Strange Bedfellows
Love Never Dies, prt. 18
Wildwind Community Church
David Flowers
August 22, 2010
Well, I’ll just tell you right up front this morning that we’re skipping a chapter! I’ll be gone again next week and when I called to ask Dr. Joe to preach for me a few weeks back I told him we’d be on chapter 19. Jason was going to cover 18 last week, but then we both decided last week would be the best time to do the Group Workcamp presentation. So rather than extend an already long series another week, we’re just going to skip John 17, okay? Lots of great stuff in there, nothing against John 17 – we just need to keep moving. I thought about not saying anything and seeing if anyone noticed, but then I figured I’d better tell you.
Okay, John chapter 18. I think this chapter is going to help us put together some really awesome stuff and I’m excited about digging in this morning. I want to talk to you about a controversial topic, but it’s one that I don’t think should really be all that controversial. It’s a topic I have never in eight years seriously addressed in a sermon, yet it is a fairly clear teaching of Christ’s. I want to talk to you today about non-violence.
My friends, for too long the Christian church has majored in the minors, and minored in the majors. We have focused on things like homosexuality and abortion and premarital sex (none of which Jesus had a single word to say about), and overlooked things like quietness and simplicity and non-violence, which Jesus clearly taught – either by word or example or both. Now why do you think we do that? Why do you think that we have come to focus on things Jesus never really talked about, and ignore things he explicitly modeled and said? Do you think it’s because we are evil? Do you think it’s because we intentionally have set out to emphasize the wrong things? I don’t think that at all. I think we major in the minors and minor in the majors because it’s easier that way. We live in a culture that simply cannot hear two of Christ’s core teachings, which are on simplicity (rejection of materialism) and non-violence. This culture cannot hear those messages because they are two of the pillars of our society. Where would we be in America if the church had truly embraced those teachings? Could there be an America at all?
God and guns, baby, that’s our creed. Oh yeah! And wealth – the endless pursuit of riches, the near worship of “the market." God, guns, and wealth. Jesus was of course all about God, but he specifically taught against violence, and against the piling up of riches and the pursuit of material comforts. But committing (or at least endorsing) various forms of violence and piling up riches are things most Christians in America WANT to be able to do. And so we offer a version of Christianity where the clear teachings against violence and materialism have been purged, and then we substitute teachings against homosexuality, pre-marital sex, and abortion. I’m not implying that the Bible as a whole is completely silent on these issues, all I’m saying is that Jesus was silent on them. Again, I just feel like that’s going to sound like a radical statement to some people, but it’s simply a statement of fact. As individuals and as a church, we need to be finding, facing, and following truth. The truth is that Jesus didn’t address most of the things that James Dobson seems to think Christianity is all about.
But to Americans, this stuff is the gospel. And that would be okay except for the fact that it isn’t the gospel. If we are accepting as gospel things that are not gospel, then we have certainly overlooked as gospel some of the things that really are supposed to be.
Is this getting uncomfortable? It might be for some, because when you start questioning the pairing of God and guns, and then question the endless pursuit of prosperity, you have desecrated core American values. And so, invariably, what happens is that people rush to politics to prop up their positions. They’ll pull out references to communism and Hitler and all kinds of radical and ridiculous stuff. People will go to great lengths to defend their values. This of course shows why we don’t hear the gospel of non-violence and simplicity to begin with. It also shows why most of our great spiritual teachers have been either murdered or dismissed as lunatics. Both are very effective ways of making sure that their challenging and revolutionary messages don’t spread very far. It also shows what Jesus meant when he said it’s easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the Kingdom of Heaven . When we have a lot, we have a lot to defend, and a lot to lose.
But hey, let’s just look at this text, shall we?
John 18:1-11 (MSG)
1 Jesus, having prayed this prayer, left with his disciples and crossed over the brook Kidron at a place where there was a garden. He and his disciples entered it.
2 Judas, his betrayer, knew the place because Jesus and his disciples went there often.
3 So Judas led the way to the garden, and the Roman soldiers and police sent by the high priests and Pharisees followed. They arrived there with lanterns and torches and swords.
4 Jesus, knowing by now everything that was coming down on him, went out and met them. He said, "Who are you after?" They answered, "Jesus the Nazarene."
