Personal Jesus, Public Savior

When I was twelve years old, I was asked to write an article for a publication.  At twelve and in an age prior to digital proliferation, I answer the question to write the story of my faith.  In confirmation, I shared it in church, in the newsletter, and beyond.  It was my personal story of how I knew Jesus.  It was Jesus’ public story of how he is redeeming the world one person at a time.  In an age before Facebook, my grandmother carried it around in her pocketbook, should the occasion arise that she might share it with someone.

For those of us who have confirmed or affirmed the gift of faith in our lives, we know that our life stories are at once personal and public.  For each of us, if our relationship with Jesus is not personal, if we do not know Jesus in an intimate and personal way, we have missed part of the gospel.   If the world at large cannot see Jesus’ impact in our life, in our witness, we have missed part of the gospel.  The life of the Christian is personal and unique, lived in the details of how you think about your neighbors and how you treat your loved ones.  The life of the Christian is public and consistent.  We are called to follow Jesus together as those who gather, forgive, rejoice, mourn, and bear each other’s burdens

Somehow, this is not what you and I have always understood as Christ-followers. We have believed that how we know Jesus is always private.  Somewhere along the way, our culture has taught us that religion is completely private and not to be shared with anyone else.  We have also been taught that it should not impact anything else in our life.  Friends, this is not biblical, and it is not of God!  While Jesus is always personal, always concerned with the specifics in our lives, Jesus is not private, needing to be restricted and confidential.

We have most often claimed Jesus as private when we did not want others to know about parts of our faith walk.  We have claimed out prayer life is private, when we did not want to be accountable to how prayer is lived out.  We have claimed our giving is private, when we did not want others to hold us accountable to how tithing is a cornerstone of the spiritual discipline of giving.  We have claimed that our service is private, when we did not want any engagement with who we were serving and how.  But private is not the same as personal.  Our prayer lives are personal and specific.  As we spend time in prayer and petition God on behalf of those in need, as we listen to how God is calling us, it is immensely personal.

The Great Commission in Matthew 28 reminds us that our faith is always public.  We know the life changing power of Jesus, experience the personal connections, and encounter the saving grace of God in order to tell the world.  In order to share the good news that Jesus is not just Savior for one, but for all.  Jim Wallis, of the Sojourners movement says this, “God is personal but never private. God knows everything about us and wants a relationship anyway. Why? To sign us up for his purposes in the world. I didn’t hear that as a kid. I heard about me and the Lord, not about God’s purpose for the world.”1   Most of us have been more engaged with what others are doing rather than how we are a part of God’s purpose for the world.

This is not a new challenge.  Listen to the exchange between Peter, Jesus and the beloved disciple at the end of the gospel of John.  Peter is trying to understand the relationship between Jesus and the disciple that Jesus loved.  Now, we are not given the name of the disciple whom Jesus loved anywhere in the scripture.  Scholars have posited different answers to who it was: John (the writer of the Gospel), Mary Magdalene, or perhaps a non-Jewish disciple.  Some have even suggested that the beloved disciple is forward looking to you and I as future readers of the gospel.  But we are not given the confirmation of who it is.  Peter is trying to uncover the personal nature of the relationship with the disciple and Jesus.  But in this, Peter is rebuked for the last time.  He has gotten distracted by the personal details and forgotten the mandate of feeding sheep that came only a verse before.  He became more interested in the details, then the follow me.

It also the challenges of the early church in Acts passage that we heard this morning.  As the movement had grown, there were more than just the Jews who had experienced Jesus.  Gentiles, who had known Jesus as well as those who had heard tell of incredible teacher, miraculous healer, and Risen Savior who began to model their lives after his ways.  Their lives did not include all of the Jewish traditions.  Their ways of following Jesus did not have kosher laws or dietary restrictions.  And Peter baptized these different eating, different living disciples of Jesus Christ, these Gentiles.  How could they all reconcile following the same Savior when there were differences?

The personal exercise of faith becomes public.  This is the first time in Acts that the church is experiencing internal conflicts, not just steeling themselves for the challenges of those who live and believe differently.  This is the first time that those who believe similarly are in conflict.  It is the growing pains of a movement that begins to realize that the Jesus they knew was not just a personal friend with healing for their needs, but a public savior redeeming the world.  It is the painful learning of a community that needs to shift thinking beyond Jesus is my savior, self-help guru, to serve my needs only, to Jesus is God to change and impact the WHOLE WORLD!

We have often believed that the way we understand following Jesus is the only way.  Following Jesus is the only way; however, our way of following Jesus is NOT!  This has gotten us in trouble as a large C church again and again.  We have believed there was only one way to have music in worship.  At points in history, traditions have dictated that it can only be with a piano or an organ, only acapella or certain hymns.  We have believed there was only one way to pray.  At points in history, traditions have said it can only be scripted prayers from the Bible or the tradition or prayers must be spontaneous to be authentic.  We have believed that following Jesus must be a part of this church or that church.  Roman Catholics have excluded Lutherans who have excluded Disciples of Christ who have excluded apostolic traditions and so on and so forth.  Certainly United Methodist have found themselves struggling with these divisions as well.

