Why Aren't You?

The Rev. Whitworth Ferguson III
Manassas Presbyterian Church
Manassas, Virginia
April 29, 2007

Why Aren’t You?
Genesis 1:26-31
Psalm 104

“American cities are … ringed with trash
– all of them –
surrounded by piles of wrecked and rusting automobiles,
and almost smothered with rubbish.
Everything we use comes in boxes, cartons, bins,
the so-called packaging we love so much.
The mountains of things we throw away
are much greater than the things we use.
In this, if in no other way,
we can see the wild and reckless exuberance
of our production,
and waste seems to be the index.”
(John Steinbeck, Travels with Charley, 22)

These are not my words,
nor are they the words of some rabid environmentalist.
These words were not written in the last few months,
or even in the last few years.
They were written by the great novelist
John Steinbeck some 47 years ago.
In 1960 he spent the year traveling around the country
exploring its nooks and crannies.
He had a sharp eye and was a keen observer
of the ordinary and the everyday.

He had no political agenda;
he simply did what he did best:
he wrote about what he saw.
And everywhere he went,
he saw garbage, and excess,
and wastefulness.

It would be another decade before we as a nation woke up
and saw what Steinbeck found so obvious.
The first Earth Day back in 1970 brought with it
a realization that we could no longer
use lakes, rivers, and oceans as our sewers,
and we could no longer pour our smoke and filth into the skies.

Growing up in Buffalo,
the effects of our disdain for the environment
were all too apparent.
Right on the shore of Lake Erie, just south of the city,
sat the hulking Bethlehem Steel plant.
Its dozens and dozens of smokestacks poured out
black, acrid, toxic smoke that literally blocked the sun.
It poured metals and poison into the sky and the lake,
turning blue to brown.

Bethlehem was hardly alone.
Just down the Niagara River, right above the magnificent Falls,
were a collection of chemical plants
that poured millions and millions of gallons
of poison into the river each year.
No one looking at the majesty of the Falls
would have had any idea
what was mixed in that water that went over the Cataracts,
but if you went a few miles downriver,
as I did regularly with my cousins,
the effects were all too clear:
tumorous fish floating on the water’s surface;
birds that lived on the fish dying,
poisoned from mercury, lead, arsenic, and other toxins
that were in the tissue of the fish;
and a foul smell rising up from the river
that no boater could escape.
We knew better than even to think about swimming
in that water.
The irony in this was that legend had it that
the name Buffalo came from the French beau fleuve,
which means “beautiful river”.

One of the sparks that captured our collective attention
as a nation was the famous image of the Cuyahoga River
in Cleveland on fire:
the river itself aflame
because of the oily slime that covered the water,
along with all the garbage that floated on the surface.
Time Magazine described the river as,
“Chocolate-brown, oily, bubbling with subsurface gases,
it oozes rather than flows”

My own eyes were opened by a report of the carcass of a whale
that had washed up on a beach in New England.
Whales die of course,
and from time to time their bodies do wash up on beaches,
so that in itself was not newsworthy.
It was how the whale died:
In its feeding, it had ingested human garbage,
probably garbage tossed from a ship,
perhaps a luxury cruise ship,
because up until recently that’s what ships
did with their garbage: tossed it overboard.
Mixed in with the garbage was an otherwise ordinary
empty plastic bleach bottle:
the kind we all buy at the grocery store,
the one-gallon size.
It turned out the bottle was the ideal size
to plug the lower part of the whale’s digestive tract,
killing the whale.

Politicians of every persuasion have been involved
in passing new laws and regulations that have cleaned up
our natural world considerably since that first Earth Day.
But for all the progress we’ve made,
we still have much to do.

I have been struck by the fact that in all the conversations
that we have had since that first Earth Day,
all the debates about how best to clean up our filth,
one voice that has been quiet almost to the point of silence,
has been the church, the followers of Christ,
the children of God.
I have been puzzled by that
since I have never regarded the need
to look after our environment as a political issue
as much as it is a matter of faithfulness.

