself,

that they also might be sanctified through the truth.

Neither pray I for these alone,

but for them also which shall believe on me through their word;

That they all may be one;

as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee,

 that they also may be one in us:

that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.

The 17^th chapter of John’s Gospel is sometimes known as Jesus’ High Priestly Prayer, which He offers among His disciples before He is betrayed, taken away, tortured, and executed by the collaboration of His Jewish countrymen and their Roman occupiers.  He knew where He was going, what He was about to endure, what He would accomplish through His suffering and death, and that He would rise again the third day victorious over every enemy of the human race.  Jesus offered this prayer in anticipation of the victory He would achieve for us through His Cross, knowing that as He sanctified Himself in His Father’s will for the salvation of mankind, everyone who would be united to Him by faith would receive His sanctification by grace.  Jesus knows that God’s Word is sanctifying truth, because He himself is the very Logos, the Incarnate Word of the Living God.

Much has been made of Jesus’ call to unity over the centuries, and usually from a position of political power.  Within the Church, there’s been no shortage of pastors or bishops calling for unity of the people under their leadership, as if they themselves would be the author or the instrument of Christian unity.  Outside the Church, many call for unity around politicians, or movements, or ideals, some certainly much better than others.  In our current day, politicians and media outlets call for unity in huddled fear of a novel virus unlikely to seriously harm over 99% of the world’s population.  This fear has permeated even the majority of Christian fellowships, blended with political rivalries, with most having suspended the gathering of the people through the entire season of Easter.  Now, as at all times, human calls and attempts at unity often either rally around the wrong things, or produce ridiculous results; sometimes they do better than others, as when nations rally to unite against evil and tyranny, but even at our best, such unity is often fractured with mixed motives and murky results.

It is important to note that Jesus’ prayer in John 17 isn’t to His disciples, but for His disciples.  This is a key difference.  Unlike the bizarre trends in contemporary prayer where people sometimes use them to preach and coerce an “amen,” Jesus is addressing His Father alone in this prayer.  Jesus confesses the surety that God’s Word is Truth, that He will be sanctified to save everyone who trusts in Him as the Incarnate Word of God, and according to His Word asks the Father to unite all those who believe in Him.  Notice that the actor in Jesus’ prayer is God, not man.  Jesus doesn’t tell His disciples to build some kind of global religious-political empire with a Caesar sitting on an earthly throne, surrounded by princes in a cascading hierarchy of worldly power.  He doesn’t tell them to overthrow various governmental structures so they can build a utopia on earth through worldly political philosophy.  He doesn’t tell them to find the most charismatic and persuasive entertainers, and unite behind a cult of personality.  Jesus’ command to His disciples was to love one another, and to abide in His Word, that they might live by grace through faith in Him alone.  The unity which would emerge among His disciples would be a unity born of God, His Holy Spirit indwelling all who repent and believe, that they might live in Jesus and Jesus live in them.  This is a unity which doesn’t need political statements of communion fellowship or various church leaders to bless it—but rather, it is a reality recognized by every believer, who sees the seal of the Holy Spirit in his fellow brothers and sisters, who together abide in the Word of Christ.  It is a unity not born of man but of God, and it is a unity undaunted by paltry human efforts to endorse or ratify it.

The One who creates Christian unity is God alone, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  Man does not create unity, anymore than man can create the Word of God, or be in himself the sanctifying Truth which saves all who believe in him.  When we stop trying to do what God alone has promised to do, we find a peace and confidence that transcends all striving and effort.  For God’s will shall be done, and Jesus’ prayer for Christian unity shall be accomplished—in fact, is already accomplished among everyone who will repent, believe, and live in Him.  When we turn from our hatred and fear, love one another as Jesus loves us, and abide in His Word of Law and Gospel, we find our unity not by our own efforts, but by the power of the Holy Spirit dwelling in and among us, uniting us to the Father through the Son by His gifts of grace and faith.

As the Church steps from the season of Easter to the season of Pentecost, may we all learn to see more clearly our unity in Jesus and His Eternal Word.  There, in Jesus alone, we find a fellowship which is not bounded by time or space, which is not marred by human sin and wickedness, but endures in the purity and truth of His sanctifying Word of grace.  Thanks be to God!  Amen.

A Place Prepared: An Easter Season Meditation on John 14

Let not your heart be troubled:

ye believe in God, believe also in me.

In my Father's house are many mansions:

if it were not so, I would have told you.

I go to prepare a place for you.

And if I go and prepare a place for you,

I will come again, and receive you unto myself;

that where I am, there ye may be also.

And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know.

