The Temple of God

I Corinthians 3:10-23

 I have been to Israel on a number of occasions. In fact I used to host tours to the Holy Land regularly for a number of years, although I haven’t been back for quite a while. I got tired of those long plane flights and long bus rides. One thing I never tired of was the first sight of the city of Jerusalem. The best view of the Old City is when you approach it from the east over the Mount of Olives. The dominant landmark of the Old City of Jerusalem is the Dome of the Rock. It is a Muslim shrine (to be distinguished from a mosque) with a huge beautiful gold plated dome that shines in the sunlight. It was built in the seventh century and sits on the rocky summit of the temple mount. Muslims regard this site as holy because they say that it was from this spot that Mohammad began a visit to heaven one night. When the crusaders controlled the city they turned it into a church and called it Templum Domini, the Temple of the Lord - because that was the original site of the Jewish temple built by Solomon and later restored by King Herod. That is why that little piece of real estate is so fought over these days between Palestinians and Israelis. Ariel Sharon caused what is called the second intifada – a new wave of Palestinian uprising - simply by stepping onto this sacred ground. When you see this magnificent religious shrine you get a sense of what the Jerusalem temple must have looked like in Jesus’ day. The temple of God was one of the great structures of the ancient world and it remains so today.

Jesus’ comments about the temple got him in trouble. Jesus predicted the destruction of the temple while sitting on the Mount of Olives shortly before his arrest. In fact his words were used against him at his trial, and were one of the reasons he was executed. Jesus’ predictions turned out to be true. Within a generation, the temple was in ruin, destroyed by invading Roman armies. When we read what Jesus said carefully we see that Jesus was not only predicting the destruction of the stone temple but also predicting his own death – the destruction of this own body. He refers to his body as a temple. The apostle Paul picks up on this metaphor of a body being a temple in our epistle lesson for today. He says in verse 16, “Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?” That is the verse I am preaching on today. I have two points.

1. First, you are the temple of God. That is what the apostle says. What does he mean? He means this is two ways. First, you individually are the temples of God. Our bodies are temples. Paul says a few chapters later in this same letter: “Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own?” In the Gospel of John, right after he cleanses the temple by driving out the moneychangers, he predicts the destruction of the temple. He says, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” The Jewish religious leaders were outraged and said to him, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will You raise it up in three days?” Then the gospel writer explains, “But He was speaking of the temple of His body.” Jesus was talking about his own resurrection, and the temple was his own body raised from the dead.

The physical temple in Jerusalem was considered by Jews in OT and NT times to be the dwelling place of God on earth. They believed that that God in a special way dwelled in the holy of holies, the innermost chamber of the temple building. Of course they believed that God was Spirit and omnipresent – that he was present everywhere and could never be limited or confined in a physical structure. But they believed that in some way God was especially present in that structure of stone. As Christians we also believe that God is Spirit and omnipresent. There is nowhere that God is not. But we also believe that God was present in a special way in Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is our equivalent to the temple. Furthermore the NT teaches that we are temples of God as well. Our physical bodies are physical temples of God. We believe that God dwells within us a Holy Spirit. We come to this church building to worship on Sundays and sometimes we call this building the house of God. But we also house God. God dwells within us. We are temples of God.

The second thing that the apostle Paul meant, when he say that we were the temple of God, is that he was referring to the Church. I am not talking about the church building, but the church which is composed of people. Paul talks at great length about the church being the Body of Christ. Christ does not walk the earth in the body of Jesus of Nazareth any longer. That body died 2000 years ago. But Christ still walks the earth in his church which is his body. The Church is called the body of Christ. We are the temple of God on earth individually and as a church. Those are the two ways that we are the temple of God. “Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?”

2. Now for the rest of his message I want to explore the implications of those statements.

It means that we are not our own. Paul says in chapter 6 of this letter: “Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.” There was a famous book published back in 1971 as part of the women’s rights movement entitled “Our Bodies, Ourselves.” It is still in print, having been republished in 2011. It was about women’s health and sexuality. I am certainly not going to get in to those issues in this sermon. I don’t know about the content of the book. I never read it. But from a spiritual perspective the title is not true. These are not our bodies and we are not ourselves. “Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.”

When something is not ours, it changes the way we look at it and treat it. If I borrow something from someone – a tool or a book or anything else – I take special care of it because I know it is not mine. I am more careful than normal because if it is lost or damaged that I have to give an account of it to its owner. I will have to return it someday. I am responsible for it until that day. That is the way we should consider our bodies. They are not ours. We have them on loan from the Creator and Owner of this world and everything in it. In the context of the letter in which Paul spoke these words were spoken about sexual immorality. The verse right before it says, “Flee sexual immorality. Every sin that a man does is outside the body, but he who commits sexual immorality sins against his own body.” That is the way we ought to come at sexual ethics – not with a list of do’s and don’t’s, but with this basic principle that our bodies do not belong to us. If they did, then we could do whatever we want with them. But from a biblical perspective we are just the caretakers of these physical forms for a few decades. When they are returned to God, we are responsible for what we have done with them.