After all, didn’t God create this world?
Didn’t God look out upon his creation on the sixth day
and find it all good, very good? (Genesis 1:31)
Doesn’t God delight in all of his creation?
After the floodwaters receded, did God limit
his covenant made visible in the rainbow just to humankind?
No: the covenant included all living creatures. (Gen. 9:9ff)

The Psalmist sings the praises of God’s creation in Psalm 104:
“…You stretched out the heavens like a tent,
you set the beams of your chambers on the waters,
you make the clouds your chariot,
you ride on the wings of the wind,
you make the winds your messengers,
fire and flame your ministers.
You set the earth on its foundations,
so that it shall never be shaken.
You cover it with the deep as with a garment;
the waters stood above the mountains.
At your rebuke they flee;
at the sound of your thunder they take to flight.
They rose up to the mountains,
ran down to the valleys
to the place that you appointed for them.
You set a boundary that they may not pass,
so that they might not again cover the earth.

You make springs gush forth in the valleys;
they flow between the hills,
giving drink to every wild animal;…
By the streams the birds of the air have their habitation;
they sing among the branches.
From your lofty abode you water the mountains;
the earth is satisfied with the fruit of your work.”

This is God’s world,
God’s creation,
not ours.
We don’t create; only God can create.
God created and called it all good, all very good.

In our human arrogance, we like to think we can do anything
including creating,
but God is only too happy to knock us off our pedestal
when we begin to think that way.
Just have a look at chapter 38 of Job:
“Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?
Tell me, if you have understanding
Who determined its measurements –
surely you know!
or who stretched the line upon it?
On what were its bases sunk?
Or who laid its cornerstone
when the morning stars sang together
and all the heavenly beings shouted for joy?
Or who shut in the sea with doors
when it burst out from the womb?...
Have you commanded the morning since your days began,
and caused the dawn to know its place,
so that it might take hold of the skirts of the earth…
Have you comprehended the expanse of the earth.
Declare, if you know all this?” (Job 38)

The hymn we just sang is right:
“This is our Father’s World”,
our Father’s world, not ours.
(Maltbie Babcock, 1901)
The hymn was based on text from Psalm 50
in which God leaves us with no doubt:
“For every wild animal of the forest is mine,
the cattle on a thousand hills.
I know all the birds of the air,
and all that moves in the field is mine…
for the world and all that is in it is mine.” (Psalm 50:10ff)

But wait, you say,
didn’t God give us “dominion” over the earth?
Weren’t we told to go out and subdue the earth?
Didn’t we just hear that in the first lesson?
Yes, there’s no question that that’s what we read,
right there at the beginning of the Bible, right in Genesis.
But what does it mean to have dominion over something or someone?
Does it mean we can do whatever we want?
Is that what God intended?

The Hebrew word we translate as “dominion” or “rule” (rdh)
carries with it a strong element of responsibility.
To have dominion over something or someone,
to rule over something or someone, is to have responsibility
for that plant, that animal, or that person,
responsibility for their welfare and wellbeing.
A good ruler is not one who takes whatever he wants,
does whatever he wants, whenever he wants.
A good ruler is a steward of his people, his lands,
his crops, and his animals.

Solomon had dominion over the people of Israel,
but when he prayed to God, what did he ask for:
he asked for wisdom in how he governed
because he knew that the people over whom he had dominion
were not his people, they were God’s people,
He had been entrusted by God to rule over them.
(1 Kings 3:7ff)

To have dominion is to understand the farmer’s adage:
“I didn’t inherit this land from my father,
as much as I was given the responsibility
to look after it for my children.”

The Psalmist who wrote Psalm 104 understood this
as he continued his song of praise for God’s creation:
“The trees of the Lord are watered abundantly,
the cedars of Lebanon that he planted.
In them the birds build their nests;
the stork has its home in the fir trees.
The high mountains are for the wild goats;
the rocks are a refuge for the [rabbits].
You have made the moon to make the season;
the sun knows its time for setting.
You make darkness, and it is night,
when all the animals of the forest come creeping out.
The young lions roar for their prey,
seeking their food from God.
When the sun rises, they withdraw and lie down in their dens.
People go out to work and to their labor until evening.
O Lord how manifold are your works!
In wisdom you have made them all;
the earth is full of your creatures.
May the glory of the Lord endure forever;
may the Lord rejoice in his works.”

You and I are to care for this earth,
we are to care for it for the Creator
precisely because the Creator has given us dominion
given us responsibility to look after his creation,
his creation that he delights in.