Thomas saith unto him,

Lord, we know not whither thou goest;

and how can we know the way?

Jesus saith unto him,

I am the way, the truth, and the life:

no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.

Christians have demonstrated themselves to be a peculiar people over the centuries, not least in their seemingly conflicted approaches to celebrating life and fearlessness in death.  There are certainly examples of Christians behaving poorly in every generation, but in the main, those who hear Jesus’ Word and abide in it, have shown a strange ability to embrace the goodness of life without panic regarding their earthly demise.  Christians rejoice in all the good events of a well ordered life from birth through old age, and yet while they may weep during times of suffering and death, they do not mourn as if they have no hope.  In today’s Gospel reading from John 14, we have some insight as to why this is.

Jesus’ words open this chapter with a call not to be troubled, and a reminder that He is going ahead of them through death to prepare an eternal place for them with God the Father.  This place is described as a house with many mansions, an image which beholds a vast Kingdom within which there is plenteous room for all.  While physical imagery strains to fully communicate spiritual realities, the principle is absolutely clear:  in the glory of God the Father, God the Son fully abides, as do all who believe and abide in Jesus.  Time and space are tricky things to consider in the presence of God, who is Himself above and beyond all time and matter, but the ultimate reality of the universe rests in the eternal glory of God, as do all His people who abide in Him by grace through faith in His Eternal Word.

Consider the implications this unshakeable truth can have on a Christian life.  The Christian knows by the Word of God that all life is good, and a gift from God Himself; that life has an intended pattern and structure which flows from God as the Author and source of all life; that every person is loved by the God who gave them life; that even in a fallen universe in which change seems constant, every living thing which abides in the Word of the Living God, abides in Him forever.  Thus the Christian can embrace and celebrate all the good things in creation, most especially the gift of life and the loving fellowship of all those living.  He can also see death for what it really is, and know that his life is guarded by the Living God even through death.

Such a beatific vision might seem only a sophistic dream, except that Jesus, the one who offered it to His disciples, actually rose from the dead.  After telling His disciples not to be troubled, to believe in Him and abide in His Word, He went to the crucifixion He said He would endure, died, and three days later rose again from the dead, just as He said He would.  No one else in all of human history has done such a thing, and the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus remains to this day the most well attested and witnessed miracle of all time.  And while this miracle of miracles actually occurred in a particular time and place, witnessed by countless actual people, many of which set their witness to writing and whose verbal testimony found place even in the annals of hostile contemporary historians, Jesus’ ongoing miraculous promise of the powerful abiding of the Holy Spirit has been testified in every generation since.  Everywhere the Word of Jesus is preached in every corner of the earth, the Holy Spirit continues to work the miracles of conversion and faith, to heal the sick hearts and raise the dead souls of those who are lost in their fear of sin and death.  In the fellowship of the saints, both those present today and those already fully abiding with God before us, the Holy Spirit continues to work miracles in guiding others toward Jesus, and Jesus continues to be our one great Intercessor for all our prayers to the Father.  This living community of faith, with all its variation in rite, ritual, and custom, continues to be a miraculous testimony to the promise of Jesus given nearly 2000 years ago in Judea, and first prophesied to our fallen human race at the dawn of time.

This is why Christians embrace the fullness of life without fear of death, because they know beyond any shadow of a doubt that their lives are secure in Jesus.  The faith which clings to Jesus and abides in His Word surges with the grace and power of the King of the Universe, unstoppable and unshakeable as the Lord God Almighty.  The Christian need not be troubled by war, politics, or plague, because he knows from whence he came and to where he is going, and he knows the Savior’s promise in which he and all the saints abide—he knows that Jesus alone has proved Himself to be the Way, the Truth, and the Life, and that Jesus has promised that all who repent and believe in Him will not perish, but have everlasting life.  This is the peculiar hope of a peculiar people, rooted in both the Word and Person of Jesus Christ.  Here we abide by the power of His Spirit, not just today, but for all time.  Here we find eternal fellowship in a blessed communion that never ends, is never separated, and can never die.  Here in Jesus and His Word, we glimpse the blessings of eternity even as we pass through the trails of a fallen creation, knowing that He has sealed the promise of our salvation in His own most precious blood. 

Does fear, despair, or anxiety grip your heart?  Turn your eyes to Jesus, and hear His promise made new to you today.  Hear Him, repent, believe, and live.  Amen.

Of Shepherds and Sheep: An Easter Meditation on John 10

I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep.

But he that is an hireling, and not the shepherd, whose own the sheep are not,

seeth the wolf coming, and leaveth the sheep, and fleeth:

and the wolf catcheth them, and scattereth the sheep.