The same is true with our selves. The body is just the outermost shell of who we are. Our selves – our psychological selves – our minds, our emotions, our wills – what the Bible calls the soul or sometimes the spirit - is the engine of this body. It also is God’s. We belong to God body and soul. “For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.”

Let me talk about that first part of that verse also. You were bought with a price. This is the Christian concept of redemption, which is at the heart of the Christian gospel. It communicates the idea that we are the purchase of God. We have been bought and paid for. We are not our own. The Epistles picture us as being in bondage before our spiritual awakening. We were slaves, and our freedom has been purchased and we have been set free by Christ. “For freedom Christ has set us free,” Paul says elsewhere. Christ has given us our freedom at a great price. What are we going to do with it? Eleanor Powell said, “What we are is God's gift to us. What we become is our gift to God.” Christ bought us back from death at the cost of his own death. He gave us life at the cost of his own life. He redeemed us and set us free. We are free agents who can either spend our lives in gratitude or on ourselves.

There are a couple of other implications of this idea that we are the temple of God. Another is that we represent God. Whenever anyone saw the Jerusalem temple they knew that it represented the presence of God on earth. In the same way we represent the presence of God on earth. When people drive through this town and see the church buildings they think they represent God, or at least Christianity. When I am identified as a pastor publically I am aware that I represent God to people, or at least I represent this church in a certain sense and represent Christianity in a broader sense. When Lee Quimby as Town moderator invites me to say the invocation at the Town Meeting, he is not asking me as an individual citizen of Sandwich. He is asking me because I am the pastor of the church. I represent something more than myself. For better or worse Ministers represent God to many people. That is why when ministers do immoral things it damages not just their own reputation, but the image of the larger church and Christianity. That is why the sex abuse scandal in the Roman Catholic Church has done great damage not just to the Catholic Church but to all of Christianity, because a lot of people do not distinguish between different branches of Christianity.

In the same way every one of us Christians represents Christ and God. We are the temple of God. We are the Body of Christ. If we are followers of Christ, that means that our actions or lack of them, will reflect on Christ and his church. And they should, because we are his church. We are the living presence of Christ to this world.

Another aspect of being the temple of God is that we have some building to do. Both the apostles Paul and Peter develop this metaphor of the people of the church as being a building. Paul writes in our passage today:

“According to the grace of God which was given to me, as a wise master builder I have laid the foundation, and another builds on it. But let each one take heed how he builds on it. 11 For no other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. 12 Now if anyone builds on this foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, 13 each one’s work will become clear; for the Day will declare it, because it will be revealed by fire; and the fire will test each one’s work, of what sort it is. 14 If anyone’s work which he has built on it endures, he will receive a reward. 15 If anyone’s work is burned, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire.”

The apostle Peter writes: “Coming to Him as to a living stone, rejected indeed by men, but chosen by God and precious, you also, as living stones, are being built up a spiritual house….” The metaphor being employed by both of the apostles is that some building is going on. God is building something of our lives. We are building something of our lives through the grace of God. God is building something here in this town in this church. Lots of churches have building programs in which they erect new structures. But every church is in the middle of a spiritual building program. In Paul’s metaphor we are the builders. What are we building? What type of material are we using? Are we doing the best that we can to give glory to God through what we do as a church in this town?

In Peter’s metaphor (which is somewhat different than Paul’s) we are the building material. He calls us living stones which are being built up into a spiritual house – a temple to glorify God. In either case, some building us going on. It took King Herod the Great forty six years to completely rebuild the temple which Jesus and the disciples worshipped in. You can still see today the foundation stones of Herod’s temple in the Western Wall, which is the holiest site to Jews today. Those huge stones are impressive. If the foundation stones are so impressive, we can only imagine how great the temple was.

Our lives are a temple. The foundation of our spiritual lives according to Paul is Jesus Christ. “For no other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ.” It is a sure foundation. The storms of life will not wash this foundation away. The earthquakes that shake our lives will not crack this foundation or cause it to fall. If that stone foundation of the Jerusalem temple is still standing after 2000 years, how much more will the foundation of Jesus Christ stand throughout eternity. The question is not whether the foundation will remain. It will. The question is whether what is built on it will stand the test of time. Herod’s temple did not stand. It was torn down by the Romans. Not one stone above the foundation was left standing. How about our lives? What will stand the test of time?

Paul writes: “12 Now if anyone builds on this foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, 13 each one’s work will become clear; for the Day will declare it, because it will be revealed by fire; and the fire will test each one’s work, of what sort it is.” The Day that Paul is referring to is the day when we have to return our lives to God and give account of how we have used our time and materials. On that day it will become clear what we have done with our lives. Will they stand the test? Some people’s lives are only about themselves and their possessions. Other people invest their lives in that which will not perish. The missionary Jim Elliot, who died young, wrote: "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose." We cannot keep these bodies. We cannot retain our earthly lives. They are only of value insofar as we spend them for that which does not perish. Let us do so. 

Digging Deeper

Matthew 5:21-37

          One of our society’s problems that gets a lot of press time is violence, especially gun violence. It just so happens that Jesus addresses this issue in our passage for today. Not guns specifically of course, but murder. He also addresses issues like sex – specifically adultery.  He tackles the breakdown of marriage and even talks about what is called “hate speech” today. That seems to be in the news a lot these days.