God created a delicate balance, and as we are learning,
when we do things that disrupt that balance,
we interfere with God’s creation.
Biblical scholar James May has written,
“To intervene in the flow of water,
the habitat of birds and animals,
the topography of earth,
is to breach an intricate divine ecology into which
human life is integrated….
We are learning slowly that we damage ourselves,
live in alienation from that to which we belong,
and threaten the future of life,”
when we live without regard for this earth
or how our actions affect it.

It is time for us to live green and act green,
not for political reasons,
but because our faith demands that we do.
It is time for churches to take the lead
because this is our Father’s World.

In a recent article in the New York Times,
author Thomas Friedman observed,
“One of the things that struck me about the term ‘green’
was the degree to which, for so many years,
it was defined by its opponents,
by the people who wanted to disparage it.”
(New York Times Magazine, 42, April 15, 2007)

Let’s embrace that term because of our faith,
because we have been given dominion over the earth,
because we understand the responsibility
that comes with having dominion,
because God rejoices in his creation.

As a man of faith,
child of God, and disciple of Jesus Christ,
I will state here and now that I am
proud to be green,
and I will go farther: I will say that
I am proud to be a tree-hugger,
proud because I glorify and honor the one who created the trees:
whether it is a beautiful cherry tree in its peacock best display
in early Spring,
or a sugar maple ablaze with color in the fall,
or a mighty sequoia out in California
that stretches so high in the sky that the very top
must tickle God’s feet as he walks the heavens.

Being a good steward means that we are called to learn to use
the resources that God has entrusted us with responsibly,
not just for our own comfort, but always mindful
of the generations to come.
Being a good steward is remembering that how we live today
will determine whether a group of children will gather here
in this Sanctuary in a clean, safe world to mark
the second 140 years of this congregation.

Are you willing to learn more about the impact that you have
on the divine ecology that God has created?
Are you willing to accept your responsibility as a steward
of God’s Creation?
Are you ready to remember that this is our Father’s world?
Are you ready to live green as a matter of your faith,
as a child of God and disciple of Jesus Christ?

Are you ready to do these things so that
the glory of the Lord may endure forever?
So that you and I may be good and faithful stewards
of all of God’s creation?
So that the Lord, our Creator,
may rejoice forever in his works?

AMEN

Another Look

The Rev. Whitworth Ferguson III
Manassas Presbyterian Church
Manassas, Virginia
April 15, 2007

Another Look
John 20:19-31
Acts 2:29-36

I think Thomas has spent the past 2000 years
stuck with a bad reputation,
a reputation he does not deserve.
Think about it: “Doubting Thomas”.
That’s how we have thought of this man,
this disciple,
this man who followed our Lord,
both before and after the crucifixion.
This man, who according to legend,
took the gospel as far as India.
I think Thomas needs some help,
some reputation rehabilitation.

Let’s have a look at the text from John:
On that first Easter evening
the disciples were huddled behind locked doors,
hiding from the authorities whom they were sure
were hot on their trail,
eager to arrest them and kill them.
I cannot imagine they were quiet, though:
there had to have been a buzz in that room
as they talked about what Mary Magdalene had told them:
How she had seen Jesus,
seen Jesus as alive as he had been just three days earlier,
how she at first mistook him for the gardener,
but then heard that voice that was peace itself
and knew immediately that it was Jesus.

They didn’t believe Mary;
the whole story sounded too fantastic.
They had all seen him take his last breath
from the cross.
They all knew his lifeless body
had been put in that tomb,
a stone rolled against it
and later sealed by Pilate’s Roman legion.
Those were all facts.
How could there be any credibility in Mary’s story?

When Mary first went to the tomb and found it empty
she immediately told Peter and John.
They had been intrigued enough to have gone to the tomb.
They’d seen that the stone had been rolled aside;
they’d seen the linen burial cloths lying
where Joseph of Arimathea
had set the body on Friday night.

Peter, the one Jesus had looked to for leadership
walked away from the tomb confused,
uncertain as to what to believe.
John’s gospel tells us,
“for as yet they did not understand the scripture,
that [Jesus] must rise from the dead.” (John 20:9)

It was after Peter and John had walked away
that Mary saw her Lord, Jesus in the flesh.
She then told all the disciples, “I have seen the Lord.”

But who believed her?
Why would they believe such a story?
How could they believe that Jesus was alive?

