“I Am a United Methodist Christian Because…Because Personal Holiness
Should Result in Social Holiness”
Week #3 of the sermon series
Pikeville UMC
September 16, 2018
Review series
Throughout the month of September, we are exploring our heritage as United Methodists, and what makes us unique, through a sermon series entitled, “I am a United Methodist Christian Because….”
As I have with each of the previous two weeks of the series, I want to be very clear about two important aspects of this series. The United Methodist Church is part of the larger Christian family which means that we are unapologetically Christian. Our faith is in Christ. And, secondly, we do not believe that we are the only Christians or that we are “more Christian” than other Christians. To be United Methodist is to be ecumenical.
While we are inherently an ecumenical people, it is okay to say there is something unique about being a United Methodist Christian; something worthy of celebrating. I compare it to a combination lock. This particular lock has numbers from 0-39. Mathematically speaking, that means there are 64,000 possible combinations to find the correct three numbers required to open this lock. Other combinations open other locks, we have been talking about the right numbers for us.
In the first week of the series, I stated that, “I am a United Methodist Christian Because Salvation is only the beginning of the journey.” We examined what it means to continue our journey of faith after our initial saying “Yes” to Jesus. We spoke of a journey towards sanctification – the refining of our faith and perfecting of our love for God and what that means – as well as what it does not mean.
Last week, I explained that “I am a United Methodist Christian Because of the Beautiful Way the Head and the Heart Meet.” Our Christian experience is one that engages our entire being and that includes our heads and hearts. How we think and what we feel are very important to us as followers of Jesus.
Mark 12: 28-34 (NIV)
28One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, "Of all the commandments, which is the most important?"
29"The most important one," answered Jesus, "is this: 'Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. 30 Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.' 31 The second is this: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no commandment greater than these."
32"Well said, teacher," the man replied. "You are right in saying that God is one and there is no other but him. 33 To love him with all your heart, with all your understanding and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices."
34When Jesus saw that he had answered wisely, he said to him, "You are not far from the kingdom of God." And from then on no one dared ask him any more questions.
Introduction
In the early 1970s, Brandenburg United Methodist Church was going through a significant renovation. As part of that renovation, they looked at their church narthex – the gathering area outside the church’s sanctuary – and decided to utilize the space to honor the church’s past.
There were times when I would walk down the hall and soak in the atmosphere of that space. It was like a mini-museum. Among the items on display was a series of wooden plaques created by the pastor who had been there during the renovation. He enjoyed woodworking and created these plaques with quotes and information from early Methodism.
On one, he carved a quote from John Wesley which reads, “Christianity is essentially a social religion: and to turn it into a solitary one is to destroy it.”
That quote served to remind me of another of Wesley’s famous quotes, “The Gospel of Christ knows no religion but social; no holiness but social holiness.” Clearly, whatever else Wesley believed about Christianity, he believed it had ramifications upon the social order of a society. I think Jesus did too.
Text
Our text this morning finds us coming into the middle of an extended conversation between Jesus and some of the different factions of first century Judaism whose teachers have questions for Jesus. On the surface, these questions are a litmus test as if these groups want to see where the candidate stands on key issues, but their true intent is to trip up Jesus. Let’s back up to the beginning of the conversation….
The first question for the candidate Jesus is the nature of his platform related to the Romans. “Is it right,” they ask, “to pay taxes unto Caesar?” On one side of this issue sits the Pharisees who want Jesus to denounce Caesar. On the other side sits the Herodians, a group of Jews loyal to Rome who want Jesus’ endorsement. Each is ready to pounce depending upon how he answers this hot button question. Jesus response, “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and give to God what is God’s,” leaves both groups happy. Sort of. They’re not sure how they should interpret it.
The Sadducees – a group who did not believe in the resurrection – wanted to know Jesus’ view of the resurrection. They set up an extreme, and ridiculous, scenario of a woman who marries a man and, upon his death, marries one of her late husband’s brothers in keeping with Jewish custom. Unfortunately he too dies and she continues to marry brothers who meet untimely ends until, in the end she has been married to seven men. “The question,” they ask is, “whose wife will she be at the resurrection?” Jesus points out that their question is flawed from the beginning and reveals a lack of the knowledge about the scriptures.
