This is a true story – no I mean it, it really is true.
Warren had an MRI a couple of weeks ago. I don’t know if you have ever had one. I’ve had a couple. One a long time ago and one just a few years ago. They have gotten better. For the first MRI that I had, the MRI was this big tube that completely surrounded you. In the most recent one, it was a large ring that just surrounded the part of the body that they were examining. In my case, it was a knee.
In either case, you have to lay flat on an examination table. They put you in an awkward position, and you have to lay perfectly still. They dim the lights. I really felt as if they were putting me in a tomb – buried alive.
They often give you headphones and play music for you so that you will be more comfortable during this near death experience. That is what they did for Warren. They offered him a choice of musical styles. Did he want “Easy Listening”? How about classical? No, he chose inspirational.
I want you to picture Warren. My guess is that he was wearing gym shorts and a t-shirt. He is laid out on a table in the dark. They start pushing him into the tomb of the machine, and the music that is supposed to soothe him starts playing. Their inspirational song choice? It was “Jesus is Tenderly Calling You Home.” Warren was not comforted.
Our text today talks about light and dark and contrasts death and life. In fact, when I did Mildred’s funeral a couple of weeks ago, I used this text. I also used some of this sermon, so if you were at the funeral and some of this sounds familiar, you’ll know why.
Before I get into the text itself, there is some background that you need to understand.
Technically, the various heresies that are collectively known as “Gnosticism” didn’t emerge until the second or third century. Still, some of the ideas that developed into Gnostic thought are seen toward the end of the first century. They are addressed in Paul’s later letters – Colossians and Ephesians, and in the letters of John. I’ll be telling you about Gnostic thought as it developed, knowing that the readers of this passage from Ephesians would not have had a developed philosophy.
The roots of Gnosticism actually go back to Plato. If you took a college philosophy course, they probably told you about Plato’s parable of the cave. He asked his students to imagine what it would be like to be sitting in a chair at the mouth of a cave looking at the back wall. You aren’t doing this for an hour or even a day. Your entire life you are in that chair and can only look at the back wall.
Somewhere behind you, there is a fire. You can’t see the fire, but you do see the light on the back wall of the cave. From time to time, animals walk between the fire and your chair. You can’t see the animals, but you do see their shadows. Plato said, that you would naturally believe that the shadows are real and would doubt the existence of the animals, even though the opposite is true.
Plato said that we live in a sort of cave. We think that the things around us are real, but, according to Plato, they are not. He said that there is an ideal realm that is the true reality. The material world around us is just the shadow of that ideal realm and is inherently unreal.
The basic idea of Gnosticism takes this idea of Plato one step further. Instead of saying that the material world is unreal, the Gnostics say that the material world is evil. In their thinking, that which is spiritual has the same nature as God and is necessarily pure. That which is material, like our fleshly bodies, is inherently evil, while our souls are divine.
Gnosticism was condemned as a heresy based primarily on two issues, their view of creation and their view of the nature of Jesus.
If the material world is inherently evil, where did it come from? A perfect God certainly could not create an evil world. Instead, they believed that the true God created a secondary god – what they call a demiurge. This secondary god created yet a more inferior god. This continued until the being that was created was far enough removed from perfection that he could create the evil material world. In their view, the god of the Old Testament – the god worshiped by the Jews – is a very inferior god who is the author of evil. Gnosticism was inherently anti-Semitic.
The second problem was the nature of Jesus. Here Gnostics split into two camps. One group said that Jesus was a human being and as such was not the Son of God. Instead, he became the adopted Son of God at his baptism. The other group said that Jesus was truly spirit and divine, but he was not at all physical. Instead, Jesus just appeared to be a man. He appeared to eat, appeared to sleep, appeared to weep, appeared to suffer, and appeared to die. The Gnostics are the reason that the church developed a confession that said that Jesus is fully God and fully man.