The hireling fleeth, because he is an hireling,

and careth not for the sheep.

I am the good shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known of mine.

As the Father knoweth me, even so know I the Father:

and I lay down my life for the sheep.

And other sheep I have, which are not of this fold:

them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice;

and there shall be one fold, and one shepherd.

Jesus’ parable in John 10 uses earthly imagery to help convey spiritual realities.  In ancient Israel, as in many agrarian communities to this day, the image of shepherds and sheep is one readily perceived.  Sheep are creatures which are easily hunted and taken by those who would destroy them, and shepherds serve as both guide and guardian for an animal which cannot even fathom their own dangers. But sheep do learn the voice of their shepherd, and the ones who survive and flourish are those who heed their shepherd’s voice; those who are drawn by their own inward desires or other outward voices away from their shepherds, usually find only suffering and disaster.  Wolves love an easy mutton lunch, and the earthly terrain is ambivalent of those who traverse it.

Jesus uses this imagery, because it teaches us something about Him, ourselves, the world, and our relationship to Him.  First, we learn that He is unfailingly good, in full unity with God the Father, and that He is so devoted to the life and flourishing of His people, that He is prepared to give His life to save theirs.  This love and divinity brought forth in His human Incarnation, make Him a unique Shepherd to His people, at once their Lord, their Savior, and their Preservation.  No other pretender of human or demonic origin can fulfil this role which Jesus has with His people, nor would they seek His people for anything but destruction, slavery, and death.  While demons and wicked men will seek to enslave and ensnare people, using them as means to their own ends of power, lust, and wealth, Jesus alone seeks His people only to love and save them, that they might have life eternal and abundant.  He is the one and the only Good Shepherd.

We also learn of ourselves, that we are hopeless without our Good Shepherd.  Like sheep relative to the shepherd, our perception and our wits are dim.  Easily we would wander into dangerous terrain that would wound us, into snares which would entangle us, or into lairs which would devour us.  Unable are we to untangle the web of our own fallen desires from the dangers of a fallen world, and unmatched are we to the predators who swarm throughout it.  A herd of sheep to a pack of wolves is nothing more than a buffet; a gathering a people is nothing more than slave labor to the tyrant; a wounded soul to the demonic horde is nothing more than the prey of hell; without the guidance and guardianship of a Good Shepherd.

As the perception and abilities of sheep are to people, even more so are man’s perceptions and abilities to God.  We traverse a universe of majesty and wonder, but it is also one of danger to our fragile and fallen nature.  There are forces for good and evil at work in the world, both in human and angelic realms, so little of which we can see.  The wolves which hunt the people of God lurk everywhere, hidden in the camouflage which amplifies their lethality.  Our minds are easily drawn to the shiny and the smooth, to lies and deceptions, and to our own destruction.  Thinking ourselves wise, we find ourselves fools, as easily despoiled of our lives and liberty as a wandering sheep is by a passing brigand.

And so, this Easter season, we are reminded of where our life, our liberty, our safety, and our preservation abide:  in Jesus, our Good Shepherd, alone.  He alone is God with Us, fully human according to our unfallen nature, and fully God according to the divine nature.  He alone loves us as the Eternal Word of our Omnipotent Creator, the revelation of the Holy Spirit which is testified to every living soul.  He alone has laid down His life for His people, and He alone has taken it back up again, that He might lead His people from fallen life, through death, to the bliss of eternal life.  His voice alone calls to forgiveness, life, and salvation, by His Word carried forth in every generation.  He alone gathers all who repent and believe in Him into one flock, one universal church, with Him alone as their One Good Shepherd.  His voice, His Word alone, prevents our eternal calamity and restores us to eternal life by His grace and mercy.  What we could not do, He has fully accomplished, leading His people today as He has faithfully led His people in every generation which has come before, and every generation yet to come.

We will never see things, in this world or the next, as clearly and completely as our divine Good Shepherd.  Even in glory we remain creatures, and our Creator remains the only omnipotent, omnipresent, and omniscient King of the Universe.  And yet, while we may not know the fullness of all things in heaven and on earth, we know that our Saving Lord is Good—that His voice, His Word, leads and preserves us even through the valley of the shadow of death, that we may fear no evil of man or demon.  We know what He has done for us, and what He has promised to complete in each of us, according to His own time and wisdom.  And so, with Him we rejoice even in our sorrows, knowing that our Good Shepherd remains and abides with us, leading us through this world and into the endless ages of ages to come.  Glory be to Him forever.  Amen.