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Sermons from Commons Church. Intellectually honest. Spiritually passionate. Jesus at the centre. Since 2014.
And when we take seriously the possibility that the words we say to each other might be the very words God wants someone to hear when we serve, we put on display the strength of the living God. This fall, we've launched into season eleven with the series, How I Hold On to Faith. And I don't know about you, but I have found it refreshing to take honestly this question, how do I hold on to faith? Not just in whispered conversations or appointments that you make with the pastoral team or stuck to some old hurt that you hold inside, but to center this question in a big public way. Another way to ask it is, how can faith keep changing as I change?
Speaker 1:Like, can it honestly keep up with the work I'm doing in therapy or what I'm learning about the world? So in this series, we've talked about the need to be born again and again and again. We've talked about the way absence can coexist with faith and divine friendship. Last week, Jeremy spoke about our felt experience of faith. And he said something I'm sure many of you have been thinking about ever since.
Speaker 1:That faith is both a relationship and a religion. Maybe you like me have had people kinda poo poo the word religion in your faith experience. Following Jesus they'd say, it isn't a religion. It's a relationship. And for me, I always bristled at that.
Speaker 1:It just wasn't true. I mean, how do I think I came close to Christ except through the path of religion? There's religious history, tradition, ritual. There's religious community, scholarship, and art. You and me, we have personal experience with all of that, some good, some great, some terrible.
Speaker 1:And that's why we get to we get to come to this Christian religion and we get to, like everyone who came before us, leave our mark on it. We bend it, stretch it, and reimagine it for our time and place. And know this, we can never break faith so badly that the next generation can't find something beautiful inside. Today, we will talk about that work, the work of remaking faith in a way that stays true and keeps changing. But first, let us pray.
Speaker 1:Loving God, as we welcome the ways our bodies bend ever so slightly in this posture of prayer, we acknowledge this embodied response as openness, as reverence, and need. We know that there are places in the world where this moment of peace is not available today. And we pray as violence once again spreads past borders and boundaries this week. God, may your peace come. And still, somehow, we are called to live the lives that we have right here, to participate in the ways that your spirit is at work with us right now.
Speaker 1:So as we breathe in more deeply and allow ourselves to settle in with the next exhale, remind us that there is beauty all around us and we can work for peace. Amen. So today, we take a bit of a right turn out of the gospel of John, a text we've been in through this series, and we head for one of these little tiny books near the end of your bible called epistles or letters. We are going to first Peter to talk about what it means to participate in faith that keeps changing. We'll talk about the particulars, complicated belonging, koinonia, and icons of participation.
Speaker 1:And we all come from particular places when it comes to faith. In my lifetime, I have been Catholic, Pentecostal, Presbyterian, Mennonite, Baptist, but the kind that ordains women, and covenant. Bit of a denomination roll call, isn't it? Maybe you have a similar checkered church background, maybe you don't. But the truth is that the Christian tradition isn't one thing, it's many.
Speaker 1:If you flip through any textbook on the history of Christianity, you'll see how varied and innovative this faith has been. So let's see how faith took shape in the New Testament. We're in first Peter, a letter the scholar Catherine Gonzales called a jewel of Christian teaching. And the letter begins, Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ to God's elect, exiles scattered throughout the provinces of Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, who have been chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the father through the sanctifying work of the spirit to be obedient to Jesus Christ and sprinkled with his blood. Grace and peace be yours in abundance.
Speaker 1:Now, maybe you noticed the name of the apostle Peter as the author right at the top. Maybe you notice this reference to what looks like Trinitarian language. Maybe you notice this beautiful little phrase, grace and peace be yours in abundance? I like that. This greeting is classic greeting in its form.
Speaker 1:It's author, recipients, divine invocation. It is grace and peace. And the truth is that for most of Christian tradition, centuries of it, we took these words at face value, but there's so much more going on here. First Peter is loaded with covenant language. It pulls from the old testament.
