the upper room with an open door

Shalom Mennonite Church

Sunday, June 5, 2011

Easter 7 - “Commissioned and Waiting”

Texts: John 17:1-11 and Acts 1:6-14

Eric Massanari

“the upper room with an open door”

Jesus' birth into the world

may have been humble,

but his exit from the world seems fantastic.

His death may have been that of a criminal,

but his departure is that of an angel.

His resurrection from a dark tomb had no witnesses,

but his ascension is a glowing, main-stage event

with all of his disciples bearing witness.

For as much as we celebrate Jesus' birth,

and remember his death,

and confess his resurrection,

we don't tend to say much about

this moment when Jesus makes one final rising

up into the glorious, sunlit clouds.

Jesus goes up . . . up . . . and away!

Able to leap tall buildings in a single bound!

Going . . . going . . . gone!

The temptation may be to interpret this as

a final parting of the ways—Jesus bound for

his home in a heaven high beyond the clouds,

while the disciples and the rest of us are left earthbound.

The temptation may be

to interpret the ascension of Jesus as a

final moment of separation.

And, in fact, it has largely been viewed

this way in traditional theologies.

Which is unfortunate because to read the story this way

may be to miss one of the deepest and

most transforming messages of the gospel.

There is another stream of Christian wisdom

that invites us to see something

quite different in the story of the ascension.

Rather than interpreting this as a moment of separation,

we might understand it as a revelation of profound union.

This stream of theology suggests

that Jesus is not ascending to some place apart from the world;

Jesus is in fact returning to the very place

where Christ has always lived:

fully immersed in the world

and in the fullness of all life.

Thomas Keating describes the ascension of Jesus in this way:

This is the invitation to enter into the cosmic Christ—into his divine person, the Word of God, who has always been present in the world...This is the Christ who disappeared in his Ascension beyond the clouds, not into some geographical location, but into the heart of all creation. In particular, he has penetrated the very depths of our being, our separate-self sense has melted into his divine Person, and now we can act under the direct influence of his Spirit. Thus, even if we drink a cup of soup or walk down the street, it is Christ living and acting in us, transforming the world from within...The Ascension is Christ's return to the heart of all creation where he dwells now in his glorified humanity.

Keating, Thomas, The Mystery of Christ

The “Cosmic Christ.”

That is a term not often heard in church.

Usually when we speak of Christ

we speak solely, even exclusively, of Jesus as Christ.

And when we do this we sometimes neglect

the strong scriptural witness

which suggests that Christ

not only describes Jesus of Nazareth,

it also describes the Living Word of God

as a reality that transcends

the historical person of Jesus.

The Cosmic Christ is the glory of God

that permeates the whole of life.

The world is charged with it, filled with it!

At the beginning of John's gospel

it is described in this way:

In the beginning was the Word,

and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

He was in the beginning with God.

All things came into being through him,

and without him not one thing came into being.

What has come into being in him was life,

and the life was the light of all people. (John 1:1-4)

In the first chapter of the letter to the Colossians

Christ is described with these words:

Christ is the image of the invisible God,

the firstborn of all creation;

for in Christ all things in heaven and on earth

were created, things visible and invisible . . .

all things have been created through and for Christ.

Christ is before all things,

and in Christ all things hold together. (Col. 1:15-17)

Later in the letter to the Colossians,

as Paul describes what it means

to be “clothed” in the love of Christ,

He writes:

Christ is all and in all! (Col. 3:11)

This reflects a far more expansive

understanding of who and what and where Christ is.

This is the wisdom that understands

all of creation as bearing the Christ presence.

From its beginning in a Big Bang,

or whatever dream or movement sent

the expanse and evolution of the universe into motion,

Christ has been the power of being

at the heart of all life—the Cosmic Christ

is an extension of the very heart of God.

For a particular window of time

this power of being was expressed

in a profound way, in human form,

in the person of Jesus.

The special gift of Jesus is that through him

we come to see what it means to live a human life

fully immersed and fully surrendered

to the glory of God's love—what it means to live in Christ.

