August 25, 2002
Sermon preached by Rev. Donald Ng at the First Chinese Baptist Church in San Francisco.
One of my seminary classmates fell in love with a woman who was Jewish. He came from a strong Baptist family and evidently, she too came from a strong Jewish family. At their wedding, they had both a Baptist minister and a Jewish rabbi to officiate the service. All of the rituals were shared equally. There was the typical sharing of vows and the giving and receiving of rings. But there was also the drinking of wine and stepping on the glasses. In fact, the couple was so strongly invested in their own religion that they couldn’t decide to have the wedding at a Baptist church or a Jewish synagogue. So it was at a rented community center.
When I thought about my friend’s wedding, I wonder about the question, “When it comes down to it, what is the one thing that makes Christians, Christians?
The answer is not church picnics, WWJD bracelets, or even a Baptist minister officiating at a wedding. The thing that makes us who we are is who Jesus is. Jesus Christ is Christianity.
When my brother, Steven was in his young adult searching years having majored in philosophy and was now in law school, he would argue with me about Christianity. Since I was in seminary at that time, I was an easy target for him. With his logical and persistent treatise against the existence of God, I found myself stammering and defensive. At the end, the only defense that I had was—“I believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God.” Steven like many youth in our church was baptized when he was in junior high, but now he had doubts. He asked me one time, “Can I get un-baptized?” Steven just didn’t get it.
Other faiths have love. They have beliefs about the good and the true. But only Christianity has Jesus. If God had only given us a book like the Bible, we wouldn’t be Christians. Rather, we would be another noble philosophy of life or a system of ethical virtues.
Jesus in the Flesh
What God did, we believe, is to come to us in the flesh, as a Jew from Nazareth named Jesus, or more accurately in the Hebrew, Joshua, meaning “God saves.” We believe that the peculiar way that God saves, gets to us, and gets us, is Jesus. When we look at this Jewish carpenter’s son, who was born, lived briefly, died violently in his thirties, and rose from the dead unexpectedly, we get to see as much of God as we hope to see.
Now some people just don’t get it. When they see Jesus, they see a noble teacher, or only a great moral example, or even, a wide-eyed revolutionary. My brother was thinking like this. After all, from the very beginning—who Jesus was, what he was about—was far from self-evident. There were people who stood face to face with Jesus and said, “This is God in the flesh.” But there appears to be many more who said, “This man is nuts.”
Many people didn’t get it. From the start, Jesus frustrated people’s expectations about how a Messiah ought to act. Jesus didn’t directly say who he was. He asked his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” Some thought he was John the Baptist or Elijah or Jeremiah or one of the prophets. He didn’t walk around with a sign on his back saying, “Son of God.” Messiahs were supposed to have power, were supposed to take charge, set things right, fix all of our problems.
Jesus just didn’t do these things and so people didn’t get it. Jesus refused to stiff-arm anybody into following him. He refused to dominate or to take up arms. And when we look at what he ended up doing based on what they were looking for in a Messiah, he was one of history’s most notable failures.
God in Jesus
What makes Christianity different from all other faiths is that God came as Jesus. It’s not that God sent Jesus—God himself came as Jesus. And when he was among us, he was executed for doing the things he did and saying the things he said. He wasn’t killed for walking around bragging that he was God.
Jesus was killed for saying, “This is God’s way: the poor are precious, the rich are in big trouble. Caesar isn’t God despite what his political advisors claim.” Jesus was killed saying, “Not everybody and specifically the religious leaders who are full of themselves who cries, “Lord, Lord” is going into God’s kingdom. In fact, prostitutes and tax collectors will get there before you.”
Being a Christian is about following Jesus, doing what Jesus did, speaking as he spoke. You see, Jesus warned us that his way is “narrow.” Look at some of the things that Jesus said that I wish he had not. He said, “Hate your mother,” or go sell everything you have and give it to the poor.” When he said these things, I didn’t get it either!