Speaker 1:It pulls from the past. The blood of Jesus is sprinkled like sacrifices on Mount Sinai. The recipients are named as exiles spread throughout the land like ancient Israel exiled by Babylon. There's even this reference to Babylon as Rome near the end of the letter. It's a common like Switcheroo.
Speaker 1:After Rome destroyed the second temple in Jerusalem in seventy CE, Christians called Rome Babylon. It is not flattering. What's so interesting to me about all of this is that the audience of first Peter isn't even primarily Jewish. They're gentiles. And still, the past of Jesus' tradition defines their identity.
Speaker 1:It grounds them even. A second thing I want you to notice is this proto trinitarian formula. It's a precursor to the actual doctrine of the trinity that didn't get hammered out until the council of Nicaea in March. Now I know I'm throwing dates at you all fast and loose but the point is that we can see in this formula of God and Jesus and spirit that the writer is kind of yanking the tradition forward. It's a deeply theological word, by the way.
Speaker 1:And somehow, without the word trinity, God was known and linked inseparably to son and spirit before it all. And it would be anachronism to call this the doctrine of the trinity, but the beginning, the seeds of it, it is there. And finally, the author of this letter isn't Peter. Surprise. Don't get me wrong.
Speaker 1:For most of Christian tradition, it was trusted that Peter wrote the letter. And it wasn't until centuries later with the rise of biblical criticism in the eighteenth century that the view of authorship actually changed. For one thing, the Greek is just too fancy for our guy Peter, the Galilean fisherman. Another thing is that with the reference to Rome as Babylon in chapter five, this would date the letter post destruction of the temple. Peter was martyred in Rome in the sixties.
Speaker 1:Dead guys, they don't write letters. And finally, it was common practice to write a letter in another person's name. It showed honor. Like, I am talking to you like Peter would talk to you. I write in Peter's own name.
Speaker 1:And so when we come up against these questions of authorship, we shouldn't read them as deceptive. That wasn't the intent. This was the Christian community reaching back to stay connected to the people who mentored them. And as somebody completely in love with this Christian tradition, I actually get such a kick out of all of the times it is forced to change. The first two verses of first Peter give us a bit of a strategy for holding on to faith.
Speaker 1:You can't have faith without the past. You just can't. Preserving it, understanding it, and wrestling with it. Also, leaders and participants in the Christian tradition are constantly yanking faith forward into the present. They are always asking how does what we hold onto take shape in our lives today?
Speaker 1:And the last thing I'll say is that we can and should break with tradition when the facts change. When we learn something new. When we realize that what used to work isn't working anymore. It's called intellectual honesty. So to recap, hold on to the past, innovate in the present, and break up with what is broken.
Speaker 1:And all of that is biblical. Now let's see how that work for the people of first Peter took place throughout Asia Minor and modern day Turkey. The people who received this letter were going through a bit of a tough time. Now it's not the toughest of times, the persecution that took lives, but it was uncomfortable. As mostly pagan people, they used to fit so nicely into society, but now as converts to the way of Jesus, they are marginalized and they are misunderstood.
Speaker 1:And to these people, the writer strings together phrases from the Old Testament to reassure them of their identity. But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's special possession that you may declare the praises of God who called you out of darkness into God's wonderful light. This all means that the people in these various communities spread throughout the land are in a bit of a similar loneliness because they are out of step with the world around in them. But that doesn't mean they don't belong. Next, the letter guides these intentional Jesus communities to live what are good lives, and this is how they should do it.
Speaker 1:The friends, the beloved should live honorable lives and submit to human authority like the rule of emperors and governors. Slaves should be subject to their masters. And if their masters are especially cruel, they should win them over by suffering like Christ. Wives should submit to their husbands and maybe even win over unbelieving ones with, you know, a gentle and quiet spirit. Husbands should respect their partners.
Speaker 1:Women folk are, after all, the weaker ones. Now, are some of you squirming a little bit? I have for years, and that is okay. Because over and over and over again, the bible describes the world it comes from without ordaining the institutions that give it shape. The empire, patriarchal families, the institution of slavery, they are not blessed by God.
