Dramatic Introduction: ‘The Road to Jerusalem’ written by Arden and Peter Mead and published by the Creative Communications for the Parish, © 2004.
(1) This past week there have been roads in our state and across the center of this nation and elsewhere that has not been hospitable to drivers. An early spring snow storm made travel, especially around Indy and the southern part of our state, very difficult.
Roads have also been the topic of discussion around our state and in our state legislature for a couple of months now since Governor Daniels proposed the sale of the Toll Road to a private corporation for 75 years with the money going for road construction across the state. Now we know that there are those who say, ‘bad idea, governor and shame on you state legislators!’ for proposing and passing the law as well as those who say, probably after hitting a pothole or two, ‘show me the money!’
(1A)For some people roads represent transportation to and from work; (1B) travel for pleasure and vacation. For others, roads represent work itself, using them to carry goods and services from one place to another, repairing them, or constructing them.
But I think that roads represent for all of us something else: memories. A few months ago I spoke of a stretch of road that I traveled on a snowy January Friday afternoon in 1976 upon which I totaled my mother’s car. That road had name, Ohio Route 235, and when I run to get the wonderful Cassano’s Pizza that is a required meal when we visit mom, I drive that spot of road.
Another is a street that I have fond memories of is located in East Dayton. It is called Stillwell Drive and is in a housing development called Overlook Homes that literally overlooks the once active runway of the Wright Field section of what now is Wright Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton. The homes were built in the 1940’s and are simple row tenement style homes. 33 Stillwell Drive was the place that my father graduated High School from, left from for the battlefields of Korea, the wedding ceremony to my mom, and where we lived briefly during my childhood. It was the home of the Kane’s for 34 years until the death of my Aunt Mary in 1977. The memories of afternoon tea (my Grandmother was born to first generation immigrants from Wales) and mincemeat cookies and a woman of great faith are attached to that address. There are other roads that hold memories but those are two of mine. Roads are an important and essential part of our lives.
(2)If I were to interview you this morning (and I’m not) and ask you, ‘Describe the road you’re on today,’ what would I be asking? I would be asking ‘How are you doing right now? How’s your life going?’
‘Road’ has come to mean a metaphor for our lives. It represents the journey, and the places along the journey, we make from birth to death.
We have been on several roads already this Lenten season and they hold meaning for us because of what this particular season of the Christian faith means.
(3) The first road that we traveled was The Road to Damascus. The road to Damascus was a road of confrontation because Christ confronts Paul about his persecution that sought to destroy the church and the Christian faith. ‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?’ Saul was on ‘his high horse’ thinking that he was doing the right thing for the right reasons. But he was all wrong.
Yet the Road to Damascus also became a road of transformation because Saul becomes Paul by God’s grace and power. He changes his direction in response to the grace and power he experiences. He is ‘born again.’ His values and his priorities and his mission – they all change because God changes Paul’s heart and soul, in a flash of light! He becomes a living illustration of what this season and, Praise the Lord, Easter Sunday means for us and all of humanity.
(4) The second road we have traveled this month was The Road to the Wilderness, a road of temptation to take shortcuts instead of following the Father’s plan and a road of preparation for Jesus’ ministry and mission that would begin after this wilderness experience. Jesus was tempted with ‘taking a shortcut’ to fulfill a legitimate need, violate some important boundaries, and choose to worship someone else that promised power. However, He said, ‘No!’ to Satan’s temptations and by doing so, He stayed obedient to His Father’s purpose and mission. And that obedience would lead Him on a road that would take Him to the Cross, the grave, and most important, the Resurrection from the dead!
We briefly (5) stepped onto The Road Home last week as we were reminded of the prodigal son who decided that life was better on his own than with the father and so he decided to truly ‘live it up!’
It was a road of reconciliation because the son would ‘come to his senses’ and decided that dad’s place was better than the pig’s troth that he was working in. But it also a reminder of the reconciliation that Christ has made possible because it is also the story of a father who saw his son a long way off and ran to bring him all the way home.
(6) Today we travel for a few moments on The Road to Jerusalem.
Notice in verse 21 of our main text, (6A) ‘From then on Jesus began to tell his disciples plainly that he had to go to Jerusalem, and he told them what would happen to him there.’
There is a shift in Jesus’ teaching and the end of His mission on earth is now in sight and involves two things that makes this road a hard road to walk the first being (7) suffering.
In verse 21 we read, ‘He would suffer at the hands of the leaders and the leading priests and the teachers of religious law.’
Many have indicated over the years that Jesus’ trial was a circus and a farce of justice as we read in places like Matthew 26:67, “Then they spit in Jesus’ face and hit him with their fists. And some slapped him, saying, “Prophesy to us, you Messiah! Who hit you that time?”
