the ones that i loved
the city of hope
It’s good to be back! And especially to this weather!
As nice as the vacation was; by the final few days, I was telling all these stories about YOU! Yeah, you….
At some point I realized it, and worse than that, what it meant!
“Darn it!” I thought to myself, “I miss them! They’ve wormed their way into my heart!”
I couldn’t help but wonder how I’ll ever keep y’all under control, now that I’m fond of you!!!
…But, I hope the treachery is mutual.
In fact, I remember when I first came, and how Cooper — good Lutheran than he is— was suspicious… “Who’s that,” he asked. And when he was told I was the new pastor, he replied, “He’s not my pastor.”
After a few months though, his tune had changed to greeting me with a “Pahstohr Rye-un!” as I rushed into the sanctuary on Sunday morning.
Because the deal it, this is what God LOVES to do; take strangers and turn them into kindred spirits. And, the more unlikely a pairing, the better in God’s eyes. Because God uses odd couples like us, to bear witness to this new thing God has done in Jesus Christ.
After all, isn’t that what God’s up to in today’s scripture?
Taking the jailer, who’s been charged with keeping Paul and Silas under his thumb; and flipping him to be the one who walks these two OUT of the jail!
Using three unlikely allies and using them to start the first ever Christian prison ministry.
All the differences between Paul, Silas (themselves an unlikely couple) and the jailer, turn out to be small potatoes in the face of God’s resolve to use them to do a new thing!
And it all begins under pretty auspicious conditions…
For the jailer, it was undoubtedly a pretty ordinary assignment. Keep the trouble-makers under control. And trust me, he had no doubt they were trouble-makers when, well after the sun had set, those two kept making a ruckus with their prayers and hymns.
Even though he knew better, even though the prisoners hadn’t gone to sleep yet, the jailer let his eyelids falls closed for longer and longer. Until finally he stopped trying to stay awake…
You get the sense that no sooner has the jailer fallen sleep on the job, that the earth began to rattle. Rattle so violently that all the doors in the prison swing open! And all the chains around the captives wrists and ankles burst apart!
Who knows how long it felt for the jailer, whether it felt like like hours or seconds that he had been asleep, but it doesn’t take long for him to put the pieces together. He’s failed to do the one thing he was tasked with; keep the prisoners under control…
Drawing his sword to literally fall on it;, he hears from, of all places, the prison! “Do not harm yourself,” Paul shouts. “We’re all here. It’s okay.”
What looked to the jailer like the end of his life, was actually the beginning of the new one God was giving him!
And he sees it in these folks who could have run away, but didn’t.
The jailer who had bound up his life so tightly with his career, realizes these two prisoners are the freest of all. And he wants what they have. “What must I do to be saved (from this),” the jailer can’t help but blurt out.
As the scene closes, the once sworn enemies are washing each other, doing what Jesus commanded on Maundy Thursday. They’re eating together, doing what Jesus commands each week. And to cap it all off, the jailer even joins in making a ruckus, rejoicing. Singing the hymns of freedom in Jesus’ name!
This is what God LOVES to do! Take strangers and make kindred spirits!
And to make this happen God will take what was once the tools of death, and flip them. Use the end of a career. A disaster. Unlikely pairings to do this new thing.
Today’s scripture, it has a lot of resonances with Easter, doesn’t it? It happens in the dark. While the guards sleep. And an earthquake signals it.
You spend a little time reading the Bible, and you start to realize every story of God’s people before Easter foreshadows it. And every one after, repeats it!
These unlikely allies in today’s scripture, turn out to be the very tools God loves best to make Easter happen all over again. And, again…
I mean, I’m not the only one to notice there aren’t just uncanny parallels between today’s scripture and Easter, but today’s scripture and what God has been up to with US, right?
Here, let me bear a little witness, on a week like this, I can sure relate to the jailer. Yeah, the jailer.
Because while I was away on vacation; sleeping on the job, as it were; God was getting to work with a group of unsupervised sinners. And at a council meeting of all places!
I got back, put the office in order. Started planning how I’d catch up; and as I was going through odds and ends, I read the announcement about our little experiment this summer.
And I couldn’t help but blurt out, “exactly who’s in charge here?!?”
Now, don’t worry, I didn’t for a second think of falling on my sword. I’ve already done that one too many times. ;-) What I did think of doing though, was working a barb into the sermon to remind everyone that not a one of us is in control of this. ;-)
The church is God’s great project to rehash the resurrection over and over again. To take a group of folks who are dead in their trespasses, and delight in forgiving them! Giving them new life in Jesus’ name!
Or, to take separate households, unlikely pairings, and give them the gift of unity in Jesus’ name, make them one by virtue of what God is doing.
All to bear witness to the God who can make new life happen when and where God pleases. And with nothing more than chains, a disaster, a failure on the job.
Or, a council with a pastor who’s away in sunny California, while anyone with any sense knows he should have been at the darn council meeting!
It doesn’t take a lot, God is resourceful that way.
Because this is what God LOVES to do! And now that God has done it to Death, there’s no stopping God!
After all, we’re all lutherans here, for heaven’s sake! Paul, Silas and jailer we’re sworn enemies; so this is a cake-walk for God. God’s just showing off!
Taking lutherans of all people, and causing a little CHANGE! Yes, I said it, change! And not even when circumstances force them to!
*Talk about an earthquake!
Paul and Silas, although they were chained, knew the Gospel can’t be. And so they sang in prison of all places. They couldn’t have known exactly how God was going to orchestrate another Easter; but by then it had happened to the two of them often enough, that they had come to expect it.
So they did.
They counted on what the jailer would learn before the night was over, what we’re all learning right here; nothing can stop God from doing what God loves to!
So folks, while the changes in the world rock us, while we sleep on the job, while we fall on swords; God is rehashing Easter all around us.
And like every person who finds themselves in the presence of the resurrected one, we have no choice in the matter—God has determined we will bear witness to the victory Jesus has won!
And what we get to do is, get caught up in it! Notice all the ways God is making it happen all around us! And while it may be a wild-ride, like the Guardians of the Galaxy ride I drug Amanda on, what fun it is!
Because we get to do this with a couple promises: That we have each other. And better yet, that we have God.
God who is bigger, stronger and more resourceful than any other force you’ve encountered. And I’m including Death in that list.
In today’s scripture, by the end, when everyone finds out how powerless they are in the face of the resurrection God is making happen out of the nothing of unlikely allies, earthquakes and chains, they all just drop their guard and rejoice together! Because it turns out, that’s all there is to do.
And, truthfully, it’s the most fun way to go about it.
So while God is making another unlikely Easter among the likes of us, let’s just get on board. Rejoice that God has found us worthy of another Easter.
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