#icandoallthings

I was a little disappointed when we put the new carpet in last year, not with the new carpet but with the removal of the old carpet.

You’ve probably heard the story about how on Thanksgiving Sunday 2005, six weeks before the building opened, we had our first service in the building. 

The building was really just a shell, and after the service we handed out sharpies and invited people to write their favourite scriptures on the concrete floor to be immortalized.  That was the plan, and it sounded good in theory, after all we were using permanent markers.  But you know what they say, In theory there is no difference between theory and practice; in practice there is.

Last summer when we tore up the old carpet I was excited to see all the promises that we had written on the floor, and there they were, gone.  I would suspect that it was the glue that held down the carpet, combined with the scraping that eradicated our scriptures. 

However we are promised in Isaiah 40:8  The grass withers and the flowers fade, but the word of our God stands forever.”  And Jesus promised us in Matthew 24:35  Heaven and earth will disappear, but my words will never disappear.

I can’t tell you every scripture that was written on the floor, I do know what I wrote and it is on the concrete beneath my feet, I wrote 1 Corinthians 9:16  Yet when I preach the gospel, I cannot boast, for I am compelled to preach. Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel!

And even though the writing on the floor is gone I can tell you that the one scripture that was written over and over again and that was Philippians 4:13  For I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength.

Our preaching series this Fall at Cornerstone is “Hashtag This” and we’ve been looking at various words and phrases in the Bible that deserve a hashtag.  For those who don’t have a clue what I’m talking about.   A hashtag is simply a means of identifying a common theme in social media, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.    So you type the #sign or hashtag followed by a description of your subject, written without spaces.

Week one was #gointoalltheworld  Week two was #castthefirststone and two weeks ago we looked at #turntheothercheek. 

I would suspect that 2000 years ago if Hashtags had of been a thing that when Paul’s letter was being read someone would have claimed Philippians 4:13 with the hashtag #icandoallthings, and while I love the verse and I have claimed it many times, most of those times I claimed it out of context. 

Let’s begin by looking at How We Take the Text Out of Context

We’ve been down this road before and you’ve heard me say it before but listen up this is really important.   As you read the bible and claim the promises of the bible always, always, always remember the words of D. A. Carson who often quoted his minister father saying  "A text without a context is a pretext for a proof text."

Like the man who was looking for direction from the bible and so he decided that he would simply open the bible and put in his finger and go from there.  So he did and his finger landed on the last part of Matthew 27:5 Judas hanged himself, he figured that couldn’t be what he has looking for so he did it again this time his finger landed on Luke 10:37 now go and do the same.  Well, that wasn’t getting him anywhere so he decided one more try, and this time he ended up at John 13:27, “Hurry and do what you're going to do."

And yes all three verses came from the bible, and if you put them together they would indeed say “Judas hanged himself, now go and do the same, Hurry and do what you're going to do."  But that wasn’t the intent, those texts may be from the bible but they are out of context.

So regardless of what you might think, Philippians 4:13  For I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength,  does not necessarily mean that you can do everything that you set your mind to through the power of Christ.  We keep on using that verse, but I don’t think it means what we think it means. 

If that was the case we all be ultra-talented, uber-rich, super successful and very thin and we aren’t.  And as long as we cling to a promise which isn’t really a promise at all, we are destined for disappointment, guilt and doubt.  Because when we can’t do it, whatever it is then we feel spiritually defeated and think, “Well, Paul said that we could do everything through Christ, so how come I can’t stay on my diet, how come I can’t learn to sing, or how come my business failed?” 

And those are good questions, if we were meant to take Philippians 4:13 in isolation.  But Philippians 4:13 wasn’t written in isolation.  Paul didn’t just write those words on a slip of paper and send them to the Philippian church.   “Oh look everybody Paul wrote to us and said Philippians 4:13  For I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength,  

So, what was Paul telling the people he wrote that letter to all those years ago?  Well to discover the truth here we first need to put Paul’s words into context.

We Need to Put the Text into Context

Remember this was a letter, we are reading someone else’s mail here.  The letter was written by the Apostle Paul to the church in the city of Philippi. 

And it was a special group that Paul was writing to.  Back in the book of Acts we discover that it was Paul who had started this church.  And it had begun with his preaching on a riverbank and with one convert, a lady named Lydia. 

And so Paul had seen this church born and watched as it grew up.  He is writing to the church as the founding pastor of the church, which meant he had a little skin in the game, so to speak.  And by this time the Church in Philippi was pretty much a mixed bag of folks. 

There were those Jewish, Roman and Greek backgrounds.  So understand not only did they come from different cultures they came from different faith back grounds and different economic and social backgrounds as well.

There were folks in the church who had been raised in the Monotheistic faith of the Jews as well as the Polytheistic faith of the Romans and Greeks.

There were servants, masters and small business owners.  But regardless of their differences they were one church and one family, they had all found a church to call home.

It’s now been eight or nine years since Paul started the church and he is now in prison for preaching the Gospel.  And it’s from his prison cell in Rome that this letter was written, it was one of four books in the New Testament that Paul wrote from his prison cell.  And for the most part this has been a letter of thanksgiving and celebration, a letter of encouragement written to lift people up.   

