FROM THE FULLNESS OF HIS GRACE

A sermon by George R. Pasley

Ephesians 1:3-14; John 1:1-18

Joe had no idea why he finally went to church.

Some of his friends had been inviting him to church for months, but that wasn’t why he went.

There was no big crisis in his life to send him running to church.

Joe hadn’t experienced a miracle or anything.

He just went. But to tell the truth, Joe was kind of worried about the Jesus thing.

As far as Joe was concerned, Jesus was cool- but some people took Jesus WAY TOO SERIOUSLY, and Joe just wanted Jesus to leave HIM alone.

But for some very strange reason, Joe went to church that Sunday.

People were happy to see him. In fact, Joe recognized a few people- a few more people than the friends who’d already invited him. One of them introduced Joe to another visitor, Chuck.

“What brings you here,” asked Joe.

But Chuck just squirmed. “Oh, it seemed like I needed it,” he answered, but Joe suspected there was more to it than that,

One of his friends had told Joe the preacher at that church gave good sermons, which kind of amused Joe because he couldn’t imagine anyone caring about a sermon. But anyway he listened as the preacher gave a sermon on the wise men following a star and visiting Jesus.

She- the preacher- said the wise men gave some valuable gifts to Jesus, but they took something even more valuable with them when they left. She called it “the light of Christ,” and she said it was like a star to guide them wherever they went in life, like a flashlight so they could see their life and other’s in a different way, and like a candle so other people could see Jesus in them.

After church Joe figured he’d go somewhere and get a hamburger, but before he got out the door someone stopped him (Joe thought his name was Paul) and invited him to go to lunch with them.

Joe asked, “Where are you going?”

Paul laughed. “We take sandwiches and coffee down to Mission Street, and hand them out to the homeless.”

That made Joe squirm a little bit, because he’d never done anything he’d consider a “good deed” before. But he went.

Joe was surprised by what he saw on Mission Street. He’d seen the homeless many times, every time he drove through the area. But he’d never looked at them eye to eye before. When he did so now, pouring coffee for them, he saw gratitude, which he had expected- but he also saw a strange sort of courage and joy, and he knew he was receiving something from the poorest people in town.

He mentioned this to Paul when as they headed back to the church.

Paul laughed. “You’ve just seen Jesus,” he said. “That’s what pastor was talking about this morning- seeing Jesus in others.”

That made Joe squirm, because if he’s seen Jesus in someone else then it was because the Light of Christ was starting to burn in him, and he wasn’t sure he wanted that- not really.

But it felt good to help those people, and that made Joe squirm even more. After all, they were in really bad condition, so it seemed wrong to, well, feel good.

All that week, Joe alternated between squirming over the things that had happened on Sunday, and feeling a slight bit of eagerness to go back next week.

So he went, and the next week, too- and most every week after that. There were a lot of things he didn’t understand.

He didn’t understand what it was that Jesus had done to make him so special.

He didn’t understand how that made a difference,

And most of all, he didn’t understand what was happening to him.

But he kept going, and he kept looking for answers.

But most of all, he was happy.

Some of his friends noticed his happiness. One of his friends, Jill, a Christian friend, said it wasn’t really happiness- it was better than that. Joe readily agreed- but he didn’t have a name for it. Jill laughed and said, “Oh, silly, it’s JOY!”

Well, Joe wasn’t sure he believed. After all, human beings ALL had potential, and maybe it just happened to bring out the best in him. Besides- the Son of God? Rising from the Dead? But he kept on going to church. NOT because of the preacher, and NOT because he believed in Jesus, but because he had questions that seemed to be getting answers, and because it seemed to be good for him but mostly because he liked the things they DID.

Then came Valentine’s Day, and the preacher talked about love. She said that in every love relationship, the lovers each gave something up. Joe had never been in love- he hardly even dated, but he knew that what the preacher said was true. In fact, more than once he had teased his friends about the changes that had occurred in their lives because they’d suddenly fallen in love.

The preacher went on to say “It can’t be just one way. Both sides must say to the other, ‘I will adjust to you. I will change for you. I will make a sacrifice for you’ because if only ONE person in the relationship says that, the relationship will be exploitive.” (Tim Kellor, “The Reason for God,” p. 50)

That startled Joe a little bit, not because he didn’t believe it but because he’d never actually known the girlfriends of his friends BEFORE they started dating his buddies. He’d never THOUGHT about the changes they made in their lives.

But then the preacher went on to say “What about God?” and Joe thought “Yeah- what about God? Does God adapt for us, or do we do all the changing? Isn’t it all one-sided?”

Well wouldn’t you know, right then the preacher said, “In the most radical way, God HAS adapted to us, in Jesus’ incarnation and in his sacrifice on the cross. In Jesus Christ, God became a limited human being, vulnerable to suffering and death. On the cross, he submitted to OUR condition as sinners- and died in our place to forgive us. In the most profound way, God has said to us, “I will adjust to you, I will change for you, I will make sacrifices of love for you.” (ibid)

Now that really shook Joe up, because now he started to get what the Jesus stuff was all about.

Jesus was about God falling in love with us.

Redemption was about falling in love with God.

Believing was about the change in thought and attitude that comes along with falling in love.

Becoming a child of God was about making the adaptations from our side of the relationship that result in a visible change in our lives from an outsider’s point of view.

So not too long after that, Joe went in to see the preacher on a weekday. He wanted to know if he had the Jesus stuff right, because he actually wasn’t sure about ALL the Jesus stuff. After all, believing that Jesus walked on water, and suddenly turned brilliant white, and cast out demons was still believing in some pretty weird stuff. And didn’t the Bile say we had to believe? What if believing was just too hard?

The preacher seemed to know what Joe was talking about. She said they were questions lots of people asked, including herself.

But then she said, “Joe, we need to think about ‘belief’ in a different way.”

“Sometimes when we say ‘believe’ we mean exactly that, Joe. Believe that God loves you, believe that Jesus died for you, believe that he rose from the dead, believe that you can experience new life.”

But then she said some other things about belief Joe had never thought of before.

“Joe, the word the New Testament uses is actually more like the word ‘faith.’ Do you know what faith means?”

Joe said he supposed that ‘faith’ pretty much means the same as ‘believe.’

“Only sometimes,” said the preacher. Most of the other times it means something like ‘trust.’”

So when the bible says “believe in Jesus,” it’s really asking us to do something different than ‘believe.’ Different, but maybe harder and definitely better.”

“How so” asked Joe.

“Well,” said the preacher, “just replace ‘believe’ with ‘trust.’”

“Trust in Jesus,” said Joe. “Ahhh!”

Then the preacher picked up a bible, and turned to John chapter one: “Yet to all who received him, to those who TRUSTED in his name, he gave the right to become children of God.”

“Joe,” the preacher asked, “Have you ever been in love?”

Joe blushed. “No,” he said.

“But Joe,” the preacher said. “If you do fall in love, you’ll want to trust the girl, won’t you? You’ll have to trust her before you really give yourself to her, won’t you? You’ll have to trust that she respects you and loves you, right?”

Joe started laughing- “Well, I guess I’d have to HOPE that I could trust her. I might not know for sure until I actually take the chance.”

“Exactly!” said the preacher. “That’s what faith is.”

When Joe left church that afternoon, he was pinching himself- and so should we.

After all, God loves us and “from the fullness of his grace we have all received one blessing after another.”

In the name of the Father, Son, and Hoy Ghost. Amen.