And then, there he was,
their Teacher, their Master, their Lord:
Jesus, standing in that room with them.

The men stood there in stunned silence,
eyes riveted on Jesus.
Jesus spoke to them,
“Peace be with you.”
And with that, what did he do to the awestruck group?
He held out his hands
and he showed them to the group gathered there.
He showed them the scars on his hands,
the scar on his side where the soldier
had so coldly, so ruthlessly,
pierced his flesh as he hung dying on the cross.

They all looked at his body,
the flesh, the bone: this was no ghost.
It was real;
he was real.
But no one said what they were all thinking:
how could this be?

Jesus broke the silence with his words,
“Peace be with you.
As the Father has sent me, so I send you.
Receive the Holy Spirit.
If you forgive the sins of any,
they are forgiven them,
but if you retain the sins of any,
they are retained.”

And with that he was gone.
Gone.
Silently, as quickly as he had come.
Gone.
Was it real?
Or in their state of utter emotional exhaustion,
had they imagined the whole thing?

Thomas wasn’t there to witness what the others had seen.
None of the other gospels, nor any of the apocryphal sources
explain why Thomas was not there.
Perhaps he had been sent out to buy some bread
and some fish for supper.
Perhaps he had been sent out to scout around
to learn whether the Roman soldiers were looking for them.
Whatever the reason, he was not there.
So when he returned, the other disciples told him
“We have seen the Lord.”

And Thomas then offered that response that has made him famous:
“Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands,
and put my fingers in the mark of the nails
and my hand in his side, I will not believe.”

But was he asking for anything the others had not had?
Mary Magdalene had seen Jesus in the flesh
in the garden, and she believed.
The rest of the apostles had seen Jesus in the flesh
and they believed.

Luke doesn’t mention Thomas,
but his account is quite similar to John’s:
When Jesus appeared to the disciples
he stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.”
The disciples were “startled and terrified
and thought they were seeing a ghost.”
Jesus saw their fear and responded,
“Why are you frightened,
and why do doubts arise in your hearts?
Look at my hand and my feet;
see that it is I myself.
Touch me and see….” (Luke 24:36ff)
“Why do doubts arise in your hearts?
Look at me; touch me, and see…”

What Thomas wanted was the same opportunity
the others had had.
Yes, blessed is the one who believes without seeing,
but was Thomas really any more of a doubter than the others?

The more important words where those he spoke
when he did have the chance to see Jesus,
to see the scars,
to touch him,
to know that Jesus was risen from the dead:
“My Lord and my God!”
There was no doubt,
no hesitancy,
nothing but faith,
powerful faith.

Now this begs the question for us:
Why can’t we have the same opportunity?
It almost seems unfair, doesn’t it?
We are asked to believe, when we have not seen.
We hear Jesus’ words, and agree, yes,
blessed is the one who has not seen,
and yet has come to believe,
who takes things on faith.
But we are human, afterall,
rational men and women,
often skeptical,
wanting evidence, proof,
anything that would help make believing
help make having faith just a bit easier.

Think of the conviction each of us would have
if we could only just see Christ the way the apostles did
in that dark room that first Easter evening,
see the scars,
touch the body,
feel the flesh and the bone:
to know for certain.
Have the same experience Mary Magdalene had;
have the same experience all the disciples had.

But, of course, we can see the living Jesus,
the risen Christ,
just as clearly as those exhausted men and women did
in that room so long ago.
You heard me say that to our children last week.

We can see Jesus in the face of one another;
in the face of all God’s children.
We see Jesus in this community that gathers here each Sunday
to worship God in the name of Jesus.
We see Jesus in the way we embrace the children who
fill our Sanctuary with wonderful chaos and laughter.
We see Jesus in each group that gathers together
to do God’s work:
each Ministry Team,
our Deacons, our Elders,
the Prayer Shawl Group
the Youth Groups.
Take a walk down the hallway on a weekday morning
and you will see Jesus in the face of every child
who comes here to participate in the ministry
we offer through our Early Learning Center.

Jesus is present every time we reach out in love.
Jesus is present each time we put aside
anger, resentment,
pettiness, jealousy,
envy, or fear.
Jesus is present each time we offer forgiveness,
each time we offer mercy to one another.
He is as present and visible as he was
to Thomas and the other Disciples.

