Perverse and foolish oft I strayed (J. Barry Vaughn, Apr. 21, 2013)

At the end of a week in which a small Texas town was almost obliterated by an explosion, two powerful bombs killed three persons and injured more than hundred spectators and participants in the Boston Marathon, and the city of Boston came to a screeching halt for an entire day while police hunted for a terrorist, we need to hear the words of Psalm 23: “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want… Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil…”

 

But we need to hear those words not only because of the terrible events in Boston. We need to hear them because (as another song reminds us), “we are poor little lambs who have lost our way… little black sheep who have gone astray.”

 

The other song, by the way, is the theme song of the Yale Whiffenpoofs, otherwise known (at least at Harvard) as the Yale fight song.

 

I want you to listen to the words of Psalm 23 once again:

 

The LORD is my shepherd ;

I shall not want 

He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: 

He leadeth me beside the still waters. 

He restoreth my soul: 

he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake. 

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, 

I will fear no evil: for thou art with me;

thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. 

Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies : thou anointest my head with oil; 

My cup runneth over. 

Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: 

and I will dwell in the house of the LORD forever .

 

The King James’ version may not be as accurate as some more recent translations, but it can’t be beat for poetry.

 

I want to stroll slowly with you through several verses of Psalm 23.

 

The Lord is my shepherd.

 

The first thing to notice about Psalm 23 is that it presupposes that we are sheep,

so maybe the Whiffenpoofs were on to something. Maybe we really ARE “poor little lambs who have gone astray… little black sheep who have lost our way.”                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         But it’s not a very flattering image.

 

I wish the psalmist had said, “The Lord is my lion-tamer” or “The Lord is my falconer” or even “The Lord is my jockey or horse whisperer.”

 

It would be much nicer to be a lion or a falcon or a thoroughbred horse. But we’re stuck with sheep.

 

The second thing to notice is who is doing the shepherding, and I’d like you to notice what Psalm 23 does NOT say. It does not say “God is my shepherd.” If you read this psalm from the King James’ version, you will notice that the word “Lord” is in capital letters. The psalmist used the divine name; he addressed God by name.

 

The psalmist’s God has a name and he invites us to address him by name. The other side of this is that the Good Shepherd not only has a name, but he also addresses us by name.

 

If we go back to the beginning of the 10^th chapter of John’s gospel from which Marguerite read this morning, we would see that Jesus said, The Good Shepherds “calls his sheep by name…”

 

We worship a God who knows our names and who calls us by our names.

 

He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: 

He leadeth me beside the still waters. 

He restoreth my soul: 

he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake. 

 

Why do we need the Lord to make us lie down in green pastures and lead us beside still waters? Isn’t that just common sense?

 

We need God to lead us and guide us because, as psychologist Rollo May says “Humans are the strangest of all God’s creatures; they run fastest when they have lost their way.”

 

We need God to guide us because we have not only lost our way, we are running as fast we can in the wrong direction.

 

Now, most of us do not look lost. On the contrary, we look as though we have our act together. Most of us have jobs, money in the bank, and friends who care for us. But at some time or other, we have all known what it means to be lost.

 

It may have happened when the doctor’s office called with the results of a blood test of biopsy; we may have felt lost when we were “downsized” or whatever euphemism was used to explain the fact that we were being fired; it might have happened when we hesitated before signing the divorce papers. But we all know how it feels to be lost.

 

If you are feeling lost this morning or if you have ever felt lost or if you are afraid that some day you will feel lost, then I have some good news for you.

 

The first piece of good news is this: Look around you. This church is full of good shepherds. There are people here who will love you if you will let them, who will do their best to find you if you get lost. I have not been here very long, but that is something I already know about Christ Church, Las Vegas. You do a good job of shepherding. This is a place where you can not only find your way; it is a place where you can be found – you can be found by God and you can be found by this community. So let the people of Christ Church be good shepherds to you.

 

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, 

I will fear no evil: for thou art with me;

thy rod and thy staff they comfort me

 

Psalm 23 is profoundly realistic. Right after we walk beside still waters and through green pastures, we find ourselves in the valley of the shadow of death. Isn’t that what happens in our own lives? The valley of the shadow of death is right next door to the still waters and the green pastures.

