Followership
Sermon
God in Flesh Made Manifest
Cycle A Gospel Lesson Sermons For Advent, Christmas, And Epiphany
In today's Gospel text, Jesus calls for repentance, expects Peter and Andrew to drop their nets and follow him, and calls James and John to leave their Father Zebedee in the boat without so much as a "So long, see you later."
My task today is to issue that same call to repentance, that same call to radical obedience and decisive discipleship. For that call is urgent and cries out to be issued in all of its majesty and might.
But as preacher of the gospel -- the good news of God in Jesus Christ -- I cannot issue that call in such a way as to imply that any of us is capable of responding to it of our own free will and spiritual strength. If we can't even keep New Year's resolutions any more than 21 days into the new year, isn't it a little presumptuous to believe that we can turn our lives around in such fundamental ways as repentance, renunciation, true obedience and discipleship?
There is a poem that I believe can help us as we grapple with the call to repentance and discipleship. It deals with the very text we have before us today. Listen:
They cast their nets in Galilee, just off the hills of brown;
Such happy simple fisherfolk, before the Lord came down,
Before the Lord came down.
Contented, peaceful fishermen, before they ever knew
The peace of God that filled their hearts
Brimful, and broke them too, brimful and broke them too.
Young John, who trimmed the flapping sail,
Homeless in Patmos died. Peter, who hauled the teeming net,
Head down was crucified, head down was crucified.
The peace of God is no peace, but strife closed in the sod.
Yet, let us pray for but one thing:
The marvelous peace of God, the marvelous peace of God.1
Martin Bell, author of The Way of the Wolf, has written: "Human beings do not intentionally seek out upside down crosses. Upside down crosses happen. Suddenly. Often without warning. If we can avoid being there, we do. If we can't, we don't. It's really almost as simple as that."
Just so, according to the poem, Simon Peter, Andrew, James and John were "simple fisherfolk before the Lord came down; contented, peaceful fishermen before they ever knew the peace of God that filled their hearts brimful and broke them too." The strange peace of God penetrates and permeates our every fiber even as dye permeates a piece of unbleached fabric.
The primacy and priority of that peace of God which lays claim on us and lays hold of us: that is what we need to apprehend as we reflect on our own daily need and struggle to repent, renounce, obey and follow.
In today's Gospel text, Jesus says, "Repent" -- and he means it!
He goes on to say "for the kingdom of heaven has come near." The rest of Matthew's Gospel can be read as the unfolding of that promise of the nearness of God's sovereign rule. It is Matthew's way of saying, "In Jesus, God's reign draws near to us. In him Isaiah's prophecy is fulfilled: We who walked in spiritual darkness now see the great light of the Lord's Christ. He kindles in us the flame of faith and by the light of that flame we walk and do not stumble."
For in preaching, teaching, healing and exorcising; in being baptized, tempted, tried and crucified, Jesus brings God's kingdom near to people. In Jesus, the time is fulfilled, and in him the kingdom of God truly has come near. The good news of God's presence, of the nearness, the at-handness, of his kingly rule gives birth to faith and trust. Such faith and trust empowers us to turn from anxiety to peace, from sorrow to joy, from despair to hope, from hatred to love. In a word, we repent. The power and the call so to do come from Christ, who works in us the miracle of faith and repentance.
The second half of the Matthew passage gives us a snapshot of what the God-empowered life of repentance, obedience and discipleship begins to look like. The word Matthew uses three times to describe it is the word "follow."
Jesus said to Peter and Andrew "follow me" and immediately they left their nets and followed.
Similarly, he called James and John and immediately they left their father in the boat and they followed him.
Our culture is not real big on followership. We rear our children to be leaders. "Don't follow the pack," we say. "Get out in front and be a leader." That's not wrong. When our children are entrusted with a task that requires coordinating the efforts of several people -- or several hundred people -- we want them to feel competent and confident. We want to have done our job of equipping them.