Taking all of this in is a man described as a scribe – a religious scholar. He’s something like a cross between a paralegal and a church leader in today’s world. We’re not sure which group he was affiliated with, if any. He listens to Jesus’ answers and, in my mind’s eye anyway, I see him smile and nod his head. “At last,” I hear him say to himself, “Someone gets it.” As the groups stand around annoyed and muttering, He steps forward and poses a question to Jesus. One, not designed for entrapment, but asked from a sincere heart, “Which of the commandments is the most important?”
Jesus certainly had options from which to choose. There are, by most interpretations, 613 commandments in what we know as the Old Testament. Jesus responds to the question with what we have come to know as “The Great Commandment.”
The Great Commandment is a two-part answer in which Jesus deals with both the vertical (our relationship with God) and the horizontal (our relationship with our fellow human beings). In his response he quotes two passages of Scripture. “Part A” of the answer, “Love the Lord,” is a quotation from Deuteronomy 6 that deals with the relationship we are to have with God. In Judaism, this passage is known as the “Shema” (for the Hebrew word “hear” which is the word used to begin the prayer). The Shema is a powerful part of Judaism even today and calls for total commitment of our beings to love God. It addresses what is commonly called the “vertical” relationship – that is the relationship between God and humanity.
Remember though, we said there was a part A and a part B. “Part B” of Jesus’ answer, “Love your neighbor as yourself”, is a reference to Leviticus 19: 18. It addresses the “horizontal” nature of life; our connection with each other. While the words of Jesus are not unique, what does appear unique is that he seems to be the first one to tie the two together.
Jesus makes it clear. We cannot truly love God if we do not love our neighbor as we love ourselves. But I would submit that we cannot truly love our neighbor if we do not love God.
This understanding challenges much of what we see in American Christianity today. In American Christianity, one feels almost forced to choose either the vertical love of God or the horizontal love of neighbor. I would submit, and I believe our tradition as a people called Methodist submits, that’s not a full understanding of the message of Scripture.
In American Christianity today, churches tend to be labeled “conservative” or “progressive.” Exactly who gets to do the labeling I am not sure. The labels are terrible stereotypes, often inaccurate, but the labels appear nonetheless.
Churches that might be labeled “conservative” tend to place an emphasis on the vertical love of God. We want everyone to have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ and to pursue we what we might call “personal holiness”. For our purpose this morning, we’ll define “personal holiness” as one’s commitment, as an individual or as part of a larger community, to be true to the gospel of Jesus Christ especially in behavior, morality and ethics.
To be sure, we are to be called to pursue holy living (which is not to be confused with “holier than thou” living). The word “sanctification” means that we are in the process of being made pure in the love of God. As we mentioned a couple of weeks ago, in our tradition as a people called “Methodist,” salvation is only the beginning of the journey. We are to continue to grow in our faith. That is after all a biblical mandate. In writing to the church in Corinth, Paul addressed them as, “… those sanctified in Christ Jesus and called to be his holy people….”
The other side of the coin is where we find churches most commonly associated with the theological label of “progressive.” These churches tend to place a strong value on the “horizontal” love of our fellow human beings and what we might call “social holiness.” For our purpose this morning, we’ll define “social holiness” as one’s commitment, as an individual or as part of a larger community, to be true to the gospel of Jesus Christ especially in how we treat our fellow human beings.
There’s certainly nothing wrong with a commitment to social holiness. In fact, we are to pursue social holiness. In Matthew 25, Jesus says how we treat, “the least of these” is in fact how we treat him. The book of James makes it clear that we cannot say we have faith in God if we disregard the needs of our fellow human beings.
Our tradition as a people called Methodist is strongly identified with social holiness. We are not only called to provide for the needs of those who are struggling, but we are called to address the larger concerns that keep people in need. As one individual I met put it, “Sometimes it’s not enough to give someone a fish or even teach them to fish. Sometimes we have to take down the ‘No fishing’ signs.”
You’ll remember I spoke of the challenge to American Christianity to seemingly “choose sides” as to which of the two groups we will join. The genesis of that dates back to the late 19th and early 20th century when what was known as the “Social Gospel” and “Fundamentalism” collided and fought for the hearts and minds of American Christians. It remains, I believe the wrong fight, but our predecessors fought long and hard and forced what should be a natural living out of our faith into a false dichotomy. Personal holiness and Social holiness is not an either/or question. According to Scripture, as I understand it, it’s a both/and question.
A personal holiness without a social holiness the faith of isolationism. How can we say we love God but then run away from a world in pain and pretend we don’t notice? That’s not Christlike at all.
