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SERMONS

The Fifth Sunday of Lent
March 25, 2007

By The Rev. Alston Johnson

Jesus has gone into the heart of the machine in Luke’s Gospel. Its interesting how we often think of Jesus sharing his teachings in pastoral locations - hillsides, candle lit rooms following dinner, sitting by the Sea of Galilee. All of this true. It is also true that Jesus went straight to the great Oz himself, and sat in the shadows of one of the greatest temples the ancient world ever knew - just to make sure, just to make sure, that he was not misunderstood; just to make sure that folks can “hear” the words that He is bringing to this world.

Luke’s 19th Chapter ends and 20th Chapter begins with this small, but significant, stage cue: “One day while he was teaching the people in the Temple area and was preaching . . .” The power of the parable that Jesus tells is not simply what He says, but where He says it - right, literally, under the noses of those who need to hear it . . . that’s one of the things that I love about my Lord - he cuts to the chase; its one of the reasons that truth always beats fiction, hands down.

“By what authority are you doing these things, who gave you this authority?”

The priests and scribes and the hangers-on at the Temple are challenging Jesus; they are calling the authority card. “Who do you think you are to say such things?”

And so Jesus tells them a story about a vineyard - a garden, you might say. The landlord sends home to receive some of the produce from his garden, but the tenants are what have gone to seed, gone wild, and they beat and kill the messengers. And not only the messengers, they kill the son, the heir, thinking that the garden/vineyard is theirs. So . . . what should happen to these tenants? What should happen to these would-be land lords? They should die - the real owner, THE owner, will kill them - and justly so.

What does it all mean? And Jesus looks at them . . . It means this:

“For the struggle is not over, and the potentialities for gain in India are still great. In the Chinese language, the word ‘crisis’ is composed of two characters, one representing danger, and one representing opportunity. The danger now is clear. But let us also make the most of our opportunities. For if they are lost now, they may never come again.” — Senator John F. Kennedy May 20, 1959.” —“The Basis of US Interest in India - Its New Dimensions.”

The then young Democratic senator from Massachusetts was talking about a race that India was facing with “Red China” to secure economic and political leadership in Asia, and how the free world, the world on one side of the “iron curtain,” on one side of a “cold war,” desperately needed to see India succeed. In making his case against the totalitarian state of Red China, the young senator was plucking an arrow from the adversary’s quiver to fire right back at her: that the Chinese character for crises contains both a stroke of danger as well as opportunity was made famous by this speech. Using their own language, Kennedy seems to be saying, “the symbol for crisis also implies a nod in the direction of opportunity, of change, of hope . . . now is such a time for India, and China perhaps.”

What does it all mean? And Jesus looks at them . . . It means this:

“The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.”{Psalm 118:22}

Jesus comes into the heart of their machine and plucks this arrow from their quiver, this saying from the Psalms, in the midst of their own camp, and fires it right back at the scholars of the Old Testament. Most everyone standing in his midst would know the Psalms by heart. “Everyone who falls on that stone will be broken to pieces; and it will crush anyone on whom it falls.” This is your crisis, your danger and your opportunity, Jesus is saying to those who will hear him.

Jesus is in the midst of truth telling. He is telling the truth about the religious machine in Israel, and He is telling the almost- but-not-yet truth of his own fate. The One who finds no welcome, the One who finds no legitimacy, is the very One God intends to stand upon in this world.

Jesus shows us that he is not frightened of the truth. Jesus shows us that he is not afraid to tell the truth. It is a courage and transparency that he will pass to his friends and followers.

As this stone, this rejected stone, Jesus is the crisis of the world . . . He is the danger and the opportunity of each life, of each soul. He is the moment of truth, “Do I reject this stone or do I build upon it?”

The danger of rejecting this stone is to hang onto squatter’s rights in this life, forgetting that we do not inhabit our own garden, our own vineyard. These bodies, these things, families, homes, careers, even our hearts and souls and minds, are not our “real” estate, they are gifts for a season.

The crisis is not that these will be taken away; no, the crisis comes if we seek to own or possess them; that is precisely when we risk losing them. And our Father in Heaven risks something as well, to reach out, touch us, give us the word of love and invitation; he risks his beloved, his only-begotten . . . so that we might hear his voice.

This is what I have been telling you through the generations God is saying: Listen to me, listen to me:

“I am about to do a new thing . . . I am about to do a new thing . . . I will make a way in the wilderness . . . and rivers in the desert.” I am clearing a way so that I can get to you. It has been our story from the beginning, from the beginning, you have been mine . . . you are mine . . . “I am about to do a new thing . . . do you not perceive it? . . . do you not perceive it?”

There is water in the wilderness; there is water in the desert . . . so that you might be mine, so that I might be yours . . . so that you might declare my praise.

With Jesus Christ in the world there is always water in our deserts, and hope in the midst of our danger.