A couple of months ago there was a brief controversy on the news about a woman named Justine Sacco. She had her 15 minutes of infamy. She was a PR executive for a media company who make a careless and racist statement on Twitter right before boarding a plane to South Africa. Her tweet read: "Going to Africa. Hope I don't get AIDS. Just kidding. I'm white!" What a horrible thing to say! What was she thinking? She obviously was not thinking clearly. She was not editing the thoughts coming into her brain, and she suffered the consequences. Her tweet went viral as they say. It was called “the tweet heard round the world.” She was unaware of all the controversy she was causing because he was on the plane for 12 hours. By the time she landed in Cape Town, South Africa and checked her twitter account and email, she had already been fired from her job. Then there was the more prolonged case of Paula Deen, the American celebrity chef and TV cooking show host. She likewise lost her job and a lot of business because she admitted to using the N word to refer to African Americans.

It is obvious that such language is wrong and should be eliminated from our vocabulary, but the problem runs much deeper. It is more important that the attitudes be removed from our hearts. That is the way Jesus approaches this and all the issues he tackles in this passage. In this segment of the Sermon on the Mount he tackles five sensitive areas.

1. The first is violence and he also says some things about language in the same section. He says in verse 21-23 “You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder, and whoever murders will be in danger of the judgment.’ But I say to you that whoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment. And whoever says to his brother, ‘Raca!’ shall be in danger of the council. But whoever says, ‘You fool!’ shall be in danger of hell fire.”

Violence is a big problem in American society and in many societie. Gun violence in particular. Gun deaths are on the local and national news shows every night. They did not have guns back in Jesus’s day but what he says about murder still applies to today. Jesus looks at the problem of murder and he sees a deeper problem. He sees that violence rooted in anger. Anger is the real issue. And he sees anger expressed not only in acts of violence, but also in violent language. So Jesus takes language seriously. I think his teachings apply to bullying, which is often done in words as much as physical acts. Words can lead to violence and death as certainly as any assault weapon. Words can be used as verbal assault weapons. That is why Jesus uses such strong language in speaking against them. But he addresses the real issue much better than our nation does. Our society punishes the one for using the language. The person is fired and people think the problem is resolved. It is not resolved. It has just gone underground. The language was just a marker of something deeper. The deeper issue is not being addressed.

The deeper issue is a psychological problem and an emotional problem. We would call it a mental health issue.  Personally I think that is where our attention and money should be directed – in detecting, diagnosing and treating mental illness. But Jesus sees something deeper than even the psychological. He sees a spiritual issue. Anger is an issue not just for those who might turn that anger into violence. It is an issue for all of us. And that anger can be turned to our family and especially the most vulnerable in the family. This is the source of abuse of all sorts, and it is fundamentally a spiritually issue that needs to be dealt with spiritually.

2. Jesus goes on in our passage to talk about the importance of reconciliation as a way of resolving anger and conflict before it turns into violence and even legal problems. He says in verses 23-26:

Therefore if you bring your gift to the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar, and go your way. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift. Agree with your adversary quickly, while you are on the way with him, lest your adversary deliver you to the judge, the judge hand you over to the officer, and you be thrown into prison. Assuredly, I say to you, you will by no means get out of there till you have paid the last penny.”

Jesus is talking about interpersonal conflict. We all have interpersonal conflict. As nice as we try to be, none of us gets along with everyone. But it is how we handle disagreement that makes the difference. These teenage shooters who open fire on people in cinemas, schools, and shopping malls seem to have a problem connecting with people and relating to people and handling disagreements. Their frustration and anger gets bottled up and eventually erupts in violence.

In this passage Jesus is telling us to deal with disagreement and conflict quickly. He is refers to Jewish practice in his day of the daily offering, and says that if during your daily offering – which for us would be like out daily time of prayer in the morning – if during that  time with God we remember we have a problem with someone, then we ought to deal with it sooner rather than later.  The longer you wait the more difficult it is and the bigger the problem will become until it can get blown all out of proportion. Jesus advice is to solve small problems before they become big problems. Very good advice.

The apostle Paul gives similar advice when he says, “Be angry but do not sin, and do not let the sun go down on your anger.” By that he means it is okay to feel anger, but do not let the anger fester and grow because it will turn into a much bigger problem. It is like cancerous and precancerous cells. I get recurring skin cancer so I go to a dermatologist annually and he removes all the precancerous cells so they do not turn into cancer. Anger is like precancer. It is not bad or wrong in itself. Anger is natural; it is not sin. But if left unattended it can grow into sin. It can grow into the cancer of verbal or physical violence.

3. The next subject Jesus deals with is sex. Jesus certainly does not shy away from the controversial topics. He says in verses 27-28  27 “You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ 28 But I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” Sexual misconduct is a problem in America. It is the cause of the failure of many marriages. The media has been telling us recently about the serious problem of sexual assault on college campuses and in the military and military academies. It is just another aspect of this problem of violence. This is sexual violence. Jesus deals with this in the same manner. He is saying that the problem is in the heart. The body is going to feel what the body feels. You cannot eliminate lust. It is the body doing what the body does. But it is what we do with our bodies that makes the difference between a loving committed relationship and adultery or even sexual violence.  Then Jesus starts to speak in hyperbole. He uses exaggeration as a teaching technique and says in verses 29-30

If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and cast it from you; for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish, than for your whole body to be cast into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and cast it from you; for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish, than for your whole body to be cast into hell.