 

Psalm 23 does not tell us that life is perfect, that bad things only happen to people who deserve them.  It tells us that beauty and terror are next door neighbors, but that we are not to fear because God is on our side. And that’s enough.

 

I want to believe in a loving God, but when terrorists blow up the spectators at the Boston Marathon or an explosion takes the lives of half the volunteer fire department in West Texas or there’s a massive earthquake in China, I wonder. How can you believe in a loving, compassionate God allow this to happen. Perhaps even God’s heart breaks over these tragedies.

 

Psalm 23 doesn’t promise us that there will be no death but promises us that God walks with us through the valley of death’s dark shadow.  It doesn’t say that we will have no enemies but assures us that God is with us in the presence of our enemies.

 

I want to conclude on a personal note. Jesus is the good shepherd, not me. But you have asked me to be your shepherd, and I want to be the best shepherd I can be.  I don’t want to let you down, and I certainly don’t want to betray your trust. But I know my own limitations, my weaknesses. Sometimes I feel overwhelmed and frightened. Sometimes I feel lost, too. So I’m going to ask you to bear with me, to understand that I don’t have all the answers and can’t do it all.

 

But I promise you this: I will do my very best. I believe that I can be a good shepherd for you, not because of my own abilities but because I know the Good Shepherd and I will do my best to let him lead me so that I can lead you.

 

We need shepherds because wherever there are sheep, there are also wolves. Sometimes the wolves are disguised as sheep; sometimes they are disguised as shepherds. Make no mistake: Just as there is some sheep in all of us, there may also be some wolf in all of us.  But I will do everything in my power to guard the sheep from the wolves.

 

I want you to notice one last thing about today’s readings. The 23^rd psalm begins beside still waters and leads us through the valley of the shadow of death. But the reading from the book of Revelation takes us beyond the valley of the shadow into heaven itself. And what do we find in John’s vision of heaven?

“After this I looked, and there was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, robed in white, with palm branches in their hands. They cried out in a loud voice, saying, ‘Salvation belongs to our God who is seated on the throne, and to the Lamb!’”

 

The shepherd who prepared a table for us in the presence of our enemies and led us through the valley of the shadow of death goes before us into heaven. But the shepherd who led us has become the Lamb of God who died for us, who takes away the sin, the brokenness, the lostness of the world.

 

Perverse and foolish oft I strayed,
But yet in love You sought me,
And on Your shoulder gently laid,
And home, rejoicing, brought me.

 

"Apostle of the heart set free" (J. Barry Vaughn, April 7, 2013)

The British novelist P.G. Wodehouse wrote a series of comic novels  about the aristocratic but dim-witted Bertie Wooster. In one of the novels, Bertie said that he had failed a course in New Testament because he had been taught that it was wrong to read other people's mail and most of the New Testament was made up of St. Paul's letters.

I think that's a case of doing the wrong thing for the right reason!

Bertie Wooster was right: The largest component of the New Testament does consist of the letters of Paul. The 13 letters by or attributed to Paul amount to only one less than half of the 27 books of the New Testament or almost a third of the New Testament by length.

But there are quite a lot of people who would be just as happy to see Paul excluded from the New Testament , and a number of them are Anglicans. To Thomas Jefferson, Paul was "the first corrupter of the doctrines of Jesus." And to Jefferson's friend, Thomas Paine, he was "a manufacturer of quibbles."

By and large, Anglicans have preferred the gospels, especially the gospel of John, to Paul.

But just consider a few things:

In Matthew's gospel, Jesus tells the parable of the wedding feast. Those who arrived unprepared were sent into the "outer darkness, where there was weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth."

And in the parable of the sheep and the goats (also in Matthew), those who have not cared for the poor and hungry are sent "into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels."

Paul, on the other hand, tells us that "love is patient and kind," that "faith, hope, and love abide but the greatest of these is love."

One of the most common charges brought against Paul is that he was a misogynist or anti-woman. There is no doubt that Paul or one of his disciples writing in Paul's name urged women to be obedient to and subordinate to their husbands. But it was also Paul who selected a woman, Phoebe, a deacon of the Corinthian church, to be his personal ambassador to the church in Rome. And it was Paul who declared that two woman of the Philippian church - Euodia and Syntyche -were his "fellow workers."