The scars on Jesus’ body are also right there before us, too.
We see the scars in violence in homes,
in communities, in war not just in the Middle East
but in too many nations throughout the world.
We see the scars in contention and anger;
In selfishness, bitterness, acrimony.

We see the scars when an elderly person dies alone;
We see the scars in the face of a hungry child,
a frightened mother,
a father who has given up hope for himself and his family.
We see the scars in 35 million men, women, and children
who live in poverty in this, the wealthiest nation on earth.

We see the scars when we look a person
whose skin color is different
or whose accent is different, or
who simply behaves or thinks differently,
and think contemptuously of that person,
or make racist or sexist,
or any kind of derogatory comment.

Churches are filled with the presence of Jesus,
but it is also easy to see the scars of Jesus in churches
in petty gossip, in complaints,
in an unwillingness to work with others,
in insisting on one’s own way.

I think it is time to give Thomas a break.
I think it is time to see in Thomas
what was in all the disciples,
what is in each of us:
a dose of skepticism as we struggle each day
to grow in faith.

Let’s learn from Thomas,
from his words, “My Lord and My God”,
from his faithful obedience
as he lived the rest of his days in faith,
serving God through Jesus Christ,
working each day to heal Christ’s scars,
as he sought to give life to Christ,
to help all the world to see what he had seen:
the risen Christ,
the living Christ.
For Christ is risen;
Christ is alive, always before us.

And anytime we don’t see Christ,
all we need to do is take another look.
AMEN

What He Didn't See

The Rev. Whitworth Ferguson III
Manassas Presbyterian Church
Manassas, Virginia
April 8, 2007: Easter Sunday

What He Didn’t See
Acts 10:34-43
Luke 24:1-12

The women watched from a distance
as Joseph of Arimathea took Jesus’ body down from the cross.
He laid the body gently on the ground
and wrapped Jesus in a clean linen cloth.
Joseph then picked up the body effortlessly,
as though it was weightless,
and carried it a short distance
to what looked like the mouth of a cave.

Mary Magdalene and the other women
knew that this was Joseph’s own tomb,
one he had had hewn from the rock for himself and his family.
Joseph was an important man,
a Councilor in the Sanhedrin,
a leader in the Temple,
but he had also been a follower of Jesus,
and they knew that he was
as overcome with grief as they were.
They looked on as Joseph carefully laid
Jesus’ body inside the tomb
and then, in the long shadows of sunset,
watched as he and another man –
it looked like Nicodemus --
rolled a large stone across the opening.

The women noted the landmarks
so that they could find this spot again.
They still had work to do to anoint the body with myrrh,
and other fragrant spices and ointments,
as was the custom,
but with the sunset came the beginning of the Sabbath,
and the Commandment was clear
that they would have to wait
until the first light on Sunday morning
before they could return.
They walked away, slowly, quietly,
their hearts overwhelmed with emotion.

On the morning after the Sabbath,
Sunday, the first day of the week,
they returned to the tomb
even before the first, red rays of the sun
had begun to inch over the hills to the east.
The women had work to do
and they were determined to get on with it.

As they approached the tomb,
they could not help but notice,
even in the darkness:
the mouth of the cave was open,
the large stone that had been set in place
by Joseph and Nicodemus
had been rolled to the side.
They looked at one another in silence,
each of them wondering,
each of them fearing.
The approached the tomb cautiously, silently, carefully.
Each went through the opening into the tomb,
and as soon as their eyes adjusted to the darkness,
their worst fears were confirmed:
the body of their beloved Teacher,
their master,
their Lord, was gone.
Gone!
Only the linens remained
outlining the body that had been placed there so carefully,
so lovingly Friday evening

Who could have done such a thing?
Why would anyone have taken Jesus?
Hadn’t Pilate even gone so far
as to have had the tomb sealed
and guarded against just such a thing?

“Suddenly two men in dazzling clothes stood beside them.
‘Why do you look for the living among the dead?’
He is not here, but has been raised.
Remember how he told you, while he was still in Galilee,
that the Son of Man must be handed over to sinners
and be crucified,
and on the third day rise again?’”
(Luke 24:4ff)

Even in their fear, they remembered Jesus’ words.
But as they looked at one another they realized
that the two men who had appeared so suddenly,
had disappeared just as quickly;
the tomb was once again empty and dark.

