Acts 1:1-11

In the first book, Theophilus, I wrote about all that Jesus began to do and teach until the day when he was taken up to heaven, after giving instructions through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom he had chosen. After his suffering he presented himself alive to them by many convincing proofs, appearing to them during forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God. While staying with them, he ordered them not to leave Jerusalem but to wait there for the promise of the Father. “This,” he said, “is what you have heard from me; for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.”

So when they had come together, they asked him, “Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?” He replied, “It is not for you to know the times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” When he had said this, as they were watching, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. While he was going and they were gazing up toward heaven, suddenly two men in white robes stood by them. They said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up toward heaven? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.”

Sermon Text

We come now to the close of Easter. Soon, except for Baptisms and certain celebrations, we will stow away our Paschal candle and its light will not shine again. The season of resurrection shifts into a new season, one of mission and of commitment to living our faith out in the world fully and properly. Our celebration today looks to Christ’s ascension and the accompanying things it tells us about the world we live in. Like the disciples, we look up, but just like the disciples, we cannot let our eyes remain heavenward for too long.

The Church holds that there are a handful of ways in which we ordinarily meet with God. The celebration of Holy Communion, the prayers which we offer to God, the scripture which stands as a perpetual testimony to God, and the community of the faithful we call the Church. Sometimes these allow us a glimpse of God, sometimes they allow us to see God more completely – our eyes locking onto the divine and the divine looking back toward us. These are, however, mostly modes of faith that move our eyes upward toward heaven. When we come together to worship, to celebrate the sacraments, when we pray privately or in worship… All of these are examples of us creating space to look up from earth toward heaven, even for a moment.

Despite the importance of this time we take to look up, it is never the intent of God that we spend our whole life with our necks nearly broken in an attempt to see God’s movements in the heavens. It is fully possible to be so fixated on seeking God in the places we expect God to be that we miss the important ways God is trying to show up outside the ordinary. When we are constantly looking up, we miss the fact that God is around us, in the world, and not just in the “sacred spaces,” we have often tried to lock the Holy inside of.

Our scripture shows the disciples having followed Jesus for forty days after his resurrection. Having seen the horrors of his death, they now fully appreciate the wonder of his resurrection. Not just raised from the dead, but perfected in his flesh in the way that tells us what we will someday look like. The risen Christ was the same Christ who died on the cross, but without the veil of misunderstandings that kept the disciples from seeing who Christ really, truly, fully was. God and man, now shining in an obvious as well as perfect unity. This is the resurrected Christ.

Amidst further teachings and miracles, the disciples follow Jesus and he promises them that the Holy Spirit will soon be poured out into the world, and that they would be the first to receive the life it gives. Not fully understanding, they think Jesus is planning to end the world shortly, to bring the kingdom of God to fulfillment in one decisive movement. Jesus does not let that linger, however, and gives one final instruction to his disciples. “Forget about figuring out when everything will be finished, look to what there is to do now! I give you the Spirit so you can give it to others. Speak the truth to the Judeans first, then to the Samaritans, then to the entire world! Go and change the world and trust that I’ll settle any scores after that.”

The disciples then watch Jesus disappear into the heavens, not literally the sky above us, but the place where God dwells. In his place, two angels appear and question the disciples lack of movement. “Why do you look up? He’ll be back.” The disciples stop their worshipping, stop their staring, and then go into Jerusalem to await the coming Spirit. The disciples realize that, while looking to Heaven has its merits, their job involves more than just sitting and looking up.

There is a balance in our faith between devotional and missional pursuits. The two are not oppositional, they are not even opposite ends of a spectrum, they just both take time and resources to complete. If you invest time and money into expanding worship and prayer and sacramental access you do not guarantee that the same amount of money and time and resources will go into missional works of mercy, evangelism, and general community support.

I have only seen once successful complete fusion of worship and service. My wife, in her incredible penchant for ministry, planned a system whereby every fifth Sunday was a mission Sunday. The congregation would gather in the fellowship hall, read scripture and pray together, and then they would assemble kits and supplies for local non-profits that they would then go out to deliver. It built community relationships, it got people resources they needed, and it combined the acts of worship and service such that all involved could see in the work they did a different kind of devotion, a way to worship while working.

These were still occasional services though, and each week the congregation still had to find the balance between the two shades of our work on earth. The angels here, helpfully, give us an understanding of how to go about our work. The disciples have done nothing wrong by standing on the mountain and watching Jesus ascend, they were asked to go up and do exactly that. The angels were not their to chastise them, but to redirect them. “The time for this work is ending, the time for another is beginning.” After the disciples return to Jerusalem, they do not immediately get to work, they still gather together and pray in the upper room until the Pentecost comes. The mode of their work changed, but the validity of either type did not.

