First Presbyterian Church of Elizabethton's Podcast

Readings: Ephesians 6:10-20
Theme: Practical Nonviolence
The original intent of the “armor of God” passage in Ephesians was to take military imagery and lampoon it for the cause of non-violent resistance. Those who would use this passage to promote actual warfare of course miss the lampoon. The belt of truth, the breastplate of justice, the shoes of peace, the shield of faith, the helmet of salvation, and the sword of Spirit are the “weapons” of choice. Of course, they are not weapons at all. For an image of a non-violent soldier who has put on the “armor of God” we might look to those who illegally sat at segregated lunch counters and took beatings for it,or who stand in front of Israeli bulldozers, or who have learned to communicate nonviolently when it would “feel so much better” to lash out.

Theme: The Myth of Redemptive Violence
“We are number one! My daddy can take your daddy. We are the most powerful nation in the world. We are FIRST Presbyterian Church.” Even Jesus’ disciples argued among themselves as to which one of them was the greatest. Jesus put a stop to it. He didn’t tell them to “be nice.” He told them that they needed to change their entire outlook. The violence of the domination system was crushing and unjust. How do we break the violence against Earth, against the poor, against the marginalized, and against the enemy? The only way to defeat it was to die to it. “The tyrants lord it over you,” said Jesus. “That is not the way it will be for you. To be great, you must serve.”

Isaiah 27:1 Matthew 26:51-52
Theme: The Domination System and the Myth of Redemptive Violence
You see it in cartoons and movies. You hear it from our elected leaders regardless of political affiliation. You see it and hear it in every nation. It is legitimized by religion. It is the myth that has been told in every conceivable medium since the dawning of civilization.

That myth is, “Violence saves.” Good guys beat the bad guys because they are better fighters and have cooler weapons. Violence is the only way to really win. This is the myth of redemptive violence.

We learned it as children by watching Saturday morning cartoons. Our earlier generations heard it from the radio. Children today enact it through video games. It is everywhere. It is the way “the world” works. The scandal of Jesus is that he overcame “the world” through nonviolent resistance. Dare to be scandalous?

This is from Walter Wink’s book, The Powers That Be: “The crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus is the assurance that there is a power at work in the world to transform defeat into divine victory. In that sense, nonviolence never fails, because every nonviolent act is a revelation of God’s new order breaking into the world.” P. 135. Easter is the celebration of nonviolence. It is the claim and the act that peace through justice is more sustainable than Empire’s claim and act that peace comes through violence and oppression. Keep fighting (nonviolently) for justice, beloveds. It’s not over ‘til it’s over.

Reading: John 17:1-26

Theme: I In Them
Jesus prays to the Father. He prays that all will be one as he is one with the Father. “May they be one with us....” The last verse is key: “I also revealed to them who you really are and will continue to reveal that, so the love you have for me may be in them, and I in them.” The symbolic language of 1st century supernaturalism was attached to Jesus. That is difficult to get past.

A mystical or natural reading of this gospel and of Jesus sees Jesus as a human being who developed an elevated consciousness. This elevated consciousness is available to anyone. It isn’t necessarily spooky or supernatural. It is about living a life with meaning.

Most of the time our concerns are quaint. We worry a great deal about them. The mystical life is taking time to put our quaint concerns into perspective. We take the time to examine our lives, our ideals, and our values, and to watch the lilies. It is all pretty strange, really, this life we have been thrust into. It is nice, now and then, to travel lightly and to live life as if it is holy and to see the Divine One, the Human One, in everyone. In you too.

In John 16:1-33, Jesus says that it will be better for his followers if he leaves. He also promises that he will return. A literal reading sees Jesus going "up" to heaven and literally returning someday. A mystical reading might regard Jesus' leaving and returning as a symbol for the external becoming internal. It is like the Buddhist koan, "If you meet Buddha on the road, kill him." The point is that if we have externalized the Buddha we are not enlightened. We are the Buddha. Similarly, Jesus, the Human One, "returns" when we realize that we are the Human One. We cannot realize that unless we let him go as an external savior. He needs to "leave" so he can "return" in us. We are the ones we have been waiting for. Lighten up.

Reading: John 11:1-57

Theme: Resurrection and the Life

Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead and before he raises him he says to Martha, “Your brother will be raised.” Martha,thesisterofLazarus,saysshe knows that he will be raised on the last day and Jesus says, “I am the resurrection and life; those who believe in me, even if they die, will live, but everyone who is alive and believes in me will never die.” What can that possibly mean? Whatever it means, Jesus is telling Martha that her religious doctrine isn’t big enough to grasp this mystery. John Shelby Spong in his book Eternal Life asserts that we need to look beyond religion, beyond theism, and beyond heaven and hell. He calls eternal life a movement from self-consciousness to universal consciousness. Others say we come back and live again and again. Still others say we enter a peaceful rest like before we were born. No one knows for sure although many claim to know. I’ll just let the mystery be.

Reading: John 10:1-42

Theme:The Good Shepherd

Jesus is the good shepherd. And he is the gate. And he is the anointed one. And he is God’s son. And he is one with the Father. Jesus is all these things. In the synoptic gospels, Jesus points away from himself. In the Gospel of John it is all about Jesus. But it is Jesus as the Human One who is all these things. He is so in control that he can give his life away and take it back. The author of John’s gospel misreads Psalm 82. The psalmist is not calling human beings gods as the author has Jesus state. The psalmist is actually addressing gods and telling them they are not behaving as gods should behave and so will be demoted and die like mortals. The misreading is instructive. For the author, the transcendent is in the human, inparticular,inJesus. AmysticalreadingofJesus and the gospel takes the next logical step. The transcendent is not in Jesus alone, but in us too. All those titles and metaphors we give to Jesus are for you as well, if you will accept them and live them.