In Jesus we are invited

to live in this same manner—

we are invited to allow the Christ-presence

that is in each of us to be fully revealed.

We keep wanting to make Jesus someone wholly different from us,

and Jesus wants to make us wholly one with him.

When we build bonds and bridges with others

instead of boundaries and dividing walls

we are participating in the life of Christ

that ascends within our own being;

we are revealing the Christ in us,

and we are recognizing the Christ in our sister and brother.

When we follow self-centered patterns

or wallow in self-pity,

when we speak of Christ as having

having been present exclusively

in the historical Jesus,

then we deny the Glory of God

that is written in all life, in our neighbor,

and in our own flesh and bone.

We must choose with our lives, each day,

whether we will join in the revealing of the glory of God,

or whether we will shroud it and deny it.

Will we live this day, this moment,

in awareness and in union with

the Cosmic Christ, who is all and in all?

Will we direct our intentions and actions

to the path of Christ-like love?

Or, will our choices deny

that this world and our own lives

are the revealing place for God.

I look at the disciples in this story from Acts,

and at what they do after they have witnessed

the ascension of their teacher.

They go back to their upper room,

their gathering place in Jerusalem

that has for a time been their hideout

in the days following Jesus' death.

We might remember some of the Easter stories

in which they are described as gathering in

this place with the doors locked

“for fear of the Jews.”

I notice that this time nothing is said here

about the doors of the upper room

being locked or closed,

and nothing is said about the disciples being afraid.

I imagine that now the doors are unlocked,

and I imagine the doors standing wide open.

Because now the disciples have seen

that there is no where they can go

where Christ is not already alive and dwelling.

They have seen what has always been true,

and what will forever be true:

there is nothing that can separate us

from the love that is God.

So, they need not fear.

They need not fight or defend.

They are free to love.

They are free to receive God's Spirit.

They are free to join in the ascending of Christ.

And so are we.

a first-hand God

Shalom Mennonite Church

Sunday, May 29, 2011

Easter 6 - “Orphaned and Adopted”

Text: John 14:15-21

Eric Massanari

“a first-hand God”

Orphan.

To be an orphan is one of the most vulnerable

human conditions we might imagine.

It evokes the image of a child

standing alone,

facing the dangers of the world.

“I will not leave you orphaned,”

Jesus says to his friends, assuring them that

he will not leave them without a “spiritual parent.”

He promises them that when he is gone,

they will not be alone.

As Jesus points them toward the road ahead,

he gives them two distinct messages

about the way of discipleship they are to follow.

The first message is:

Remember to keep my commandments.

It is a clear, direct and simple

reminder that they are meant

to orient their daily living

to the path of loving action

he has taught them and modeled for them.

This path includes

tending to the needs of the poor,

visiting the sick,

feeding those who are hungry,

giving drink to the thirsty.

This is the path of loving one's neighbor as oneself.

The second message Jesus gives them is:

God's own Spirit will be with you as your Advocate.

This Advocate will be their teacher and guide

just as Jesus has been their teacher and guide.

The Spirit will dwell among

the community of believers

and within the community of believers.

God's movement continues to be toward

humanity through the Holy Spirit.

And we are called to continue to move

toward God by living in ways

that reflect God's love into the world.

The path of discipleship then is two-fold:

it is receptivity and it is action,

it is being and it is doing,

it is yielding oneself to God and it is asserting oneself in the world.

And Jesus is very clear with his disciples

that these interrelated movements of faith

are complimentary and necessary for the way of the disciple.

The Christian path has found many expressions

over the centuries, and these varied expressions

and traditions have emphasized

these two movements of faith to varying degrees.

Some traditions—just like some individual believers—

have been more naturally reflective,

focused on worship and prayer life,

sometimes with less emphasis on obedience

to Jesus' commandments in daily living.

Other traditions and communities

have been much more inclined to

emphasize the active movement of discipleship;

following Christ in relationships,

preaching the Good News, sharing it

through action and service:

planting churches, disaster relief,

peace & justice work, mission efforts, and so on.