We are obviously not supposed to take Jesus literally. He is not advocating self-amputations Some people in the history of Christianity have taken Jesus literally with devastating results. Jesus is using the literary technique of hyperbole to tell us that this is serious business. I think the problem with sexual assault and sexual abuse is that we have not taken it seriously enough.  I think that most people do not take morality seriously. They certainly do not take spirituality seriously. They consider religion to be a hobby, and church like a social organization. Jesus is using the most forceful language he can to tell us that we need to take morality seriously. It is not just a matter of personal opinion or personal choices. What we do with our bodies effects our souls and our relationship with God.

4. Now if Jesus has not tackled enough controversial topics in this passage, now he deals with divorce. He says in verses 31-32, “Furthermore it has been said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.’ But I say to you that whoever divorces his wife for any reason except sexual immorality causes her to commit adultery; and whoever marries a woman who is divorced commits adultery.”  Here is Jesus speaking in hyperbole once again. We have to get comfortable with Jesus’ style of teaching. Jesus was not a legalist. He was not a religious lawgiver like Moses. He is a grace giver. The whole point of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount was to present an alternative to Moses Sermon on the Mount – Moses giving of the Law on Mount Sinai. Jesus starts off with nine beatitudes which are supposed to remind us of the Ten Commandments. Our section here today deals with some of the Ten commandments like “Thou shalt not kill” and “Thou shalt not commit adultery” and “Thou shalt not bear false witness.” Jesus is reinterpreting them here.  Jesus is presenting an alternative to living a religious life based on law. He is presenting a spiritual life based on grace.

That is how he approaches divorce. The Mosiac Law allowed divorce and men took advantage of it to the harm of women and children. Divorce was common in Jesus’ day and it was easy. At least for the husband it was easy. Not so easy for the wife. All a man had to do was write on a piece of paper that he was divorcing his wife, and give it to his wife in the presence of two witnesses. That was it. On the certificate of divorce he could give any reason he wanted. It could be a trivial as burning his breakfast that morning. A man could divorce his wife for any reason at any time. That put the woman in a very serious situation. It was very difficult for women to survive financially without being part of a male-led household. After divorce, if a male relative did not receive her into his household the woman was homeless, and so were her children. The dirty secret of the society at that time was that a lot of women who were divorced were forced into prostitution. Today we talk about sex trafficking. That existed in Jesus’ day as well. That is what Jesus was referring to when he said, “But I say to you that whoever divorces his wife for any reason except sexual immorality causes her to commit adultery.” He is saying that a man is forcing his ex wife to sell her body just to survive.

Jesus is speaking against the abuse of women. Men used divorce as an excuse to get rid of one wife so he could marry a younger woman. Often it was to advance his career or get a rich dowry. We cannot take Jesus’ words and apply them legalistically to the 21^st century American phenomenon of divorce. It is not the same thing. If we want to apply Jesus’ words to day, we should see Jesus supporting marriage and in particular caring for women’s standing in society. It is certainly true today that single-parent household headed by women account for a disproportionate percentage of families living in poverty. Divorce still today harms women and children much more than men. So if we are going to apply Jesus’ words about divorce to today, we need to see him as trying to protect marriage and particularly protect women.

4. The final subject Jesus deals with in this passage is about oaths, which brings us right back to the subject of language once again. Jesus says in verses 33-37, “Again you have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not swear falsely, but shall perform your oaths to the Lord.’ But I say to you, do not swear at all: neither by heaven, for it is God’s throne; nor by the earth, for it is His footstool; nor by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King. Nor shall you swear by your head, because you cannot make one hair white or black. But let your ‘Yes’ be ‘Yes,’ and your ‘No,’ ‘No.’ For whatever is more than these is from the evil one.”

Again let’s not make Jesus’ words into a rigid rule. There are religious groups that take Jesus’ words literally as law and will not take an oath of political office, or an oath to tell the truth in court, or an oath to defend the country by joining the military, or even recite the Pledge of allegiance to the flag. These religious groups believe that all such oaths violate Jesus’s teaching here in the Sermon on the Mount. That is legalism, and a misunderstanding of Jesus’ words. Once again, Jesus is speaking “over the top” as it were. He is trying to make a point by exaggeration. It is a well-known teaching method used at that time used by religious teachers.

Jesus is telling us that we should not need to take an oath, or to swear to God, to tell the truth. Truth should be our natural and normal way of speaking. Unfortunately it is not. Not even in court. Oaths taken in court have become meaningless. People perjure themselves under oath in court all the time, especially when they take the stand in their own defense. Even the plea “Not guilty” is a lie most of the time. No one takes that statement seriously. Jesus is telling his followers to make honesty an everyday practice. “But let your ‘Yes’ be ‘Yes,’ and your ‘No,’ ‘No.’ For whatever is more than these is from the evil one.” Let your tongue speak the truth.