 Furthermore, I believe that the greatest chapter in the NT is the 8th chapter of Romans, at the end of which Paul declares, "I am convinced that nothing in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord."

 To understand Paul, it's helpful to know a little background. In the first century, there were 2 great divisions of Judaism - Palestinian Judaism and Diaspora Judaism. The diaspora consisted of the Jews who lived outside of Palestine. There were Jewish communities in all the great cities of the Roman empire - Rome, Athens, Corinth, Alexandria, Antioch, and so on. It is estimated that there were about 4 million Jews in the first century, and about 3 million of them lived outside of Palestine.

 Paul was a Jew of the Diaspora. For the Jews of the Diaspora, Greek was their first language. Hebrew was the language of the Torah and the synagogue.

 The Book of Acts tells us that Paul was a Roman citizen from the city of Tarsus in Asia Minor or present day Turkey. But Acts also tells us that Paul studied with Rabbi Gamaliel in Palestine.

 One mystery about Paul is his name. We are told that he was called Saul until his conversion and Paul afterward. This is probably not exactly correct. More than likely, Jews of the Diaspora had 2 names: a Hebrew name used by other Jews and a Greek name they used outside the Jewish community. Saul is a Hebrew name, and Paul a Greek name.

 But the most famous story about Paul is the story of his conversion in the 9th chapter of Acts. Paul, a disciple of the most famous and important rabbi of the first century, had become the chief persecutor of Jesus' followers. He was so fierce in his determination to persecute Christians that he was on his way from Jerusalem to Damascus - a journey of about 100 miles in a day when such journeys were difficult and dangerous - to continue the persecution.

 Lo and behold, as Paul was riding along on his ass, when all of a sudden, a light from heaven knocked him off it! The heavenly light shone and a voice from above said, "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?" He asked, "Who are you, Lord?" The reply came, "I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. But get up and enter the city, and you will be told what you are to do."

 One of the most interesting things about this story is that Paul never tells it himself. In his letter to the Galatians, Paul simply says that he was called by God and received a revelation. In 1 Corinthians 15, Paul says that the Risen Christ appeared to him "last of all, as to one untimely born." And that's it - Paul himself tells us nothing about the heavenly light, the voice from above, or about being knocked of his... uh... donkey. And that's it -Paul says nothing else about his conversion.

 But it is this experience, the so-called conversion of Paul, that I want to talk about, because in many ways it is the most problematic part of Paul's story.'

 It is problematic not because of the historical questions it raises: Did it happen the way Acts describes it? Why does Paul himself not tell this story? And so on.

 It is problematic because for many Christians, especially for evangelicals and charismatics, the story of Paul's conversion, his "Damascus road experience," has become a paradigm, a model, for the way that we are supposed to become Christians.

 To be a Christian is to be converted from our sins and wickedness, to give up our vices and embrace virtue.

 It reminds me of the time that Mark Twain went to see his doctor. The doctor said, "Mr. Twain, if you want to continue living, you must stop drinking whisky and smoking cigars." So Twain promptly did that. An elderly widowed school teacher went to the same doctor, who told her, "Madam, if you want to continue living, you must stop drinking whisky and smoking cigars." She said, "But I don't drink whisky or smoke cigars." To which the doctor replied, "Then I'm afraid there's no hope for you." You should always have some vices to give up!

 A lot of evangelicals tell us that to become a Christian is to go through emotional agonies about our sinful past, to undergo a cathartic experience, to kneel in the divine presence and confess our sins and repent of them. It is to walk the aisle at a crusade by Billy Graham or another evangelist and say the so-called "sinners' prayer" with a counselor and sign a card saying that we have turned our life over to God, or made a decision for Christ, or something like that.

 But it is precisely at this point that Paul himself comes to our rescue, because Paul says nothing of the sort is necessary to become a Christian. Paul says that what is important is not our choice, our decision, but God's choice. The important thing is not what we do for God but what God does for us.

 Think back to what I said earlier about the unflattering comparisons made between Paul and the gospels. Paul, it is often said, is the legalist, the Pharisee, the corruptor of the pure teaching of Christ. The gospels, esp John, teach the doctrine of "gentle Jesus, meek and mild." But where is the verse so often held up at the Super Bowl and World Series, "You must be born again"? It is not in Paul; it is in John's gospel.

