May 29, 2011
Offspring and Orphans
- Acts 17:22-31
- Dr. Teri Thomas
According to the Gospel of John the Passover meal Jesus shared with his disciples before he was arrested probably should not be called the Last Supper. It might better be called the longest supper. Those guys must have been in that room forever! It takes John five entire chapters to relate one evening.
There is the gathering
and then the footwashing,
then they actually eat dinner
Judas storms out
Peter gets defensive
and eventually Jesus starts his final sermon.
It is called his farewell discourse.
He knows when he leaves the house he will be arrested. This is his last chance to get through to these fishermen and tax collectors. Everything he has been telling them for three years now has to be summarized; the gospel in Cliff Notes.
Here at the table, Jesus says the same things over and over in different ways.
But the central word is love.
If you love me you will keep my commandments. A new commandment I give you, that you love one another as I have loved you. Whoever does not love me does not keep my words. I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another.
He also tries to reassure his bewildered disciples that while he is leaving them, he is not leaving them alone. He will arrange for them to be cared for, comforted, assisted. He will leave the Holy Spirit with them, an advocate, a helper, a counselor.
Jesus said, "I will not leave you orphaned; I am coming to you. In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me; because I live, you also will live."
And you will know that I am with you because of the love that will be shared. No matter what happens remember to love one another. I am not leaving you orphaned.
When I was in Kenya earlier this month I was visiting orphans.
HIV/AIDS is a crisis in much of Africa. In western Kenya, along Lake Victoria it reached epidemic proportions. Education, medical care and treatment has lowered the number of new cases and reversed the trend, but over 20% of the school age children have lost one or both parents to the disease.
The Umoja Project and the Interfaith Hunger Initiative are projects we support here at Northminster. These projects work to address the needs of orphans and vulnerable children in the Chulaimbo district of western Kenya.
That is where I went to visit and where I met Nicholas.
Nicholas is 16 years old and in the eighth grade. He is a striker on his football team. He's sitting under a large shade tree waiting for us to arrive. His mud covered house is in need of some repair
but it was freshly cleaned and neatly prepared for visitors.
Right outside the door of the house are two stone covered graves. His father died in 2009 and his mother one year later- both of AIDS. During their illness Nicholas' older brother dropped out of school and became involved in drugs. Nicholas was alone to care for his parents and himself. His brother now works on other people's farms so Nicholas lives in the house alone. No one in the family ever went past the 7th grade in school. Nicholas is the first to even consider secondary school.
He comes home from school each day and has to gather wood, go for water, cook, tend the garden and the animals and care for the property. He makes pots from the local clay to sell for money. Then he has to study. He wants to go to college. He wants to be a science teacher.
I asked Nicholas if it was hard to live all by himself.
He said- I miss my parents love. That is hard. But I know God loves me.
"How do you know that?" I pried.
You and the people in Indiana make sure I have food at lunch. You give me corn and beans to eat when school is over. You bought my school uniforms and my shoes. You give me kerosene so I have light at night to study. If I study hard you will pay my fees for secondary school and even help me go to college. Today you came to visit me. That is how I know God loves me.
Jesus said, "I will not leave you orphaned; I am coming to you. In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me; because I live, you also will live."
And you will know that I am with you because of the love that will be shared.
No matter what happens remember to love one another.
I am not leaving you orphaned.
In our first reading this morning Paul told the people of Athens that it is in God that we "live and move and have our being"; he tells them that we are God's offspring.
So we are God's offspring
God's children-
all of us
and God is not leaving us orphaned
any of us
Jesus is proving that to us with the gift of love.
The kind of love that God has for Jesus
The love the Spirit allows us to share with one another
The love that Jesus has for us
If we love Jesus.
Jesus begins by saying "If you love me, keep my commandments." And he concludes. "They who have my commandments and keep them are those who love me; and those who love me will be loved by my Father, and I will love them and reveal myself to them."
I sometimes think it is easier for us to know how God loves us than it is for us to know how we love God. When I was in high school and started going to Young Life with some of my friends
I watched as people had very emotional and dramatic conversions. They accepted Jesus into their hearts with tears and delight. That looked like love to me. But I never had that experience.
I never had that rush of feeling and emotion. I felt for a long time that I was simply faking my love for God.
But the love Jesus speaks of here is not sentiment or emotion.
The love Jesus speaks of here is devotion.
Jesus doesn't want our feelings; Jesus wants our obedience.
The issue here is behavior. To keep his commandments is to love him.
Once I figured that out, the problem of loving him disappeared.
It had to do with how I would live my life, to whom and what would I be devoted.
And as I have grown older I have come to realize if you live that devotion, that obedience,
if you follow those commandments long enough, eventually it brings with it the emotion and a strong feeling of love and tears and delight. I had that experience with Nicholas.
We experience that love whenever we feed a hungry child
comfort a tired caregiver
sit with a worried parent
stand up for the ignored or the abused
Anytime we act like Jesus.
Anytime we bear the love of Christ to another.
We experience that love when we say to another-
you are God's offspring
God's child
you are not alone,
Christ will never leave you orphaned.
God bless you.
Amen.