5 He said, "That’s me." The soldiers recoiled, totally taken aback. Judas, his betrayer, stood out like a sore thumb.
6
7 Jesus asked again, "Who are you after?" They answered, "Jesus the Nazarene."
8 "I told you," said Jesus, "that’s me. I’m the one. So if it’s me you’re after, let these others go."
9 (This validated the words in his prayer, "I didn’t lose one of those you gave.")
10 Just then Simon Peter, who was carrying a sword, pulled it from its sheath and struck the Chief Priest’s servant, cutting off his right ear. Malchus was the servant’s name.
11 Jesus ordered Peter, "Put back your sword. Do you think for a minute I’m not going to drink this cup the Father gave me?"
There are two seemingly separate observations I was able to pull out of this text, but then I realized how beautifully they actually all fit together.
The first thing we have to look at is how there was no difference in this scene between “religious” Peter and the “pagan” men who came to arrest Jesus. If we overlook this, we’re missing something huge. Jesus is wanted by the authorities and men come with swords to apprehend him. After it is clear that they are there to take Jesus, Peter does what? He draws a sword and uses it to oppose those who have come to oppose Jesus.
Here we have, in one brief scene, the oldest problem of history between people and between nations. One sets out to oppose someone else. That person then opposes the one who opposes him, and you have violent conflict on your hands. It cannot be any other way. When I was a kid, I used to wonder how come instead of having wars and people dying, why world leaders didn’t just get together and play chess and whoever wins got to have the other guy’s country. Funny idea, isn’t? I was young and naïve and didn’t understand the dynamics of opposition that play out in the human heart. It seems that the fate of nations cannot decided by anything less than the death of human beings because we know that it is our lives and our ways of life that are at stake.
Realize that although the soldiers are coming to take Jesus away, there is no violence happening until Peter draws his sword. The Roman soldiers were certain they were just doing their job. Peter was certain he was just defending his master. Everybody’s certain, everybody thinks they are justified in what they do. But Jesus does not praise Peter’s opposition. He does not thank Peter for defending him. He does not encourage the other disciples to fight alongside him. But the most striking thing is that Jesus isn’t even living in the same world Peter is living in. Peter is living in the “how dare you do this to my Lord” world. But Jesus isn’t in that world at all – that “how can you do this to me” thing. Richard Rohr in fact teaches that Jesus taught us how to be victimized without ever playing the victim! You know I think Jesus’ struggle in the Garden of Gethsemane was a struggle in prayer to leave that world behind – the world that opposes, that looks for ways of standing our own ground, that refuses to submit to what is, that says poor me, that cannot accept what will be. Interestingly, that struggle is not recorded in the gospel of John, but what are Jesus’ words where it is recorded?
Luke 22:42 (NIV)
42 "Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done."
Now that’s one sentence, but I think we can reasonably conclude that it took many hours for Jesus to come to peace with this. It is not easy to withdraw from the game of opposition and violence. There will be a great deal to lose, maybe even including our lives.
So Peter responds from the world that most of us live in most of the time. You are threatening what is precious to me, so I will oppose you and take something that is precious to you. And what does Jesus say?
John 18:11 (NIV)
11 Jesus commanded Peter, "Put your sword away! Shall I not drink the cup the Father has given me?"
Jesus is working from a totally different frame of reference. Peter’s frame of reference says, “Things that look good to me are good, and I have to keep bad things from happening and make good things happen. That is my job.” Jesus’ frame of reference says, “Even things that look bad right now are filled with divine possibility – God is still up to something here.” And so he commands Peter to put down his sword. The question for all of us is what frame of reference are we living from? Are we scurrying around thinking that whatever looks good must be good and whatever looks bad must be bad, and it’s our job to keep all bad things from happening and make sure that only good things happening? That is idolatry! That’s putting ourselves in the place of God.
Now Matthew records something amazing about this scene.
Luke 22:49-51 (NIV)
49 When Jesus’ followers saw what was going to happen, they said, "Lord, should we strike with our swords?"
50 And one of them struck the servant of the high priest, cutting off his right ear.
51 But Jesus answered, "No more of this!" And he touched the man’s ear and healed him.
It’s amazing and beautiful that Jesus healed the servant. And Jesus’ response to the violence is fantastic. “No more of this!” No more of this! If only we heard these words from Jesus again and again. If only Pope Urban, instead of helping Emperor Alexus I organize the first crusade in 1095, had gone to the Emperor and said, “No more of this!” But instead of being gospel salt and light, the church and the government were on the same side, just like Peter and the Roman soldiers were both acting in the spirit of violence.