Gnostics blamed their sins on their physical selves. Again they split into two groups. Some were ascetic, meaning they endeavored to tame their flesh, often fasting excessively and torturing themselves. Others saw themselves as spiritual beings trapped in fleshly cells. No matter what they did, their bodies would be evil. Why not let the flesh be flesh? No sin of the flesh could make anything worse than it already is. A person can be spiritually pure while being physically reprobate.
It is this last view that Paul is confronting here. There were people who said that they were children of the light, spiritual beings saved by God’s love. As such, what they did with their bodies did not mater. Their fleshly bodies could continue to walk in darkness, with no impact on their Christianity.
To folks like that, Paul said, “WAKE UP!”
Isn’t it amazing how we come up with excuses for our failures – anything to avoid taking responsibility. A couple of weeks ago we talked about people who avoid responsibility saying that the devil made them do it. Now we encounter folks who say that people are just too weak to be held responsible for what they do. We might as well just give in. Who cares what that says about our relationship with Christ? Who cares about the consequences to ourselves and others? According to them, we just can’t do any better.
Most of us have seen TV shows about near death experiences. Often, a person will report that they felt as if they were in a long tunnel with the brilliant light coming from a distant opening at one end. These people often report that they hear voices encouraging them to “walk toward the light – walk toward the light.” I am not so sure about all that TV stuff. Maybe there is something to it and maybe not. But let’s take a few minutes to think about what it means to walk toward the light.
Benjamin Franklin is noted for many innovations, but you may not realize that he invented the street lamp. He created an oil lamp that was suitable for outdoor use. When he first tried to convince the city of Philadelphia to install these street lamps down town, they were reluctant. Franklin argued that the lights would make the city more inviting in the evening and would deter crime, but he found the city officials hard to convince. Having lost an initial vote, Franklin took a street lamp he created and erected it in front of his home. It was not long before the city leaders saw the value of that light and purchased lamps for the community.
I want you to imagine yourself walking down Ben Franklin’s street when he had the only street lamp in the world. It is a dark and moonless night. Clouds hide the stars. From the glow on the shades in some of the windows of homes along the way, you know that there must be light somewhere inside. Those lights in other people’s homes provide some cheer, but they do little to guide your steps. As you turn a corner you catch a glimpse of that light in the distance. That single light pierces the gray and black that surrounds you. At this distance, it is still a dim glow, but it attracts your interest. As you move toward it, it provides a clear reference point, allowing you to walk a straight path. Before long, its light actually begins to illuminate the road ahead. Steps that were once tentative become more sure as you can see the footing clearly. The path remains clear as long as you walk in the direction of the light, but should you decide to turn aside, something odd happens. Your own body blocks the light and you find yourself stumbling through shadows of your own making. But as long as you are faithful and walk in the light, your footing is certain and your direction is sure.
Do you know what it means to walk in the light? We need a clear vision of God’s love made known to us through Christ, and we must be faithful in walking toward that light. Our faith can give us a surety of purpose and direction that will see us through the ups and downs that are inevitable in this life.
Now some of us just aren’t satisfied with the light that God provides for us. We don’t want a street lamp, we want a search light. More than that, we want GPS and a radar-guided tracking system like they have at large airports. We want to be able to put our lives on auto pilot and let God do the flying. Or if we have to be the ones at the controls, we want weather maps and flight plans. We want a path with no surprises and one that is well known in advance. We want assurance of a smooth path and no problems.
I’m sorry, but it doesn’t work that way. We get a “lamp unto our feet.” God points the direction and illuminates the next step, but not much else. Trusting in God’s direction and taking one single step at a time help us to develop an intimacy with God. It demonstrates our faith. Besides, God often wants to lead us beyond our own comfort zones. If we knew the destination - if we knew how far we might be asked to stretch, we would assume that we would fail. We would refuse to go on. It is not until we are walking the path and growing as God prepares and equips us that we are in a position to face the challenges that lie ahead. As we take baby steps, God leads us to His ultimate goal for our lives.