A social holiness without personal holiness is like a plant with no root system. Doing good deeds without remembering our reason “why” will leave us exhausted and empty. The Church of Jesus Christ is more than a social service agency.
As the people of Christ, we are called to be anchored in the Word while serving in the world.
Even before his life-changing Aldersgate experience, John Wesley understood that biblical Christianity had social implications. At Oxford University, the Holy Club – the group of college students of which he was a part – saw visiting the sick and the imprisoned as a natural extension of their pursuit of God.
After Aldersgate, the Methodist movement consciously and intentionally reached out to those society deemed the least, the last and the lost. Wesley preached before thousands of coal miners outside the mines of Bristol. In London, the Methodists bought a former cannon factory; repurposed it and, for nearly four decades, it served as their headquarters in England. Known as the Foundry, they not only met for worship there, but had a school for children of the poor, a book store, an agency that acted much as a credit union for the poor, a clinic with cutting edge medicine for its time and apartments which housed widows – including John’s mother Susanna in her later years.
Under Wesley's direction, Methodists became leaders in many social justice issues of the day, including the prison reform and abolitionism movements.
In the 19th and early 20th centuries, our tradition worked hard to establish schools, hospitals, orphanages and colleges. Our spiritual ancestors called for social reform such as abolition of slavery, an end to child labor and called for the Golden Rule and the mind of Christ to serve as our guide for how we treat each other – regardless of income or social status.
Somehow we have let someone deceive us into believing that we are to either live our faith in isolation or we are to be merely do-ers of good deeds. We are to do neither. We are called to engage this world for Jesus Christ as part of our citizenship of the Kingdom of God. We do this not because it’s a good idea on our part but because it is the love of God welling up within us and pouring out around us. As Chris Bartley likes to say, “Our cup runs over and splashes on everyone around us.”
Insert Anna Coleman’s comments here…
Conclusion
I believe one of the reasons we – as Christians – have struggled to connect with many in today’s world is that they see us as being weak and impotent. We are often known more for what we oppose than the One whom we worship.
Our commitment to Jesus – our personal holiness, our love for God – should result in a commitment to love our neighbor – a commitment to social holiness. The vertical and horizontal must meet for us to be biblically authentic followers of Christ. In the name of God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit, let us pray….
Week #3 of the sermon series
Pikeville UMC
September 16, 2018
Review series
Throughout the month of September, we are exploring our heritage as United Methodists, and what makes us unique, through a sermon series entitled, “I am a United Methodist Christian Because….”
As I have with each of the previous two weeks of the series, I want to be very clear about two important aspects of this series. The United Methodist Church is part of the larger Christian family which means that we are unapologetically Christian. Our faith is in Christ. And, secondly, we do not believe that we are the only Christians or that we are “more Christian” than other Christians. To be United Methodist is to be ecumenical.
While we are inherently an ecumenical people, it is okay to say there is something unique about being a United Methodist Christian; something worthy of celebrating. I compare it to a combination lock. This particular lock has numbers from 0-39. Mathematically speaking, that means there are 64,000 possible combinations to find the correct three numbers required to open this lock. Other combinations open other locks, we have been talking about the right numbers for us.
In the first week of the series, I stated that, “I am a United Methodist Christian Because Salvation is only the beginning of the journey.” We examined what it means to continue our journey of faith after our initial saying “Yes” to Jesus. We spoke of a journey towards sanctification – the refining of our faith and perfecting of our love for God and what that means – as well as what it does not mean.
Last week, I explained that “I am a United Methodist Christian Because of the Beautiful Way the Head and the Heart Meet.” Our Christian experience is one that engages our entire being and that includes our heads and hearts. How we think and what we feel are very important to us as followers of Jesus.
Mark 12: 28-34 (NIV)
28One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, "Of all the commandments, which is the most important?"
29"The most important one," answered Jesus, "is this: 'Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. 30 Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.' 31 The second is this: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no commandment greater than these."
32"Well said, teacher," the man replied. "You are right in saying that God is one and there is no other but him. 33 To love him with all your heart, with all your understanding and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices."
34When Jesus saw that he had answered wisely, he said to him, "You are not far from the kingdom of God." And from then on no one dared ask him any more questions.
Introduction
In the early 1970s, Brandenburg United Methodist Church was going through a significant renovation. As part of that renovation, they looked at their church narthex – the gathering area outside the church’s sanctuary – and decided to utilize the space to honor the church’s past.