And in closing Paul wants to end on a positive note.  It seems that the church had lost track of Paul for a couple of years, they didn’t realize that he had been arrested and imprisoned.  

Remember this was long before social media, Paul was unable to update his Facebook status to indicate that he was in prison, he couldn’t tweet about it or change his “Linked in” profile from tentmaker to prisoner.  

But when the church discovered his predicament they sent a messenger from the church along with a care package.  And Paul is thanking them for what they’ve done, but he’s also assuring them that he isn’t upset that they had taken so long to respond.  And this is what puts vs. 13 in context.

So Paul begins this section by writing  Philippians 4:10  How I praise the Lord that you are concerned about me again. I know you have always been concerned for me, but you didn’t have the chance to help me.

The sentiment here gets a little weird, because he starts by kind of saying “thank you for your help.” But in the next verse he basically says “But I really didn’t need it.”  Philippians 4:11-12  Not that I was ever in need, for I have learned how to be content with whatever I have.  I know how to live on almost nothing or with everything. I have learned the secret of living in every situation, whether it is with a full stomach or empty, with plenty or little.

So Paul is saying “Thanks, sort of.  It’s nice that I have what you sent but I was content with what I had before you sent it.”  You know when someone gives you a present and you say, “Thank you, but you didn’t have to.”  That’s what Paul was saying, and that is what leads into verse 13 and what puts #icandoallthings into context.

Let’s read it in context.  Philippians 4:11-13  Not that I was ever in need, for I have learned how to be content with whatever I have.  I know how to live on almost nothing or with everything. I have learned the secret of living in every situation, whether it is with a full stomach or empty, with plenty or little.  For I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength.

Listen up folks, Philippians 4:13 is the secret to spiritual contentment, not necessarily the secret to worldly success.   It would appear that Paul was teaching a concept that was later spelled out by Alfred Nobel who said “Contentment is the only real wealth.”

Let’s flip it around and read it another way. 

For I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength, for I have learned how to be content with whatever I have.  I know how to live on almost nothing or with everything. I have learned the secret of living in every situation, whether it is with a full stomach or empty, with plenty or little.  

And so while seeking the promise of success, we may very well miss the promise of contentment.  It was Bernard Williams who reminded us  “We may pass violets looking for roses. We may pass contentment looking for victory.”

And you understand that the real promise of Philippians 4:13 may be at odds with the perceived promise of Philippians 4:13.

Because the promise that we want to claim from Philippian 4:13 is often asking God to do what we can’t do on our own.   Or at least what we don’t think we can do on our own. 

One thing that we often miss is that God has already given us the ability to do the impossible.  Human history is full of instances where people have done the impossible. 

Before May 6 1954 it was thought to be impossible for a man to run a mile in less than four minutes, until Roger Bannister did it.  Now it is routine.

Before December 17 1903 the dream of heavier than air motorized flight was considered impossible, until 2 brothers proved it possible.  Remember until you try the impossible you will never know what is possible.

Before July 20 1969 very few people thought it would be possible for a man to walk on the moon, and there are some people who still think that is impossible. 

Every day we do what used to be impossible, from talking on cell phones to driving automobiles, to surviving cancer, simply because someone decided to do the impossible.

And if the truth was known, too often we want God to do the possible for us.  It’s just that for us to do it on our own seems like way too much work so we ask God for help.

For our first ten years as s church we met in rented facilities and we kept trying to find a way to get land and build, but we weren’t all that serious about sacrificing for it.   We really wanted God to provide a piece of land and a building without us having to pay too much for it. 

It was only when we moved ahead with the capital campaign and folks in the church committed over $350,000.00 toward the project that we realized that God had already provided for our building.

And today I still talk to Pastors of churches that meet in schools and theatres, and community centres and they want God to give them land and provide them with a building, but they aren’t willing to do it themselves.

And maybe if we listen hard enough we can hear God whisper those words that parents across time have told their children.  “You can do it yourself.”

You can quit drinking, you can lose weight, you can read the bible you can love the unlovable. 

And notice that Paul’s contentment didn’t depend on what he had.  He said he was content when he had a little and he was content when he had lots.  And sometimes it easier to be content with little than with lots.  We’ve all felt the curse of the desire for the “Next best thing.”  Perhaps today Paul would write, I’m content with a “flip phone or an iPhone 7.”

It was Charles Caleb Colton who wrote “True contentment depends not upon what we have; a tub was large enough for Diogenes, but a world was too little for Alexander.”   As a point of interest Colton was an English preacher in the early 1800s.  And while you may think you’ve never heard of him, you’ve probably quoted him.  It was Colton who wrote “Imitation is the sincerest of flattery.”  And “True friendship is like sound health; the value of it is seldom known until it be lost.”

The danger of discontentment is spelled out by Solomon in  Ecclesiastes 1:8  Everything is wearisome beyond description. No matter how much we see, we are never satisfied. No matter how much we hear, we are not content.

