It is time to put up or shut up.
It is time to admit once and for all
that we trust God . . . that we trust Jesus . . . and, to live our lives as if
we do.
It is time to move on.
It was not a good homecoming for
Jesus. He was not welcomed with a hero’s
welcome; no, far from it. He was
questioned . . . he was ridiculed . . . he was not embraced and given a parade
to mark his homecoming. Far from
it. He was one of them and they knew him
. . . they had seen him grow up . . . seen him working with his father . . .
and, they wondered who in the world he thought he was to come waltzing in to
preach to them. They did not believe
him, nor did they trust him. The writer
of the Gospel of Mark tells us that
Jesus could perform no miracles and was amazed at their lack of faith . . .
. . . so, he moved on. He moved on proclaiming, “A prophet is not without honor
except in his own town, among his relatives and in his own home.” So, he move on . . . went out teaching in all
the neighboring villages. Outside of his
hometown he was well received and performed all sorts of miracles and healings.
What is the issue?
They don’t trust him. They don’t trust that he speaks for God, or
can do the things that he says he can.
How does this hometown-boy have the gall to come back and act high and
mighty? The problem is that everyone
knows him . . . they know his family.
They don’t trust him any further than they can throw him and they can’t
throw him too far because he is one of them.
The issue is one of trust. Jesus
tells them to trust in his words . . . to trust him . . . and, their only
response is, “Yeah, right!”
What can Jesus do? He can only move on and keep doing the things
that he has been doing . . . he has to earn their trust. He has to keep preaching . . . teaching . . .
changing people’s lives . . . he has to die . . . and, he has to rise again.
Tough lesson to learn, but a lesson
none the less. Jesus realizes that he
cannot sit there and waste time, energy, and resources trying to invite his
hometown and family to come into the Kingdom of God if they are not going to
give him the time of the day. Knowing
this he heads down the road to share with those who will listen.
And so it would be for his disciples .
. . they, too, needed to learn this lesson.
Thus comes the day that they are given their first assignment . . . to
go out into the nearby area and to share the Good News. The instructions were simple: go out among
the people . . . be like the people . . . and, share the Good News of God’s
Kingdom. Accept the hospitality offered;
but, warns Jesus, do not waste time attempting to change those who do not want
to change or hear what is being shared.
He tells the disciples: “And if any place will not welcome you or
listen to you, leave that place and shake the dust off your feet as a testimony
against .”
Reality is sometimes the best
teacher. The disciples would learn a lot
on this assignment, and from what the writer of the gospel tells us . . . well,
they did well. People listened. Miracles
and healings were performed. All in all,
it was a job well done . . . and, if the disciples encountered any who would
not listen, they shook the dust off of their feet and moved on.
And, why wouldn’t the people
listen? I imagine that those who did not
listen were those who did not trust. Why
should they trust a bunch of strangers?
They didn’t know these guys . . . for all they knew these guys were just
selling a bunch of hooey.
That is the tough part of evangelism .
. . or the tough part of being an evangelist.
Remember, an evangelist is one who shares the Good News about God’s
Kingdom. Plain and simple they tell the
story and invite others to come along and join in. It is not the evangelist’s job to make the
listeners believe . . . it is not the evangelist’s job to make the listeners
convert. And, that is what make it so
tough because as an evangelist . . . as one in relationship with God and
knowing the blessings that relationship has . . . well, we naturally want that
for everyone else. But, you know what,
that is not our problem . . . that is between God and the individual. Ours is to share the Good News and invite
others to join in.
So, how is the “church”—and I do not
mean this local congregation of followers; but the “church” as a whole doing?
Apparently not very well. We could point our fingers at a myriad of
excuses as to why the “church” is not doing well . . . why it seems that the
“church” as we know it is falling apart . . . why more people are leaving
through the back door than coming in the front door. We could blame secularism or pluralism or the
lack of having a great contemporary service on Sunday morning. We could blame a lot of things . . . point
our fingers in a lot of directions; but, none of them would be the real
reason.
The real reason is because people
don’t trust the “church”. The track
record of the “church” does not provide a whole lot of ground to place trust in
it. So, what is the “church” to do? What are we to do as individual followers of
Jesus here in this place of worship and fellowship?
I would say that the first thing that
we need to do is to “put up or shut up”.
If we are going to proclaim that we believe in the loving and
grace-filled God that Jesus preached and taught about, then we better start
living as if we believe. If we trust God
. . . if we trust Jesus . . . then we ought to live like we do. Which brings us to the second thing we need
to do . . . we need to make the actions of our lives congruent with the words
out of our mouths. We need to live our
lives in faith . . . in trust . . . . we need to remember that God never
abandons us . . . that God can be trusted . . . that God is our rock and
redeemer . . . that God never lets us down.
We need to believe it and live it.
And, lastly, it does not matter what
words we speak . . . what actions we take, there are going to be people who
will not trust us. We are going to be
rejected . . . Jesus told his disciples this . . . they witnessed it when it
happened to Jesus in his hometown. We
are going to be rejected . . . going to be ignored . . . ridiculed . . . and we
are to shake the dust off of our feet and move on. Move on because there is still much work to
be done. The work of sharing the Good
News of God’s Kingdom here and now.
The question becomes . . . can we do
it?
I don’t know. It is up to each of us as individuals to step
up to this challenge . . . that is all that any of us can do . . . to take care
of ourselves. But, if we take care of
ourselves . . . work on trusting God . . . work on building that relationship
between us and God . . . and, continue to share the Good News . . . well,
people are going to notice. People are
going to begin to trust.
It begins with you and me as
individuals. May we all move on. Amen.
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