More importantly we need to search our heart and see why we are so reluctant to tell the truth to others or even ourselves. The problem with lying is self-deceit. The problem is lying to ourselves and lying to God. People live a lie. Jesus is teaching us to live truth. Live his way. Follow him. He is the Way , the Truth and the Life. To sum up this passage, Jesus is trying to get us beneath the surface of life. It is not just about changing outward behavior, as much as it is about what causes the behavior. When the heart is changed, the behavior will change. That heart change comes from God. It is an act of grace.

True Wisdom

1 Corinthians 2:1-12 (13-16)

We live in the Information Age, also called the Computer age or the Digital Age. We are living during the biggest shift in human history since the Industrial Revolution. We have more information at our fingertips than any other generation in the history of the world. We do not need to consult experts or encyclopedias any longer. We just Google it. We don’t even have to go to a computer. We can google it on smartphones and tablets. Yet with all of this vast information, it seems to me that people know less than ever before.

Jay Leno just finished hosting the Tonight Show this week, so I will use an example from his show. He had a segment on the Tonight Show called Jaywalking. Comedian Jay Leno interviewed people on the street, asking them simple questions. It is amazing what people do not know these days.  In November he asked some questions about Thanksgiving, like when the first Thanksgiving was. Answers were 1966 and 1492. Where did the first pilgrims land? Hawaii, Rhode Island or Virginia. The episode in January reviewed current events for the year 2013. No one could identify the Vice President by name or face, nor the new pope Francis. I am not just saying that they did not know the new pope’s name; they could not identify his photograph in his white robes as a pope. But they knew Miley Cyrus. On another episode people could not answer the questions "What color is the White House?" or “What country is the Panama Canal located in?” It makes us question the quality of public education in our nation. We might have more and more information available to us, but it seems the average person knows less and less.

There is knowledge and then there is wisdom. Long before computers or the internet, T. S. Eliot wrote “Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?” Knowledge and wisdom are different. Some people are very smart and knowledgeable, but they are not very wise. They can make pretty stupid choices. And there are different types of wisdom. There is the common sense of living – street smarts. One does not have to be religious to have this type of wisdom. There is even wisdom in children. Children can say some wise things I ran across these examples of Words of Wisdom from Children

Never trust a dog to watch your food. - Patrick, age 10 

When your dad is mad and asks you, “Do I look stupid?” don't answer him. - Michael, 14 

Never tell your mom her diet's not working. - Michael, 14 

Stay away from prunes. - Randy, 9 

Never allow your three-year old brother in the same room as your school assignment. - Traci, 14 

Puppies still have bad breath, even after eating a tic tac. - Andrew, 9 

Never hold a dust buster and a cat at the same time. - Kyoyo, 9 

You can't hide a piece of broccoli in a glass of milk. - Armir, 9 

Felt markers are not good to use as lipstick. - Lauren, 9

Don't pick on your sister when she's holding a baseball bat. - Joel, 10 

Never try to baptize a cat. - Eileen, 8

Good advice. But today I want to talk about spiritual wisdom. Spiritual wisdom is different than religious knowledge or even common human wisdom. You can have a very intelligent highly educated minister who may not be very wise at all. And you can have a person with no formal education at all who is very wise spiritually. Unfortunately most denominations have strict requirements for ordination with include college and seminary training with lots of knowledge, but there are no requirements when it comes to wisdom. Some churches learn that difference too late. 

That is what our Epistle lesson is about. When the apostle Paul went on his missionary journeys he would come in contact with highly intelligent and educated people who were considered wise. This was especially true in Greece. One time Paul addressed the Greek philosophers who had gathered on Mars Hill in Athens, right below the Parthenon.  They listened carefully to his words until he started talking about Jesus’ resurrection. Then they mocked him. Paul did not appear wise in their eyes. Our epistle lesson is addressed to the church in Corinth which was about 50 miles west of Athens. They also saw themselves as educated, sophisticated and wise. To this audience, Paul described the difference between human wisdom and spiritual wisdom – wisdom that comes from us and our own experience and knowledge and wisdom that comes from God.

I. First let’s see briefly what he says about human wisdom. He says in the first verse, “And I, brethren, when I came to you, did not come with excellence of speech or of wisdom….” He says in verse 4 “And my speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom.” In other words he says that human wisdom sounds great, but it is not all it is cracked up to be. Let me say right now that there is nothing wrong with human wisdom in its own realm. It is not that human wisdom is bad and spiritual wisdom is good. It is that human wisdom only goes so far. It is limited by the fact that it is from human beings and subject to our human limitations. In verse 6 he talks about human wisdom as “the wisdom of this age.“ Human wisdom is culturally conditioned by the time in which we live and the place we live. What seems obvious to us will seem like foolishness to future generations.

It is like hair styles. What looks good today will look silly to the next generation. Did you watch any of the Grammy Awards? We watched a little of it. I could not stand to watch too much. That is not music in my opinion. And did you see the hairstyles. There is this new pompadour thing going on now that looks ridiculous to me. This Justin Beiber, Mylie Cyrus look. So many of the singers were sporting these silly-looking things on their heads. They think they look great now. But they are going to look back on photos and videos of this years later and say, “What was I thinking?” That is the way human wisdom is. It is wisdom of this age, which will look silly in the next age.