Pilate tried to release him because of His innocence as we hear in Luke 23:22, ‘For the third time he demanded, “Why? What crime has he committed? I have found no reason to sentence him to death. I will therefore flog him and let him go.’ But they, those who had opposed Jesus so long and hard, would not allow that to happen. Pilate finally gave in to their demands and turned Jesus over to them to be crucified.
(8) At that point Jesus experiences the second thing on this road sacrifice. Again we read in Matthew 16:21 ‘He would be killed, and he would be raised on the third day.’
He is unjustly murdered. His killing today would evoke howls of protest and cause all of the justice organizations on the face of this earth to demand an investigation.
There are times during this Lenten season when I must admit to you that I grow numb as I re-read and re-encounter these texts. It gets all so familiar to me as the years go by and there is the very grave danger of taking all this for granted.
But Jesus goes onto make an even bigger point, one that we have trouble with, one that overwhelms us, and one that forces us to reconsider the cost of following Jesus: “If any of you wants to be my follower, you must put aside your selfish ambition, shoulder your cross, and follow me. If you try to keep your life for yourself, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for me, you will find true life. And how do you benefit if you gain the whole world but lose your own soul in the process? (9) Is anything worth more than your soul?”
That last question stops me in my tracks because as I consider the question, I have to confess that there are moments in which I do place other things higher up on my value list than my soul. Things like things, people, relationships, status, and the like. Maybe that is why Lent is so important. It forces me to stop and consider all the attachments to my soul that cause me to put down my cross and take up my own selfish agenda.
What does Jesus mean by ‘shoulder your cross?’ It is not that we must be sacrificed on a cross because Christ has already done that for us.
When Jesus called the twelve He called them to follow Him. Jesus is in the lead not us. It is Jesus’ agenda that we are to follow. He does not follow our agenda.
His agenda, the Father’s agenda, is an agenda that requires us to do His work as agents of reconciliation. Jesus spoke often of this and we read it in such places as John 17:21, ‘My prayer for all of them is that they will be one, just as you and I are one, Father—that just as you are in me and I am in you, so they will be in us, and the world will believe you sent me.’ In this prayer, not long before He would undergo terrible treatment, unbearable pain, and then death, Jesus makes clear that there is unity of purpose in His life and ministry with the Father. And carrying the cross, in what would be a short period of time, was part of that agenda.
Our selfish ambition that Jesus speaks of in our main passage keeps us from fully experiencing God’s good agenda. (10) To ‘shoulder our cross’ is to let go of our own agenda and embrace God’s agenda. The disciples knew what Jesus meant by shouldering the cross. They knew what Jesus meant by the phrase because they regularly saw men shouldering a cross as they walked toward their death.
(11)And this agenda is costly because Jesus Himself said it would be as we read in Matthew 24:9, ‘You will be (11A) arrested, (11B) persecuted, and (11C) killed. You will be (11D) hated all over the world because of your allegiance to me. And many will turn away from me and betray and hate each other.’
Now, I don’t know about you, but I did not sign up for such treatment when I confessed my sins to God and trusted Christ for my salvation! I signed up for eternal life and joy!
But for some believers this has meant, or will mean, physical death and persecution because that has happened, it is happening, and it will continue to happen until the Lord returns because Jesus said that it would. We may not, or may, experience this kind of persecution in our situations, but there is another kind of sacrifice that we must make, daily, that is sometimes more unbearable than physical death.
For some, the harder surrender comes in surrendering our agenda or, better yet, our dreams and our hopes to God. Those things are tied into our souls. They are a part of the spiritual element of our lives. The fear that comes in letting them go is a critical issue here. Peter’s statement of disbelief that Jesus would die, is an illustration of this truth that to fully follow God we have to surrender our dreams and life to Him. They have to die.
We look at Jesus’ death and crucifixion with beauty of hindsight. To the disciples and those who followed Jesus, His death and crucifixion was disillusioning. But Easter Sunday would come and Jesus’ resurrection would turn them, the world, and us on its ear.
But the Road of Jerusalem would have to be traveled first before all of that would take place.
Where are you at with God in all of this? Where are you not at with God in all of this?
Have you died to your agenda? Have you surrendered yourself, totally to the Lord? To walk this road requires surrender but not blind surrender. It is an intentional surrender to God who knows all about us and offers us eternal life in the hereafter and a meaningful life now. May each of us find the life that Jesus speaks of and may we live it well. Amen.
Power Points for this sermon are available by e-mailing me at pastorjim46755@yahoo.com and asking for ‘032606svgs’ Please note that all slides for a particular presentation may not be available.
