Sermon 1/31/21
Created by: Senior Pastor Sarah West
Sermon Series: Living in the Light
Title: Inner Transformation
Scriptures: Acts 26:12-18
Acts 26:12-18
”With this in mind, I was traveling to Damascus with the authority and commission of the chief priests, when at midday along the road, your Excellency, I saw a light from heaven, brighter than the sun, shining around me and my companions. When we had all fallen to the ground, I heard a voice saying to me in the Hebrew language, ‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? It hurts you to kick against the goads.’ I asked, ‘Who are you, Lord?’ The Lord answered, ‘I am Jesus whom you are persecuting. But get up and stand on your feet; for I have appeared to you for this purpose, to appoint you to serve and testify to the things in which you have seen me and to those in which I will appear to you. I will rescue you from your people and from the Gentiles—to whom I am sending you to open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.’
When I woke up this morning I read a devotional written by a UCC pastor in California who talks about her own consumption of social media and in particular the modern day phenomena of “doom scrolling”. (the practice of obsessively checking online news for updates, especially on social media feeds and the tendency to continue to surf or scroll through bad news, even though that news is upsetting). She compares it to most addictive behaviors which provide a short-term dopamine hit but end up making you feel worse than ever. She has made the decision to severely limit her time on social media because it is having the opposite effect of what she intends it for. “This place where I go for information and connection leaves me angry, depressed, lonely and never good enough”. (Rev. Molly Baskette)
When I read that, It reminded me of a quote I read recently:
“We are drowning in information but starved for knowledge.” - John Naisbitt
Humans have long sought knowledge or understanding of ourselves, our universe, God. In school we learned about the Age of Enlightenment:
a European intellectual movement of the 17th and 18th centuries that dominated the West and influenced art, philosophy, and politics. Central to Enlightenment thought were the use and celebration of reason, the power by which humans understand the universe and improve their own condition. https://www.britannica.com/event/Enlightenment-European-history
When I was a student I was taught that this era followed the Dark Ages or the Middle Ages, the time after the fall of the Roman Empire.
These themes of darkness and light, knowledge and enlightenment are what I want to explore today as we continue our sermon series Living in the Light.
What can we know and understand about ourselves, our world and God?
Where does this knowledge and understanding come from?
We will explore these questions with the help of the scriptures, in particular, a story of one of the most significant moments of enlightenment recorded in the Bible - the account of Paul’s encounter with Jesus.
Where they lead us I believe is to this ultimate conclusion.
Enlightenment is not about grasping God but rather the realization that God has grasped us. Knowledge does not come from studies of the mind but from relationship with the author of all that is. The author of all love. All truth is contained in Christ the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end.
This is what it means to live in the light. Or to summarize it in another way, using the words of Jesus in John 15:16, “You did not choose me, I chose you.”
The truth of the matter is, we participate in the life of Christ whether we realize it or not. For In him we live and move and have our being.
Which also means that whether we realize it or not, we are working against Christ or for Christ.
Story of Paul’s conversion is all about this revelation. He thought he had knowledge of God, (raised in the temple, a devout practitioner of the faith) he believed he was living a life that was holy and righteous in God’s sight by persecuting the followers of Jesus. Until that fateful day on the road to Damascus when Jesus appeared to him. One minute he is walking down the road with his companions and the next moment they are overcome by a blinding light, Paul (known at the time as Saul) is suddenly unable to see but he can hear, and what he hears is the voice of Jesus speaking to him and asking: “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?” Jesus goes on to explain to the stunned Paul, that he has been chosen to tell others about Christ. in particular to go to the Gentiles and share what he has seen and experienced so that they may turn from darkness to light.
What does Paul’s story teach us about Revelation and Response?
It is in God’s nature to love and be in relationship, to reveal God’s self.
God is always trying to communicate with us. (not often in such a dramatic way mind you). This story is a hopeful reminder of God’s light and love and transforming power.
Understanding is not about grasping God but rather the realization that God has grasped us.
God’s light and love were always there, Paul simply was not aware of it.
Enlightenment came not from his religious study and practices but from entering into relationship with the author of all that is, with Jesus Christ.