And Paul warns Timothy of the consequence of discontentment in 1 Timothy 6:6-10  Yet true godliness with contentment is itself great wealth.  After all, we brought nothing with us when we came into the world, and we can’t take anything with us when we leave it.  So if we have enough food and clothing, let us be content.  But people who long to be rich fall into temptation and are trapped by many foolish and harmful desires that plunge them into ruin and destruction.  For the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. And some people, craving money, have wandered from the true faith and pierced themselves with many sorrows.

But it’s not enough with knowing the context of Philippians 4:13 because while one danger is to take it out of context we have to Be Careful to Not Take the “In Context” Out of Context  And now you think that I’m just babbling. 

Paul tells the church in Philippi that they didn’t need to worry about him because he had discovered the secret of contentment.  But while Paul may have been content Paul was never complacent.

Had Paul’s contentment led to complacency, the church as we know it would not exist.  Paul was always pushing himself to do more, to plant more churches to reach more people.  His hashtag probably would have been #contentnotcomplacent. 

It was Jimmy Carter who said “I hate to see complacency prevail in our lives when it's so directly contrary to the teaching of Christ.”    

Every one of us has the power within us to change our world if not the world.

God calls us to do better and to be better Christians.  We can’t be content to not grow as Christians, instead we care called to strive, to grow and to mature.  We can’t be content to see evil and allow evil without speaking out against evil.  Albert Einstein said  “The world is in greater peril from those who tolerate or encourage evil than from those who actually commit it.”

We can’t be content to let someone else to change the world, to let someone else rescue the slaves or feed the hungry or provide clean water in West Africa   And we can make a difference, if only we are willing to step outside of our comfort zone,

Which is why Benjamin E. Mays wrote  “The tragedy of life is often not in our failure, but rather in our complacency; not in our doing too much, but rather in our doing too little; not in our living above our ability, but rather in our living below our capacities.”

If the most famous prayer of them all is the Lord’s prayer.  Which by the way speaks to both contentment and complacency when Jesus taught us to pray “Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”    We are content in the will of God but we can’t be complacent as long as God’s will is not being done in our lives.

So if the most famous of prayers is the Lord’s prayer I’d say the Serenity prayer has to run a close second.    Written by Pastor Reinhold Neibuhr in the 1940’s and now a staple for AA and other 12 step groups, it seems like a good way to end today’s message.  Let’s pray it together:

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,

Courage to change the things I can,  And wisdom to know the difference.

#turntheothercheek

Is it just me or does the US presidential election seem nastier than usual? 

The interesting thing, or disturbing thing, or sad thing, use your own adjective, is that both Candidates would say they were at least brought up in the Christian tradition.

When asked about her faith Mrs. Clinton responded with a trinity of faith statements. “I am a person of faith. I am a Christian. I am a Methodist”

Not to be outdone the Donald said “I’m a Protestant; I’m a Presbyterian.” He elaborated by later stating,  “When I drink my little wine — which is about the only wine I drink — and have my little cracker, I guess that is a form of asking for forgiveness, and I do that as often as possible because I feel cleansed.”

And both candidates attended Sunday school, Trump at 1st Presbyterian in Jamaica Queens and Clinton at First United Methodist Church in Park Ridge, Illinois.   

And while I wouldn’t want to question the personal faith of either of them, apparently even though they may have heard the teachings of Jesus from an early age it would seem that some of them didn’t stick, in particular how to treat those who treat you badly.

It seems as if have forgotten some of Jesus’ most important teachings.   You know, the section we call the Sermon on the Mount. 

This is week 3 of our “Hashtag This” series at Cornerstone as we take a look at words and phrases that could use a hashtag.  Week one was #gointoalltheworld  last week was #castthefirststone and this week we are going to delve into the Sermon on the Mount, all of which would probably carry the hashtage #sermononthemount

Most of this section of the Sermon on the Mount is summed up in Jesus’ words in Matthew 5:43-44 “You have heard the law that says, ‘Love your neighbour’ and hate your enemy. But I say, love your enemies! Pray for those who persecute you!”

This is kind of interesting because there is nowhere in the bible that we are told to hate our enemies.  This particular command comes from Leviticus 19:18 Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against a fellow Israelite, but love your neighbour as yourself. I am the Lord.  Somewhere over time the oral law decided that if you were to love your neighbour then it only makes sense that you should hate your enemy.

The Love your neighbour part would appear to be a New Testament favourite because Jesus mentions it five times, Paul quotes it twice and James quotes it once.  You might assume from that, that it was important concept. 

But it wasn’t “Love your neighbour” that Jesus was concerned with at this point, instead it was the second half of what was said the “Hate your enemy” side of it.

What Jesus is talking about here ties in with what he said a little earlier in this passage, when he stated in Matthew 5:38 You have heard the law that says the punishment must match the injury: ‘An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.’

His listeners would have heard this in a variety of Old Testament scriptures in particular in Leviticus 24:20, Deuteronomy 19:21 and Exodus 21:24.  This is the oldest law in the world, “an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth”.  That law was referred to in the ancient world as Lex Talionis, but it might have been more aptly referred to as the “law of tit for tat.”

It appears in the earliest code of laws and that was the code of Hammurabi, who was a Babylonian King who lived 1800 years before Christ.  The main principal is clear; if a person inflicts an injury then he would receive the same treatment.

