Remembering: Just Because
A sermon
delivered by Rev. Peter T. Atkinson
May 26, 2013
at Gordonsville
Presbyterian Church, Gordonsville, Virginia
1 Samuel 8: 4-17
1 Corinthians 3:
16-23
Let us pray,
Almighty God fill our hearts with a desire for
your will, fill our minds with thoughts of others, and fill our wills with your
ways. As the scriptures are read and proclaimed may they bring us closer to You
O God. In Christ, Amen.
16
Do you not know that you are God’s
temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? 17 If anyone destroys
God’s temple, God will destroy that person. For God’s temple is holy, and you
are that temple.
18
Do not deceive yourselves. If you
think that you are wise in this age, you should become fools so that you may
become wise. 19 For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with
God. For it is written,
“He catches the wise in their craftiness,”
20 and
again, “The Lord knows the thoughts of the wise,
that they are futile.”
21 So let no one boast about human leaders. For all things are yours, 22 whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or the present or the future—all belong to you, 23 and you belong to Christ, and Christ belongs to God. [1]
This morning is one of those fun times in the
life of the church where we commemorate two things at once, a special church occasion
and a secular holiday, for today we celebrate Presbyterian Heritage Sunday,
thus Tim MacLeod is here with his bagpipes, we remember our roots in the Church
of Scotland, we remember our history. And also this weekend as a nation we
celebrate Memorial Day, we take a look back again and remember the heroes that
have fallen protecting and serving the God given freedoms that this nation
strives to secure for us. I can't think
of a more appropriate combination, for the Presbyterian heritage and history is
closely tied to the American ideals we claim to believe in, and Presbyterian
Philosophy is intertwined with the
foundational philosophy of this nation, even our Presbyterian system
provided the framework for the American Constitution, James Madison having been
trained and taught in his youth by Presbyterian educators at Princeton so long
ago. This morning I want to shed a little light on that story so that we can
remember who we've been and hopefully inspire us to be more than we are. And I
want to tell the story just because it is my favorite story, my favorite
sequence of historical events, other than of course the event that makes these
possible, important, and real. . . The life death and resurrection of Jesus
Christ. The story of Reformation and its connection to the ideals of the United
States on her best day. I hope that it inspires us both as Presbyterians and as
Americans to live up to our historic values.
After Jesus' resurrection and ascension, and
then the gift of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost and the birthday of the church, the
disciples tried to do their best to spread the gospel throughout the Roman
Empire, but over the course of the next 300 plus years they went through
periods of oppression, the type of oppression where people were often killed
for being Christian, yet Christianity did spread, and many people became
faithful martyrs, dying in witness for the truth of the gospel in horrific
scenes of cruelty and violence. Then Christianity had spread so much, that it
became part of the framework of the Roman Empire, so much so that the Emperor
Constantine decided to convert. Constantine has a famous vision of seeing a
Cross in a dream, hearing a voice say you will conquer under this sign, and
Christianity becomes indelibly linked for the first time to real earthly
temporal power, but it's hard to tell whether Constantine sees Christianity as
a new religion or just a new pagan religion, does Constantine know Christ, or
is Christ just another god, much like Zeus or Jupiter, just more powerful,
nevertheless, Christianity takes a very strong turn, and Christendom is
created. Christianity goes from being a faith, a religion, a philosophy, a
world view, a relationship with God through Christ into being a realm. It
becomes tied to politics and for the next 1900 plus years kings will use it to
consolidate their wealth and power. It was soon after the fall of the Roman
empire in the 600's when the first of the germanic tribal chiefs, the Frankish
chief Clovis, became Baptized by the Pope, converting to Christianity and then
having the Pope crown him king. All of a sudden the church again is tied to
those secular powers, or still, but I've often asked the question of history,
was Clovis a true convert, coming to know Christ, having a personal
relationship with Christ, for his actions are far from those described in the
sermon on the mount, they actually are more similar to the description from 1
Samuel 8, just like Constantine, it's hard to tell the difference between them
before with their pagan beliefs and after with their so called Christian
beliefs, can we judge them based on their fruits?
And kings aren't the only ones. Popes,
Bishops, Priests, Monks, Friars, they also used Christianity to consolidate
their wealth and power. They change doctrine, they conceal parts of the Bible,
they promise salvation in exchange for all types of things, from money, to
military service, to trading of church offices, and political favors, they do
what they want, when they want, while manipulating by preaching restriction and
fear and obedience. It is almost as if the powers that be were more effective
in squelching the true teachings of Christ by adopting them than they ever were
at open persecution and executions, but that very truth is biblical, sometimes
the "easy, safe, secure way" is not the best. Look at our Old
Testament lesson. The Israelites want a king, basically for two reasons, 1.
everybody else has one and 2. he would offer us greater security from outside.
