Light for the Perplexed

Second Week of Easter

I John 1:1-2:2

Usually the Sundays following Easter are devoted to stories from Matthew, Luke, John, or I Corinthians 15 about appearances of the risen Jesus to the disciples.  But this year we’re doing something different.  The lectionary offers a series of readings from I John.  And for the next several weeks we’ll read from this unusual letter. 

But we’re still very much in the vein of prayerfully reflecting on Easter and the risen Jesus.  Our reading begins with a confession from those who were eye-witnesses, those who saw and heard and touched the Jesus who is the risen Lord now in our midst.

 

Near the back of your Bibles, near the very end of the New Testament, there is a bundle of three letters, 1, 2, and 3 John.  Scholars believe these three letters were bundled together from the very beginning.  2 and 3 John are short, and it’s unlikely they would have been preserved and included in the New Testament had they not been bundled together with 1 John.  These shorter letters were meant to be read as a letter of recommendation for the messenger, and as an introduction to the main letter, which is 1 John.

These letters remind us that, although Jesus is risen, there is still some confusion about what this all means.  They were written to reassure and encourage a congregation that was struggling.  Some people had left.  And it’s hard when a group leaves.  There was some disagreement, though we can’t be quite sure what it was.  But a group left.  And the group left behind was perplexed by the experience. 

These two congregations (or two clusters of congregations) viewed one another with suspicion.  There were leaders of these divided congregations who refused to receive leaders connected to the other group in their homes (this is partly what 2 and 3 John is about).  But there are also some theological questions stirring about faith in Jesus Christ and what confessing him as God’s Son means.  When everyone agrees and stays together, there is a kind of energy and momentum that comes from that togetherness.  But when some disagreement leads a group to leave, a new kind of worry and anxiety emerges for both sides.

We also read from Acts 4 this morning.  It’s a wonderful confession of the agreement of early Christians about the basics – apostles’ teaching, fellowship, breaking bread, and prayer.  And about the open-handed generosity that characterized the early church.  But Acts also shows us fissures and breaks between leaders in the early missions movement.

I like Paul’s language of “perplexed” in 2 Cor. 4:8 – it gets to the confusion and tumult, but presses forward into something redemptive.  He’s writing to the church at Corinth – a church that was divided around issues of leadership.  And some of them didn’t trust Paul and wanted to cut ties with him.  Paul writes, “We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair.”  When we find ourselves in perplexing situations, there is pain and confusion, but the perplexity is not a sign that God has abandoned us.

Some churches foster a rosy memory of some golden age where everyone got along.  On that model, the goal is to “restore” some original purity, some early honeymoon period where everyone got along swimmingly.  Yet conflict seems to have been present from the very beginning of the movement.  The gospels, Acts, and the letters all suggest serious differences and disagreements, relationship fractures and name calling.  So there is no reason for naïve and sentimental longing for some past time when no one argued.  What we need is honest, searching, and prayerful consideration of the division and fractures that exist within our personal lives and our congregational life. 

Division is nothing new.  But deep disagreements that ruin relationships still ought to pain us.  Jesus prayed to God the Father for his followers this way: “I pray that they may be one as we are one – I in them and you in me – so that they may be brought to complete unity.  Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me” (John 17:23).  When Christians are at odds with one another due to differences about leadership, power structures, mission strategy, political and cultural issues, and money – it diminishes the powerful ministry of the body of Christ in the world. 

So divisions ought to be a cause for sadness.  But also for renewed commitment to be a part of the solution, to contribute to a generous and hospitable view of Christians from other streams of the tradition.  This is, by the way, why we frequently pray for God’s blessing upon all other congregations in our community, and around the world, whether we agree with them or not.

I find 1 John an odd little letter.  I don’t always know exactly what to make of it.  But I find it healthy to put ourselves before its light.  Because if we listen honestly to it, we are called to confess that the risen Christ is the same Lord for our enemies and opponents as he is for us.  We are called to an honest negotiation of our feelings and beliefs about those who are apart from us in some way.  Put differently, reading 1 John prompts something like conflict-resolution in the deepest shadows of our hearts.

We’re part of a tradition where there have always been fractures.  There was a painful fracture between followers of Jesus and the Jewish people.  There was a significant fracture in 1517 between those labeled “Protesters” or “Protestants” and the Catholic Church.  (The year after next – 2017 – will be the 500^th anniversary of Protestant Churches.)  And over the past 500 years the Protestant churches have splintered in a thousand directions – over doctrine, leadership, worship, structure, and lots else besides.