There are some who would call this harsh and blood thirsty, but in reality it was the beginning of mercy, for two reasons:  The first is that it limited Judgement, if someone knocked out one of your teeth then you can’t knock out all of his.  Secondly it took judgement away from the individual and gave it to society. 

Probably the greatest example of the why and how of this law was capital punishment.  If someone killed your child they would be sentenced to death, that was their punishment, you couldn’t go out and kill their children and their spouse.  This type of law was indicative of the society in which Christ lived.  It was very much a retaliatory society. 

And it still is through much of the Middle East, Iran does it, Syria does it, Lebanon does it, Iraq does it, Libya does it and if you want a real lesson in retaliatory justice then just watch the Jews.  But then again we support Israel so when the do it we don’t call it terrorism.

And remember that Christ said that he didn’t come to destroy the law.  Also keep in mind that we are dealing with an imperfect world.  We need to accept the reality of a system which punishes the lawless and rewards the lawful. 

In a perfect world there would be no murder so there wouldn’t need to be laws concerning murder.  In a perfect world there wouldn’t be adultery so there wouldn’t have to be laws concerning adultery. 

In a perfect world there would be no divorce and nobody would ever break a promise or cheat on their spouse but we don’t live in a perfect world so God laid down regulations, regulations for everyone, believer, non believer, Christian pre-Christian, redeemed unredeemed.  We live in a less than perfect world, and although the law is not perfect it was concerned with checking the evil which threatens to destroy society.  And so Christ accepted the necessity of an imperfect system to deal with an imperfect world.

But he felt that his followers needed to go beyond the law, it wasn’t enough for them not to commit murder they were to refrain from hating.  It wasn’t enough for them not to cheat on their spouse they couldn’t even think about it, and we are going to deal with that next week. 

The Mosaic Law punished evil doers; Jesus sought to eradicate evil.  Not by eradicating the evil doer but by redeeming them, by changing them.

If’n you want to stomp out evil by stomping out the evil doer then the Law of Moses is fine.  But if’n you want to destroy evil and salvage the sinner then you need a completely different approach.

The law tells us to react in kind, and that suits our human personality.  We are quite willing to kill the killer, hate the hater, and be close minded to the close minded.  But Christ isn’t content with those who call themselves by his name reacting in the same way as the world.  Instead of reacting in kind, he commands us to react in contrast.

Indeed, he goes so far as to tell us in Matthew 5:39 But I say, do not resist an evil person! If someone slaps you on the right cheek, offer the other cheek also.

Now I can almost ready your minds, “He can’t be serious.  Jesus didn’t understand what the situation would be like today.  But you know Jesus wasn’t referring to international situations, and Jesus didn’t intend for this to be taken serious, besides all of that Jesus only meant this as guidelines in relationships between Christians.”  I had a Professor in Bible College who said “When you say ‘that isn’t really what it means’ then it must have hurt”

Jesus was talking about October 16, 2016, he meant for his words to be taken literally and he was referring to all of our interpersonal relationships.  To top it all off Jesus even lays down some examples from the everyday life of his listeners.

Matthew 5:39 But I say, do not resist an evil person! If someone slaps you on the right cheek, offer the other cheek also.  

Often we don’t read into this statement what Christ intended for us to see.  We see someone who struck another person and we don’t see more because we are relating this statement to 2016 Canadian culture and that isn’t the time or place that Jesus was when he made this statement. 

“     “ would you come up here for a minute, let me demonstrate.  In the culture of Christ, the backhanded slap was the greatest insult going; as a matter of fact, it was twice as insulting as being slapped with the palm of the hand.

What Christ was saying was not only “do not retaliate” but “don’t resent either”. 

Now don’t make the major error of limiting Jesus’ words to a physical slap. 

In 2016 Canada you will probably never be physically struck, just doesn’t happen in polite company. 

But there will be verbal blows, insults, and rumours.  They will be real and imagined, petty and large, personal and general.  Don’t forget the words of Christ in Matthew 5:11 “God blesses you when people mock you and persecute you and lie about you and say all sorts of evil things against you because you are my followers.  Christ didn’t say “If that happens” he said “when that happens” and there’s a big difference in those two little words. 

Christ was a lot nicer person then me and he was called a glutton and a drunk, he was accused of being a friend of tax collectors and prostitutes, and he was beaten and spit on, hey I haven’t got a chance.

Early Christians were called cannibals and accused of all kinds of gross immoralities.  Time and time again Christians suffer real and imagined insults.  They aren’t nominated for a position, they’re forgotten in a note of thanks, or they are snubbed by someone in the church or heaven forbid by the Pastor. 

But the true Christian has forgotten what it is like to be insulted because they have learned from the master to accept any insult without reprisal, and without resentment.

It was John Maxwell who said “If you want to help others and become a person of influence, keep smiling, sharing, giving, and turning the other cheek.”

The second illustration comes in Matthew 5:40 If you are sued in court and your shirt is taken from you, give your coat, too.  All except the very poorest of the Jews would have a couple of shirts.  The coat on the other hand was their outer garment but it was more than that.  It was like a long poncho and the people of the day wore it as a garment during the day and used it as a blanket at night. 

