Third Sunday of Easter
Luke 24: 36-49
"Are you ALIVE in CHRIST?"
36 ¶ As they were saying this, Jesus himself stood among them.
37 But they were startled and frightened, and supposed that they saw a spirit.
38 And he said to them, "Why are you troubled, and why do questionings rise in your hearts?
39 See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself; handle me, and see; for a spirit has not flesh and bones as you see that I have."
40
41 And while they still disbelieved for joy, and wondered, he said to them, "Have you anything here to eat?"
42 They gave him a piece of broiled fish,
43 and he took it and ate before them.
44 Then he said to them, "These are my words which I spoke to you, while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the law of Moses and the prophets and the psalms must be fulfilled."
45 Then he opened their minds to understand the scriptures,
46 and said to them, "Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead,
47 and that repentance and forgiveness of sins should be preached in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem.
48 You are witnesses of these things.RSV
A young, ambitious pastor was called to serve in a certain church. He was warned by his predecessor that the congregation was "dead".. But he accepted the call because he believed with God’s guidance he could bring life to that church. He was an optimist and he worked hard, visiting the members, preaching his best sermons enthusiastically, he tried to develop an outreach or lay visiting program so that visits might be done in the homes of the active, the inactive and new people moving into town. The harder he tried, the more he knew that his predecessor was right, this was a dead church.
The spark for ministry, the excitement of preaching and sharing the gospel message was not there.
So one Sunday he made a startling announcement to the few who were gathered for worship. He said, "In as much as you are a dead congregation, unresponsive to resuscitative efforts, unresponsive to any effort of pumping life into the workings of the congregation, in as much as the vital signs of the congregation are dead, I will conduct a funeral for this ’dead ’church next Sunday morning at 10:30."
The members. the few who were there, buzzed with excitement following the service. One said, "What’s ’s he trying to pull anyway?" Another said, "I don’t understand?"
The pastor and his announcement of a funeral for the church was the main talk of the tiny rural town during that week The phone lines were hot with talk, the coffee shop was filled with men talking about what they expected next Sunday.
Sunday arrived, and as the people gathered, there was an open coffin in the front of the church. As the 10:30 hour approached, the pastor looked out and saw that every pew plus some chairs were filled for this funeral service.
He began the funeral service by reading scripture, he shared prayer, he even gave a very sad sermon on the demise of this over 100 year old church and congregation.
After he finished his sermon, he did something which again startled the membership. He asked the members to please rise and past slowly by the open coffin to pay their last respects to this now dead church. Slowly, they shuffled pass the coffin, their faces assuming disconcerting expressions as each peered inside.
The coffin was empty except for a mirror.
As each person peered into the coffin to view the deceased each looked upon his or her own face.
Are you Alive in Christ? This is the second Sunday since Easter and and we can ourselves if the resurrection has made us alive in Christ?
Are the vital signs of this church alive with the power of the Easter Resurrection?
In our gospel lesson, Jesus is calling the disciples together and telling them they are witnesses to the resurrection and they, the disciples, should preach forgiveness to all nations beginning with Jerusalem as Jesus said in verses 46 to 48
46 and said to them, "Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead,
47 and that repentance and forgiveness of sins should be preached in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem.
48 You are witnesses of these things.
In these verses, Jesus is laying out the beginnings of the church.
The signs that a church is alive with the power of the resurrection are many, however, this morning I would like to look at one sign worship.,
Worship. As the gospel lesson says, the disciples were gathered together and Jesus appeared among them, ate some fish, then explained the scriptures to them. This act of explaining the scriptures can be seen as an act of worship.
For worship what we do on Sunday morning is no more or no less than what Jesus did that day in that room. For our worship is hearing again and again the great love God has for us as His children, celebrating that love in word and song. Worship, being in contact with God, is important for the gathered community.
Remember last Sunday and Easter Sunday, the texts said the disciples were gathered together . They were reliving all Jesus had said to them were discussing the possibility that he had risen. All of these events were forms of an early worship of God’ and His Son Jesus Christ..Worship became better focused after the Pentecost event, as the community began to worship in a more formal way, but the important fact was the gathered community worshipped. It was a sign, a way for them to know that they were alive in Christ. This worship gave meaning and purpose to their lives.
Is worship a way for us to see if we as individuals and as the church are alive in Christ? How is our worship? Do you see your presence in worship as an important element, or do you believe that it doesn’t matter if you are not here on Sunday?
The following story shows how much you do matter or count on Sunday morning.
"In a certain mountain village, a nobleman wondered what legacy he should leave to his townspeople. Finally, he decided to build a church for a legacy. The complete plans for the church were kept secret. When the people gathered they marveled at the church’s beauty and completeness.
But an astute observer asked, "Where are the lamps? How will the church be lighted?"
Without answer, the nobleman pointed to some brackets in the wall, then he gave to each family a lamp to be carried to the worship service and hung on its proper place on the wall.
"Each time you are here, the area where you are seated will be lighted," explained the nobleman. "Each time you are not here, that area will be dark. Whenever you fail to come to church, some part of God’s house will be dark."
In our worship, each one is important, each one brings to the worship experience, their light, their response, their prayers, their confession, their love and compassion to be shared with others. Our faith lives, our faith stories are and can be shared during our worship experience.
A full church gives to us the confidence that we are not alone in our faith, but there are others, a whole host of others who share this same common experience.
Someone once said l "The Christian faith is a lot like the chicken pox--you catch it--it’s A Holy infection." And those of you who have children in the lower grades at school know just how catching chicken pox were this school year.
Worship is the time for us to catch the faith, the excitement, the conviction of our brothers and sisters in faith. Worship is o time to be renewed by the power of God’s Spirit, the Holy Spirit, so that our faith can be alive out in the world.
But sadly, for many worship is seen not as b time of excitement, or a mountain top experience, but as the following cartoon says, "A cartoon shows a man leaping up from his pew in the middle of a worshiping congregation. He is waving his arms in the air, his mouth is open with a shout of joy. And beside him, his wife is frantically trying to pull him back into his seat and she is saying, ’Okay, so you feel the Spirit, but not here in this Worship Service"
Are we alive in Christ in our worship?
Maybe we don’t need to be jumping up out of our seats, but we do need to give the worship experience a chance to have an impact on our daily lives. We come to worship to be reminded again and again about the love Jesus has for us. And then we take that love out with us into the world where we live, work and play. That love gives us the courage, the confidence to live life. For we all know that our’s is not a perfect life. We experience the brokenness of the world every day and when we do, we can turn to our worship experience to give us the courage, the peace, the confidence to live through all that reminds us we are less than what God intended for us to be.
Being involved in worship can be summed up in this closing story:
In the old days of ocean sailing, a small boy was traveling on shipboard with his father. About once a day the boy saw the captain stand on deck with sextant in hand, and, as they used to say, "shoot the stars."
The boy said to his father, "Daddy, what is the captain doing?"
His father replied, "The captain is taking our bearings, seeing where we are, finding out if we are going in the right direction."
As a matter of fact, it is something of this kind that each of us is doing as we are in worship on Sunday morning. We are checking in with God; we are seeing where we are; we are finding out about our directions in relation to His will concerning our journey of life.
We can so easily become confused or lose our way out there in the weekday world of days, and we need this checkpoint.
Here we touch base with the Lord of our life, and from Him we take our bearings for going on. We can deviate from the course and by winds and currents be carried far astray, unless from time to time we check in with God to set our course again.
Are you Alive in Christ? Are you alive in Worship?
Amen
Written by Pastor Tim Zingale April 28, 2003
