Occupy Jerusalem

Long Story, Short
March 9, 2012

Did you follow the story of the Occupy movement over the last several months? Protesters occupied public places in demonstration against large corporations and the global financial systems that seemingly control the world’s economy – leaving power to only a few (the 1 percenter's), and nothing but powerlessness to the 99% of us.

The world of Jesus and his disciples is essentially the same when we come across them in John 2.  The 99% were powerless.  Romans occupied his homeland and were doing business with the priesthood for political rest.  Israel had become – yet again – a key military point in the supply line to dominate distant regions of land.  And the worst of it was that Israel’s people, the ones to whom Jesus belonged and with whom Jesus most closely sympathized, were being sold out by the religious leaders to the political system.

By the time Jesus walked into the temple that day in the middle of the Passover season, it was clear to him that the temple had become a shell of its former glory.  Instead of being a holy place, its core identity and function had gone missing.  It had become a shopping mall, a bank, and a government building all rolled into one.
All his righteous anger seethed.  It fumed.  It boiled over.  His pressure relief valve triggered and he exploded.  Jesus makes a whip and from cords in a fit of anger begins driving the people out of the temple like he’s driving cattle.  Imagine the sweat, the tears of rage, his furrowed brow.  It’s animated for us in children’s Sunday School pictures with the title “Jesus cleanses the temple.”  It says that in the heading of some of your Bibles, too.

cleanses

It’s an appropriate word for what happened.  It’s an appropriate word for the season of Lent when we think about forgiveness of sins and how we experience cleansing in confession, cleansing that is only found through the sacrificial death of Jesus Christ.

cleanses

Like a good spring-cleaning from top to bottom, Jesus cleanses the temple.  He’s dusting out the cobwebs of a musty old religious system, as we’ll soon see.  He’s decrying the elite priests, he’s calling out the Roman occupiers.  Jesus conducted a “Occupy Jerusalem” protest of his own because he wanted to cleanse the temple of its consumerism, politicization, and the power plays of the elite priests and ruling class.  Jesus occupied the temple in anticipation of his final protest site, the place where his purpose would become clear and his work decisive:  Jesus was heading to “Occupy Calvary.”

Join us this week for worship to discover why Jesus occupied Jersalem and Calvary.  The answer is so close to home it may surprise you.  John 2.13-22 is the focal passage, so read it at home and bring your Bible to church.  We gather for worship at 10:30 am and Bible study is at 9:15 am.  Don't forget the clocks move ahead one hour this Satuday night!

See you Sunday,
Pastor Gary

A Timid Preacher's Secret

It's 10:39 on a Sunday morning, the Second Sunday of Advent, 2007. In a few minutes I'll put on a clergy robe and don the blue stole that is identical the ones the other ministers in our church will wear. They were all hand-made by a dear saint in the choir.

I'll go out for a microphone check and line up with the choir for the processional. For the next hour and a half in that robe I'll be speaking on God's behalf, I'll be an objectified symbol of religion for some, and a hopeful sign of the possibility of God for others.

It is a mantle I have accepted, but not one I would choose.

I wouldn't choose it because every Sunday morning I am sick to my stomach. I've preached nearly 500 sermons in my life, and yet I spend 30 wrenching minutes in the bathroom every time. I do it because I am afraid. Now don't go thinking you can talk me out of this - others have tried, and frankly I think the fear is somewhat healthy.

It's not that I'm afraid of speaking in public. I do that lots, and if it's not in worship then I don't get sick. Honestly, I'm afraid of God. I'm afraid of hurting someone. I'm afraid of saying something that would distract from God almost as much as I fear having nothing to say at all. I fear that people will see that blue stole as a costume cover up for the fact that sometimes I am a doubting Thomas, sometimes I am a cynic about religion, and that sometimes I am closer to leaving the pulpit than to staying.

I don't want to do anything to injure someone's faith. So lean in here, and I'll tell you the secret of how and why I get up and preach Sunday in and Sunday out despite all these fears. If you were near me I'd be whispering now. The secret is that God does this work through frail humans like me and you despite our fear. When I walk into the sanctuary in a few minutes I'll pray that same prayer as last Sunday: God, I've done what I can to prepare for this, the rest is up to You.

Amen.

The Lees of Desire and Yearning

I'm reading thirteen moons by Charles Frazier. The jury is still out on how good a story it is, but so far the writing is breath taking. Better than Cold Mountain; more alive, more poetic.

In the first chapter the main character, Will Cooper, is an old, old man, feeble and nearly bed ridden. "There is no scatheless rapture," he says. "...even when all else is lost, there is yearning. One of the few welcome lessons age teaches is that only desire trumps time."

I'm only 36, and though ancient to my children, I'm young to a lot of people. I feel young to me. I don't know what it means to be old, but I'm far enough along the journey now to understand what it means to age. I hope Will is right. I hope that yearning persists, that desire does trump time.


A lot of what I see as a pastor suggests otherwise, though. What I see suggests that most souls die long before their bodies, that desire and yearning are a commodity of the young. What I see suggests that passion proves faltering when dreams die. What I see suggests that vision and possibility seem less important for most of the aged than for the young.

There are exceptions, of course. Take one of my church members. He is in his 70's, he dances competitively, and he visits our church members in the hospital every day. In many ways he's younger than me and passion still has a grip on him. But the average middle class American seems so lulled into complacency that living life is more maintenance than anything else. It is a taming by way of easy life.

This I cannot take. This way I cannot live.

- Desire means that no matter how many times you read The Old Man and the Sea, you still believe he might pull that fish in.
- Yearning means that no matter how many times you watch The Blues Brothers you laugh at the "Orange whip" line.
- Desire means that no matter how many times you've held her, you want to do it again.
- Yearning actually means that my favorite joke about the Scotsman and the steering wheel sticking out of his kilt is always going to make me laugh when I tell it.
- Desire means that no matter how sleepy I get, I'm always willing to shoot one more game of pool, linger in that conversation just a few ideas more, and to argue politics with you even when we agree.

I cannot imagine a life without yearning and desire. Will Cooper gives me hope that ahead of me still lies years of wanderlust, adventure, restlessness, and hope. When that ceases, someone please take me off of the ventilator. Until then, I want to live life to the lees.