Most Jews had only one cloak, and the cloak was such an important part of the Jews wardrobe that it was protected by the law.  We are told in Exodus 22:26-27 If you take your neighbor’s cloak as security for a loan, you must return it before sunset. This coat may be the only blanket your neighbor has. How can a person sleep without it?

By Jewish tradition and Jewish law, you might ask a man for his shirt, but never His cloak.  And yet Christ is saying, even that which is protected by law, be ready to give up.  Even that which you don’t want to give, give.  Unfortunately, the church is full of people who militantly stand on their rights and their privileges, and they won’t be pried loose from them. 

People like that haven’t even started to see what Christianity is all about.  The Christian doesn’t think of His rights he thinks of his duties; he doesn’t dwell on his privileges but remembers his responsibility.  He has forgotten that he has any rights at all.  The man who vehemently stands on his rights, who will fight to his death over his legal rights both inside and outside the church has a lot to learn about giving up his cloak as well.

The third illustration comes from Matthew 5:41 If a soldier demands that you carry his gear for a mile, carry it two miles.  Here is a picture taken from an occupied country and it’s tough for us to even imagine what Christ is talking about because we can’t imagine being forced to do anything.  Yet in Palestine 2000 years ago at any time a Jew might feel the flat of a Roman spear on his shoulder and the Soldier on the other end command them to do anything, even act as their porter and carry their baggage for a mile.

Do you remember Simon of Cyrene?  He was the man who was forced to carry the cross of Christ.  That was the only other time that this word which we translate as forced was used in the Bible.

Now you could obey the soldier one of two ways:  the first would be with grudging acceptance, like the little boy who was told to stand in the corner and he sat there with his arms crossed and said “I may be sitting on the outside but I standing on the inside.” 

You ever do that?  I sure have.  Or you can cheerfully do your best.  There are always two ways to do something 1) doing it with the bare minimum and that’s it, or 2) do what you’re asked to do and more, graciously and cheerfully.  But listen up, don’t wait until you are pressed into service by a Roman soldier because it probably won’t happen.  But you will have all kinds of opportunity at work, school and church.

The ineffective employee, the resentful volunteer the ungracious helper has no idea what the Christian life is supposed to be about. 

The Christian shouldn’t be concerned with only doing what he likes to do instead he should only be concerned with being able to help, even when the demand is discourteous and unreasonable.  And so Jesus has given us three guiding principles for our Christian life: 1) Christians shouldn’t resent or seek retaliation 2) Christians shouldn’t stand on their rights 3) Christians Shouldn’t demand the right to do as They Please.  Instead they should be seeking to help, or go the second mile if you will.

Christ summed it all up in Matthew 5:44 But I say, love your enemies! Pray for those who persecute you!  as a matter of fact if you were reading in the New King James Version of the Bible it goes into even more depth because it says “But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you,  But you ask, “how do I love people like that?”  Good question and the way to the answer is to first get a proper understanding of the word love.  There are all kinds of “love” out there and we relegate them to one word.  I love your shirt, I love my wife, I love my kids, I love my church, I love to fly, I Love pizza.  And yet I love each of those things in a different way.

The Greeks got around this problem by using different words for love.  1) Storge, was family love it was what you would feel toward your children or your parents.  2) Eros, was the love you felt toward your husband or wife, it’s where we get the word erotic. 3) Phileo was a close friendship.  There was a fourth word used by the Greeks for love and that was Agape.  And this was an act of the will not of the heart. 

It’s not an if or because love, you know I’ll love you if you do this or I love you because of that.  This type of love is not based on the actions of others.  It’s not the love of family, friend or lover although it may grow into one of these.  And this is the type of love that Jesus commands us to show to others even our greatest enemy. 

Why Agape?  Because. That is the love of God for the world.  A love based on no external factors.  This commandment can only be comprehended and obey by Christians, because it is only when Christ lives in our lives that bitterness dies and love springs to life.

We also need to note that this commandment isn’t just passive, we are required to commit ourselves to action.  We are commanded to pray for our enemies.  We cannot go on hating a man in the presence of God.  In prayer bitterness dies.  It’s pretty well summed up in Matthew 5:48 But you are to be perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect. Sometimes people have some problems with that verse.  They think perfect like God, hmm kind of sounds like Genesis 3:5 when Satan told Adam and Eve that they could be like God.  And that isn’t what the word perfect implies here. 

Again if we were to go back to the original language of the New Testament we would discover the word used was Telios and it literally means complete.  This word is used to indicate that something is perfect for the job at hand.  A fully grown man is telios compared to a half grown boy.  A graduating student is telios compared to a freshman.

God is perfect as God.  He is a perfect God, he has perfect knowledge, and perfect power and that is a perfection which we can never attain because we’ll never be God.  And yet God has a perfection for each one of us and that is when we come to a place where we are complete for the task set before us.  When we live a life with perfect love, perfect motive and perfect obedience.  It comes when we live by the Sermon on the Mount not because we have to but because that is the inner most desire of our heart.  When even politicians realize that if they profess to know Christ then they need to act it, and maybe a part of that is not participating in attack ads and personal attacks against their opponents.  I understand you can even win elections with that philosophy.

And now I leave you with the words of Martin Luther King Jr.  “That old law about 'an eye for an eye' leaves everybody blind. The time is always right to do the right thing.”