And now here we are in 2015, our own denomination the PCUSA deeply divided over how to respond to gay Christians and whether to bless same sex marriage as a faithful way to live before God.  There is a whole host of practices of reading the Bible that both sides are passionate about and worried about.  Some congregations have already left the PCUSA.  Some congregations in John Calvin Presbytery are perplexed, and wondering what to do.  They might leave.

And on a more personal level here where we live, here in our congregation, we’ve experienced a few hard years of difficulty around issues of leadership.  Feelings have been hurt.  Relationships have been damaged.  And some have left. 

If this were the year 1415, the only church around would be the Roman Catholic Church.  You’d be required by law to go.  If you missed Mass too many times, you’d be brought before a city council, questioned and likely fined.

If this were the year 1715, you might live in Catholic territory or you might live in Protestant territory, but still, there was only one church in your neighborhood.  And you belonged to it simply by being born there.  There wasn’t any other congregation to belong to.  There was no choice.

But in 2015, even here in a small city there are about 90 churches or fellowships of some kind.  If you get mad at me, or at someone else in this congregation, you can simply drive your car to a different congregation next week.  If you feel wronged or neglected, if you disagree with the strategic vision or don’t feel like your needs are met, you are free to check out and not go anywhere.  No one will fine you or arrest you.  Or you can hop from church to church, shopping for the place that makes you most comfortable and caters to what you and your family need right now.  Or you can join an online church.

So we have a letter or sermon that attempts to deal with a difficult situation.

It begins by emphasizing our shared connection to each other and to God.  Note, it doesn’t begin with doctrine or beliefs, but with “fellowship,” with relationships.  Picking up on themes from John’s gospel, this “fellowship” language brings to mind language about “friendship” with God and one another.  This is why division is difficult – because what God has created between us is fellowship and friendship.

Doctrine and beliefs don’t unite people.  We can’t always connect with one another in an intellectual way.  The gospel is rich and complex and mysterious, and we all come at it from different backgrounds, perspectives, and life experiences.  Yes, our confession of faith in the risen Jesus does form a kind of boundary and connects us in that way.  But the creeds we confess do not imply that we all agree on all issues.  They carve out a large, open space for people who confess Jesus as Lord.  But within that large space there is lots of room for different perspectives.

So the first move is to emphasize relationships and connections.  But the next move is just as important.  In a fiercely fought division with real opponents, the urge to demonize the other side in a self-righteous way is always present.  Those people who left.  There was something wrong with them.  They don’t love God as much as we do.  They aren’t as faithful as we are.  This path, our path is the narrow and straight one.  And they took an exit ramp onto a path of disobedience and unfaithfulness.  Theirs is the blame.  Theirs is the wrongdoing.  We are those who stayed.  The righteous.  The safe.  Those pleasing to God.   This dynamic is at play in all areas of our lives.  When we experience conflict, division, disappointment – we will always be tempted to assume the worst about others and to excuse ourselves.

But that is not what happens in this letter.  Instead, there is a self-critical confession of sin.  The early wisdom of this letter invites us to allow God to shape our lives in a way that conflict and crisis do not lead to scape-goating, but rather to modest appraisal of our own involvement in the problems at hand. 

This letter reminds us that God is with us in times when we are stressed and hard-pressed.  God remains with us when we lose our bearings, disoriented and frustrated.  God is light for those who are perplexed. 

God’s light shines in our connections and relationships with one another.  Our friendships are luminous testimony to God’s goodness.  We should treasure them and work hard to mend them as best we can when they become broken.  This work of reconciling differences is where we will find God nearby to help us.

God’s light shines in our confession of sin.  Not in our performance or alleged perfection.  Not in our success or our faithfulness.  But in our agony and despair.  In our failures and broken promises.  My point is not that we should become careless about our lives so that God’s grace shines all the more brightly in our foolishness and dysfunction.  I mean, rather, that God’s light shines in communities and friendships that are capable of humility and contrition.  God’s power to make us new and make the whole world new in Christ will be seen most clearly in the ways we come before God to say we’re sorry.  In the ways we come before each other to say we’re sorry.

So I’d like to invite you to a sustained and prayerful reading of 1 John over the next month or so.  This ancient letter can change lives by God’s grace.  It reminds us that the risen Christ is good news.  Not because the world is fixed.  Not because everything with us is fixed.  Not because your path will become easy or even clear.  But because there is light for the perplexed.   And you will find it most often in the blessings of friendship, and in the humility of confessing your sins.  Amen.