 Instead, Paul says, "If anyone is in Christ, they are a new creation. The old has passed away, behold, the new has come.  All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation;  that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself..."

 So is conversion necessary? Absolutely. But the conversion we need is not the kind of experience that Paul had on the road to Damascus.

 Make no mistake: there are many people who have had the kind of experience that Paul had on the way to Damascus - a sudden, cathartic, wrenching emotional experience when you see that you had been headed in the wrong direction and God sets your feet on a new and better path. Or in a flash you see the world in a new light, God's truth becomes plain to you. Perhaps some of you have had this kind of experience.

 But the conversion that we all need is of a more mundane variety. Conversion simply means to turn around, to go in a new direction. We all need that conversion. We need it every day. And every day God will supply it, if only we will be attentive, if only we will ask. Because every single day of our lives we find ourselves going in the wrong direction, and we need to turn around, retrace our steps, ask God's forgiveness, and set off again in the right direction.

 Not for a single minute do I believe that there is a single way of becoming or being a Christian. It is different for every single one of us because God made each us different and unique. I believe that most Christians grow into the Christian life from the beginning to the end of their lives. For most Christians, the Christian life begins with baptism and continues with what we are taught by our parents and Sunday school teachers and clergy.

 In most of us the Christian life grows as quietly and gently as the flowers and trees and grass. God does not coerce; God invites. God rarely hits us over the head or blinds us with a heavenly light or deafens us with a thunderous voice from above. Rather, God speaks to us with the "still, small voice" that the prophet Elijah heard. Sometimes the faint light of a distant star is all that we have but even that was enough to guide the wise men to the manger in Bethlehem.

 So, thank God for the gospels and thank God for Paul. One witnesses to the life of Christ and his teachings and the other to what the Spirit has revealed about the significance of that life.

 But it was Paul - apostle of the heart set free - whose own heart was set on fire with the love of God who took the Christian faith throughout the ancient world, making Christianity into a faith that would spread throughout the world.

 "Facing danger at sea, and fearful persecution, Paul became a chosen vessel of the Savior. With his sermons he enlightened the nations, and to the Athenians he revealed the unknown God. Teacher of the nations, Saint Paul, the Apostle, protector of us all, keep us who honor you, safe from every trial and danger."

Easter - Breaking Out and Breaking In (J. Barry Vaughn, Apr. 7, 2013)

I probably haven’t been in Las Vegas to generalize about it, but that’s never stopped me before!  I am struck by the number of gated communities here.  I understand the need for security and have no objection to it, but it is sad to think that we need it. It is even sadder to think of the fear that prompts our need for security.

 

Fear causes us to build walls not only around our homes but also around our hearts. Every hurt, every harsh word, every assault on our pride and self-image adds another brick to that wall.

 

Fear is not the only reason that we build walls. We also build walls of shame around our lives. Shame is the feeling that not only have done something wrong but we ARE something wrong. We fear that we are defective, damaged goods that need to be returned to the store for a refund or traded in for a new model.

 

Another wall we build is the wall of grief. Do you remember Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations? Miss Havisham lives her life behind a wall of grief, wearing the wedding dress she wore on the day her fiancé jilted her. Who else do you know who still lives their life dressed in the rags of mourning behind the walls that grief builds?

 

One of the strongest walls we build is the wall of anger. I know a lot about the wall of anger. It takes a lot to make me angry, but when I get angry, I tend to stay angry. Theologian Frederick Buechner says that of all the seven deadly sins, angry is possibly the most fun. Anger can give us that delicious sense of self-righteousnessness. I’m right and you’re wrong or sometimes even the whole world is wrong. Don’t misunderstand me: there is a time and place for anger, and I believe it is just as dangerous to deny our anger as it is to hang on to it too long. But anger is terribly dangerous. The wall of anger can be almost impossible to penetrate.

 

Today’s gospel reading says, “On the evening of the first day of the week, the doors being shut where the disciples were, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said to them, "Peace be with you." In other words, the disciples had built a wall of fear between themselves and the world that could only be penetrated by the Risen Christ.

 

When the women came to the tomb on Easter morning, they wondered who would roll the stone away, but the disciples were hiding behind an even bigger stone - the stone of fear.