But none of us is a leader all of the time. We are more like that centurion in one of the Gospels. You remember, the one who said, "I am a man set under authority" (that is, I have leaders whom I follow) "and I have subordinates" (troops who follow me). That's the way it is in real life, isn't it? Sometimes we lead and sometimes we follow, and most of the time we do both things simultaneously -- taking orders from some and giving orders to others.
Why is it, then, that we are so averse to teaching and learning the skills of good followership? In large part I think because it means giving up control. And most of us have a dreadful fear -- a deathly fear -- of relinquishing control of any segment of our lives.
Indeed, we do not give up control willingly; and God will not take control from us by force or false promise.
So what's the answer? How does God make disciples -- followers -- of the likes of us?
The only power I know that enables people to loosen their white-knuckled grip on the control lever of their lives is the liberating power of love.
For it is only in a relationship of love -- and the trust that is love's constant companion -- that we find the freedom to surrender ourselves to another, make ourselves vulnerable to another, trusting that the other will not exploit our vulnerability for selfish purposes. The other reciprocates our love and trust and similarly surrenders control. When, because of human brokenness, either party violates that trust, then forgiveness is the dynamic force that has the power to make the relationship whole again.
That is how God in Christ makes followers of the likes of you and me: by first making himself vulnerable to us; by forgiving us when we exploit that vulnerability, nailing it to a cross; by then loving us into a new life and a new relationship with him and with one another; and finally, by entrusting to us a task of extraordinary importance.
In faith, we trust that Christ is leading us to a place worth going. And trust him we must, for the way is fraught with dangers and the power is not in ourselves to sustain our commitment over such a journey. That power belongs to the one who is our leader and whose followers we are. And when he infuses us with that power, that is when we know the same strange peace of God of which the poet spoke. It is that peace that continually looses our death grip on our lives and frees us to find our lives in giving them up.
As followers, we are a pilgrim people -- never quite at our goal but always on the way, sustained by the love of Christ, strengthened by that exceedingly strange peace of God which is no peace, but strife closed in the sod. Yet let us pray for just one thing: the marvelous peace of God.
_____________
1. William A. Percy. Public Domain.
My task today is to issue that same call to repentance, that same call to radical obedience and decisive discipleship. For that call is urgent and cries out to be issued in all of its majesty and might.
But as preacher of the gospel -- the good news of God in Jesus Christ -- I cannot issue that call in such a way as to imply that any of us is capable of responding to it of our own free will and spiritual strength. If we can't even keep New Year's resolutions any more than 21 days into the new year, isn't it a little presumptuous to believe that we can turn our lives around in such fundamental ways as repentance, renunciation, true obedience and discipleship?
There is a poem that I believe can help us as we grapple with the call to repentance and discipleship. It deals with the very text we have before us today. Listen:
They cast their nets in Galilee, just off the hills of brown;
Such happy simple fisherfolk, before the Lord came down,
Before the Lord came down.
Contented, peaceful fishermen, before they ever knew
The peace of God that filled their hearts
Brimful, and broke them too, brimful and broke them too.
Young John, who trimmed the flapping sail,
Homeless in Patmos died. Peter, who hauled the teeming net,
Head down was crucified, head down was crucified.
The peace of God is no peace, but strife closed in the sod.
Yet, let us pray for but one thing:
The marvelous peace of God, the marvelous peace of God.1
Martin Bell, author of The Way of the Wolf, has written: "Human beings do not intentionally seek out upside down crosses. Upside down crosses happen. Suddenly. Often without warning. If we can avoid being there, we do. If we can't, we don't. It's really almost as simple as that."
Just so, according to the poem, Simon Peter, Andrew, James and John were "simple fisherfolk before the Lord came down; contented, peaceful fishermen before they ever knew the peace of God that filled their hearts brimful and broke them too." The strange peace of God penetrates and permeates our every fiber even as dye permeates a piece of unbleached fabric.