Jesus heals a man born blind and this leads to conflicts with the authorities. Jesus has plenty of such conflicts in the Gospel of John. The conflict is not about blindness or healing but about who Jesus is and “where he comes from.”

Is he the real thing? If so, the authorities wonder, why is our religion unable to recognize him? Jesus is bigger than the religion. That is still true today. Pointing out the blindness of the religious leaders is the point of this story. They cannot see even as the man born blind can see.

The authentic life, that is seen in the Human One, Jesus, is not seen with eyes, but with insight. Religion at its most narrow is about controlling access to authenticity. It doesn’t have to be that way. Religion can be an invitation to a life-long journey of self-discovery and a celebration of the holy that is all around us. Which would you prefer?

It is Evolution Sunday.
Today we honor Charles Darwin, an evolutionary mystic. His life (and the symbol of his life) is a tribute to the power of reason and observation. Because human beings have developed these skills we have learned a great deal about how our universe works and how life has evolved on Earth. We know quite a bit more than did the authors of the Bible about the universe. We need to read these ancient texts like the Gospel of John with an awareness of its limits.

The ideas of the first century simply cannot translate to the twenty-first without modification. These ancient works can teach us a thing or two as well. But how do we learn? A mystical reading of this gospel and of Jesus may be a way to bridge the gap. Rather than to think of Jesus as the second person of the Trinity who came down from heaven and so on and so forth, we might see him as human being who had an increased sense of consciousness. Because many exaggerated tales were told about him he has become an icon for the authentic life.

In today’s text, he is reported to have said that only when a kernel dies will it produce a great harvest. The observation is that everything dies. But from these deaths new life comes. Stars die. Planets die. Humans die. Jesus, the Human One, dies as well. From his death comes new birth. Such is life. The via creativa.

John 6:1-71
Theme: The Bread of Life
In the sixth chapter of John, Jesus feeds 5,000 people with a child’s lunch and has twelve baskets of leftovers.

Obviously, we are not talking about an event, but a parable about the authentic life. The signs and sayings of Jesus are the storyteller’s creations (or are from a stock of stories) and they are attributed to Jesus.  The point is not whether it happened or not. We are invited by this story and by the ensuing discussion Jesus has regarding bread about what it might mean to live life as if life itself was a miracle.

What if we lived confident that no matter what happens we always have enough “bread?” Could we trust that much? What if we saw ourselves as “bread” for others?  What stands out most in the Gospel of John is the confidence of Jesus.

It is not the confidence of an external supernatural being. The scandal of the story is that he is a human being no different from any of us except that he has grown to recognize something about himself that we have yet to realize about ourselves. He is the Bread of Life. So are you. Take and eat.

Jesus converses with a Samaritan woman. The two strikes against this conversation are that she is a Samaritan and a woman. She holds her own speaking with Jesus on theological matters. Jesus tells her that he has living, life-giving water. If she drinks of it she will never thirst again. She recognizes that he is the Anointed One and she tells the community. Because of her testimony many people come to believe in Jesus. A mystical reading of this gospel doesn’t stop with a recognition that Jesus is the Anointed One. So are you. The point is not to worship Jesus or to believe things about him, but to go ahead and drink deeply of the living, life-giving water. Drink deeply of life.

This weekend marks the life of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. In many ways he is a modern example of someone who sought to live authentically. That does not mean he was perfect. It means that he found a reason for his life and he pursued it. Like Jesus, King died violently at a young age.

Like Jesus, his death was related to his life. "There is no greater love than to hive up your life for your friends." (John 15:13). Like Jesus, he lived for the pursuit of justice and equality. He was hated by "the world" which is John's word for the forces of domination, inequality, and fear. Like Jesus, he produced fruit, the fruit of love and non-violent resistance both as a way of life and as a way to make pragmatic change.

King was a mystic. So are we. Jesus invited us to participate in the vine and tp produce fruit. The vine is a metaphor for connectedness. We are vital, alive, and able to produce because the sacred flows through us naturally like branches on a vine.

Reading: John 1:19-51
Theme: Baptized With Spirit
In the synoptic gospels, John the Baptist baptizes Jesus. In the Gospel of John, John the Baptist reports that he saw “the spirit coming down like a dove out of the sky, and it hovered over him.” (1:32) There is no baptism of Jesus by John in this gospel.

There is no “Lord’s Supper” or “Communion” in the Gospel of John either. Perhaps the author cares little for those external religious rituals. The Baptist reports that Jesus “baptizes with holy spirit.” That is probably the important thing.

What might that mean? Perhaps it means that life itself is present, beautiful, and sacred. Perhaps it means that we don’t need permission to enter deeply into this life. Perhaps it means that each of us, you and me, have something to do in this life and have something to offer and perhaps we shouldn’t deny that or hide or pretend we aren’t “holy” enough. We are. You are. Beloved.

“I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one gets to the Father except through me.” Most of us have had this passage preached at us. The assumption is that we all know what it means. The meaning is something along these lines: “No heaven for you unless you become a Christian. That means you, non-believers, Muslims, Hindus, and whatever else.”

It is exclusionary Christianity and John’s Gospel has been used as its primary tool and weapon. You can read it that way if you like. What if we chose to read it differently? If Jesus represents the authentic human, then the way of authenticity “the way to the Father” is to be real and authentic.

You live as Jesus lived. You love. You heal. You seek truth. You welcome. You enjoy. You give yourself for others. It has nothing to do with converting to the “right” religion or assenting to the “right” beliefs. It isn’t about getting external rewards (or avoiding external punishments). The reward of this path is internal. “The way, the truth, and the life” isn’t about making it to heaven, but discovering heaven within.

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