They climbed out, and quickly returned to where the eleven
were staying, where they had been hiding since Friday,
behind locked doors.
They told the group what they had seen
and what they had heard.
“…But those words seemed to [the men] an idle tale,
[so much nonsense]
and they did not believe them.
But Peter got up, and ran to the tomb,
stooping, and looking in,
he saw the linen cloths by themselves,”
… (Luke 24:11ff)
His jaw dropped as he looked into the void.
All he saw was emptiness,
darkness.
Nothing. Nothing.
Just the burial cloths;
Nothing.

The sun began to climb in the sky,
flooding the garden all around him in light,
but Peter’s eyes saw nothing but darkness,
nothing but emptiness,
nothing but death.

Had the women really seen something, or someone?
And what did those words mean:
"Why do you look for the living among the dead?
He is not here, but has been raised.”

Why hadn’t he paid better attention to Jesus’ words
while he was still alive, still with them?!
Surely his teacher must have told them something,
something, that would help him figure this all out.
But his mind was blank.

He turned from the tomb,
alone in the stillness of the early morning.
Hadn’t Jesus said something about
the Son of Man dying and then rising on the third day?
What had he said?
What were the words?
Remember, Peter, Remember!

“After they kill the Son of Man,
on the third day, he will rise again”
(Luke 18:33)
Yes, he remembered, now.
Those were the words Jesus had spoken.
Spoken not once,
not twice,
but three different times!
The last time not even two weeks ago.

But even as he remembered,
his face flushed red as shame overwhelmed him.
He recalled the first time Jesus had said those words,
how he pulled Jesus aside away from the others
and rebuked him, “God forbid it Lord!
This must never happen to you.”
Jesus’ response was immediate and angry:
“You are a stumbling block to me,
for you are setting your mind not on divine things,
but on human things.”
(Matthew 16:22)

How many times had he been just that:
a stumbling block to his Lord?
How many times had he shown himself to be so clumsy,
so faithless, so weak?
How many times had he tried Jesus’ patience?
How many times had his Teacher looked to him for leadership
only to find him lacking?
How many times had he failed his Lord?

He thought back to the Passover meal
just three days before:
Hadn’t the Teacher acted differently?
Why hadn’t he noticed?
He only now thought about what Jesus had said that night
as he held up the Passover bread,
the unleavened bread,
“This is my body, which is given for you.
Do this in remembrance of me.” (Luke 22:19)
And then when Jesus took the fourth cup,
after all the Hallel Psalms had been sung
and said, “This cup that is poured out for you
is the new covenant in my blood.” (L22:20)
What had he meant?
And when they got to the garden after dinner
why had he not been able to stay awake?
Why had he let the wine and the late hour get the better of him?

Hadn’t his Teacher, his rabbi, his Master, His Lord
looked him squarely in the eye and told him
that that very night he would deny Jesus?
Deny him, say he didn’t even know the man!
Not once, not twice, but three separate times.
And hadn’t his Teacher been right?

Some rock!
he felt like so much loose stone,
not even gravel, but pebbles to be kicked,
scattered by the wind,
washed away by the rain.

The only course left for him was to return north
back to the his life as a fisherman.
Perhaps there, on the waters, he could hide his shame
and forget, forget.
And so, Peter headed back to the others,
back to the locked room, the closed door,
back to hiding until they could safely slip away
from the city mixed in with crowds.


What Peter saw as he looked into the tomb
was death, emptiness,
despair, hopelessness.
What he didn’t see in that tomb was light:
Light that was his in the Resurrection.
What he didn’t see in that tomb was hope:
Hope that was his in the Resurrection,
What he didn’t see in that tomb was new life:
New life that was his in the Resurrection.
What he didn’t see was redemption and salvation:
Redemption and salvation that were his in the Resurrection.

Through Christ’s resurrection,
Peter would no longer be the stumbling, impetuous,
temperamental fisherman he had been.
All that was in the past now,
even if he didn’t see it.
In Christ’s resurrection, Peter was reborn,
reborn to be all those things Jesus had called him to be,
to do all those things Jesus had called him to do.

He would be the rock on which the church was built;
He would be a fisher of men and women.
He would have his mind set on divine things
rather than things of the world.
He would be fearlessly faithful,
confident, no stumbling block to himself or to Christ.

