Paul and Politics: Jesus is Lord!
Rev. Eugene N. Nelson, Jr.
The Community Church of Sebastopol
January 31, 2010
Philippians 2:1-11
You know, hearing these words in Sonoma County, 2010, it can be difficult to imagine the radically different world experienced by Paul and the people who were in Paul’s churches Theirs was a world dominated in a way we can hardly imagine, dominated by the imperial power of Rome. There was military power – Rome had a monopoly on the use of force and violence and would brutally punish anyone who dared challenge that monopoly. There was economic power – the web of roads and aqueducts constructed by Rome, first to support its legions, was unprecedented, and it led to an unprecedented expansion of commerce around the entire Mediterranean world – all taxed and controlled by Rome. There was political power – Rome called the shots, blessed or removed local officials. Those who knew how to get along by going along, who could play the game – think of the long reign of Herod the Great in Jerusalem – could do all right. As long as there was peace and order and taxes were collected, Rome was willing to allow a fair measure of local autonomy. But woe to those who veered too far from the party line and the imperial definition of normalcy. And finally there was ideological power. Roman imperial theology was the ideological glue that held all of this together. Whose image was on the coin? Caesar, the Emperor. King of Kings, Lord of Lord’s, God’s Chosen, Savior of the World, Divine Son of God, Prince of Peace – all titles ascribed to Caesar. When you spoke of the Lord, everyone knew who you were talking about. Everyone, it would seem, except Paul.
“Therefore God also highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name…” He’s obviously talking about Caesar, right? Everyone knew that. In the first century world, who else could he be talking about? “So at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord…” Jesus? As Dominic Crossan has said, with these words Paul is either telling a really good Jewish joke or he’s committing high treason. Jesus is Lord? An itinerant Jewish peasant from Nazareth is Lord? This troublemaker who was crushed like an ant by Rome the minute he got out of line is Lord? Come on. Perhaps Paul should consider cutting back on the wine consumption before he writes these letters. Caesar versus Jesus: no contest, right?
“Guess what,” says Paul. “Jesus is Lord, the emperor is not, Jesus is Lord; the rulers of this world are not; Jesus is Lord, the market economy is not; Jesus is Lord, the correct political ideology or theology is not.” This is nothing less, says Crossan, than a vision of life other than imperial normalcy, a vision of life radically different from reality as defined by the wisdom of the world.
I am reminded of a statement by Bishop Desmund Tutu during the struggle against apartheid in South Africa. In a confrontation with the South African Minister of Law and Order – which then was a euphemism for oppression – Tutu said this: “Mr. Minister, we must remind you that you are not God. You are just a man. One day your name shall merely be a faint scribble on the pages of history, while the name of Jesus Christ, Lord of the church, shall live forever.” To which Paul would say, “Now that’s what I’m talking about!”
Some of you may recall this story told by my most significant mentor in ministry, Bill Nelson (no relation). Bill says, “A friend of mine marched through the jungles of New Guinea during the Second World War. He encountered native tribesmen he found to be living a peaceful, but curiously superstitious form of Christianity. Through an interpreter, he visited with them about some of their rather peculiar customs. Almost in spite of himself, he showed obvious distaste for some of them. Seeing his disapproval, an old man stood and got right to the point when he said to my friend, ‘Before we followed Jesus as Lord, we would have cooked and eaten you!’”
The point is plain. We can talk about Jesus. We can read books and have classes on the historical Jesus. We can admire him, we can even celebrate him. But that doesn’t necessarily make him the Lord. No, Jesus is Lord when he makes a difference in our lives, when we allow ourselves to be touched and changed by the spirit of his life and so choose to follow in his way. It’s one thing to use his name. It is quite another to allow him to change our priorities, to allow him to open us to a new reality, to a whole new way of being. There’s such a difference between simply using his name and allowing him fundamentally to change our lives.