But Samuel warns them saying:
“These
will be the ways of the king who will reign over you: he will take your sons
and appoint them to his chariots and to be his horsemen, and to run before his
chariots; 12 and he will appoint for himself commanders of thousands
and commanders of fifties, and some to plow his ground and to reap his harvest,
and to make his implements of war and the equipment of his chariots. 13 He
will take your daughters to be perfumers and cooks and bakers. 14 He
will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive orchards and give
them to his courtiers. 15 He will take one-tenth of your grain and
of your vineyards and give it to his officers and his courtiers. 16 He
will take your male and female slaves, and the best of your cattle and
donkeys, and put them to his work. 17 He will take one-tenth of your
flocks, and you shall be his slaves.[2]
Sometimes what you want is not what you get. Christianity is saved, it
grows, it is protected, but in so many ways it becomes exploited just like
Samuel says the Israelites will be. Power is a dangerous thing, even for a
religion, or maybe especially for a religion. We still are paying the price for
it today.
In my World Literature class, we talk about
how the Medieval Catholic Church, in Western Europe anyway, the old western
Roman Empire now fallen, had a monopoly on the teachings of Christ. That there
was no way of getting to Jesus except through the church, there were no other
options. People could not divide the two, even in their minds, there just is no
concept of God, no concept of Jesus outside the big "C" Church. It is
not until the Renaissance that this monopoly is challenged. As education,
literacy, and translations of the Bible begin being made available to people,
this monopoly on the teachings get challenged on the biblical authenticity of the
teachings that dominate the middle ages. I'm not saying that there are not
faithful exceptions, but there is no denying the secular aspects of
Christianity during the late empire and throughout the middle ages and their
detriment to authentic Biblical representations of Christ. In the Renaissance,
writers like Dante and Chaucer and Boccaccio begin to describe a difference
between the Church, and its corruption, and God incorruptible. The monopoly
begins to fall apart, but it happens slowly. (To be honest many of our
protestant denominational differences have to do with how slowly these layers
fall apart, or which ones should go and which ones must not go, what is the
baby and what is the bath water, that old saying is often used).
From the seeds of the Renaissance and the
thought that just possibly there could exist a Christ, and that the Church may
be wrong in its teachings about him, comes the Reformation. And from the
Reformation Presbyterianism. I want to look at two of the historic principles
of the church in the light of the history I have just laid out for us. I printed
them in the bulletin. These are very much my favorite and have so much to do
with why I am Presbyterian, but how often do we talk about them?
F-3.0101 God Is Lord of the
Conscience
a.
That “God alone is Lord of the conscience, and hath left it free from the doctrines
and commandments of men which are in anything contrary to his Word, or beside
it, in matters of faith or worship.”
Look at what is addressed, the historical
problems addressed with that statement, and what it means. Freedom of thought is important. There is no monopoly
on truth, other than scripture. The foundations of truth are not found in an
institution, but in God's Holy Word, not in human wisdom, but in divine record,
not in the human beings, but in Christ, as the head of the church.
Now look at the next one, part b:
b.
Therefore we consider the rights of private judgment, in all matters that
respect religion, as universal and unalienable: We do not even wish to see any
religious constitution aided by the civil power, further than may be necessary
for protection and security, and at the same time, be equal and common to all
others.
These private judgment rights are to be
universal and unalienable, and should not be aided by any civil power. No
longer can the church be held up by the secular powers, because they had seen
the damage possible there, that though the name Christendom grew when tied to
those civil powers, at such a devastating cost. Christianity was spread, but
seemingly with an altered watered down, dare I say, Pagan version of Christ.
And now the last historic principle I
include: mutual forbearance. . .
F-3.0105 Mutual Forbearance
That,
while under the conviction of the above principle we think it necessary to make
effectual provision that all who are admitted as teachers be sound in the faith,
we also believe that there are truths and forms with respect to which men of
good characters and principles may differ. And in all these we think it the
duty both of private Christians and societies to exercise mutual forbearance
toward each other.