The primacy and priority of that peace of God which lays claim on us and lays hold of us: that is what we need to apprehend as we reflect on our own daily need and struggle to repent, renounce, obey and follow.
In today's Gospel text, Jesus says, "Repent" -- and he means it!
He goes on to say "for the kingdom of heaven has come near." The rest of Matthew's Gospel can be read as the unfolding of that promise of the nearness of God's sovereign rule. It is Matthew's way of saying, "In Jesus, God's reign draws near to us. In him Isaiah's prophecy is fulfilled: We who walked in spiritual darkness now see the great light of the Lord's Christ. He kindles in us the flame of faith and by the light of that flame we walk and do not stumble."
For in preaching, teaching, healing and exorcising; in being baptized, tempted, tried and crucified, Jesus brings God's kingdom near to people. In Jesus, the time is fulfilled, and in him the kingdom of God truly has come near. The good news of God's presence, of the nearness, the at-handness, of his kingly rule gives birth to faith and trust. Such faith and trust empowers us to turn from anxiety to peace, from sorrow to joy, from despair to hope, from hatred to love. In a word, we repent. The power and the call so to do come from Christ, who works in us the miracle of faith and repentance.
The second half of the Matthew passage gives us a snapshot of what the God-empowered life of repentance, obedience and discipleship begins to look like. The word Matthew uses three times to describe it is the word "follow."
Jesus said to Peter and Andrew "follow me" and immediately they left their nets and followed.
Similarly, he called James and John and immediately they left their father in the boat and they followed him.
Our culture is not real big on followership. We rear our children to be leaders. "Don't follow the pack," we say. "Get out in front and be a leader." That's not wrong. When our children are entrusted with a task that requires coordinating the efforts of several people -- or several hundred people -- we want them to feel competent and confident. We want to have done our job of equipping them.
But none of us is a leader all of the time. We are more like that centurion in one of the Gospels. You remember, the one who said, "I am a man set under authority" (that is, I have leaders whom I follow) "and I have subordinates" (troops who follow me). That's the way it is in real life, isn't it? Sometimes we lead and sometimes we follow, and most of the time we do both things simultaneously -- taking orders from some and giving orders to others.
Why is it, then, that we are so averse to teaching and learning the skills of good followership? In large part I think because it means giving up control. And most of us have a dreadful fear -- a deathly fear -- of relinquishing control of any segment of our lives.
Indeed, we do not give up control willingly; and God will not take control from us by force or false promise.
So what's the answer? How does God make disciples -- followers -- of the likes of us?
The only power I know that enables people to loosen their white-knuckled grip on the control lever of their lives is the liberating power of love.
For it is only in a relationship of love -- and the trust that is love's constant companion -- that we find the freedom to surrender ourselves to another, make ourselves vulnerable to another, trusting that the other will not exploit our vulnerability for selfish purposes. The other reciprocates our love and trust and similarly surrenders control. When, because of human brokenness, either party violates that trust, then forgiveness is the dynamic force that has the power to make the relationship whole again.
That is how God in Christ makes followers of the likes of you and me: by first making himself vulnerable to us; by forgiving us when we exploit that vulnerability, nailing it to a cross; by then loving us into a new life and a new relationship with him and with one another; and finally, by entrusting to us a task of extraordinary importance.
In faith, we trust that Christ is leading us to a place worth going. And trust him we must, for the way is fraught with dangers and the power is not in ourselves to sustain our commitment over such a journey. That power belongs to the one who is our leader and whose followers we are. And when he infuses us with that power, that is when we know the same strange peace of God of which the poet spoke. It is that peace that continually looses our death grip on our lives and frees us to find our lives in giving them up.
As followers, we are a pilgrim people -- never quite at our goal but always on the way, sustained by the love of Christ, strengthened by that exceedingly strange peace of God which is no peace, but strife closed in the sod. Yet let us pray for just one thing: the marvelous peace of God.
_____________
1. William A. Percy. Public Domain.
