This sermon was preached by Rev. Mark Peterson at Christ the King Lutheran church on March 8, 2015.
Gospel: John 2:13–22
13The Passover of the Jews was near, and
Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 14In the temple he found people selling
cattle, sheep, and doves, and the money changers seated at their tables. 15Making
a whip of cords, he drove all of them out of the temple, both the sheep and the
cattle. He also poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their
tables. 16He told those who were selling the doves, "Take
these things out of here! Stop making my Father's house a
marketplace!" 17His disciples remembered that it was
written, "Zeal for your house will consume me." 18The
Jews then said to him, "What sign can you show us for doing
this?" 19Jesus answered them, "Destroy this temple, and in
three days I will raise it up." 20The Jews then said, "This temple
has been under construction for forty-six years, and will you raise it up in
three days?" 21But he was speaking of the temple of his
body. 22After
he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this;
and they believed the scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.
Greetings to you in the name of Jesus Christ,
46 years.
That’s how long it took to build the great temple in
Jerusalem over 2000 years ago. That must have been a pretty impressive
structure.
And, as those 46 years passed, this great temple, became
much more than a building, a simple place where God could be worshipped.
Indeed, in a way, that temple became a sort of god in and of itself.
The temple, one of the finest examples of what humans could
build, offered in its permanence and grandeur a sense of security and
stability. For many of the Jewish people, the presence of the temple was
synonymous with the presence of God. And over that time, instead of life
revolving around and depending upon a living God, the life of the faith
community revolved around that magnificent building.
While the building of the temple was a well-intentioned and
faithful process, over those 46 years, sin, as it always does, made its way
into things. Sin, caused these People of God to build a temple where the
creator of all things could be domesticated and structured, so that faith could
be lived out according to the will and agendas of humans, rather than God. The
temple became symbolic of human dependency on humans, rather than God.
Today, over 2000 years later, not much has changed. This
imagery of the building of a great temple, applies to our lives both as
individuals, as societies, and even as communities of faith.
To illustrate this, we’ll use the game, Jenga.
(At this point, I pulled out a Jenga game
and put it on a table.)
Now, when we start out, we see a good, solid structure. But
this is the middle, this is what we’ve accomplished in our lives. It’s what we
have to show the world. This, is the temple of our lives.
Though today, with the blocks already in place, we sort of
have a middle point that we’ve built too.
So, we have this structure, the metaphor for the temples we
build in all parts of our lives. But, because we become dependent on our
self-sufficiency and independence, we as humans need to become great. We need
to be bigger and better, and so here’s what happens. We pull out pieces,
important pieces, from the bottom, and put them on top.
The first ones don’t seem so bad, they’re the low hanging
fruit:
(I start taking pieces from the
structure and putting them on top)
Maybe, in order to reach our goal of greatness, we sacrifice
some time for family and friends. Or we take our hurts, disappointments, and
feelings of inadequacy, but rather than admit to being vulnerable, we turn these
things into strengths.
As a society, in an attempt to make our towns and cities
greater, we pull the lives out from under those who have less stuff. Schools,
transportation, access to food, and other social concerns seem to be societal
luxuries that we are regrettably willing to sacrifice, as we seek greatness.
And in our faith communities, Christian congregations across
time and place, get caught up in this quest for greatness. Take just a moment
and think of what things we sacrifice, what things are collateral for the sake
of becoming a greater congregation, at least according to the measurements and
standards of the world.
As people think, I
continue to build.
It doesn’t take long, and pretty soon, we are a little
greater, at least in the eyes of humans. We can build something pretty big, and
we could build it even higher and greater if we start taking blocks from
others…
Over time, in our desperation for greatness, the low
hanging fruit becomes greater sacrifices, and maintaining what we have built,
maintaining the god of our own greatness, in whatever metaphorical temple form
that is, becomes the sole focus of our lives.
But as we build lives of greatness, we also build lives of
isolation. After a while, we’ve become so unstable, that our greatest concern
is keeping things upright. We lose all flexibility and our comfort zones get
smaller and smaller. If there is any change, we topple. Or, if we allow others
to get to close to us, they might touch us with their love and lives, and in
doing so could cause us to topple.
As we look at our unstable Jenga tower, it reflects the
sentiment of a recent newspaper article titled “The Age of Loneliness is
Killing Us”, George Monbiot writes about our state, saying there is
…A life-denying
ideology, which enforces and celebrates our social isolation. The war of every
man against every man – competition and individualism, in other words – is the
religion of our time, justified by a mythology of lone rangers, sole traders,
self-starters, self-made men and women, going it alone. For the most social of
creatures, who cannot prosper without love, there is no such thing as
society, only heroic individualism. What counts is to win. The rest is
collateral damage.
As we take stock of our situation, our vision, our hope, is
that a miracle will happen, and restore some of our old life. Finally, when we realize we can’t save ourselves, we look for a savior to come and save
us.
The Good News is that we have been given that savior, in
Jesus Christ. And with unending love for us and this creation, Christ comes to
us, and our various temples of human accomplishment, just as he entered the
Temple long ago, and… well.. he…
.tip
table over Jenga pieces fall to floor.
Well, Jesus turns the tables over, he turns the whole world
upside down.
Then, with our old life in ruins, Christ makes for us a new
temple. A temple in our community of faith, in our hearts, and in our world
that is worthy to be the house of the God who created all things.
But it’s not a Jenga temple, or anything that shows the
greatness of human accomplishment. Rather, this new temple is more like a
cross, a cross metaphorically made out of legos, (take out lego cross) a cross that connects all of us and all of
creation, regardless of color, shape, or size, with God, and with each other. A
cross that is the most foolish of ambitions for us humans, but yet has the
power, the power of God, to change and transform and save each of us, and all
of creation.
Through the waters of baptism we are sealed with the cross,
God’s loving presence with us in the temple of our lives. And, through the meal
of Holy Communion, we are given this loving power, as Jesus’ life is broken and
poured out for us again and again. This morning, may we go forth from this
place, leaving the pieces of our old lives and human puruits behind, and so
that we may share the life of Jesus Christ, dying on a cross, and being broken
and poured out for all of creation.
In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
Amen
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