II. Paul compares human wisdom and God’s wisdom. In verses 6-7 he calls God’s wisdom a mystery: “However, we speak wisdom among those who are mature, yet not the wisdom of this age, nor of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the ages for our glory.” “We speak the wisdom of God in a mystery.” Human wisdom can be understood. We hear someone speak it and we say “Isn’t that profound?” The wisdom of God is spoken in a mystery, according to the apostle Paul. Mystery refers to something that cannot be understood. He goes on to describe it in verse 9 in these words:

“Eye has not seen, nor ear heard,

Nor have entered into the heart of man

The things which God has prepared for those who love Him.”

God’s wisdom cannot be seen or heard or thought. It has to do with personally and directly knowing God. It is not about being experienced in the ways of the world. That is human wisdom, and it is fine as far as it goes. It just does not go very far and is subject to human pride. We always have to watch out for those who are wise in their own eyes. The prophet Isaiah said, “Woe unto them that are wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight!” Proverbs says, “If you have seen a man that is wise in his own eyes, a fool is more useful than he.” That is why meekness and humility always accompanies spiritual wisdom. Those who think they are wise are not, and those who are do not think they are. We all can think of people in both categories. God’s wisdom is not something that can be captured and owned by a human being. It is God’s alone and he communicates it to us in mystery.

He goes on in our passage: “10 But God has revealed them to us through His Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God. 11 For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God. 12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God.”

Here Paul speaks of the source of spiritual wisdom, which is the Spirit of God. In fact there are other passages that describe the Holy Spirit himself as the Wisdom of God. This is important. Spiritual wisdom is God. God is Wisdom. You cannot know wisdom without God. Remember I am speaking of spiritual wisdom now, not human wisdom. There are people who do not believe in God who are wise in a human sense. They can have profound thoughts and speak profound words. That is the wisdom of human philosophy; that was the wisdom of the Athenian philosophers. What Paul is talking about as spiritual wisdom is very different. It is wisdom that comes only with knowing God.

It is revealed wisdom. Verse 10 “But God has revealed them to us through His Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God.” Spiritual wisdom is a gift. It is not earned or achieved through years of experience and practice. It is not gained through effort and time. It is revealed by the Spirit of God to our spirit. That is what the next verse says, “For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God. 12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God.”

I know this is starting to sound a bit esoteric, and I apologize for that. But we are talking about spiritual things here. Spiritual wisdom is revealed wisdom communicated by the Spirit of God to our spirit. He talks more about that in the next verse 13 “These things we also speak, not in words which man’s wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual.” A better translation says: “speaking spiritual truths in spiritual words.” I love that phrase. What are spiritual words? They are not written words or spoken words. They are not human words. Paul is saying that the Spirit has his own language. It is the language of conscience and intuition and communion with God. Human words cannot convey the spiritual truths communicated by the Spirit of God to our spirits.

Because of this spiritual wisdom appears foolish to many people. Paul says in the next verse: “14 But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” We are talking about discernment here. A blind person cannot discern colors, no matter how much you describe the colors in words. The natural mind cannot discern spiritual wisdom, no matter how much you describe it in words. We are talking about something beyond words. Something communicated directly from the Holy Spirit to our spirit, which is the inmost essence of ourselves.

Paul goes on in verse 15 “But he who is spiritual judges all things, yet he himself is rightly judged by no one.” This means that spiritual wisdom is self-authenticating. People can judge us and say this is a bunch of nonsense. And it certainly sounds that way, but it is real. Then he makes the most extravagant claim of all in verse 16 “For who has known the mind of the Lord that he may instruct Him? But we have the mind of Christ.” This is an amazing statement: We have the mind of Christ. It sounds like megalomania. Who would ever claim to have the mind of Christ? Paul does! And he says it is not unique to him but that we all have the mind of Christ. For wisdom we need to look no further than Christ, who dwells within us.

There is one important aspect of spiritual wisdom which I have not mentioned yet, even though it was mentioned first in our passage. I saved the best until last. It is literally crucial to spiritual wisdom. (The word crucial refers to the cross.)  It is found in the opening words of our passage. “And I, brethren, when I came to you, did not come with excellence of speech or of wisdom declaring to you the testimony of God. For I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified.” The cross of Christ is spiritual wisdom. A few verses before our passage Paul wrote: “22 For Jews request a sign, and Greeks seek after wisdom; 23 but we preach Christ crucified, to the Jews a stumbling block and to the Greeks[b] foolishness, 24 but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. 25 Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.”

In the Cross of Christ the wisdom of God is displayed. In this historical event is a spiritual symbol which communicates the power of God and the wisdom of God. The Cross is what makes us Christians. A lot of people can talk about spiritual wisdom in mysterious and vague language which makes it all sound very profound. But without the Cross is just a subjective experience. The Cross grounds the wisdom of God in history. It grounds it in human suffering. It grounds it in human flesh, so it is not just some lofty philosophy. The Wisdom of God is grounded in the Cross of Christ which was literally stuck into the ground and Christ’s hands and feet literally pinned to that wood.