There were times when I would walk down the hall and soak in the atmosphere of that space. It was like a mini-museum. Among the items on display was a series of wooden plaques created by the pastor who had been there during the renovation. He enjoyed woodworking and created these plaques with quotes and information from early Methodism.
On one, he carved a quote from John Wesley which reads, “Christianity is essentially a social religion: and to turn it into a solitary one is to destroy it.”
That quote served to remind me of another of Wesley’s famous quotes, “The Gospel of Christ knows no religion but social; no holiness but social holiness.” Clearly, whatever else Wesley believed about Christianity, he believed it had ramifications upon the social order of a society. I think Jesus did too.
Text
Our text this morning finds us coming into the middle of an extended conversation between Jesus and some of the different factions of first century Judaism whose teachers have questions for Jesus. On the surface, these questions are a litmus test as if these groups want to see where the candidate stands on key issues, but their true intent is to trip up Jesus. Let’s back up to the beginning of the conversation….
The first question for the candidate Jesus is the nature of his platform related to the Romans. “Is it right,” they ask, “to pay taxes unto Caesar?” On one side of this issue sits the Pharisees who want Jesus to denounce Caesar. On the other side sits the Herodians, a group of Jews loyal to Rome who want Jesus’ endorsement. Each is ready to pounce depending upon how he answers this hot button question. Jesus response, “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and give to God what is God’s,” leaves both groups happy. Sort of. They’re not sure how they should interpret it.
The Sadducees – a group who did not believe in the resurrection – wanted to know Jesus’ view of the resurrection. They set up an extreme, and ridiculous, scenario of a woman who marries a man and, upon his death, marries one of her late husband’s brothers in keeping with Jewish custom. Unfortunately he too dies and she continues to marry brothers who meet untimely ends until, in the end she has been married to seven men. “The question,” they ask is, “whose wife will she be at the resurrection?” Jesus points out that their question is flawed from the beginning and reveals a lack of the knowledge about the scriptures.
Taking all of this in is a man described as a scribe – a religious scholar. He’s something like a cross between a paralegal and a church leader in today’s world. We’re not sure which group he was affiliated with, if any. He listens to Jesus’ answers and, in my mind’s eye anyway, I see him smile and nod his head. “At last,” I hear him say to himself, “Someone gets it.” As the groups stand around annoyed and muttering, He steps forward and poses a question to Jesus. One, not designed for entrapment, but asked from a sincere heart, “Which of the commandments is the most important?”
Jesus certainly had options from which to choose. There are, by most interpretations, 613 commandments in what we know as the Old Testament. Jesus responds to the question with what we have come to know as “The Great Commandment.”
The Great Commandment is a two-part answer in which Jesus deals with both the vertical (our relationship with God) and the horizontal (our relationship with our fellow human beings). In his response he quotes two passages of Scripture. “Part A” of the answer, “Love the Lord,” is a quotation from Deuteronomy 6 that deals with the relationship we are to have with God. In Judaism, this passage is known as the “Shema” (for the Hebrew word “hear” which is the word used to begin the prayer). The Shema is a powerful part of Judaism even today and calls for total commitment of our beings to love God. It addresses what is commonly called the “vertical” relationship – that is the relationship between God and humanity.
Remember though, we said there was a part A and a part B. “Part B” of Jesus’ answer, “Love your neighbor as yourself”, is a reference to Leviticus 19: 18. It addresses the “horizontal” nature of life; our connection with each other. While the words of Jesus are not unique, what does appear unique is that he seems to be the first one to tie the two together.
Jesus makes it clear. We cannot truly love God if we do not love our neighbor as we love ourselves. But I would submit that we cannot truly love our neighbor if we do not love God.
This understanding challenges much of what we see in American Christianity today. In American Christianity, one feels almost forced to choose either the vertical love of God or the horizontal love of neighbor. I would submit, and I believe our tradition as a people called Methodist submits, that’s not a full understanding of the message of Scripture.
In American Christianity today, churches tend to be labeled “conservative” or “progressive.” Exactly who gets to do the labeling I am not sure. The labels are terrible stereotypes, often inaccurate, but the labels appear nonetheless.
Churches that might be labeled “conservative” tend to place an emphasis on the vertical love of God. We want everyone to have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ and to pursue we what we might call “personal holiness”. For our purpose this morning, we’ll define “personal holiness” as one’s commitment, as an individual or as part of a larger community, to be true to the gospel of Jesus Christ especially in behavior, morality and ethics.