#castthefirststone

Have you ever had a song or a part of a song stuck in your head?  You know like, . . .  “Mahna Manhna.”   You’re welcome.

Back in the early eighties I heard a song once, only once as far as I can remember.  It was in the kitchen of our family home on Golden Grove Rd. in Saint John.  We were that family that always had a radio playing in the kitchen.  And one afternoon I hear a song, didn’t catch the name of the artist but the words of the chorus stuck in my head.  For over thirty years they have lived there, and every once in a while I’d try and track down what the song was.  And low and behold the other day thanks to the power of the interwebby I found it.

The song was recorded by a young Christian artist by the name of Robyn Pope who had limited success for a few years in the United States.  Why it was played on a secular radio station in Saint John New Brunswick is beyond me.  But the line that has been stuck in my head for the past thirty years, is “Cast the first stone if you think you’re so hot, if you think that she’s wicked and you think that you’re not.”

To put it into context, here is first verse and chorus song by Robyn Pope. 

Maybe you know the story and maybe you don’t.  It was read this morning from the book of John Chapter 8 the first eleven verses.  It’s pretty self-explanatory; really all you have to do is read it to get a sense of what is happening.

And today I’m sure that if someone was tweeting about this event the hashtag would be #castthefirststone.  We are in our second week of our “Hashtag This” series, and over the next few weeks we will be looking at various words and phrases from the bible that deserve a hashtag.

A woman had been caught committing adultery, a sin that was considered a crime under Jewish law.  As a matter of fact the Rabbis said “Every Jew must die before he will commit idolatry, murder or adultery.”  A view that obviously wasn’t shared by everyone.  In particular, a view that must not have been shared by this woman, at least not in practice.

You’ve either heard the story or you’ve heard the phrase “Cast the first stone” which is the central part of what happened that day.  This morning we are going to look at the characters who made up the story.

1) The Accused Let’s start by clearing a couple of things up right away.  First you ever get the impression that the woman here was an innocent spectator? You kind of get the idea that she was just standing on the side of the road and they grabbed her and dragged her to Jesus.  I don’t know how many times I’ve heard this message preached and I’ve always gone away feeling sorry for the woman.  Hold it.  The woman was an adulteress.  The Bible says that she’d been caught in bed with a man who wasn’t her husband.  Now I don’t know for sure what she was doing in bed with the man who wasn’t her husband but I’d be willing to bet they weren’t playing checkers. 

Now in 2016 Adultery may not seem all that serious.  Across the border in the presidential race one candidate is an adulterer and the other candidate is married to an adulterer and it hasn’t seemed to hurt either of them.   And all most of us probably know at least one adulterer or adulteress, but in Jesus day it was a pretty dangerous accusation.

The second impression that you get from hearing some of these sermons was that she was just caught in the act right then and dragged from the scene and thrown at the feet of Jesus, but it doesn’t even imply that it had just happened. 

So we probably should presume, because we don’t know any different that the woman was fully clothed and her husband or her partner’s wife or whoever had caught them, had reported them to the powers that be and now action was being taken.

The third impression that you get is that the man got away with it.  You hear preachers asking that question “Where was the man”?  And then saying things like “She couldn’t have been alone.”  As if this was some grand conspiracy where only the woman involved in adultery was punished.  And then the preachers start speculating that the person that she had been caught with was one of the religious leaders or someone important.

Maybe, but according to one source the Mishnah, or Jewish codified law states the penalty for adultery would be strangulation and it even lays down the method.

It then reiterates that death by stoning is the penalty for a girl who is betrothed and then commits adultery.  So, maybe the guy had already paid the price.

We know nothing else about this woman other than the bare facts laid down in John’s narrative.  She was caught in adultery and was being sentenced.  There was no defense for her; she couldn’t appeal to a higher court. 

She had started writing the story and her accusers would finish it for her.  As a Jewish woman, in a Jewish culture, raised in a knowledge of the Jewish law she would have known the consequences of her actions. 

We might ignore the words of the law laid down in the Old Testament but for her that wouldn’t have been an option so she would have known that Leviticus 20:10 “If a man commits adultery with his neighbor’s wife, both the man and the woman who have committed adultery must be put to death.

When she started down that path, she would have known the ultimate destination if she got caught.  She may very well have thought that she wouldn’t get caught but she knew what the law dictated would happen if she did get caught.

We might feel sorry for her, we might feel that the punishment didn’t fit the crime, after all what would happen today if adulterers & adulteresses were put to death.  Other than the fact that the unemployment problem would be solved with all those jobs opening up, Hillary would be a widow, the Donald Trump question would have already been answered, Hollywood would be a virtual ghost town and most of us would lose some friends.

And as much as we might feel that this was extreme and unjust action, in her country, under her religion according to her traditions and customs she was simply getting what she deserved no more no less.

Which brings us to 2) The Accusers The scriptures tell us they were the teachers of religious law and Pharisees.  These men were the court of Israel.  They were the legal experts of the day.  When you had an issue that needed to be resolved this is where you brought it. 