Among the reasons we meet weekly as a Church is that it assures us the presence of God. We know we can find God in the pews when we gather to pray and worship and proclaim scripture because God promises to be found in these things. What makes the difference for us, both individually and as a Church, is if we can make tangible movement toward mission in the time between our worship gatherings. What are we doing to serve the world? How are we proclaiming our salvation and our scriptures? How are we being God’s people?

My job as a minister, and especially as an Elder, is to provide a place where we can gather and receive God’s Spirit and grace. In gathering like we do this morning, God is offering us the fuel, fire, and perspective we need to go out and do our work outside this room the rest of the week. It is my earnest hope that, as time goes on, I will be able to add more opportunities for us to gather devotionally across the week.

I am called, at the same time, to point us outward. Though we in the United Methodist Church hold that Deacons are the kind of minister who work primarily out in the world, I am not exempt from this requirement either. It is my hope that, with everything we receive in this service on Sunday, we can go into the world and share a bit of it with those around us. The virtues that God builds within us, the insight the scriptures show us, the goodness that is shared between us, we owe the world to show them these truths. The laity of the church are to be equipped by ministers to go forward and do the work of the Church, the minister likewise provides guidance, rest, and sacramental strength to those works.

We are all gathered here, on this blessed day, to look up and remember that Christ is our advocate for all time. When we pray, Christ is seated beside the Father and praying alongside us. When we cry, Christ sits in the presence of God weeping with us. In all things, we have an eternal advocate we can worship and praise with everything we have. That same Christ, however, has asked us to see him not only in bread and wine or choirs or prayers, but in the face of our neighbor, and of those in need. We must be a people who do not spend our time only looking up, because Christ is revealed in more than just our worship. To truly know God, we must serve one another, our neighbors, even our enemies.

Take time then, as we continue our service today, to truly embrace Christ’s presence with us in worship. Take the strength that comes from knowing God is with you in all things and let it prepare you for a week lived out in the world. Once we leave this room though, do not let your rumination lead to stagnation. See Christ in the people around you, worship him with your care. – Amen

Acts 7:55-60

But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, looked up to heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. “Look,” he said, “I see heaven open and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God.”

At this they covered their ears and, yelling at the top of their voices, they all rushed at him, dragged him out of the city and began to stone him. Meanwhile, the witnesses laid their coats at the feet of a young man named Saul.

While they were stoning him, Stephen prayed, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” Then he fell on his knees and cried out, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” When he had said this, he fell asleep.

Sermon Text

 Stephen is someone I look up to. A Greek speaking Jew, a Hellenist to use Biblical Language, he was something of an outsider in Judea. Judean Jews would not see him as being really Jewish. Likewise, Gentiles would look at him as just another Jew in the gutter. He is a foil to Paul in the book of Acts. His death inspired Paul to go on with his attempt to persecute the Church – a mission that was as much about Paul denying his identity as it was any genuine religious conviction.

Unlike Paul, Stephen embraced his identity. Though we are given just a handful of verses describing him, we can see that he was a trust member of the Christian community and someone who made a lot of difference. Firstly, we know he was a Hellenist by his name. Stephen is a thoroughly Greek name. While all the apostles’ names are written in Greek, most are cognates. In other words, people like John, are named Yoannen in Greek, which is just another way of saying the Hebrew Yohenen. In the same way today John is the same as Jean is the same as Johannes. Stephen is just a Greek name, and so we know that Stephen is of Greek descent.

Secondly, we know he was trusted because of the moment he enters the Biblical narrative. A concern is raised by Hellenistic Christians that their widows are not getting the same help that Judean widows are. We are never told the cause of this – was it intentional because of bigotry? A barrier of language? The scripture never says because the Disciples were focused on remedying the problem more than they were trying to find someone to blame. They called forward several Hellenists to take over the distribution of food. One of these people was not even Jewish, just a God-fearing gentile.

The work embarked upon by these men erased the issue. No longer did anyone feel that they were being overlooked. I think today of our modern struggles with racism. Sometimes you hear people worrying that if people of color are put in positions of power they would abuse white people in the same way that they have historically been abused by white power structures. While we must admit that power is a corrupting influence, we cannot have oppression ever be considered a natural condition of humanity. Stephen and the other Greek Jews did not begin to deny Judean widows food once they were in charge of food distribution. Why? Because the oppressed are never the enemy of one another. We could learn a lot about listening, and about promoting leaders from all backgrounds, from just this brief episode in Acts 6.

After this episode, Stephen is arrested for the preaching he has been doing in Jerusalem. Stephen is, again, an outsider. His preaching would have been easier to attack than that of the Judean disciples. The words he spoke were easier to paint as heretical, because people were already looking for excuses to exclude him for one reason or another. A false accusation of blasphemy is brought against him and a mob is formed to take him before community leadership. Reading the text, we might be led to believe this was the full council of Jewish leaders in Jerusalem, but that is unlikely.