This last week, as Kristen told you, Kristen and I went to the Earl Lectures in Berkeley. The theme of the lectures this year was Spiritual but Not Religious, which everyone down there referred to as SBNR. Spiritual but Not Religious. You hear that a lot from people in the west county. And I suspect that is how many of us might describe ourselves: searchers, seekers, pilgrims on a spiritual path that may not have a specific name. People who have had a variety of experiences of the spirit, the sacred, the holy. As one such seeker has said, “I know there is a river of spirit within me and it doesn’t need a name.” Now as a Christian pastor – this probably doesn’t shock you – I have no trouble naming that spirit Jesus. Paul had no trouble with that. I know many of you can join me there, but I also know that many of you may not quite be ready to say that. I mean, we are in this church together, we support it, we are faithful to it – thanks be to God – but I know that when it comes to talking about Jesus, and talking about Jesus as Lord, as I am attempting to do today, there are probably just about as many opinions as there are people in this sanctuary. Maybe you are not quite ready to say that. Maybe you are not sure where you are with that. And it’s not my job today to force feed Jesus as Lord down your throats, I mean well, maybe just a little.
But I get to be the preacher, and as preacher and pastor what I do want to do is share my faith, speak from my own heart and experience, share my conviction that there is a power of life in this Jew from Nazareth, a power that summons each of us to transformation, that seeks, as you have heard me say before, to pull our fingers, one by one, from their firm grip on the status quo and to wrench us away from our submission to the world as it is, to all the lords and powers of this world and their definitions of reality. Peter Gomes, professor and chaplain at Harvard, was once asked to give a one sentence definition of the good news. Without hesitation, he replied, “You don’t have to be as you are.”
Could that be what it means to affirm Jesus as Lord? We don’t have to be as we are. We can change and keep changing. We are not trapped by our histories or our fears. We can set ourselves and our communities on a new course. We can be emancipated from self-preoccupation and set loose by the divine. Could that be what it means? That kind of freedom? Of course, Gomes went on to say that this good news is not only liberating, but also unnerving, destabilizing, even frightening. “When we encounter Jesus”, he said, “We can’t rely on things always being the way they have always been.”
Think of the many ways Jesus invited people to change. To the rich young man who sought his counsel, Jesus said, “Great, sell all that you have, give the proceeds to the poor, come follow me.” Thanks for nothing, Jesus. To the woman he saved from being stoned to death, he said, “Go, you are now free, dare to walk a new path and sin no more.” To the fishermen he met by the sea, he said, “Put down your nets,” he said. “Follow me, and I will teach you how to fish for people.” Always, new beginnings, new life, new paths, new doors opening, but also always big changes. Says seminary professor, Stephanie Paulsell, “Jesus believes that human beings are capable of radical change. That in itself is good news. Even when we do not rise to his invitation, he never stops offering it. Our progress toward the vision he offers may be slow and halting, but we can’t deny that in him we catch a glimpse of the people we might become.” Jesus comes along with this call, this promise, this love that continues to seek us out. And in our human imagination, so often battered and torn by our fears and limitations, maybe we begin to see a new world. Can we believe it? Dare we embrace it?
There is a reported incident coming from the Revolutionary War. A prominent merchant came to visit General George Washington at Valley Forge during what had to be some of the darkest days of that war. With soldiers freezing and starving on all sides, the merchant seemed content simply to flatter and praise Washington. Finally the General stopped him and asked, ”But where do you stand regarding independence and what will you do about it?”
Well, when it comes to this affirmation of Jesus as Lord, that really becomes the issue, doesn’t it? Do we just say it and sing it in our hymns? Or do we allow it to become a part of who we are. Generation after generation we hear his words to turn the other cheek, go the second mile, return good for evil, find greatness through the giving of ourselves and serving others and to never place our final loyalty on anything less than God. And generation after generation we don’t really act that way and we suffer and our world bleeds. Where do we stand? What are we going to do about this Jesus?
I don’t know. Maybe that is a question that comes too much from the head, when what we really need to do is listen with our hearts – which isn’t easy for me because I’m always a person who likes to stay in his head. But, as one colleague points out, perhaps the issue isn’t so much trying to understand Jesus. Perhaps we are called on to keep on loving him, seeking as much as we are able to follow in his way, to embrace the reality of his overwhelming love for us, to feed on him, to savor and enjoy him as if we were feeding, well, as if we were feeding on the very bread of life.