In the Cross of Christ is the wisdom of God. That is why it is so offensive to human wisdom. The resurrection of Christ is the wisdom of God. That appears foolish to human wisdom. That is why the Greek philosophers of Athens heckled Paul off the floor of the Areopagus when he preached the death and resurrection of Christ. It does not fit the standards of human wisdom of the philosophies of the age. But God in his divine wisdom became a human being, who taught, and ministered and healed, and was crucified and rose again. Through our identification with Christ – ourselves being spiritually crucified and risen with him – we share in the Divine life of God. Through the Spirit of Christ given to us we have the mind of Christ, through which we can share in his Divine Wisdom. That is true wisdom. 

The Topsy Turvy Kingdom of God

Matthew 5: 1-12

Hebrew 13:2 says, “Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.” Two traveling angels stopped to spend the night in the home of a wealthy family. The family was rude and refused to let the angels stay in the mansion's guest room. Instead the angels were given a corner of the cold basement to sleep in. As they made their bed on the hard floor, the senior angel saw a hole in the wall and repaired it. When the junior angel asked why, the senior angel replied, "Things aren't always what they seem."

The next night the pair came the house of a very poor, but very hospitable farmer and his wife. After sharing what little food they had the couple let the angels sleep in their own bed where they could have a good night's rest. When the sun came up the next morning the farmer and his wife were in tears. Their only cow, whose milk had been their sole income, lay dead in the field. The junior angel was infuriated and asked the senior angel: "How could you let this happen? It isn’t fair. The first family had everything, yet you helped them," he accused. "The second family had little but was willing to share everything, and yet you let their cow die." "Things aren't always what they seem," the senior angel replied.

"When we stayed in the basement of the mansion, I noticed there was gold stored in that hole in the wall, hidden there by the previous owner of the house. Since the owner was so obsessed with greed and unwilling to share his good fortune, I thought it best to seal the wall so he wouldn't find it. Then last night as we slept in the farmer's bed, the angel of death came into the bedroom for his wife. I convinced him to take the cow instead. Things aren't always what they seem."

The Kingdom of God is not what it seems to be. Religious people think we have it figured out – who is good and who is bad, who is in and who is out, who is going to heaven and who is not, who is right and who is wrong, what is true and what is false. Jesus came on the scene and turned everything upside down, telling us and showing us that things are not always as they seem.

The first sermon of Jesus recorded for us in the Gospel of Matthew is the famous Sermon on the Mount. The beginning of this most famous sermon is the Beatitudes. The beatitudes define who is in the Kingdom of God and what it means to live as part of the Kingdom of God. There are eight brief statements which we are going to be looking at today.  Because there are eight I will do them briefly.

I. The first four beatitudes tell us who is in the kingdom of heaven.

1. "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” The world tells us what wealth is. It says that those with money, power , fame, beauty and position are rich - the celebrities, the world leaders, the billionaires. They have got it all. Those of us who consider ourselves to be above such crass materialism say that the truly rich are those with friends, family, and health, meaning and purpose. We religious people say that the truly wealthy are those who are spiritually rich. Therefore that is what we expect Jesus to say. But that does not seem to be saying. He says, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, For theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”  What does this mean?

I think he is challenging the conventional wisdom of all people, including those who would say they are spiritual but not religious. He is saying that it is not those who think they are rich by any standards who are the truly rich, but those who see themselves as poor, even spiritually poor. I don’t understand this completely. Jesus is too profound for me, but I try not to make Jesus words fit my beliefs. I think he is challenging me and all of us to a life of spiritual humility. He is urging us to be very careful about our views of who is in and who is out of the Kingdom of Heaven.

2.  ^“Blessed are those who mourn, For they shall be comforted,” says Jesus in the second beatitude. Grief is one of the most difficult emotions. It is a psychological response to loss. It can be any type of loss. Most powerful is the loss of a person we love. But it can be the loss of a pet we love, the loss of a home, the loss of a job, the loss of our health or reputation. And it is the loss of our own lives as we approach our own death. All types of losses prompt us to mourn.

 Jesus says, “Blessed are those who mourn.” There is a spiritual blessing in grief. That is hard to hear. We would rather not have the grief and therefore forgo such a blessing. But the fact is that we cannot avoid loss in our lives. We will have it no matter how much we try to protect ourselves. How will we approach it? I think that Jesus is saying that loss brings us in contact with something fundamental in life. It shows us life in stark true terms. It brings us face to face with ourselves, and the spiritual reality of life. Loss brings us face to face with the Eternal God. Somehow in that grief and loss, comfort is found.

3. “Blessed are the meek, For they shall inherit the earth.” I think this addresses the modern cult of the self. We are obsessed with the self. We make a religion of self-help, self-esteem, self-fulfillment and self-realization. Self, self, self. Meekness, as I understand it, is anti-self. Jesus instructed us to deny our self. This is not beating ourselves up or putting ourselves down. It is not even low self-esteem. It is seeing that the self is not who we really are.