Well, to be honest, I think we all knew what he meant when he said some of those things. It’s just that we didn’t like what they mean. For most of us, it isn’t that we’ve listened to Jesus and found him incomprehensible. It’s that we’ve listened to him and found him darn too difficult.
I am nervous some times when I preach here. I’m a little nervous right now. When I am preaching about following Jesus, and what it will cost you to follow him, I’m afraid that my words might hurt you. And then I thought to myself, “Where on earth did I get this notion that the sermon will never hurt anybody. This is Jesus! It’s going to get rough from time to time!”
Being a Christian is about the challenging, lifelong struggle to be friends with Jesus and to allow him to be a friend with you. And we all can testify that friends can and usually do hurt each other. Brothers can hurt each other.
Relationship with Jesus
When my brother, Steven was struggling with his faith, he came at it like it was yet another philosophical school of thinking. He was thinking A + B = C. And for him, it just didn’t add up. Instead, Christianity is about a relationship. When have you had a meaningful relationship that added up logically?
Richard Niebuhr once said that, “conversion happens when God whom you thought was your enemy to be feared is really your friend to be loved.”
We love God because, we believe, God first loved us in Jesus. So Christianity is not first adhering to a set of great ideals or ethics, nor is it the comprehension of a set of great ideas like philosophy. Christianity doesn’t add up logically. It is a way of life, a way of walking with Jesus. It’s having a relationship with Jesus.
In a few weeks, Pastor Chris will be starting a BASICS class for youth who want to walk with Jesus. In October, I will be starting an Inquirers class for those who want to know what this new way of life is all about. These are invitations for you to develop a relationship with Jesus.
Other religions might have good and moral examples, but Christianity has Jesus who not only spoke to us, but he continues to come to us, speaking to us, and walking with us.
Let’s take a look at Easter. If Easter had not happened, who would still think about Jesus today? Most of his teaching wasn’t original but rather his teaching was an inheritance from the faith of Israel. He was not particularly effective in getting his program across to his followers.
But when he came back to us, even from the dead, we are able to say that Jesus—who he was, what he taught, what he did—had been vindicated by God. That’s what happened when those early Christians exploded out into the world shouting, “God has raised Jesus from the dead.”
Easter was like God saying to us, “In case you have ever wondered whether or not Jesus was truly and truthfully revealing my will for the world—with all his talk of forgiving enemies, and loving the unlovable, and finding the lost—then be assured, that this is the truth and it’s exactly the way I planned it.”
God is saying, “When Jesus speaks, I’m speaking. When you look at Jesus, you’re looking at me, the one who hung the stars and flung the planets into their courses.” Through Jesus, God is having a relationship with us.
This may sound unbelievable if you have yet to experience it but Christians believe that Jesus is present with us, walks with us, and is closer to us than we are even to ourselves.
God’s Grace
After the disciples offered Jesus a variety of answers to his question, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is,” he asked them who they thought he was. Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God.” How did Peter come up with the right answer?
The writer and storyteller, Garrison Keillor in his book, Leaving Home includes a story about a young girl named Lois. One beautiful spring morning, Lois is confirmed in her faith at Lake Wobegon Lutheran Church. {Confirmation in a Lutheran church is like baptism at our church.) Her Bible verse, which her mother wrote in blue frosting on her confirmation cake, was Romans 12:2:
“Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing
of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good
and acceptable and perfect.”
On Lois’ confirmation day, which might be expected to be a day of celebration and certainty, was instead disturbing and distressful to Lois. Just a day before her confirmation, Lois’ faith was deeply shaken. While preparing to iron her dress, Lois turned on the TV evening news and saw some horrific things. On the screen she saw men beating people, shooting them, and tossing their bodies out of helicopters.
Questions, fear, and doubt crowded in upon Lois as she gazed at these things. Where, she wonders, is God in this? Lois tried to pray, but the prayers seem to echo in her head. As one to be confirmed, she must boldly declare her faith in God the next day, but watching the TV, she wondered how the terror, evil, and destruction she knew exist in the world can be reconciled with a belief in a loving, powerful, merciful God whose will, according to her Bible verse, is good, acceptable, and perfect.
