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Sunday, October 8, 2017

Changing the World

This is the message given in the United Methodist churches of the Wheatland Parish on Sunday, October 8, 2017.  The Bible verses used are John 23:13-25.


            Our Bible reading today picks up where we left off last week.  Jesus has been arrested, he’s been questioned by the high priest, and now he’s been brought to the Roman governor, Pontius Pilate.  Pilate thought he’d gotten rid of this problem of Jesus by sending him to Herod, but Herod sent Jesus right back.  So now, Pilate has no choice but to deal with him.
            Pilate tells the people there’s no basis for the charges against Jesus.  He says he’s going to release Jesus.  Three times he says that.  And each time, all the people say no.  They don’t want Jesus released.  They want him crucified.  They want him killed.  So Pilate, who really does not care about Jesus one way or another and just wants to keep the peace, agrees.  Jesus is led away to be crucified.
            This whole crowd of people wanted Jesus killed.  Listen again to how Luke says it:  “With one voice they cried out, ‘Away with this man!  Release Barabbas to us!’”  “They kept shouting, ‘Crucify him!  Crucify him!’”  “With loud shouts they insistently demanded that he be crucified.”
            I wonder if that’s really the way it was.  I mean, I’m not questioning the accuracy of the Bible or anything.  I’m just thinking about it.  We’re not told how big the crowd was.  It’s described as “the chief priests, the rulers, and the people.”  Maybe it was a hundred, maybe it was a thousand, maybe more, we don’t know.  But out of all these people, was there not one who disagreed?  Was there not one who thought, “Wait a minute.  Does this man, this Jesus, really deserve to die?”  Was there not one person there who thought, “Maybe Pilate’s right.  Maybe we should think about this a little more”?  Is it literally true that every person there was shouting for Jesus to be crucified?
            It may be.  Remember when we talked about Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem on what we now call Palm Sunday?  We talked about how a lot of people there probably did not believe in Jesus.  They just got caught up in the emotion of it.  That may well have happened here, too.  People who did not know who Jesus was might have been there demanding his death.  People who had heard Jesus and had questions might have been there demanding his death.  In fact, some of the same people who, not very many days before had been shouting “Hosanna” and waving palm branches might have been there demanding Jesus’ death.
            It’s easy to get caught up in the emotion of a situation.  Most of us have probably had it happen at one time or another.  But there’s another thing going on here, too.  There may very well have been people who did think Jesus should not be killed, but who simply did not have the courage to say so.  They may have, privately, been on Jesus’ side, but simply have been afraid of what might happen to them if they spoke up about it.
            What do those two things have in common?  Peer pressure.  Going along with the crowd.  Not wanting to rock the boat.  Doing what everyone else does.  Thinking the way everyone else thinks.  Believing what everyone else believes.  Living the way everyone else lives.  Wanting to fit in.  Wanting to be popular.  Not wanting to be different, not wanting to be the oddball.  Wanting to be part of the crowd.
            We talk about peer pressure in regard to young people a lot, but it’s not just young people who feel it.  I think every person here probably feels peer pressure at one time or another.  We might not realize it, we might not think about it that way, but we do.  In fact, one reason we don’t realize it or think about it that way is that we’ve done it for so long we no longer realize we’re doing it.  We think we’re making independent decisions, entirely on our own, when in fact we’re just doing things the way everyone does them and thinking about things the way everyone else thinks about them.
            But here’s the thing.  As Christians, fitting in should be the last thing we think about.  It should not matter to us whether we think or believe or live the way other people do.  What should matter to us is whether we think or believe or live the way God wants us to.  Our goal as Christians is not fit into the world.  Our goal as Christians is to change the world.
            That was Jesus’ goal too, of course.  Jesus could’ve saved himself a lot of trouble if he’d been willing to go along, to fit in.  If Jesus had just gone along with what the high priests and elders wanted, he would not have been killed.  In fact, I think that even at the point of our reading for today that option was still open to Jesus.  If Jesus had apologized, if he’d said that the chief priests were right and he was wrong, he’d probably have saved his life.  He might’ve even gotten praise from the chief priests as a sinner who’d seen the light.  Things would’ve been so much easier for Jesus if he’d just tried to fit in.  Just as, many times, it seems like things are easier for us if we just try to fit in.
            But Jesus was not sent to Earth to fit in.  Jesus was sent to Earth to change the world.  And you and I, as Christians, were not put here fit in, either.  You and I were put here to change the world, too.
            Now that sounds like a pretty lofty goal.  In fact, it probably does not sound very realistic.  You and I are just ordinary people.  We’re out here living in a small town in a state that most people consider the middle of nowhere.  How in the world are you and I supposed to change the world?  It sounds ridiculous.
            But it’s not.  For one thing, Jesus was just a guy from a small town in the middle of nowhere, too.  Remember in John Chapter One, when Jesus is gathering his first disciples?  Jesus calls Philip, and Philip goes and tells his friend Nathanael about how they’ve found the Messiah, and it’s Jesus of Nazareth.  Nathanael says, “Nazareth!  Can anything good come from there?”  Nazareth was considered nowhere.  Nobody worth knowing could come from there.  But Jesus did, and he changed the world.
            But we think, sure, but Jesus was the divine Son of God.  I’m not the divine Son of God.  I’m not the divine anything.  How am I supposed to change the world?
            But we can.  And we do.  You and I change the world every day, in a hundred ways, large and small.  Because every action we take is seen by someone.  Every word we say is noticed by someone.  You and I have influence over more people than we will ever know.  That influence changes the world, every day.  The question is whether we’ll have the courage to not fit in.  The question is whether we’ll have the courage to change the world in a way that brings people to Jesus Christ.
            When you decided to come to church today, rather than staying home or going someone else, someone saw that.  Maybe it was your kids or your grandkids.  Maybe it was your neighbor.  Maybe it was somebody driving by who saw you pull up to the church or walk in the door.  But somebody noticed.  And them noticing that changed the world.  Maybe just a little bit, maybe not even enough to be noticeable.  But it still changed the world to some small extent.
            Everything we do is noticed by someone.  When the cashier at the convenience store gives us too much change, how we react to that will change the world.  When we’re talking to someone and they criticize someone else, how we react to that will change the world.  When someone wants us to do something we know is wrong, but we know will be popular, how we react to that will change the world.  When we do something we know is right and we get criticized for it, how we react to that will change the world.
            And when we have the chance to spread the gospel of Jesus Christ, how we react to that will change the world.  And when we have the chance to show God’s love to people, how we react to that will change the world.  It won’t change the whole world all at once, but it will change some part of it.  It will change the world for at least one person.  And that one person will change the world for someone else, who’ll change the world for someone else, and on and on it goes.  And when enough of these changes happen, the whole world will be changed.
            If Pontius Pilate would have had the courage to stand up to the crowd, he might have changed the world.  If someone, even just one person, in the crowd shouting “crucify” would have had the courage to stand up and say no, that person might have changed the world.  But none of them did.  And the thing is that by not having that courage, they still changed the world.  They just did not realize it.
            You and I claim to be Christians.  The way we live out our Christian faith will change the world.  We will either change the world by going along with the crowd, or we’ll change the world by loving our neighbor and making disciples of Jesus Christ.
            Which way will we choose?


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