As he peered into the darkness and saw such emptiness,
he could not see that soon
he would be standing before a crowd saying,
“God raised Jesus up, having freed him from death,
because it was impossible for him to be held in its power….
Let the entire House of Israel know with certainty that God
has made Jesus both Lord and Messiah.”
(Acts 2)

The Peter who had looked into the tomb with such anguish,
and the Peter Luke tells us about as he continues the story
just a few pages later in the Acts of the Apostles
seem like two different men, and they are:
for that was the promise given Peter in the Resurrection.

And that is our promise, too,
for Peter’s story is in so many ways our story, too.
Who doesn’t struggle and stumble with faith?
Who doesn’t have his or her mind focused too firmly
and too frequently on the things of this world?

But in Christ’s resurrection we too have been given new life:
In Christ’s resurrection we have been reconciled to God,
all our sins forgiven,
and graced with the promise of life eternal.

Peter helps us to see through the darkness,
to see the light,
to understand that we have been given
“ a new birth into a living hope
through the resurrection of Jesus Christ
and into an inheritance that is imperishable…”
(1 Peter 1:3)
“an inheritance that is imperishable”

But God did not raise Jesus from the dead,
just so we could sing out Alleluia and shout out,
“He is Risen!” on Easter Sunday.
Easter is not about bunnies and baskets and bonnets.

God raised Jesus for us to follow him,
to follow him as fearlessly as Peter,
each of us willing to step over the gunwale of the boat in faith,
our eyes fixed firmly on the Risen Christ;
each of us willing to take the word out,
not to convert,
for that is what God does through the Spirit,
but to share the good news of God’s love,
God’s mercy, God’s goodness.
Each of us in our own way
working to feed Christ’s sheep,
tend Christ’s lambs.
Each of us a piece of the foundation of the church,
the Body of Christ, built in the name of Jesus Christ.
To follow as Peter did, in action and discipline,
with our minds no longer set on the things of this world,
but on the things of God.

This is the message of Easter:
the new life that is ours in the Resurrection,
the reason why the angels at the Tomb said to the women,
“He is not here...”.

It is Easter!
Rejoice in the empty cross!
Rejoice that God raised Jesus,
our Lord and Savior!
Raised him for you and for me,
Raised him to give us life,
Raised him to give us hope,
Raised him that we need never walk in darkness,

Hear the words of the Psalmist:
“O give thanks to the Lord, for he is good;
his steadfast love endures forever!...
The Lord is God and he has given us light.”
(Psalm 118)
For Christ is risen!
Christ is risen!
Christ is risen, indeed!
Alleluia!!
AMEN

What Was He Thinking?

The Rev. Whitworth Ferguson III
Manassas Presbyterian Church
Manassas, Virginia
April 1, 2007
Palm Sunday

What Was He Thinking?
Mark 11:1-11/Litany of the Palms
Zechariah 9:9-10

We can picture it, can’t we?
Jerusalem 2000 years ago,
hot, dry, the sun hanging red in the sky
from the clouds of dust kicked up by the relentless parade
of people and animals,
thousands, tens of thousands
teeming into the city for the Passover.

The Temple was the focal point for everyone.
The din of coins the backdrop,
as the moneychangers did brisk business,
taking coins from lands far and wide
and exchanging them for the local currency,
less their steep markup of course,
so pilgrims could buy doves and other animals for sacrifices.
The coins rattled
and blood flowed steadily, copiously all week long.

And then there in the hazy sunshine, the noise, the chaos
came a man, riding into the city,
riding on the back of a donkey.
riding along slowly, deliberately.

Even the youngest of children looking at the scene would have
remembered their Scripture from the prophet Zechariah:
“Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion!
Shout aloud, O daughter Jerusalem!
Lo your king comes to you
triumphant and victorious is he,
humble and riding on a donkey, on a colt,
the foal of a donkey….
He shall command peace to the nations.”
(Zechariah 9:9-10)

But could this man be the one?
The one they were waiting for, praying for?

Crowds ran before Jesus,
walked along beside him,
and danced behind him,
all shouting and carrying on.
The gospel accounts differ as to the size of the crowds.
Matthew says “very large”,
while Mark suggests a much smaller group.
John is the one who tells us that they were palm branches
the people waved.
Luke tells us nothing about the people shouting out “Hosanna”.