Historian Raymond of Agiles described the capture of Jerusalem by the Crusaders in 1099:
Some of our men cut off the heads of their enemies; others shot them with arrows, so that they fell from the towers; others tortured them longer by casting them into the flames. Piles of heads, hands and feet were to be seen in the streets of the city. It was necessary to pick one’s way over the bodies of men and horses. But these were small matters compared to what happened at the temple of Solomon, a place where religious services ware ordinarily chanted. What happened there? If I tell the truth, it will exceed your powers of belief. So let it suffice to say this much at least, that in the temple and portico of Solomon, men rode in blood up to their knees and bridle reins.
No more. My friends, we should at least be wary if not outright concerned when the church and the government jump in bed together – especially when the church comes alongside government to bless its conquests and wars.
If only the explorers had heard these words as they set sail for North America, as they forcibly converted Native Americans. NO MORE! Enough violence. CUT IT OUT!! If only pastors had said these words to early settlers – NO MORE! That’s enough! Stop thinking that you and God are on the same side when you do your acts of violence (physical, verbal, or otherwise). That is the age-old human error. We are violent people, violently inclined, so we do not see any way that God could NOT be violent. The violence of God even gets written into our scriptures. The Old Testament portrays this violent, bloodthirsty God, yet when Jesus comes to model who God is, violence is nowhere to be found. What does this tell you about most of the violence in the Old Testament? We come up with clever theories about why God seems so different from one testament to the other, and don’t usually consider that one of the main reasons God had to actually come to us in skin is to get these sick and violent images of God out of our heads. Yet many Christians (who nearly all admit that Jesus is the “imago dei,” the living image of God) are still willing to defend and endorse violence. We cannot seem to get violence out of our system. We love it, as long as it’s happening to somebody else!
The God and guns crowd in America today come from the same mindset Peter did. “We have created this nation with God and guns and it is up to us to keep them both close by.” In lumping God and guns together like this, we present God as just another tool, another way of accomplishing what it is that WE want. This is idolatry. Using God for our own purposes. Guns represent the forceful accomplishment of human purposes. God represents the peaceful accomplishment of divine purposes. God and guns, actually, is an oxymoron – like “military intelligence” or “hot chili” or “home office” or “almost pregnant,” or “anarchy rules!” or “awfully good.” When we speak of God and guns, we are nearly always speaking of using God for the forceful accomplishment of human purposes.
So this sermon is called Strange Bedfellows. God and guns. Caesar and God. Government plans and purposes, and the plans and purposes of God. Peter’s agenda, and Christ’s agenda. My agenda for my life, and God’s agenda for me. Your agenda for your life, and God’s agenda for you.
Of course this example of non-violence is completely consistent both with what Jesus taught us in the Sermon on the Mount and with the example he set in his arrest, trial, torture, and crucifixion. People who cavalierly say, “God and guns” have simply not thought in any real depth about the inconsistency between those two things. BTW, the results of the crusades? Set aside the death and maiming and let’s look at what came of them…
What was the legacy of the Crusades? Williston Walker et. al. observes:
Viewed in the light of their original purpose, the Crusades were failures. They made no permanent conquests of the Holy Land. They did not retard the advance of Islam. Far from aiding the Eastern Empire, they hastened its disintegration. They also revealed the continuing inability of Latin Christians to understand Greek Christians, and they hardened the schism between them. They fostered a harsh intolerance between Muslims and Christians, where before there had been a measure of mutual respect. They were marked, and marred, by an upsurge of anti-Semitism....
The papacy gained the most from the Crusades. Its authority was greatly increased.
Great. Just what we needed. More power, so the church could wage more wars and kill more people in the name of God for more godless reasons. What a waste.
