GETTING EQUIPPED FOR NEW SITUATIONS

Trinity Sunday

            I don’t know about you, but I like my directions simple.  “Simple” to me means I only want to hear:  “North on 75, east on Forest, then south on Landa Lane and come right into Presbyterian Village North.”  Sometimes people want to give every landmark in between the starting point to the destination.  So, they may say:  “Where are you?  Lancaster?  Okay, from the church, take Jefferson north.  You’ll go past the car repair shop on the right.  Just keep going.  You’ll pass that pretty white church on the right.  Just keep going.  You’ll cross Pleasant Run.  Keep going.  You’ll pass the high school on the left.  Okay, then you cross Wintergreen.  Now Jefferson turns into Bonnie View, so keep going north on Bonnie View until you get to the south end of L. B. J. Freeway.  Get on L. B. J. going east and then get off at the I-45 exit.  Go north.  I-45 will end and merge into 75.  You’ll pass downtown Dallas on the left.  Keep going north.  You’ll pass NorthPark Presbyterian Church and NorthPark Center on the left.  Keep going north.  Get off at Forest.  Then turn right on Forest.  You’ll pass the DART light rail station on the right.  Keep going.  Look for Landa Lane.  Turn right on Landa Lane.  Keep going.  You’ll see the gate for Presbyterian Village North in front of you.  Go in.  Find a parking space right outside the chapel entrance.  And you’re here.”  I don’t know about you, but I’m worn out from just giving the directions.  You’re eyes look a little glassed over, and some of you are drooling on your neckties about now.  It happens every time someone receives too much information.  We can’t absorb it all at one time.

            Well, that’s exactly the situation Jesus faces in our gospel lesson.  He has a lot left to tell his closest disciples before he leaves.  This is the part of the Gospel of John called the “Farewell Discourses,” the part where Jesus prepares his disciples for his departure.  Remember that he is about to return to the Father by way of the cross.  That will leave his disciples without his physical presence.  They will have to manage to carry on his work without him being with them.  What’s more, not only can a person take in only so much new information at a time, there are stages in life when you simply don’t know what you will know when you’re older.  I was telling a church member the other day about my thoughts on retiring from on-cite church camp ministry.  “I’m sixty-four years old!” I blurted out to her.  This woman, whose accumulated age is more impressive than mine, said with great authority, “Sixty-four is still young.  You enjoy camp work.  So, you should still do it.”  While I was feeling that sixty-four is old, she had a different perspective.  Because of her perspective, I could see things differently.  I won’t really know what it is to be this woman’s age until I get there.  On the other hand, she remembers sixty-four.  She was able to help me understand that I needed to get over myself and feeling old.  If I still have the energy and the interest in doing camp work, and—please be informed—I can still squat down on the floor cross-legged and get back up again, then I should offer to God what God has given to me.  All of this is to say, there are some things you just can’t know until you reach a certain age.  Another wise person once observed that what a man knows at fifty he did not know at twenty.  This brings us to the situation Jesus faces with his disciples.  He has many things yet to teach them.  But they aren’t ready to take it all in at this moment.  They’ll have to learn it later.  In fact, they’re going to have to learn it after he leaves them.

            Of course, that’s true for us who are Jesus’ present-day disciples.  Just like Jesus’ first disciples, we do not have his instructions on many things.  Good and faithful Christians, including Presbyterians all over the U. S., struggle with what is the right action, given the fact Jesus didn’t make a pronouncement concerning some things.  As you know, Presbyterians in this country are struggling with the question whether or not it is proper to ordain practicing homosexual candidates for the ministry.  If you have been following the debate over the years, you know that the Presbyterian church is nearly split right down the middle on just that issue.  About this question, we have no instructions from Jesus.  Jesus didn’t tell us what to do about abortion.  Is it ever right?  Is there a certain stage when they should no longer be performed?  What about in the case to save the life of the mother?  What about incest or rape?  What then?  People have their opinions, and they express them across the denomination.  But Jesus didn’t tell us what to do about abortion.  Jesus didn’t tell us about stem-cell research.  Is it morally right to use stem cells from an aborted fetus in order to save lives and cure diseases in the future?  What should we do?  You probably have your thoughts about that, as do I.  But, the trouble is, Jesus didn’t tell us what to do about stem-cell research.  So, how are Jesus’ present-day disciples to live and act?