Whatever the size of the crowd,
the people were filled with excitement,
eager to wave their branches,
eager to shout out, sing out,
for they were filled with hope that this Jesus was the one:
the Son of David, the great warrior King,
who had come to reestablish the great nation of Israel.
“Blessed is the coming kingdom of our ancestor David!”
(Mark 11:10)

The fact that Jesus was on a donkey,
rather than on a mighty steed,
the fact that he brandished neither the sword nor the shield
of a great warrior seemed to escape their notice.

But it didn’t matter; they were there for a celebration.
It was Passover, a great holiday,
and the city was bursting with people
from throughout Judea, Samaria, Galilee,
and far-flung lands.
There was even someone from the city of Cyrene,
almost a thousand miles to the west
on the north coast of Africa.
The faithful had come to remember that day
more than 1200 years earlier,
when the angel of death passed over the houses
of the children of Israel.
That day when the children of Israel were freed
from centuries of slavery in Egypt,
freed to begin their journey following Moses into the wilderness
and then on to the Promised Land.

Can you picture the scene?
People shouting, children laughing, dogs barking,
the clouds of dust kicked up by the feet of
thousands as they shuffled through the streets.

But turn your gaze away from the people for a moment
and focus your attention on the man astride the donkey.
What was he doing?
Was he waving to people as he rode along?
Did he have any palm branches in his hand?
Was he smiling, singing, joining in the revelry?

Look at his face.
Look at his eyes.
Look into his eyes.
What was he thinking?
What was he thinking as he rode along?
What was he thinking as he looked at those faces,
the men, women, and children, dancing, laughing,
shouting, palm branches in hand?

Had we been there and had we looked at that sun-baked face,
I don't think we would have been able to figure out
what Jesus was thinking.
I think his face would have been inscrutable,
a face that would have told us nothing
as he took in the scene around him.

Was he thinking,
“Do they know what they are asking for as they shout ‘Hosanna’?
Don’t they know that that’s why my Father in Heaven sent me,
to do just that, to save them?”

Perhaps he was thinking about scripture,
God’s words spoken through the prophet Isaiah,
“Who among you fears the Lord,
and obeys the voice of the servant?
Who walks in darkness and has no light?
…Listen to me, you who seek the Lord!” (Isaiah 50:10)

His mind might have been on the 12
who had come into the city with him.
They had such porous faith,
so solid one moment, so weak the next.
They’d been with him day after day,
heard his teachings, watched him,
and still he didn’t even have to look in their eyes
to know what they were thinking;
he knew they were afraid,
afraid that even now they were attracting too much attention,
afraid of the centurions,
afraid of the Temple leaders.

Perhaps he was thinking that all those who were celebrating
that afternoon would abandon him before week's end,
voices that were shouting out,
“Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord,”
would in just a few days be shouting “Crucify! Crucify!”
Others who couldn’t be silenced at that moment
in their exuberance would soon be still as stone.
And still others, so eager to join in the spectacle today
would simply melt into the crowds,
and disappear into the darkness.

What about you?
What are thinking as we begin Holy Week?
Are you thinking,
how nice to have a few days off from work or school?
Are you thinking how much you have to do
to get ready for next weekend?
Are you thinking that the weather forecast doesn’t look
very promising for the end of the week?

It is my hope that you are you thinking about what you will do
to walk with Jesus this week;
To walk with him through this Holy Week,
walk with him by reading the Bible,
remembering the stories,
celebrating the Passover,
and standing at the foot of the cross.

It is my hope that you are thinking about the fact
that you cannot get to Easter
without going through Good Friday;
That you cannot get to the Resurrection
without going through the Crucifixion.

This is a week for quiet, for reflection,
for thoughtfulness,
for thinking,
for thinking about the life of our Lord Jesus Christ,
for thinking about his death, his death for you and me,
so that next Sunday we can joyfully
shout out “He is risen”
as we celebrate his resurrection.

When you come to this table in a few minutes,
I encourage you to come thoughtfully
thinking about our Lord,
thinking about that week;
thinking about what he might have thought
had his gaze fallen on you along that route,
and looked into your eyes on that hazy, hot afternoon,
that first Palm Sunday.
What would he have been thinking?
AMEN