 

The gospel of Easter Day is great, good news, indeed:  Jesus rose from the dead.  If you will, he escaped from the prison of death that awaits each of us.  The great hymns of Easter celebrate this:  “He is risen, he is risen!  Tell it out with joyful voice:  he has burst his three days’ prison; let the whole wide earth rejoice.”

 

But today’s gospel is even better news:  No sooner had Christ broken out of the prison of death than he broke into the prison of fear in which his followers were still trapped.

 

Another hymn by Charles Wesley celebrates the power of the Risen Christ to free us from the prisons of sin, fear, grief, and anger:

 

Long my imprisoned spirit lay

Fast bound in sin and nature’s night;

Thine eye diffused a quickening ray—

I woke, the dungeon flamed with light;

My chains fell off, my heart was free.

I rose, went forth, and followed Thee.

 

Not only did Jesus break out the prison of death and break into the disciples’ prison of fear, he also gave us the key to the prisons of fear, grief, and anger that entrap us.

 

“Jesus said to them again, ‘Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.’ When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.’”

 

“If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven… if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.” In other words, the power to unlock the prisons of fear, grief, and anger are in our hands.

 

Think about the enormous power that the Risen Christ gave to the disciples in that locked room. He gave them the power to release themselves and others from sin, from the power of fear, grief, and anger, from everything that binds and imprisons us and prevents us from reaching our full potential.

 

In other words, Jesus called his disciples in that and every age to exercise the power of priests to bind and loose. He gave us the key to open the doors to the prisons of sin, anger, fear, and grief. The alternative is to choose to be victims. We can stay locked in our dark, airless cells. We can luxuriate in the self-righteousness of anger; we can wear the tattered rags of grief; we can pull the covers of fear over our head.

 

What are the prison doors you need to unlock? What are the offenses that you just can’t forgive? What is the shame that you can barely admit to yourself, much less to anyone else? How long have you been holding on to grief? Jesus has given you the key.

 

 “When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, ‘Peace be with you.’” Jesus’ followers had not yet grasped the reality of the resurrection; they had not yet begun to live into the meaning of Easter.

 

Easter is about Christ’s escape from the tomb, but it is not about his escape from his humanity.  The heart of the Christian faith is the idea of incarnation, the idea that God came among us as one of us, that God took on flesh and blood and bone and lived a fully human life, that God sanctifies all of human life, even our wounds. In Christ, God gathers up all it means to be human and brings it into the divine presence. And to be human is to carry many scars.

 

The Risen Christ offers to let Thomas touch his wounds. That tells me that our wounds can be sources of strength, that our wounds are not things to be ashamed of, but things to wear with pride, if only we will offer them to God. It is only when we let our wounds separate us from each other and from God that they become toxic and sinful.

 

There is a wonderful Buddhist parable. It is said that a certain woman lost her son, her only child. In her grief she went to the Buddha. “Master,” she said, “I know that you can work miracles. I pray that you would restore my son to life.” The Buddha said to her, “I will do this for you. All I ask is that you bring me a single grain of mustard seed.” The woman’s heart leapt with joy, but the Buddha added, “But it must come from a house that has never known sorrow.” And with that, she was plunged into grief again. She knocked on the door of every house and asked if they had known sorrow and listened to their tales of anger, fear, and grief. But she went on from house to house and village to village. Finally at the end of the day she sat on the hillside overlooking the town. And as the sun went down and the lights went on she realized that every one of us knows anger, fear, and grief. Every one of us knows sorrow and suffering and that redemption is found not in escaping our suffering but in embracing it.

 

The miracle of Easter is not so much that Christ rose from the dead; if he was the Son of God, that is what one would expect.  The miracle is that he remains bound by love to his followers, and comes to be with us in the trials, hardships, and fears of human life.

 

What are the prison doors that you need to unlock? Prison? Fear? Anger?  Don’t let them separate you from God and from others.  Even now we can begin to live the reality of the Resurrection.  Take hold of the promise of the Risen Christ:  “Peace be with you”.  In spite of the walls we have built around our hearts, the Risen Christ comes to speak peace.  But he gives us more than a word; he gives us himself.  Just as the Risen Christ stretched out his wounded hands to Thomas, he stretches them out to us. Reach out and take his hand. And then stretch out your hands to others.