When we speak of God and guns, we are nearly always speaking of using God for the forceful accomplishment of human purposes. Peter did it when he drew his sword, and we are nearly always doing it when we draw ours. But Jesus’ stance was a pretty definitive stance of non-violence. I am not a complete pacifist and I am not claiming that there are never times when a nation must engage in the evil of violence to protect its people – but if these times exist they are 1) exceptions rather than rules; 2) to be mourned rather than celebrated. The way people lustfully say, “God and guns, baby” – is kind of sickening. It’s shoddy theology and I believe does a disservice to the sacrifices that have to be made by those who find themselves part of the violence. Now I’ve never heard any of you say it so if you do say it, or have said it – I’m not talking about anyone personally. It’s a general observation. But if you do say it, and believe it, I encourage you to dig a little deeper into the historical connection between God and guns and how many times that has actually produced lasting good in the world.
The other thing I observe in this passage, that actually fits right into what we’re talking about – is the similarity in thinking between Peter and the Roman soldiers, and then between Peter and those who crucified Jesus. I have already pointed out that Peter, like the Roman soldiers, was prepared to make his point by force. But Peter, like those who crucified Jesus, thought he was doing God a favor. Peter, a God-fearing Jew, thought he was doing God a favor when he picked up the sword to defend Jesus. Then of course Jesus was crucified not by the will of the pagan Romans, but by observant, God-fearing Jews – mostly good people, who honestly believed they were defending God when they put Jesus to death.
That’s all part of the danger. Before we resort to violence, we must convince ourselves that it is necessary. And we can easily come to believe that we are doing God a favor by getting rid of the godless pagans (modeled in what Peter did), and we can easily come to believe that we’re doing God a favor by getting rid of the spiritual heretics (modeled in what was done to Jesus and most of the other Hebrew prophets, and many of the great spiritual teachers). We have no problem justifying our violence. See, it’s inconvenient to stay on God’s wavelength like Jesus did – to spend the time in the garden in prayer, learning to submit to the will of the Father, learning to respond in love like Jesus did when he healed the ear of one of his captors. That’s hard. That requires more than slogans and adrenaline. It’s easier to get people fired up with “God and guns!” than it is with “Silence and simplicity!!”
If you remember nothing else in this sermon, remember this. People at very high levels of spiritual understanding throughout history have traditionally been killed by well-meaning religious believers at the lower levels. These people were mostly good people who sincerely believed they were doing God a favor by getting rid of heretics. Remember, as much as we demonize terrorists, most of them are probably people who love their families and kiss their children when they tuck them in at night. They are not fire-breathing monsters. Do they do evil? Yes. Like us, good and evil live in them alongside of each other. They are sincere believers who – wrongfully – believe they are doing God a favor by eliminating infidels (that’s us). So their way of thinking, although at a considerably more primitive level than most of ours, is nonetheless similar – “eliminate the enemy and make the world a better place.” As superior as most Americans feel to the Taliban, most of us have not moved beyond that basic idea. And yes, that’s a little scary. As much as we call for peace, there will never be peace until most of us have moved beyond this.
Jesus opposed this whole system of violent opposition. Next week you’ll be looking at John 19 which contains the account of the crucifixion. In the crucifixion, Jesus shows us how to deal with violence. Accept it. Do not victimize others in the process of our own victimization. Know that usually those who commit violence against us are simply ignorant – they “know not” what they do. And know that God will prevail. But instead of following Jesus in this way, we fight and reject being victimized. We lash out and victimize others in the process. And rather than trusting that God will prevail, which is exactly what Jesus did on the cross, we – like Peter – take matters into our own hands and take up the sword. This might be either physical or verbal or emotional violence. Jesus never asked us to worship him, but he did ask that we follow him – into Gethsemane, through his trial and torture, and all the way up Golgotha to that cross. We are to follow him. To do it like he did it. Only as we do life and death like Jesus did can we be assured that resurrection awaits us on the other side. To do life like Jesus did, we must rid ourselves of this strange cocktail of God and violence. They are oil and water. They make terrible bedfellows.
Where do you see yourself inclined to violence? What kind of violence do you tend to want to do? Verbal? Physical? Emotional? Have you been defending and justifying your form of violence? If so, are you ready to begin following Jesus into his way of handling violence and opposition? That is his call. Follow me. My friends, people who claim to follow Jesus while defending and endorsing their preferred forms of violence are not Christ-followers at all – they’re just Christians. Jesus didn’t come to make Christians, he came to produce followers. So where does violence need to be rooted out of your life? Your marriage? Your work life? Your politics? Your view of yourself? Your parenting? Your view of God? You are called not to worship Jesus but to follow him. You can (and many do) worship him without following him, but you cannot follow him without worshipping.