Jesus calls us to life out loud.  To live our lives publicly as we personally encounter Jesus.  In the United Methodist tradition alongside many others, when you join the church, we call you to support the church with your prayers, your presence, your gifts, your service, and your witness.  Witness is a public act of personal experience.  When a witness addresses the court, they recount a personal experience of consequence to the court.  The personal becomes public.  When we share testimony or witness, we recount a personal experience of consequence to those around us – the personal becomes public.  We understand that God’s presence us with us in the most vulnerable places is deeply personal and yet not, private.  That Jesus’ presence with us in our darkest hour is a microcosm of Jesus’ presence with the world in the darkest hours of our world.

Our intimate and personal relationship with Christ must be rooted in a community. This community helps us break out of our own heads, to encounter the people around us and see that our Church extends beyond those we would pick and around the world.  Our personal faith and spirituality is that it doesn’t rest in our isolated abilities and efforts. Our spiritual life is about letting go of our need to do things alone and reaching out to the rest of Christ’s Body.  Private versus personal is the very line you and walk each time we decide how to share and with whom our exciting news and our devastating news.  Private or personal is what we seek to discern when we post pictures on Facebook, pass around scrapbooks, or tell our stories.  In our faith lives, there is no private versus personal.  It is all personal and all for the glory of God.

All of this means that our witness has something to say about just about every part of our lives.  What is your witness?  How is your life experiencing Jesus, who is always personal, but is never private?  Where will you proclaim the life transforming power of the personal Jesus who knows you and loves you and all redeems our world.

This is the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, thanks be to God, Amen.

1http://www.christianitytoday.com/le/2010/summer/personalneverprivate.html?start=2

New Testament Lesson:  Acts 11:1-8

Now the apostles and the believers who were in Judea heard that the Gentiles had also accepted the word of God.  So when Peter went up to Jerusalem, the circumcised believers criticized him,  saying, “Why did you go to uncircumcised men and eat with them?”  Then Peter began to explain it to them, step by step, saying,  “I was in the city of Joppa praying, and in a trance I saw a vision. There was something like a large sheet coming down from heaven, being lowered by its four corners; and it came close to me.  As I looked at it closely I saw four-footed animals, beasts of prey, reptiles, and birds of the air.  I also heard a voice saying to me, ‘Get up, Peter; kill and eat.’  But I replied, ‘By no means, Lord; for nothing profane or unclean has ever entered my mouth.’

Gospel Lesson:  John 21:20-25

Peter turned and saw the disciple whom Jesus loved following them; he was the one who had reclined next to Jesus at the supper and had said, “Lord, who is it that is going to betray you?” When Peter saw him, he said to Jesus, “Lord, what about him?” Jesus said to him, “If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you? Follow me!”  So the rumor spread in the community that this disciple would not die. Yet Jesus did not say to him that he would not die, but, “If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you?”   This is the disciple who is testifying to these things and has written them, and we know that his testimony is true. But there are also many other things that Jesus did; if every one of them were written down, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.

Meditations For Your Week

Sunday, April 24 ~ Saturday, April 30

Sunday: “Jesus said to him, ‘If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you? Follow me!’” John 21:22.  Jesus calls us personally, cares for us personally, and then, invites us to follow publicly!

Monday: “This is the disciple who is testifying to these things and has written them, and we know that his testimony is true.” John 21: 24.  Testimony is telling stories.  What stories of God are you sharing?

Tuesday: “But there are also many other things that Jesus did; if every one of them were written down, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.” John 21: 25.  God continues to work in our lives, beyond the written scriptures.  Prayerfully ask God to open your eyes to God’s movement.

Wednesday: “Now the apostles and the believers who were in Judea heard that the Gentiles had also accepted the word of God.” Acts 11: 1.  Our God is for all people, not a select few.  How are you sharing the good news with all people?

Thursday:  “So when Peter went up to Jerusalem, the circumcised believers criticized him, saying, ‘Why did you go to uncircumcised men and eat with them?’” Acts 11:2-3.  Fellow believers can sometimes be critical.  Ask God to open your heart to hear God and not just criticism.

Friday: “Then Peter began to explain it to them, step by step, saying,” Acts 11:4.  Our faith makes most sense in our lives when others walk with those in understanding.  Who in your life is your Peter?

Saturday:  “I also heard a voice saying to me, “Get up, Peter; kill and eat.”  Acts 11:8.  As God spoke to Peter to change his understandings of the law, God will speak to us.  Where is God inviting you to do something different?