Most Christian traditions and communities

I have encountered have some element of both movements,

but the balance might be struck very differently

and the expression of these movements might

look quite different than it does for other Christians down the street.

And what about us?

What about the good 'ol Mennonites?

What about us here at Shalom church?

It is an interesting question because

I think today Mennonites are often viewed by others

as being “doers of the word.”

We are seen as a tradition that emphasizes

the active more than the reflective movement of discipleship.

And, in large part, I sense we openly claim this

in our own self-identity as a Christian tradition.

In fact, when we use the word “discipleship”

we are typically pointing more to that active

part of faith – the doing more than the being.

Especially at the more “liberal” or “progressive”

end of the Mennonite church spectrum,

we tend to emphasize service to others,

and witnessing and working for peace & justice.

We are very comfortable discussing political and social issues—perhaps more than we are with joining in Bible study

or prayer circles.

We are inclined to ask,

“What can we do?” or “How can we help?”

more readily than we ask,

“How is God speaking to us right now?”

“Where is God leading us as a church?”

To put it in a bit different terms:

We are more of a Sermon on the Mount kind of church

than we are a “go forth and make disciples of all nations,”

or a “go to the garden with Jesus to pray” sort of church.

This is not a “good” or “bad” reality,

it is simply who we have been and become

for some very wonderful reasons—

those reasons being the people

and the circumstances and experiences

that have shaped this remarkable congregation of Shalom.

However, it is an important reality to name

because it reveals to us not only our gifts

but also our growing edges,

as we remember Jesus' two-fold message

to his friends about what the path

of discipleship entails – both the doing and the being.

It means, in part, God needs us—

our doing, our good works—

and it also means, we need God.

We are called to attend to the presence of the One

whose Spirit acts and speaks within us

as Advocate and guide.

We nurture that second part

through our worship together

and through making room for prayer.

And by “prayer” I don't mean

necessarily those formal expressions

of spoken word that sometimes

mark periods in our worship.

By prayer I mean much more inclusively

that spirit of yieldedness

we come to know when we grow receptive

and open to that presence of God's Spirit

within us and among us.

Prayer is less about method

as it is about all that nurtures the connection

between us and God.

This week I came across a book on prayer

that was unfamiliar to me;

a book entitled, Clinging, by Emilie Griffin.

She writes:

Prayer is, after all, a very dangerous business. For all the benefits it offers of growing closer to God, it carries with it one great element of risk: the possibility of change. In prayer we open ourselves to the chance that God will do something with us that we had not intended. We yield to possibilities of intense perception, of seeing through human masks and the density of “things” to the very center of reality.

To avoid this, sometimes we excuse ourselves from prayer by doing good works on a carefully controlled schedule . . . By doing something limited “for God,” something we judge to be enough and more than enough, we skirt the possibility that God—in prayer—may ask us what he wants to ask, may suggest what we should do.

- Emilie Griffin, in Clinging: The Experience of Prayer

I think she is naming a challenge

to a church such as ours as we seek

the path of discipleship Jesus described.

Our challenge may be to

entertain the possibility

that God is here – within and among us -

calling us to much more

than what we assume to be our tasks or jobs.

Which is not to say God is asking us to do more.

It is so easy to get lost in that language of doing

that has to do with our commitments,

our time, our energy, the limited things

we measure with “more” or “less.”

God is not seeking our heroic time commitments

or our overworked exhaustion.

God is asking for our hearts,

our yieldedness together, in community,

to the presence of the Spirit.

And there is no “more” or “less”

when it comes to the Spirit of God.

We are a people whose minds are occupied

with great complex problems and issues.

We sometimes forget, or we are terribly suspicious,

of what may be simple responses – such as prayer,

prayer that listens for God's voice and call.

However, if we make space for this listening,

as we do when we come together like this,

then we begin to participate in the Spirit,

in the Spirit that is working for the needs

and the well-being of humanity and all life.

We orient our doing with our deepest being in God.

We need God,

and God needs us. Amen