Part of what we are here to learn is the value of relationship. None of us ever gets absolute assurance in our relationships. We say words like “until death do us part,” but we know the reality is that many relationships fail. Part of learning what it is to be in a loving relationship is learning that it isn’t a happily ever after, it is hard work. We have to demonstrate our love for each other. We have to speak the right words. We have to listen. We have to gradually grow closer.
Our relationship with God works in much the same way. It isn’t all laid out in advance. We are expected to learn and grow in that relationship as we would any other. We have to develop patience and confidence and faith. God walks the path of life with us step by step. It is as we walk the road together that we grow in closeness.
At the end of that road, we are promised a place where there is no darkness and there is no night. There is no need for sun or moon or stars, because it is permeated with the constant light of God’s forgiving love.
In the passage from Paul’s letter to the Ephesians that we read a few moments ago, Paul makes some odd statements. At first blush, it might seem that Paul is admonishing us to walk in the light instead of in darkness, but he takes this metaphor of light and darkness one step further. He tells us that we should “be light.” For Paul, it is not enough for to avoiding stumbling, but we must become so transparent, so surrendered to God’s will, that the light of Christ’s love actually begins to shine through us. You have known people like that – people who radiate the light of Christ in our hurting world.
Paul says another strange thing. He says “Awake you sleepers and rise from the dead and Christ will shine on you.” The odd thing here is that the sleepers he is talking about here are not people who are physically dead. For those who lived in Christ, physical death is only a passage from life in this world to eternal life with God. No, the people whom Paul calls dead are people who, though physically alive, are spiritually asleep. He says, “Wake Up!”
Do we earn a relationship with God by doing good things? If we are generous enough or caring enough will we merit God’s favor? Is God keeping score, counting up our good deeds? I don’t think so.
And what about purity? If we spend hours in prayer – if we fast for days at a time – if we sell our TVs and spend time reading the Bible does that assure us of God’s love? God loves us already. He can’t love us more.
It is true that we can never be good enough to deserve God’s favor on our lives. The Gnostics were right about that. So why does it matter. Why shouldn’t we just do whatever we want? Haven’t we already received the gift of God’s grace? Were the Gnostics right after all?
Wake Up! The mistake in this kind thinking is that it assumes that the goal is eternal salvation and nothing else matters. They saw accepting Christ as their savior as a way to get their ticket stamped. It is a mere transaction.
Christianity is not just a way to get to heaven, it is a way to live life abundantly today. Jesus is not just our savior, he is our Lord and companion as well. He walks beside us through life and sets our direction. The idea is not get something from God, The idea is to develop a relationship with God. The way that we know that our relationship is real is by the change it makes in us as we walk with him day after day after day. It makes us more caring and concerned for others. It causes us to want to learn and pray. It changes us for the better. Those changes will not take place if we are still wedded to the worst that our world has to offer.
It is possible that some of you here today may have found what I have said to be hard to understand. Part of that may be my own lack of eloquence, but it also could be a lack of a common frame of reference. You may feel as though your soul is asleep within you. Maybe you feel so isolated and alone that you have grown numb to God’s tugging at your heart. Maybe you feel separated from God by a canyon that you could never cross, no matter how hard you tried. Walking toward the light doesn’t make any sense when the light is on the opposite side of this chasm. How can anyone bridge that sort of gap?
You are, in fact, correct. Though the chasm is of our own making, it is beyond our ability to bridge. We could strive and struggle for eternity and still find that the light is still just a glimmer in the distance. The problem is that true enlightenment is never something that we can conjure up within ourselves. The gap that we created can only be bridged from the other side. While we were far from God, Christ came and was crucified for our sins and rose again to usher in new life. When we recognize our own failures and accept the gift of God’s grace, our eyes are opened to a bridge that crosses that great divide. It is the Spirit of God working within us to transform us into a new creation that enables us to follow the path before us – a path that leads to a kingdom of light. It is our choice. To find peace and purpose and connection with God, we must surrender ourselves and follow Christ’s leading. When we do that we assure ourselves a place at our Lord’s side.
