Living Divinely

Colossians 1:11-20

21 Nov. 2010

         Rick was a big, burly kind of guy in the Southern U.S. who drove a cross-country truck, chewed tobacco, and hit home runs on the softball team. However, he rarely made it to church services.  But some friends told Rick they needed his help putting on a play at church for Vacation Bible School.

             At first, Rick declined saying, "That's just not my bag." However, after some arm twisting, he reluctantly agreed.  Rick was to play Jesus.  

            The first time Mary Hollingsworth saw Rick in his Jesus costume, she almost laughed   because it seemed so out of character for him.   Hollingsworth wrote the play and wrote down this story in her book, Fireside Stories.   However, he appeared to take his job quite seriously; so she contained herself and congratulated him on his unusual interpretation of the role.

              When Vacation Bible School week arrived, Rick played his role to the hilt, yelling in his Southern accent at the money-changers to "Git outta here! . . .You cain't turn my Father's house inta a den a'thieves, ya hear? So, jist git out, and don't chew come back . . . evah!" Then he proceeded to destroy the temple by throwing over the tables of the moneychangers (he actually enjoyed this part) and tossing the crooks out into the street. It was more like a TV cop show than a Bible story . . . but the kids got the point.

            "As planned, twice every night for four nights Rick donned his Jesus suit and cleansed the temple of insincere people. And the children loved it! They voted this story to be one of the best of the whole week.

             "The best part of the story, though, came after Vacation Bible School. Somehow, acting like Jesus …. had a lasting effect on Rick. He began coming to the church services a little more often, coming to the midweek Bible study and staying for fellowship events. But the most powerful impact on him came from the young children…who, for weeks and months after, would point at Rick and whisper, "Look! There's Jesus!"

           Before long, the big, burly truck driver was giving up chewing tobacco, drinking beer less and attending church more.  “He and his wife began team teaching Sunday School classes and leading teens on mission trips…. And, after a few years, he was chosen as a deacon (elder). In short he stopped ACTING like Jesus and began LIVING like Jesus."  

(Mary Hollingsworth, Fireside Stories, Word Publishing 2000, pp. 162-164)

                    This last Sunday before Advent used to be called Christ the King Sunday.  It’s now called “Reign of Christ.  The whole day came about when people in the 1920s, thought the world was becoming too secularized and we needed to remember that   that God incarnate in Jesus Christ rules over us, not with might, but with justice and love.   

               And that’s what Rick discovered in this story.  God’s in charge and he wanted to live his life emulating Christ.

              When I read Rick’s story, it reminded me of Harry in a community where I used to live.    It was Palm Sunday and we decided to do in Church the play that the Curriculum laid out for us.  We asked one man to play Jesus.  He accepted and took the part quite seriously.  In one of the scenes, he dragged a heavy cross up the middle aisle, acting like Christ enroute to be crucified – beaten, hungry, downtrodden.  

              For some of us watching, that scene was particularly moving.  Because we knew that Harry understood what it was to be beaten down by life.  He and his wife worked hard but they’d lost their farm.  He battled depression.   Now, they both worked with seniors and they did their work with efficiency and laughter.  They lived resurrection.  They had walked a long, heavy road, still stayed together and knew new life and possibilities.

             Rick and Harry’s God is not one who lives in a beautiful castle on the highest hill.  Their God is one who walks among us.  Rick’s God is one who legitimately gets angry at the greed he sees in the market place.  Rick’s God expects and demands a just world for all people.  Harry’s God has walked with him during financial loss and despair.  His God has led him back to renewed prosperity and fullness of life.  He knows the experience of going from Good Friday’s devastation to Easter Sunday’s joy and celebration.

             The author of Colossians writes:  “May you be made strong with all the strength that comes from his glorious power, and may you be prepared to endure everything with patience, while joyfully giving thanks to the Father, who has enabled  us to share in the inheritance of the saints in the light.  He has rescued us from the power of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of his beloved Son, 14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.  He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.”  (Col. 1:11-15)

Angels Among us Tea - Nov. 20, 2010

              Jesus is the first born of Creation.  And we are part of that beautiful creation. 

            We are each beautifully created by God.    We are to value the divine in our selves.  Christ being raised from the dead, giving us the Holy Spirit.  Christ is in each one of us.  The Holy Spirit is in each one of us.  We value the Divine in ourselves and we open our eyes to see the Divine in each other.

         We look at each other with Christ’s eyes and see Christ in each one we encounter.

            In our following Wayne Dyer’s The Power of Intention on Tuesday nights, he says what gets in the way of our living connected to our God is that “People go through life looking to be offended.”

             Now, there’s a part of the story about Harry acting the part of Jesus that I still need to tell.  Harry thought very carefully how he could look the part of Jesus as he carried the cross down the aisle.  He had red marks painted on his bare back to symbolize the beatings and he’d seen  depictions of Jesus on the cross in loin cloths.  Harry’s a former Prairie farmer and he’s going to be respectable to himself and others.  He finds a very large white sheet and wraps it around himself so his belly button is covered and the cloth reaches down to his knees.

             A few days later a woman in the congregation spoke to me.  She said she didn’t want  any more intergenerational services and dramas, especially ones where Harry comes down the aisle wearing a big diaper.  It was embarrassing.

             Now the woman entirely missed the personal significance in the enacting of the story of Jesus’ walking to Calvary.    She missed how playing Jesus was important to Harry and though she knew Harry’s history as much as anyone else in the area, she hadn’t seen the connection between Harry’s story and our common story in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

           The woman was a wonderful leader in the community and church.  She just fell into a trap that so many of us fall into and I’m no saint in this either.  We go through life looking for something to offend us and, of course, we’re going to find something to annoy us or irritate us.

         But instead, Christ really wants us to look at ourselves and each other as the beautiful creations of God we are.  We are each divine, carry Christ in us.  And we look for the Christ in each other.  

           When we recognize our own blessedness and see the blessedness in those we encounter, suddenly our world is more beautiful and much larger.  It is much more full of abundant goodness.

             God’s in charge.  Christ’s in charge.  We have a loving, caring God who wants only goodness for us and that we want that goodness for others.