What impact does this revelation have on us?
Face to face with Jesus, there and only there, do we find who we are.
Truth of Christ interrupts and overthrows our assumptions about God and about humanity. - Rowan Williams (The Dwelling of the Light)
What is our Response?
Much of the time we are inattentive and distracted unaware of the ways we are even now living in the light of God’s presence.
Without realizing it we may be working against Christ rather than for Christ
Think about Paul whose greatest desire was to be faithful to God. He was a zealous persecutor of Jesus followers precisely because he believed his devotion to God required it of him.
Opposite may also be true
Mark 9:38-41 “Teacher,” said John, “we saw someone driving out demons in your name and we told him to stop, because he was not one of us.”
“Do not stop him,” Jesus said. “For no one who does a miracle in my name can in the next moment say anything bad about me, for whoever is not against us is for us.
This leaves us with the question: How do we know if our knowledge and understanding is true?
We don’t exactly have direct encounters walking down the street in which blinding light appears and Jesus speaks to us.
How do we believe that our knowledge of anything is in some degree true? We need to see existence itself as caught up in God’s own will. To know something is to become aware of God’s presence within it. P. 74 “The Dwelling of the Light”
2 Corinthians 4:6 - For it is the God who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness’, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
Continue to seek the face of Christ - revelation is ongoing journey over a lifetime
Think for a moment about the faces I showed during the Children’s Chat today. The many faces of Jesus. Which face of Jesus you seek depends a lot on where you find yourself right now on the road.
Plagued with shame about an incident from your past or present?. . . look at the face of Jesus as he stands beside the woman caught in adultery and looks out at the crowd inviting those without sin to cast the first stone.
Preoccupied with your own personal needs and wants? . . . gaze down upon the face of Jesus as he kneels to wash your feet.
Experiencing rejection and judgment from others?. . . imagine sitting across the table from Jesus having lunch like Zaccheus the tax collector
If you are grieving . . . meditate on the weeping face of Jesus at the death of his friend Lazarus
If you find yourself in a place of gratitude and joy . . . call to mind Jesus at the wedding in Cana and how he added to their joy by turning water into wine
If you are afraid . . . imagine Jesus standing in the bow of the boat commanding the violent wind and waves to cease, his face strong and calm.
If you are overwhelmed and feel like you are sinking . . . look up into the face of Jesus reaching down to pull Peter out of the waves and return him to the safety of the boat.
If you are hopeless or desperate and feel abandoned and alone . . . look upon the face of Jesus as he hangs upon the cross deserted and betrayed yet full of love and forgiveness
Face to face with Jesus, there and only there, do we find who we are.
When we look at Jesus, we see in some measure what he sees, and are drawn to where his eyes lead us. When we look at him looking at us, we see both what we were made to be, bearers of the divine image and likeness, and what we have made of ourselves.
We have been created to mirror his life, the eternal life of the one turned always toward the overflowing love of the Father.
p. 78 -81 The dwelling of the light by Rowan Williams
This is what is means to live in the light:
To be in relation with Jesus is to be “in the truth”, even when we cannot formulate this in tidy philosophical language. Existence itself is rooted in the divine “humility”, the divine self-forgetting. So for us to be true and real is for us to enter into that kind of reality - not to seek for a divine dignity and knowledge that lifts us out of this messy world, but to seek to be aligned with God’s sacrificial love as we live our lives, with all the risk that involves. p. 72(Rowan Williams)
Paul was sent to the Gentiles - Endured great hardship and suffering, beatings and imprisonment all for the sake of love. But because he had a deep awareness that he was living in the light, dwelling in the presence of the living Christ, that knowledge sustained him and brought him joy. When I imagine Paul I often picture him sitting in chains in prison, singing. He himself summed up his life with these words:
Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. - Philippians 3:8
My prayer for you this week - is that you will find time to be alone with Christ. To meditate upon his face and to reawaken to the beauty of God’s light, God’s love that surrounds you. Take that light with you as you go about your ordinary tasks with a greater awareness of how each person, each moment is infused with God’s love. Ask Jesus to show you how you are being called to serve, to bear witness to this light.