Not only is there not to be a monopoly on human versions of truth, but
we will accept the fact that people will understand things differently and
agree to be united with them anyway, that two people can be "sound in the
faith," but may differ in their understandings. Throughout the middle
ages, people were forced to agree, the Spanish Inquisition comes to mind, but
we are dedicated to the proposition that people can think for themselves, and
do not need to conform to institutional standards, but rather to conform to
Christ's standards himself as interpreted from his Holy Word. There is the
distinct possibility that the majority popular opinion is wrong and that the
minority is in the right, and therefore should be respected, the prophets of
the Old Testament come to mind. Jeremiah, Isaiah, Elijah, and many others were
like John the Baptist, lone voices, wild voices, but God's voices and they were
crying out from the wilderness of minority opinion, very important, Christ
himself often was preaching against groups who were opposed to his way of
thinking, and many of them the established religious leaders of the day. Thus
the doctrine of mutual forbearance itself like the others comes directly from
God's Holy Word.
So on Memorial Day we bring up this important history.
I think the parallels are self evident. Religious Freedom, no official
established civic support for a religion, freedom of thought, expression, etc.,
these are shared values between our church and our nation. The beauty of the
connection is that they are parallel and not connected. It is the harder way,
but history, both biblical and in our Christian Era show that it is the right
way. People's minds are their own and as such gifts to them by God. Jefferson
states in his Statutes on Religious Freedom for Virginia:
Well aware that the
opinions and belief of men depend not on their own will, but follow
involuntarily the evidence proposed to their minds; that Almighty God hath
created the mind free, and manifested his supreme will that free it shall
remain by making it altogether insusceptible of restraint; that all attempts to
influence it by temporal punishments, or burthens, or by civil incapacitations,
tend only to beget habits of hypocrisy and meanness, and are a departure from
the plan of the holy author of our religion, who being lord both of body and
mind, yet chose not to propagate it by coercions on either, as was in his
Almighty power to do, but to extend it by its influence on reason alone;
Obviously there are some differences, but the sentiment is the same.
This is but one of the connections between Presbyterianism and the philosophy
of the United States. There are many more, and the very governing principles of
Republicanism and Democracy, the separation of powers, checks and balances,
because no one person has a monopoly on truth, no king and no religious leader,
on and on, and let us not forget that both of these ideas are relatively new,
Presbyterianism and the Americanism, and both are rare in the world, many would
call both foolish and wisdom would say impractical and destined to fail, people
can't be free, they will make the wrong decision, and destroy themselves, it
doesn't seem that God thinks so, being all powerful, and fully sovereign and
giving freedom, since love demands it. Wisdom would say it is a foolish
experiment. Wisdom would say, power wins the day, not love, not freedom.
Listen again to Paul's words to the church in
Corinth:
16 Do you not
know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? 17 If
anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy that person. For God’s temple is
holy, and you are that temple.
18 Do not
deceive yourselves. If you think that you are wise in this age, you should
become fools so that you may become wise. 19 For the wisdom of this
world is foolishness with God. For it is written,
“He catches the wise in their craftiness,”
20 and
again,
“The Lord knows the thoughts of the wise,
that they are futile.”
21
So let no one boast about human
leaders. For all things are yours, 22 whether Paul or Apollos or
Cephas or the world or life or death or the present or the future—all belong to
you, 23 and you belong to Christ, and Christ belongs to God. [3]
In the Reformation, when Presbyterians got
their start, they cared, and cared deeply because they knew the darkness of the
night of living without the chance, when the thoughts of people didn't matter. Read
the Declaration of Independence, it is written by people who cared too, and
knew the oppression of Kingly singular rule, by the whims of one or few, rather
than all having a voice, a mind, and a say. But we do not know that darkness
first hand, at least not traditionally, both as a church and as a nation, our
thoughts have always mattered, but just like the book of Judges shows, and many
other evidence from history, that darkness is sometimes only a generation away.
Those who came before us who we remember on this day, and this weekend, according
to God's will, have protected us from that darkness, so we don't know it, and
since they cared they set up a system based on the fact that people would care,
care enough because their thoughts matter to think, care enough to put those
ideas to work and serve as officers, care enough to support those officers,
care enough to serve faithfully and honestly in elected positions, care enough
to vote on whose gifts and talents can be best used for the service of Christ
and His church, care enough about things not being right, that they would stand
up and work to make them right, care enough that even though someone may
disagree with you, that you stand up for the right for their disagreement
because their thoughts matter, too. These are true of the church, and they are
true of the nation. May each mutually inspire us to be better citizens and
better Christians. We thank the cloud of witnesses who have protected and
handed the legacy to us, may we with full reliance on the providence of God, do
our best to live up to it. And remember, just because. . . we care and it
matters.
May it be so.
[1]The Holy Bible : New Revised Standard Version. 1989
(1 Co 3:16-23). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.
[2]The Holy Bible : New Revised Standard Version. 1989
(1 Sa 8:11-17). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.
[3]The Holy Bible : New Revised Standard Version. 1989
(1 Co 3:16-23). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.
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