I talk about this regularly because it is an important aspect of my own spiritual experience. I see a major spiritual problem of human beings as being lost in our selves. Spiritual liberation is being freed from our selves, freed from the tyranny of the self, from the illusion of the self, to live openly and freely as children of God. When that happens, suddenly we can live life fully here on earth. Not waiting for a better tomorrow if this or that happens, nor waiting for heaven to compensate us for a tough life here on earth, but living the Kingdom of Heaven here and now. I think that is what Jesus means when he says that the meek shall inherit the earth.

4. “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, For they shall be filled.” This beatitude hinges on what the word righteousness means. I have also defined this on a number of occasions. Righteousness is not a state of moral correctness or perfection. Righteous means to be in right relationship - right relationship with God, with our selves, and with others. To be in right relationship we have to know who we are. Scripture says we are made in the image of God. That is who we really are. When we look at our true selves as God made us, then we see God reflected as in a mirror. That mirror can get pretty dirty. That is how I understand sin. Sin obscures the image of God in us. The purpose of the spiritual life is to clean the mirror so that when God looks at us, he sees himself reflected in our lives. And when others look at us, they also see God reflected in our lives.

We should hunger and thirst for this righteousness, this right relationship. Most people don’t. They hunger and thirst for things which will not satisfy. People look for love in all the wrong places, and we are never satisfied with life. But those who hunger and thirst for righteousness will be satisfied.

II. The second half of the beatitudes move from our identity in the kingdom to how we are to live as part of the Kingdom of God.

1. “Blessed are the merciful, For they shall obtain mercy.” Be merciful. Another word for this might be love. But it is good to use different words than love. Love can be so overused that it is good to use different vocabulary – like merciful. This means to be gracious to people. Be forgiving to people. Be accepting of people. Not to be judgmental of people. I see this as open-heartedness.

We can either open our hearts and lives to people or we can close our hearts to people. We close our hearts because we do not want to get hurt by people. We especially do not want to get hurt again after being hurt once. “Once bitten, twice shy” as the saying goes. But God calls us to be vulnerable, to take risks, to take chances. This is scary emotionally. It feels so much safer to put up the walls and protect ourselves. To be merciful is to let go of prejudices, to forsake retaliation, to treat others the way we would want God to treat us. The golden rule is to do unto others the way we would have others to do unto us. But the platinum rule is to do to others are we would have God do to us. We hope that God will be gracious to us, to overlook our faults and sins. If we expect that from God, we are to give that mercy to others. When we do, we find the mercy we desire.

2. “Blessed are the pure in heart, For they shall see God.” This brings us even deeper into this movement into our true selves. I don’t know about you, but my mind and heart is filled with all sorts of thoughts and emotions all the time. I have a continual inner dialogue going on. No matter what I am going, I tend to be thinking of something else. My brain will go off on some tangent even while my mouth is speaking the words of a sermon. I am double-minded. And double hearted. My emotions are the same way.

Jesus is calling us to simplicity of thought and intention. Peace of mind, if we want to call it that. Most of our emotional suffering is of our own making. It is not caused by something that happens to us. We cause it to ourselves. It is our response to what we imagine might happen to us. In other words, most of our problems are in our heads. We need purity of mind and heart. Calmness, peace. We are to relate to people and events as they happen without all the inner drama. When we do this, it opens up space for God. God is always present, but we are not present. We are always somewhere else or somewhen else. We are in the future or in the past or in some hypothetical scenario. No wonder so many people’s lives are inner turmoil. Jesus calls us to purity of heart. When we dwell in that purity of heart, we suddenly are aware that God is present. God is always present waiting for us to be present to Him. When we have some degree of this purity of heart, then we see God, and we find ourselves living in the Kingdom of Heaven here and now.

3. “Blessed are the peacemakers, For they shall be called sons of God.” We live in the Kingdom as peacemakers. There are so many different dimensions of peacemaking. Some people bring conflict, disagreement and trouble with them wherever they go. Others seem to bring peace. As residents of the Kingdom we are to bring peace. This is talking about interpersonal peace, international peace, national peace. I think this has something to say to the political bickering that seems to have settled into Washington DC. And it is even talking about bringing inner peace to others, which can only come about if there is inner peace in our lives. Peace is contagious. We cannot make peace unless we have peace. If we have peace, then we can bring peace into every aspect of our lives.

4. ^“Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, For theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” Jesus goes on to expound on this final beatitude. “Blessed are you when they revile and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for My sake. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.” In short Christ is saying that this path of the beatitudes is not easy. It will not be accepted by people. It will not be accepted by the political establishment or by the religious establishment. In fact Jesus is saying that a life lived by the standards of the Kingdom of God will be persecuted. He says, “Don’t be discouraged by this. Expect it to happen.” He even says to rejoice in it, which doesn’t sound easy to do to me. He says that this opposition is evidence that we are on the right track, because people have always opposed the Kingdom of Heaven. Why do you think they crucified Jesus? It was because He was the embodiment of the kingdom of Heaven. So the political and religious leaders felt they had to get rid of him. We should not expect it to be any different for the followers of Christ.

The beatitudes communicate for us profound teachings about the Kingdom of God. Let us take them to heart.