Jews in the first century were against the death penalty, those who were in power at least. This makes it unlikely that the death of Jesus or any other apostle was carried out with the full council present. Secondly, the full Sanhedrin was seventy people, good luck getting even half of them into a room at a given time. Instead, this is probably a small group of community leaders and a mob who opposes Stephen’s work. Stephen, who does preach a sermon born out of frustration with his Judean brethren, has angered a select group of people willing to kill. Stephen is lynched by a mob, not executed by a lawful authority.

Stephen’s death marked the first time someone died on behalf of Jesus. It started the series of events that would bring Paul to be converted, by first inspiring in him a plan to execute the same mob justice in other cities and towns. His ministry was perhaps the most dangerous one to the status quo of anyone who had been active in Jerusalem at the time. He was getting people to come together, Jews from Judea and from outside Judea. He had a Gentile under his leadership who had committed to living among God’s people as a believer. He created, in microcosm, the Church as it is meant to be. A people who care for one another, a people from all walks of life, a people saved by God’s grace and committed to the community they have become a part of.

Stephen will always be someone I look up to. He transformed his anger and frustration at the way the world was into action on behalf of, not only his own people, but all people. He was devoted to service and to love. Many have used him as a weapon, describing his murder as justification for attacking Jews. That is a travesty, a misuse of his legacy. Stephen, like so many advocates today, was fighting against a system that overlooked the least of these, and as a Greek Jew, his people were first on his mind. Stephen was willing to look injustice in the face and tell people that he and his people mattered just as much as anyone else. As such, he like advocates who say something similar today, he was rejected – and, yes, killed – for that belief.

We have to band together as a people, to serve one another, and to promote goodness in the same way that Stephen did. Listen to people when they tell you about their pain. Advocate for putting people in power who want to change the world, not double down on obviously broken systems. Work to repair this world that has become fractured, not by ignoring the problems that are but by fixing them at their root. We choose, day after day, if we will be with Stephen or with the mob that killed him. I choose to be with Stephen, with the Church, with Christ. – Amen.

1 Peter 3:13-22

Now who will harm you if you are eager to do what is good? But even if you do suffer for doing what is right, you are blessed. Do not fear what they fear, and do not be intimidated, but in your hearts sanctify Christ as Lord. Always be ready to make your defense to anyone who demands from you an accounting for the hope that is in you, yet do it with gentleness and respect. Maintain a good conscience so that, when you are maligned, those who abuse you for your good conduct in Christ may be put to shame. For it is better to suffer for doing good, if suffering should be God’s will, than to suffer for doing evil.

For Christ also suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, in order to bring you to God. He was put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit, in which also he went and made a proclamation to the spirits in prison, who in former times did not obey, when God waited patiently in the days of Noah, during the building of the ark, in which a few, that is, eight lives, were saved through water. And baptism, which this prefigured, now saves you—not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, with angels, authorities, and powers made subject to him.

Sermon Text

Apologetics is the discipline of answering questions people have about the Christian faith. The word comes from the Greek, “Apologia,” which connotes a legal defense of a position. More properly, an “Apology,” traditionally refers to the process where somebody defends or recontextualizes accusations placed against themselves or on another person’s behalf. There are many famous apologies in the world, but my favorite is written in 1611 by Amelia Lanyer. In her poem, a long description of Christ’s passion, she takes a moment to lament the Herod would not listen to his wife when she said to leave Jesus alone. Building on this, she looks to Adam and his treatment of his wife in the Garden, and our subsequent blaming of Eve for the fall.

“And then to lay the fault on Patience back/ that we (poor women) must endure it all/ we know right well he did discretion lack,/ being not persuaded thereunto at all; If Eve did err, it was for knowledge’ sake,/ The fruit being fair persuaded him to fall: No subtle Serpent’s falsehood did betray him,/ if he would eat it, who had power to stay him?”[1]

Lanyer goes on to paint a little more of the picture of this unhappy arrangement, but her main focus is to tell the story of salvation, so her “Apology,” on Eve’s behalf is short. Still, I hope you can see the typical form of an apology. “What you have heard is this/ what is actually true is this/ therefore we should really see things as this…”

In the early days of the Church, Apologists worked hard against the criticisms of Greek and Roman philosophy as well as Jewish religious tradition. Incorporating those worldviews into their arguments, the early apologists adapted where possible, conceded where common ground could be found, and rejected what could not be reconciled to the Gospel. Today, apologetics is mainly a pursuit of historical and scientific criticism, and less a matter of philosophic debate – though this too comes into the field. Most “apologetic,” classes teach people a very specific kind of worldview and argument.