To be sure, we are to be called to pursue holy living (which is not to be confused with “holier than thou” living). The word “sanctification” means that we are in the process of being made pure in the love of God. As we mentioned a couple of weeks ago, in our tradition as a people called “Methodist,” salvation is only the beginning of the journey. We are to continue to grow in our faith. That is after all a biblical mandate. In writing to the church in Corinth, Paul addressed them as, “… those sanctified in Christ Jesus and called to be his holy people….”
The other side of the coin is where we find churches most commonly associated with the theological label of “progressive.” These churches tend to place a strong value on the “horizontal” love of our fellow human beings and what we might call “social holiness.” For our purpose this morning, we’ll define “social holiness” as one’s commitment, as an individual or as part of a larger community, to be true to the gospel of Jesus Christ especially in how we treat our fellow human beings.
There’s certainly nothing wrong with a commitment to social holiness. In fact, we are to pursue social holiness. In Matthew 25, Jesus says how we treat, “the least of these” is in fact how we treat him. The book of James makes it clear that we cannot say we have faith in God if we disregard the needs of our fellow human beings.
Our tradition as a people called Methodist is strongly identified with social holiness. We are not only called to provide for the needs of those who are struggling, but we are called to address the larger concerns that keep people in need. As one individual I met put it, “Sometimes it’s not enough to give someone a fish or even teach them to fish. Sometimes we have to take down the ‘No fishing’ signs.”
You’ll remember I spoke of the challenge to American Christianity to seemingly “choose sides” as to which of the two groups we will join. The genesis of that dates back to the late 19th and early 20th century when what was known as the “Social Gospel” and “Fundamentalism” collided and fought for the hearts and minds of American Christians. It remains, I believe the wrong fight, but our predecessors fought long and hard and forced what should be a natural living out of our faith into a false dichotomy. Personal holiness and Social holiness is not an either/or question. According to Scripture, as I understand it, it’s a both/and question.
A personal holiness without a social holiness the faith of isolationism. How can we say we love God but then run away from a world in pain and pretend we don’t notice? That’s not Christlike at all.
A social holiness without personal holiness is like a plant with no root system. Doing good deeds without remembering our reason “why” will leave us exhausted and empty. The Church of Jesus Christ is more than a social service agency.
As the people of Christ, we are called to be anchored in the Word while serving in the world.
Even before his life-changing Aldersgate experience, John Wesley understood that biblical Christianity had social implications. At Oxford University, the Holy Club – the group of college students of which he was a part – saw visiting the sick and the imprisoned as a natural extension of their pursuit of God.
After Aldersgate, the Methodist movement consciously and intentionally reached out to those society deemed the least, the last and the lost. Wesley preached before thousands of coal miners outside the mines of Bristol. In London, the Methodists bought a former cannon factory; repurposed it and, for nearly four decades, it served as their headquarters in England. Known as the Foundry, they not only met for worship there, but had a school for children of the poor, a book store, an agency that acted much as a credit union for the poor, a clinic with cutting edge medicine for its time and apartments which housed widows – including John’s mother Susanna in her later years.
Under Wesley's direction, Methodists became leaders in many social justice issues of the day, including the prison reform and abolitionism movements.
In the 19th and early 20th centuries, our tradition worked hard to establish schools, hospitals, orphanages and colleges. Our spiritual ancestors called for social reform such as abolition of slavery, an end to child labor and called for the Golden Rule and the mind of Christ to serve as our guide for how we treat each other – regardless of income or social status.
Somehow we have let someone deceive us into believing that we are to either live our faith in isolation or we are to be merely do-ers of good deeds. We are to do neither. We are called to engage this world for Jesus Christ as part of our citizenship of the Kingdom of God. We do this not because it’s a good idea on our part but because it is the love of God welling up within us and pouring out around us. As Chris Bartley likes to say, “Our cup runs over and splashes on everyone around us.”
Insert Anna Coleman’s comments here…
Conclusion
I believe one of the reasons we – as Christians – have struggled to connect with many in today’s world is that they see us as being weak and impotent. We are often known more for what we oppose than the One whom we worship.
Our commitment to Jesus – our personal holiness, our love for God – should result in a commitment to love our neighbor – a commitment to social holiness. The vertical and horizontal must meet for us to be biblically authentic followers of Christ. In the name of God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit, let us pray….
Comments
Post a Comment