Text: John 1:1-18 & Romans 7:6
Theme: “Inspired by A Facebook Post”
2nd Sunday after Christmas
January 4, 2015
FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH
Denton, Texas
Rev. Paul R. Dunklau
+In the Name of Jesus+
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning. 3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome[a] it.
6 There was a man sent from God whose name was John. 7 He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all might believe. 8 He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light.
9 The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world. 10 He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. 11 He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. 12 Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— 13 children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.
14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
15 (John testified concerning him. He cried out, saying, “This is the one I spoke about when I said, ‘He who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.’”) 16 Out of his fullness we have all received grace in place of grace already given. 17 For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. 18 No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son, who is himself God and[b] is in closest relationship with the Father, has made him known.
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6 But now, by dying to what once bound us, we have been released from the law so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code.
Happy New Year, everyone! Let me start by saying this: Thanks be to God for John 1:1-18, today’s Gospel Reading! It never mentions Jesus by name, but it is all about him. It DOES mention John – meaning John the Baptist. It says that John was “not the light”. He came “only as a witness” to the light.
That’s what the church should be: a “witness to the light”. That doesn’t mean we won’t have our doubts; we will. No less a person than John the Baptist did. Later on, he was in prison and he sent something like an ancient version of a text message to Jesus that was riddled with doubt. His message to the incarnate Son of God was this: “Are you the one who is to come, or should we expect someone else?” That great witness to the life and light of Jesus Christ had his doubts too.
And, dare I say, this is exactly where we are at on this second Sunday after Christmas and first Sunday in the new year. We are witnesses who have our doubts.
There it is at the bottom of the page in your bulletin. It’s the Mission Statement of our congregation. Mission statements are relatively recent in the two thousand some odd years of Christianity in the world. Some congregations plaster their mission statement everywhere – in bulletins, print materials, on walls, on websites, etc. Other congregations, after a lot of hard work to come up with one, proceed to pay little attention to it. We print ours in the service folder every week. There it is in a box generated by Microsoft Publisher. But I have a question – and I have to ask it of myself just as I ask it to you: How often do we read it? Does it mean anything to us? Does it inspire us? Or is it just taking up space on paper? Printer ink is expensive; ask any office manager. Is it wasted ink?
Putting my theological “glasses” on, I’d say that the first sentence – which describes who we are – is pretty good. I might change a few words around, but it’s okay as is and even better than okay. The second sentence that describes what we do, which is really the mission statement (it begins with “Therefore”), says our mission is to STRIVE. It doesn’t say anything about what we hope to accomplish, and I’ll have more to say on that as we move forward in the Epiphany season. But, for now, the statement declares that we strive to FOLLOW CHRIST IN WORD AND DEED. So we don’t follow the priest, the bishop, the pope, or the pastor. Neither do we follow the Bible as if it’s a paper version of a priest, bishop, or pope. We strive to follow Christ! And how do we follow Christ? Through the words and deeds of worship, Bible study, prayer, service to others, and sharing the good news of the Gospel.
Everything that constitutes and comprises this striving in word and deed, as the mission statement outlines, is what it means to “witness to the light” as John the Baptist did. But remember: John had his doubts.
In the interest of full disclosure, here are a few of my doubts. If current statistics mean anything, and if they continue on the same track, I doubt if the PCUSA denomination – of which our congregation is a part – will even exist when I get to my father’s age. If a Christian congregation circles its wagons and becomes a fellowship of the like-minded, I doubt it will have any power to attract new followers of Christ. If a Christian congregation becomes a religious arm of a political party, I doubt if it is striving to follow Christ. If a Christian congregation, in any way, fosters a “we/they” mentality, demonstrates cliquishness or factionalism, lets petty personality conflicts continue to simmer, or gives evidence of a soft bigotry toward those who are different (say, for example, different in terms of race, sexual orientation, or economic status), I doubt if that church is even a church anymore. If a Christian congregation makes a religion and moral imperative out of hugs, handshakes, nametags, or no nametags, I doubt that it will appear anything more than desperate.
I don’t want to be a bundle of doubts. Do you? No, I want to be a witness to the light – and not in a dynamic way and not even, perhaps, in a relevant way. I want to be a witness to that light in an authentic way.
Today is the eleventh day of Christmas. Tomorrow is the twelfth and last day. Tuesday is the feast of the Epiphany of the Lord. We recall the Gentile magi who brought gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh to the infant Jesus. One of the emphases of the Epiphany season is that the light of Christ is for everyone. With that in mind, my messages to you in Epiphany will celebrate the mission of this church and look into ways to improve its witness to the light and dissemination of the same.
Besides the nature of the Epiphany season, what inspired me to take a close look at our mission was a Facebook post from my daughter, Caroline. She has a habit of regularly posting Bible verses with pictures. One, in particular, caught my eye. The verse was Romans 7:6 which reads: “But now, by dying to what once bound us, we have been released from the law so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code.”
There are two ways to serve – really, to be in mission! -- according to this reference: the old way of the written code – which is way of the law that binds people, or the new way of the Spirit.
So my question to you is this: are we going to go into the new year doing the same old things expecting different results? That’s one definition of insanity. Or are we going to enter into 2015 in the new way of the Spirit?
Some might say: “There’s no way our church can change. Leopards cannot change their spots.” But I believe that some might also say what writer Maryann Cavender Hood said so beautifully: “Faith smells the fragrance when as yet there is no rose.”
A Facebook post inspired all of this! Now that I’m finished, there’s only one thing more to say – something that, coming from Nebraska, I thought I’d never say: Go Cowboys!
Amen.
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