            Here’s how:  We live and act with the guidance of the Holy Spirit.  The Father and the Son have sent the Holy Spirit to the church in order to remind us of those things Jesus said and did while he was here on earth.  Now that Jesus has returned to the Father by means of the cross, we get our instructions from the Holy Spirit.  No, what the Spirit teaches or reminds us are not new revelations.  For example, if someone told you that the Spirit has given instructions to the church that we no longer must love one another, you could answer quite confidently, “I’m afraid you have that wrong.  The Spirit doesn’t contradict Jesus’ instructions.  Jesus has told us that we are to love one another.”  When we hear from the Spirit on the subject, it is to remind us of what Jesus said.  We won’t be getting new instructions from the Spirit.  We will instead be reminded of what Jesus said and did.  The Spirit instructs us only with those things revealed by God in Christ.  So the Spirit’s instructions will have no conflict with what Jesus taught.  What the Spirit teaches will not be new revelations.  However, we may expect that, from time to time, we may gain a clearer understanding of God’s revelation in Christ through the Holy Spirit.  For example, it wasn’t that many years ago that Presbyterians in America believed with all their hearts that slavery was within God’s will.  They truly believed that God had made things the way they were.  Whites, they believed, were superior to black people.  They believed that God intended for blacks to serve white people.  While Jesus didn’t teach us about everything there is to know about slavery while he was here, over the years, with the guidance of the Holy Spirit, the church came to understand that slavery was outside of God’s will, that no human being should be the slave of another.  The Presbyterian church came to understand that “God so loved the world,” included everybody.  At the time of slavery, the Presbyterian church split, north and south.  But now, with the guidance of the Holy Spirit, the former northern church and the former southern church have been reunited, both sides now believing that slavery was wrong.  We can hope and pray that, at the right time, we will receive guidance of the Holy Spirit on matters of human sexuality, abortion, and stem-cell research.  And when we have resolved those questions, there will always be more to work on.  But we can address these questions because today the church lives and acts with the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

            Now we begin to see how the Trinity functions.  God the Father, who makes all things and sustains them with his power, desires to reveal himself to humanity.  So, how do we know God?  Well, we can look at his creation, as Bev and I love to do.  We’ll look at a great vista, and say with a twinkle in our eyes, “Who thinks up this stuff?”  The intricate design of the universe, from the smallest cell to the greatest solar system, points to a Designer.  You know that complicated video recorder you have around the house, the one with the complicated instructions, the instructions you can’t figure out?  You know that recorder?  When you look at that box, do you imagine that that thing just appeared?  No!  You can see that someone has designed it.  The thing is, you can’t figure out how to make it work, but it is obvious that someone designed it.  It’s the same with the universe.  We may not understand it all, but it is clear that someone intended for all of this to be.  But what if God wanted us to know him more than from a distance?  What if God wanted a relationship with us?  Then God would have to reveal himself, for we would have no way to discover the unseen God.  So God came to us in the person of Jesus of Nazareth.  Jesus Christ was the self-revelation of God on earth.  By knowing Jesus, it became possible for us to learn the nature of God.  God, in Christ, disclosed his intentions for humanity.  What were those intentions?  To love us.  To forgive us for our estrangement from God.  To reconcile us to himself at the very time we were found to be estranged from God.  To know that God is for us, not against us.  To see the depth of God’s love on the cross where Jesus died for us.  When Jesus rose from the dead, we were not left alone without God’s continued self-revelation.  God the Father and Jesus the Son sent to the church the Holy Spirit.  The role of the Spirit is to speak “whatever he hears.”  The Spirit “declares to you” those things he hears.  You see how the Trinity works?  God reveals himself in Jesus Christ.  In the absence of Jesus Christ, the church has the same revelation that came though Jesus now through the Holy Spirit.  Or, look at God’s self-revelation this way:  God reveals himself in Jesus.  God and Jesus continue that self-revelation in the Spirit.

            So, what does all that mean for the church today?  It means the church is equipped for each new situation.  Our lives are changing.  We are all getting older.  The context for doing ministry is constantly changing.  Consider:  Are you living where you were five, ten, fifteen, twenty years ago?  You maybe living in a new location.  No matter where you now live, is the community the same as it was even five years ago?  No.  The context for doing ministry is constantly changing.  The world changes before we can get a fix on it.  That’s life in the twenty-first century.  But we are equipped with all we need for each new situation.  Remember how the Trinity works.  God speaks in Jesus.  The Spirit continues Jesus’ revelation.  So, we’re equipped for each new situation.  You might not think so, but you are.  There was an elder in Richardson, Texas named Jane James.  She was given the duty of being an elder sponsor for a girl named Gina.  “Gina,” she confessed to her protégé one day, “I have no idea how to be a proper elder sponsor.  I’m kind of nervous and afraid that I’m not scholarly enough for you.  Would you like to have ice cream and go to the movies with me?  We can talk and then next time we’ll talk about church stuff.”  Jane didn’t know what to do; but, as it turned out, she was more equipped than she knew.  “Funny,” Gina observed later, “Funny how a phone call, an ice cream outing, a movie become the basis for a lifetime choice to be a part of a faith community.”  And she said, “Jane helped me craft a profession of faith that truly expressed what I believed about God.  Jane stood up with me when I joined the church.  Jane gave me a poem called ‘One Life’ on the day I joined the church.  I still have that poem.”  Today Gina serves as associate for Youth Ministry in our General Assembly office.  You may not know how you are to mentor another.  You may not know how you are to give love and support to another.  But you are equipped.  God revealed himself in Jesus Christ.  God and Jesus sent to the church the Holy Spirit to continue God’s self-revelation.  The Spirit reminds you what Jesus said and did.  And that’s enough to carry on his work.  You are equipped.