And so it was to these men that the woman was brought.  Probably by her husband who explained the situation and presented the witnesses.  You see it wouldn’t be enough that he had caught her in the act because the law may have been harsh but it tried to be fair and so it said in Deuteronomy 17:6 But never put a person to death on the testimony of only one witness. There must always be two or three witnesses. 

That is reiterated in Deuteronomy 19:15-19 You must not convict anyone of a crime on the testimony of only one witness. The facts of the case must be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses. “If a malicious witness comes forward and accuses someone of a crime, then both the accuser and accused must appear before the Lord by coming to the priests and judges in office at that time. The judges must investigate the case thoroughly. If the accuser has brought false charges against his fellow Israelite, you must impose on the accuser the sentence he intended for the other person. In this way, you will purge such evil from among you.

Now that’s the bare bones of the situation, but it’s not all the story.  To put a wrinkle in the story these men did not have the right to put this woman to death, and they knew it. 

“But Denn, you said”, I know what I said.  I said that the penalty for her crime was death under Jewish law.  Right?  Right. 

But they weren’t under Jewish law, remember they were an occupied country and they were under Roman law, and under Roman law nobody but the Roman Authorities could impose the death sentence.

You might recall that is why the Jews took Jesus to Pilate to be condemned to death; they didn’t have the authority to do it.  I don’t know what they were going to do with the woman, but it wasn’t going to be death.  Or at least there had been a pretty good chance that it wouldn’t be.

But then they started spouting off things like John 8:5 “The law of Moses says to stone her. What do you say?” And that’s when the reality of the situation started to sink in.  She knew that the penalty for adultery was death but it had been a while since the penalty had been carried out and she wasn’t really all that interested in seeing a return to tradition.  But why now?  What was happening here? 

Well, to be truthful I don’t think that this woman or what she did was all that important to the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law of Moses.  Oh they would have looked at her with contempt, and probably made some rude comments about her private life. 

They may have granted her husband a divorce and made life pretty miserable for her.  But she was just a secondary concern; they had bigger fish to fry.

The woman was just an excuse; she was bait for the bigger fish.  You see this young carpenter from Galilee, Jesus was getting on their nerves and they were looking for some way to discredit him.  It wasn’t the first time nor would it be the last; remember these were the same guys who asked him in Luke 20:22 “Now tell us—is it right for us to pay taxes to Caesar or not?”

And in Matthew 19:3 Some Pharisees came and tried to trap him with this question: “Should a man be allowed to divorce his wife for just any reason?”

and in Mark 8:11 When the Pharisees heard that Jesus had arrived, they came and started to argue with him. Testing him, they demanded that he show them a miraculous sign from heaven to prove his authority.  Kind of a recurring theme wouldn’t you think?

And so the question they pose to Jesus is this, “Will you side with the Jewish law, the law of your forefathers or will you side with the Roman oppressors?”    It was really a lose, lose situation for Jesus. 

If he said “stone her” then they could go to the Romans and say, “Look here’s a man who’s challenging your authority.  On the other hand, if he says “don’t stone her” then they go to the Jew’s and say “See, he’s challenging the authority of scripture.

The woman was a nothing to the Pharisees and rulers of the law, she had no name, no personality, no feelings, and she was simply a pawn.  A piece to be played in the game they waged against Jesus.  They were using her the same way they would use a tool.

3) The Forgiver And so it’s in this little soap opera that we see Jesus at his best.  Because unlike the Pharisees, Jesus knew the woman, he had been there when she was created, he knew her when she was being knit together in her mother’s womb, he knew the numbers of her hair and he knew the condition of her heart. 

And unlike the Pharisees he cared about the woman, it was for her that he left heaven and came to earth, it was for her that he was willing to live as a mortal for thirty-three years, and ultimately it would be for her that he would allow himself to be nailed to a cross and die.

You gotta get the picture.  Jesus is teaching a crowd of people, and as was the custom of the day when a Rabbi had something very important to teach he did it sitting down with people gathered all around him.  And so there he sat, and there they stood. 

A woman who if not full of remorse was almost certainly full of shame, her head bowed, her eyes looking at the dirt, knowing that she was guilty.  Surrounded her were the religious teachers, her judges, the ones who had her very life in their hands.  And they were demanding an answer. 

And he didn’t say a word, he just bent over and started doodling in the dirt, and they stood there looking down on him demanding that he make a decision concerning this woman’s life.  And he continued to write in the sand, kind of an interesting reaction. 

Wonder why he did that?  There have been at least four suggestions.  1) To give him time, he didn’t want to be rushed into a rash statement, so this was a little bit of a time out.  Perhaps he was thinking things through and more importantly taking time to ask his Father what he should do. 

2) Perhaps by doing this he was forcing the Pharisees and scribes to repeat their charges, so they could hear exactly what they were saying. 

3) Maybe he did it so that he wouldn’t have to look in their eyes.  The leering, lustful looks of the religious leaders, the morbid curiosity of the crowd, and the shame of the woman all combined to twist his heart in knots.  So he hid his eyes.

4)  The most interesting suggestion by far is that as he sat there doodling in the dust, he was actually jotting down the sins of the men who stood before him.  This goes a little deeper than mere speculation.  Again let’s remember that the Bible wasn’t written in English, it was written in Greek which was a much more expressive language then English.  English is kind of a lazy language.  We’ll take one word and make it mean half a dozen different things. 

