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SERMONS

The Eighth Sunday After Pentecost
August 3, 2003

I recently heard Dr. Doug Draper-a clinical psychologist here in Jackson-talk with a group on the topic of loving yourself. Doug reminded us that as infants we all enter the world helpless. Very early we become aware of that and that we must rely on others for survival. As a consequence of this, we discover that it is in our interest to learn how to please those who are in positions to care for us, so that they will be disposed kindly toward us. So from a very early age we learn the importance of doing the right thing so that we will win the approval of those who are important to us.

One consequence of this is that we can begin to see our value as persons as a reflection of how successful we are in winning the approval of others. So, if we do well in "their" eyes, we are good people, and if we dont, we are bad people. Many people spend their entire lives right in this place. Their major concern is finding security and a sense of self-worth, and they do that by constantly working for the approval of those who are important to them. This kind of existence obviously forces one to prove oneself all over again every day because what was done yesterday is history; what is important is what one can do to win approval today.

For those, like us, who believe in a supreme being--in God--the approval of our fellow beings, while still significant, is less important than our relationship with God. However, we frequently feel that what works in our relationships with other people, should also work in our relationship with God. If the way to win the approval of our parents or our spouses or our bosses or our friends is to do those things that will please them, then the way to win the approval of God must be to do those things which will please God.

Today's gospel finds Jesus in conversation with a group of people, at least some of whom were probably among the five thousand he had fed the day before. As John tells the story, the crowd had become so excited at what they had witnessed, that they had tried to force Jesus to become their king. However, since that was not at all what Jesus was about, he had gotten out of there. When they had been unable to find Jesus, they had come across the sea looking for him. When they did find him they wondered aloud how he had gotten across the sea. Jesus ignored their questions however and got right to the point of why they had followed him. And he accused them of totally misunderstanding what the previous day's events had been all about.

"You came after me," he told them, "not because of what you saw happen in front of you, not because of the power that you saw displayed, and the obvious source of that power. You came after me because your stomachs were full, because you want me to fill them again today, and every day. You have completely misunderstood what I am about. I am not about filling stomachs, although that is important; I gave you all what you needed to eat. But I am about more than that. Raise your eyes. Do not focus on the things of this world, on getting by, on making it from one day to the next. Focus rather on that which will endure, that which will last, which comes from God."

And the people, who, just as Dr. Draper assured us, had learned their childhood lessons well, asked, "What must we do, to be doing the works of God? Tell us what we must do so that we can win God's approval. What should we say, how should we behave, so that God will consider us to be "good" people, his kind of people, and be nice to us?"

The answer Jesus gave to them was simple, almost too simple, so simple that it is difficult to believe. "This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent." There is nothing that we have to "do" to win God's approval. There is no particular way we must act so that God will love us. All we must do is believe in the one whom God sent. And when we believe in him, we believe in his message.

One summary of that message can be found earlier in John's gospel, in words that we probably all learned as young children, in words that seem so simple that we may overlook their depth. "For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life."

Think about that verse, and the order of its words. It does not say "God sent his only Son into the world so that those who believed in him might be loved." No. First, and eternally, God loved the world. And God loved every creature that he made. And God loves all who inhabit the world today. Every one. You. Me. There is nothing we can do to gain that love, there is no way that we can work to become worthy of that love. It is ours. Always has been. Always will be. All we have to do is to believe it.

Think of the freedom that gives us. We do not have to live lives of fear. We do not have to constantly judge ourselves. We do not have to worry about the judgment of others. The only judgment that really matters has already been passed down. We are loved. Nothing we can do to earn it. Nothing we can do to lose it. All we have to do is accept it. We can turn it down if we wish. But I am not sure that a better offer is going to come along any time soon.

And knowing that we are loved, we are then free to love others, and to serve others. Not because we ought to, but because, as Paul told the Ephesians, we are "renewed in the spirit of [our] minds, and [can] put on the new nature, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness."

And when we are unloving, when we fall away from that new nature, we are free, free to turn back to God, not in fear, but in true sorrow for our shortcomings, sure of the constancy of his love and of his forgiveness. Jesus said, "Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life; he does not come into judgment, but as passed from death to life."

Thanks be to God.

David Christian
The Chapel of the Cross
Madison, Mississippi

Proper 13B