The curious thing to me, however, is that the context in which we are told to arm ourselves with “apologia,” is not in the context of learning clever arguments or discourse. In fact, later in the Letters of Peter, he specifically speaks against “cleverly devised,” stories in favor of the simplicity of the cross.[2] While I am thankful for the ability to defend my faith intellectually, I do not believe Peter expected everyone to know everything about philosophy, history, and the natural sciences in an attempt to justify their faith. Instead, I think there is academic apologia and practical apologia, the latter being what all Christians are called to.

Peter begins our reading today by asking his people to do good, not only to themselves, but to the ones around them. Feed the hungry, help the widow and orphan, supply for the poor however you can, these were the kind of works he was asking them to engage in. Along with this, the early Church was actively gathering to worship, celebrate the eucharist and the love feast, and to read the scriptures together. Peter was asking his folks to live a life that made it so that, if anyone accused them of wrongdoing, it would be obviously false. In being above reproach, when their enemies came against them to kill them, those who were being honest about the situation would see they were wrong to punish the innocent Christian.

Recently I reread the story of Polycarp’s martyrdom. Polycarp was a bishop in Smyrna, a city sitting in a bay on the coast of what is now Turkey. Polycarp was noted for his teaching and his leadership. Likely a student of John, Polycarp was a second generation Christian. He led the Church through a time of persecution, in which the government of Smyrna was heavily invested in killing Christians.

His Martyrdom, the story of his death, tells us a lot about how we are meant to defend our faith. When his captors came to steal him away, he did not run, despite having the time to do so. He walked downstairs, welcomed them in, and set a table for them to eat. He said they should take as much as they wanted, and that he only asked for an hour to pray. Standing in the house, Polycarp would pray for two hours for the good of all those he knew, had met, or had even seen on the streets. When he was done, he climbed into the carriage, and submitted to be taken to the arena to die.

He would be asked to offer incense to the god who protected Caesar. He refused, saying Christ alone was his God. The rulers begged him to recant his faith, to accept that an eighty-six-year-old should not die in an arena. He refused, and when he was asked to explain his faith he said, “I will to you, if you want to sit down and talk about it. I will not stand before this crowd just for them to shout me down.” Polycarp would be tied to a stake and burned following his refusal to talk or recant. The fire, it is said, would not burn him, and it took a dagger to the heart to kill the saint.

Polycarp, in the extremity of his martyrdom, gives us a lens to the reality that Peter’s contemporaries were living in. People were dying for their faith and the defense they had to give was not just a conversation over coffee, it was usually a matter of them standing up before their death and giving an unwavering declaration of their commitment to Jesus, even if that means death.

1 Peter is a guide for living as an exile in this world. He asks hard things of the faithful in his charge. He says they should obey their leaders, even as their leaders kill them. He says they should not return the abuse they receive, because Jesus did not abuse his tormentors, but forgave them. The evil around us, Peter says, cannot be allowed to corrupt us. We have to do right, to love, and to pray even in the face of the most terrible situations we can imagine.

The key take away for today is that our faith is something that will cause people to expect answers from us. We are blessed that, in our context, those answers are not usually a matter of life and death. Living in a country, living in a world that has known Christendom for some ten centuries, we have somehow lost track of something the martyrs of history, and even of today, inherently understand. Jesus, Polycarp, thousands of saints since them, died without a harsh word on their tongue… Yet, when it comes to our conduct in the world, we have a reputation for anything but gentleness and peace.

What would it look like if Christians lived a bit more like Peter asked them to? If we were gentle and kind and righteous. That does not mean we have to be complacent or unopinionated, but it means that we have to act like the examples of faith we have been given throughout history. How often does someone publicly question our faith and we find ourselves angry? Disagree with us and we prepare to make war with them? Christ, while dying, prayed for those who nailed him to the cross – why am I about fight people for some petty grievance?

I usually like to be a bit more optimistic in my closings, a bit more focused on our potential than our reality… Yet, I have to ask, “What is our excuse?” In a world so full of conflict and pain and war, why am I feeding into the anger and pain and more… I who suffer nothing, who go through life with complete freedom, who am I to wage war against my neighbor in this way? Again, not that we cannot have disagreements, maybe even fights, if we really need to litigate something going on… But I don’t think we go into most battles trying to provide an “answer,” we go in trying to “win.”

Christ, the fullness of God and perfected humanity, did not win in this life. He suffered and died and was pressed down, though never crushed… All throughout this, his anger was only lifted in righteous indignation for others, he answered questions so that others might know truth, he lived in gentleness and peace, and in all that he did modeled what a perfect life could look like for us. If we wish to be Christians, who can answer for the hope which we have been given, then we need to give good answers – not through rage, legislation, or discourse – but through earnestly living into a life where we, “have unity of spirit, sympathy, love for one another, a tender heart, and a humble mind…”[3] – Amen

[1] Amelia Layner. Salve Deus Rex Judaeorum. 1611

[2] 2 Peter 1:16

[3] 1 Peter 3:8