After the service the next day, Lois left the family celebration to walk in the woods near her home to ponder her newfound doubt. There she met her godfather who was not one to be known as strong in faith in the family. Her godfather told Lois about a story of someone he once knew who, in reaction to something that took him by surprise, had suddenly thrown away something of great value. The person regretted it deeply afterward. The story encouraged Lois that she should not abandon her faith. It suggests that she should struggle with her doubts, in hopes of articulating a more mature faith.
When Lois and her godfather returned to the party, they cut up the confirmation cake with all of Paul’s words in Romans 12:2 in bits and pieces. Lois was still trying to get it after her confirmation. Lois may be able to recite the verse on top of the cake, but it will take her a lifetime to put together the meaning of her passage and to develop a relationship with Jesus.
The disciples didn’t get it at first. My brother didn’t get it either. And when Peter declared, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God,” Jesus reminded him that “For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven.” On Peter’s own efforts, he wouldn’t have gotten it either. In fact, if you would just read the next few verses after our text today, you will see that Jesus called Peter a “stumbling block” for thinking more about human things when he should be thinking more about divine things.
We get to believe in God not by our doing, but by God’s grace and mercy. It’s all grace, a gift from God, revelation. This is not about our possessing the right stuff, not the result of our brilliant logical deduction. It is a blessing to be able to say, “You are the Christ.”
The Church is Christ
Jesus blesses Peter for his confession and names him the rock on which he will build his church. The church is that gathering that is linked to this confession of Jesus as Messiah, the Son of God. The church is that group that is able to say aloud, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”
We can say the words about Jesus but may still not know their full implication. Yet Jesus keeps working on this church so that we can come to a fuller understanding of just what it means to say Jesus is the Messiah and the Son of God.
We come to church every Sunday seeking to understand. We say a prayer, tear open some bread, sip some grape juice. We believe that Jesus is with us. But when God has blessed us with the confession that we are able to say, “Jesus, you are the Messiah, the Son of the living God,” then we are able to share this gift with others.
You know that eventually we’ll get to that point in the sermon when it hurts. Whenever we talk about Jesus, it gets rough from time to time. He comes to us, blessing us with gifts of confession and commands us to share the gift with others. We can’t just take the gift and not share it. We must tell the whole world that “Jesus, you are the Messiah, the Son of the living God!”
Today, we have a special guest for the Summer Series. US Representative Mike Honda will be sharing with us how we as a church with this gift of confessing that Jesus is the Messiah can share our faith in the community. Like last Sunday, when we looked at how the disciples in the boat sailing in the stormy sea, a symbol of the church, were able to say, “Truly you are the Son of God.” Today, we as a church can say, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God!”
Like Jesus, we need to cry out, “This is God’s way: the poor are precious, the rich are in big trouble, Caesar isn’t God despite what the spin doctors claim, not everybody who cries “Lord, Lord” is going into God’s kingdom. In fact, prostitutes and tax collectors get there before you.”
And like Jesus, when we say these things out there in the public square, whether it’s in Portsmouth Square or in Union Square and in the town center where you live, people are not going to like you. In fact, they may even hurt you.
It’s Jesus
When we come to church, we believe Jesus is with us. When just two or three of us show up on Sunday, Jesus has promised, “I’ll be there.”
So what makes Christians, Christians? Jesus! Finally, we are getting it. We’re here, not because we were searching for more meaning in our lives and have found Jesus. Rather, most of us were minding our own business and from out of nowhere, Jesus found us.
Or you were just trying to make it through a Sunday service without dozing off, and he grabs you. Or you were thinking about all the fun things you will be doing this afternoon, and he blesses you with the confession, “I believe.”
It’s all about Jesus. Who do you say that I am? “You are the Messiah, the Son of God.”
Let us pray.
Gracious God, thank you for Jesus, our Messiah and your Son. Call us into faithful and active discipleship to proclaim this good news in all of the places in the world. For truly, it is Jesus who has promised us through his life, eternal life. Amen.