May 10, 2008
Text: John 20:19-23
Pr.Robert Goldstein
So I Send You

Winters in Melbourne are like winters in San Francisco: wet, sometimes frosty and sometimes foggy. In our un-insulated homes we met the damp cold with fireplaces. I can remember many a chilly morning when my breath could be seen as I hopped out of bed, running to the living room where a fire sparked and roared, delivering welcome waves of warmth onto my chilled boyish body.

Life was simpler then. Summers at home were hot. Winters were cold. At best, you cooled with a fan; you heated with a fire. A roaring, crackling fire remains such a joyful and welcoming experience to me.

The disciples in this morning’s Gospel reading are bone cold. No fire in their bellies or in their hearts! Their greetings to strangers are as chilly and suspicious as Obama walking into Clinton headquarters right now. Where is the warmth? Where is the fire? Has it gone out? -smothered by fear that Jesus has left them to fend for themselves? Easter’s joy barely flickering.

I think there are times in our lives too when we think the fire of the Spirit has gone out in us -that we are left to fend for ourselves in a cold, unforgiving and unrelenting world? Easter joy can’t seem to be rekindled. Death’s shadow crosses it bounds and glooms our hearts. But, we are mistaken. When two or three gather in prayerful yearning, Christ appears in the midst of us. The roaring warmth of Jesus’ fire of love now greets our cold. See how patient Christ is! Jesus doesn’t reprimand us, but reminds us of the peace always brought to us. Before anything else, Jesus calms us into sense of peace and wellbeing. We don’t even ask for it. Jesus always brings that peace when we gather in Christ’s name. Isn’t that a wonderful model for us to follow in our lives!

But to bring peace, one must be at peace. And that peace we share comes from simply trusting in Jesus as one who can set us free from ourselves, and set us free from our sins we need perhaps to confess. That peace comes from the spoken Word, because Christ comes through that Word. That peace comes from the intimacy of our communion table, because Christ comes to us through that bread made flesh and the wine of his utter self-giving love.

After bringing peace Jesus shows the first disciples his wounds. Only when they behold the vision of this crucified man do they come to full life at last, rejoicing now as they see Jesus in the truest form of God, the human crucified Messiah. Yes, the fire of faith begins to stir again in their hearts, and in our hearts too. Again Jesus says, "Peace be with you."

Peace is the beginning and the end of living in Christ. Peace is the knot in the thread of daily life as we sow our talents and labor into that fabric which is our life on his earth. Christ is with us bringing a warming joy and fire to our spirits. This same yearning for peace brings Christopher, Elaine, Steve and William to God and to us this morning. The world may be wintry cold but the fire of the Spirit is burning brightly in our hearts. Do not fight it. Do not try to control it. Just receive it with thanks and in peace and live.

But the greatest message this morning is in Jesus’ words, "As our God has sent me, so I send you." We are sent forth from this roaring fire of the Spirit in peace for others. Jesus has the utmost confidence in us to send us out with the same Spirit of Peace that gave him his vocation to minister to all he met and to see even his death on that cross as a gift from God.

What a vision! What a person of peace! We are sent forth with that same vision to trust in the vocation, the calling in life, that God has given each one of us, even with its twists and turns. Jesus says to each one of us, "As God sent me, I send you." This Spirit of Pentecost bursts forth to all nations and all people of all classes, even the drug addict, the mentally ill and the homeless on our city’s streets. Perhaps more so to them because they have nothing but God to warm them.

Speaking about Pentecostal fire, I want to say a word of support for the Rev. Jeremiah Wright. I do not consider his recent actions as politically helpful to Barack Obama. But his ministry in Chicago was extraordinary, even bringing that young black Harvard Law graduate and community organizer to faith in Christ. And his anger? Well, there is some things we white people need to understand. In the slavery and Jim Crow eras, and in the pervasive and often hidden racism of contemporary America, the only institution that black people "owned" was their church. Far more than white people realize, the black church was their primary, their only source of power. The black church was the one place where black dignity was conferred, black opinions were honored and black leadership was recognized. The black church was the center of black life and a powerful organizing force that whites have never fully understood.

When it came to power and wealth, the black community was historically left out of the pie. But they had to harvest the fruit, grind the wheat, bake the pie and serve it, with all the wealth from their labor going to their capitalist owners. Their church was the one place where they could tell that truth openly, express their anger openly and voice their exclusion from the American dream. As Bishop John Spong says, Jeremiah Wright is, therefore, a voice that establishment figures do not want to hear, for they do not want to listen to themselves defined as oppressors. But Jeremiah Wright was in truth showing to his people the wounds in Christ’s hands and side. They rejoiced at the truth and that Christ, their freedom and hope, was present with them.

All of this is part of the wondrous dynamic to black churches and their worship, their Pentecostal fire. Perhaps it helps you put Pastor Jeremiah Wright’s angry and prophetic sound bites, which are bound to be exploited in the General Election, into a more accurate context.

"As God sent me, so I send you," Christ dares to invite you. Do you dare to follow? The homeless on our streets are not to be verbally or physically abused, because they are truly God’s children. They remind us that the current political establishment, which we enjoy, is very broken, cold and selfish. Do we dare to follow Christ here? If you are in fear, I say to you, "Peace be to you." Christ is with us. Pentecost is a roaring fire in our wintry world. Now, take a deep breath from Jesus in this room and let the fire of faith flame up in you! It is a roaring fire as ancient as the burning bush, a fire of power to right wrongs and to warm cold hearts. As God sent me, so I send you. Go, spread the peace and the hope! Amen