Speaker 1:They're just the world that the people lived in. Here, it's a household code in a great big empire that they aren't likely to escape in their lifetime. You gotta respect this about the bible. Across sweeping centuries, into multiple voices, in surprising turns in the narrative, the bible is people doing their best. And here's the thing about being people of faith.
Speaker 1:We will always be people with a foot planted in one world and a foot planted in another. The writer is saying, yeah, yeah, yeah, you're subjects, you're wives and slaves at the bottom of privilege. But here's what's even more true about you. You're people of honor. You do what is right.
Speaker 1:You live like you're free. You love beyond your household. You center the bigger family of God. Some of you have been dealt a very cruel hand, but your dignity is intact. You can resist violence because you know your soul is safe with God.
Speaker 1:Those of you who thought you had no power have more power than you can ever know. How about the power of your kindness? How about the power of your rich inner life? You have a foot in the world with its kings and presidents and corruption and wars, but you also have a foot in a place of peace with its crucified savior who refuses to return hate for hate. It is a complicated belonging, having your feet in different worlds.
Speaker 1:Now mixed into this letter are several paragraphs that deal with a context, sure, different from our own. But there are these pockets of practical wisdom, so inspiring I think they could just blow your hair right back. This passage in chapter four begins with an eschatological exhortation, meaning these communities really believed that the end was near. And then the passage, it rests for a moment on doxology, directing the listeners' attention to this overarching beauty of God and they seal it with an amen. It reads, the end of all things is near.
Speaker 1:Therefore, be alert and of sober mind so that you may pray. Above all, love each other deeply because love covers a multitude of sins. Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling. Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others as faithful stewards of God's grace in its various forms. If anyone speaks, they should do so as one who speaks the very words of God.
Speaker 1:If anyone serves, they should do so with the strength God provides so that in all things God may be praised through Jesus Christ. To God be the glory and the power forever and ever. Amen. Now, don't know about you, but I spent so much of my faith reading these New Testament letters like they had something in them just for me. And they may have, but it's more appropriate to reframe letters like first Peter as texts of community.
Speaker 1:These words come alive when they're lived out with others. The ancient world gives us this Greek word that can help us here. It's koinonia. It's on the screen. It shows up 43 times in the New Testament and it's pretty flexible too.
Speaker 1:Koinonia can refer to God's nature, the faith of Christians, and the experience of embodiment. It gets translated as fellowship, participation, and communion. And the cool thing about koinonia is that we don't just translate it. The word is a transliteration too. So it's a word that can be a part of our own vocabulary.
Speaker 1:And my definition of koinonia is that it is a community of participation. Like you're involved. And here's how koinonia works. We begin with God, always. Right?
Speaker 1:When we start with God, we apply the same definition. God participates in divine community. Theologian Elizabeth Johnson calls God the threefold koinonia. Saying God is not monarchy but community. And so just as God is in fellowship with God's self, God is also in communion with the world for God so loved it.
Speaker 1:But it doesn't end there. In our relationships, we mirror the divine to one another. We form koinonia when we, like first Peter says, when we pray for each other and we love each other deeply and we welcome the ways love covers sin. We form koinonia when we open our hearts to connect across a meal or a pumpkin spice latte, when we share our gifts, when we don't hold back, and when we take seriously the possibility that the words we say to each other might be the very words God wants someone to hear. When we serve, we put on display the strength of the living God.
Speaker 1:That's koinonia. And lately, I've been thinking a lot about the communities of participation that I've been a part of in my life. Like this one. This is an old framed photo that I actually dug out of a box this week, and I looked at it all week while I wrote this sermon. It's a team of volunteers from First Presbyterian Church of Concord, California, bit of a mouthful, circa 2003.