Like the word fast.  It can mean quick, it can mean go without food, it can mean to tie something up, it can mean that the colors won’t fade, it can mean to be loyal, it can mean to be sexually promiscuous or it can mean that your watch gained time. 

The Greek word that would normally have been used here for writing should have been graphein which simply means to write.  But John adds the prefix of Kata to the word which means against.  Making the word katagraphein which meant to write down a record against someone. 

And so some have suggested that Jesus was confronting the men with their own sins.  Bob beat his wife last week, Fred cheated on his taxes, Joe stole from his neighbor, and Jacob slept with Marks wife.  I’ve also heard it suggested that he was writing the names of their girlfriends in the dust for all to see.

But whatever he was doing the leaders continued to demand an answer and so Jesus gave it to them John 8:7-8 They kept demanding an answer, so he stood up again and said, “All right, but let the one who has never sinned throw the first stone!” Then he stooped down again and wrote in the dust.

 Maybe this was when they noticed what the words actually said that he was writing out, I don’t know but something struck a chord because the Bible says John 8:9-11 When the accusers heard this, they slipped away one by one, beginning with the oldest, until only Jesus was left in the middle of the crowd with the woman. Then Jesus stood up again and said to the woman, “Where are your accusers? Didn’t even one of them condemn you?” “No, Lord,” she said. And Jesus said, “Neither do I. Go and sin no more.”

Now as a side bar to our sermon, you may have noticed in your bibles a footnote that says that this particular story was not included in many of the early manuscripts that have been found of the New Testament. 

And that is true; the earliest manuscripts don’t include this story.  However, some scholars feel that it wasn’t included in the earliest manuscripts because those who edited the text of the New Testament thought that this was a dangerous story, a justification for a light view of adultery and therefore omitted it. 

None other than Augustine said that the story was removed from text of the gospel because some were of slight faith and to avoid scandal.

William Barclay who wrote the daily study Bible Commentary had this to say “We may be sure that this is a real story about Jesus, although one so gracious that for a long time men were afraid to accept it.”

Now back to the message.  It’s easy to draw the wrong lesson here and to get the impression that Jesus took the woman’s sin all too lightly, as if it didn’t matter.  He didn’t say “I am not going to judge you”.  What he said was “I am not going to judge you just now, go and sin no more.” 

Jesus was asking her if she was an adulterer or if she had simply committed adultery, and there is a world of difference.    It was Richard North Patterson who wrote  “No one should be judged by the worst moment of his life.”

So what he was doing wasn’t so much abandoning judgment as much as deferring judgment.  He was saying, “Go and prove that you can do better” Jesus attitude to this sinner and to us as sinners involves a number of things.

1) It Involved a Second Chance, it was as if Jesus was saying, “I know that you’ve made a mess of things, but life is not finished yet, I’m giving you another chance a chance to redeem yourself.”  Let it be known in Jesus is a gospel of second chances. 

Jesus was always interested not only in what a person was but in what a person could be.  He didn’t say that what people had done didn’t matter, broken laws and broken hearts always matter but he knew that people not only have a past but they have a future.

And isn’t that what Jesus has done for all of us, give us a second chance?  Where we can come and ask him to forgive our sins and repent, that is turn from our sins, and through his help seek to do better.

2) It Involved Mercy The basic difference between Jesus and the Pharisees was they wished to condemn the woman he wished to forgive the woman.  If we read between the lines of the story we can see that they were taking great pleasure in what they were doing and would relish in being able to stone the woman.

3) It Involved Challenge.  Jesus confronted this woman with the challenge of a different life.  He wanted her to know the reality of 2 Corinthians 5:17 This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!  But what he didn’t say was “It’s all right, don’t worry: just go on as you are doing.”  he said “it’s all wrong, go out and fight and change your life from top to bottom, go and sin no more.”

It wasn’t an easy forgiveness, instead it was a challenge which pointed a sinner to heights of goodness which she couldn’t even imagine.

4) It Involved a Warning.  It may not be said but it is certainly implied.  Here we are face to face with the eternal choice.  Jesus confronted the woman with a choice that same choice he gives each one of us, either to go back to our old ways or to reach out to the new way with him.  This story is unfinished, for every life in unfinished until it stands before God.

So where are you at?  If you can’t put yourself in the woman’s place, then you are putting yourself in the Pharisees place. 

Listen to me very carefully.  There isn’t any sin in the world that you aren’t capable of.  I had a friend of mine who told me he couldn’t imagine how anyone could commit adultery and today he is living with another man’s wife while his wife lives alone.  You best be careful before you pick up a rock and throw it. 

Maybe you’re standing where the woman stood and you know that you’ve done wrong and you can’t imagine what Jesus would want with the likes of you, and he’s saying “The story’s not over yet, go and sin no more.”  That doesn’t just involve being sorry for sinning it involves being so sorry that you turn from your sin and that is called repentance.  listen to the message that Jesus has for you today “Where are your accusers? Didn’t even one of them condemn you?” “No, Lord,” she said. And Jesus said, “Neither do I. Go and sin no more.”