Speaker 1:And I'm right there in the middle, haven't changed at all. Right? Back in 2001, I moved to California to work at this church. I didn't know these people, and they really didn't know me. I had snail mailed my resume.
Speaker 1:And for some reason, when the youth pastor, Robbie, opened the mail and saw that I, Bobby, wanted to work at his church, he thought, well, this must be the one. You know, it was the rhyming name thing. I had only planned to stay for a year, but I stayed for three. This picture, like all pictures, it captures a moment in time. It's a time of strength in the ministry at First Presbyterian Church, these volunteers, a real mishmash of ages and backgrounds, they showed up consistently, like midweek and on Sundays, to hang out with high schoolers.
Speaker 1:We loved doing this work together. But I think I put this picture away in a box for so long because honestly, it kinda makes me sad. Eventually, the youth team, it disbanded. I moved back to Canada. Robbie and his wife, Jenny, moved to the Midwest to pursue graduate studies.
Speaker 1:Some people moved to Seattle. And my friend Dave, he died. But this photo, it did something new for me this week. In those waving hands and open mouthed smiles, in the gripping of shoulders and arms, it became an icon. Where I looked through it and I saw something of God there in the bonds of love and in the joy of service, and in the shared work of caring for kids who were awesome and depressed and trying to figure out who they were.
Speaker 1:I saw God in the particulars of this season, which did not and could not last forever. I saw God in this picture because we got to work together as Christ followers, trying to make the world just a little bit more loving and kind for kids. First Peter closes with a bit of a group photo of its own. The writer says, elders, I appeal to you. Be shepherds of God's flock under your care, not because you have to watch over them, but because you choose to.
Speaker 1:And with that we are back in the language of the Hebrew bible. First Peter leans into the possibility that everything promised to ancient Israel is available to the Jesus community. This letter says, with piles and piles of old testament references, gentile believers are Israel. One of the beautiful things about first Peter is just how big the tent of faith is. It includes the young, the old, the head of the household, and the slave.
Speaker 1:It includes the Gentile, the Jewish follower of Jesus, the unbelieving husband, and the ones who feel like they don't quite fit into the world they come from. So it's okay if you feel out of step with the culture too because wherever we are together is where we can make something that feels like home. So this is the takeaway I leave with you today. Form groups. Form all kinds of groups and teams and spaces of belonging.
Speaker 1:Form groups that work at something together. Form groups to pray and to ask meaningful questions. Form groups to learn together and read novels and watch movies together. Form groups to lead communities and shape boards and call people to good causes. Form groups to play sports and to teach kids taekwondo and tap dancing.
Speaker 1:Form groups of friends who volunteer together on the coffee team or the kids team at your church, as in this church, form groups who participate in the best of what community can be because we build it out of the best of who we are. I want this for you. To have your own framed photo of the group that you shape with others and to see through it something divine. And look, I don't know how long we get to hold onto each other. But I know that holding onto each other is the only way we will ever hold onto faith.
Speaker 1:It's the only way. Let us pray. Loving God, thank you thank you for the communities past and present that have been a part of shaping us into who we are. I'm so grateful for spaces. We can be truly alive by giving ourselves to something bigger in community for our participation in the city and neighborhoods and communities, for our participation in church and volunteer teams, extending welcome to others.
Speaker 1:I pray that we would see this work as sacred and meet Christ in it over and over and over again. The spirit of the living God present with us now. Enter the places where we are broken and in need of something new, and heal us of all that harms us. Amen.
Speaker 2:Hey, Jeremy here, and thanks for listening to our podcast. If you're intrigued by the work that we're doing here at Commons, you can head to our website commons.church for more information. You can find us on all of the socials commonschurch. You can subscribe to our YouTube channel where we are posting content regularly for the community. You can also join our Discord server.
Speaker 2:Head to commons.churchdiscord for the invite, and there you will find the community having all kinds of conversations about how we can encourage each other to follow the way of Jesus. We would love to hear from you. Anyway, thanks for tuning in. Have a great week. We'll talk to you soon.