Candidating sermon preached by the Reverend Lillie Mae Henley 26 Mar 2006
John 3:16 -- For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever should believe on him should not perish, but have ever-lasting life.
You don’t grow up in a fundamental Christian church and not learn these words by heart. They are the very foundation for the modern Christian church. They bring comfort, peace, and a sense of rightness about the world for many Christians. While John 3:16 is a formula for salvation for some, other Christians, like us Universalists, see the words as an invitation to enter into a relationship with God.
We are not literal Christians; we are somewhat like Jews, who look at their religious writings at many different levels: as symbol, metaphor, myth, allegory, or history to name a few. The first century Jewish philosopher Philo found as many as 11 different ways of interpreting the Hebrew writings of his day.
We hear John 3:16 and say to our self, what does this mean to me?
For many of us, we see it, as an invitation to relationship. It is an invitation to evaluate our lives and our relationship with God.
The author of the book of John reminds us that the Hebrew people were suffering, were dying from an infestation of serpents, and God said to Moses, make a brass serpent, put it up on a pole, and when the people are bit, all the have to do is “look up and live.”
Look up and live.
Something was wrong in their lives, they had turned away from God. They forgot their priorities. God sent the serpents, to challenge them, so they could remember what was important in life.
All they had to do was “look up and live.”
To look up to God, to trust God, is to be saved.
We know that the story of the Hebrew people is a story of their relationship with God. And in that story God longs for relationship, opening up to Israel, being there for them when they are in need. To save them, to provide for them, to help them live whole and holy lives.
There was, however, a condition to their relationship with God. The condition was they had to live within and obey Yahweh’s law.
Then, Jesus, the radical rabbi from Nazareth came along,
He stepped outside the law;
He stepped outside tradition,
and said, all you need is faith.
Faith in God’s unconditional love for us.
Faith in—God’s unconditional love.
For humankind that is difficult. Why, because unconditional love is difficult for us. We turn to the reading again, and we see, right after Jesus talked about God’s love and salvation, he began to talk about the light and the dark of the human condition.
That is our struggle, between the dark and the light of us.
It is what is in the dark within us that keeps us from experiencing fully and joyfully in our relationships, not just our relationship with God, but also our relationships with others.
During seminary, all ministerial candidates of all major denominations have to take a series of “psychological fitness” tests. The center sends you about seven tests that take many hours to complete. You send them back, and they schedule you for your week-long assessment. For years, before I entered seminary and presented myself to the center for testing, I had done a lot of personal growth work. Well, perhaps did, but with all the tests, group counseling, one-on-one assessments, I learned that I had a lot of, what I call, “challenges within!”
My wounds were hidden in the dark of me and I couldn’t be the minister I felt called to be until; I couldn’t even be the person I wanted to be, until I faced these challenges!
Each one of us has wounds buried within, because we live in families and a society that is as dysfunctional as it is functional.
The wounds are our reaction to criticism, abuse, judgment, mental illness, any thing affects our personality and spirit in a harmful or negative way, we bury in the dark within.
How did I begin my healing that sustains me in my relationship with God and others now?
I found a wonderful counselor and spiritual director who taught me that the dark within is fertilizer from which we grow.
The dark within is the fertilizer from which we grow.
I wish I would have said that.
What we do somehow, whether it is through prayer and meditation, whether it is through journaling, therapists, counselors, or spiritual directors, is to examine those wounds that we have buried in our dark fertilizer, bring them to the light, and seek reconciliation and forgiveness.
Asking God to be with us throughout this journey of growth. Being honest with our God, seeking wholeness, believing that it is possible to have relationships of unconditional love with God and others. It isn’t easy, all of us here who have done that kind of work know the difficulties. It isn’t easy, but it is worth it.
What did Sarton say in her poem, Help us to be always hopeful gardeners of the spirit who know that without darkness nothing comes to birth as without light nothing flowers.
John 3:16 speaks to each one of us as distinct and different as we are distinct and different from each other. Underlying the words is the message: God yearns for a relationship with us, one that is full of unconditional love and joy. Not only that, but it is full of serenity and support. All we have to do is receive it, accept it, and participate in it.
Receive it, accept it, and participate in it.
Readings
Numbers 21:4-9
From Mount Hor they set out by the way to the Red Sea, to go around the land of Edom; but the people became impatient on the way. The people spoke against God and against Moses, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we detest this miserable food.” Then the LORD sent poisonous serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many Israelites died.
The people came to Moses and said, “We have sinned by speaking against the LORD and against you; pray to the LORD to take away the serpents from us.” So Moses prayed for the people. And the LORD said to Moses, “Make a poisonous serpent, and set it on a pole; and everyone who is bitten shall look at it and live.” So Moses made a serpent of bronze, and put it upon a pole; and whenever a serpent bit someone, that person would look at the serpent of bronze and live.
John 3:14-21
And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.
“Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Those who believe in him are not condemned; but those who do not believe are condemned already, because they have not believed in the name of the only Son of God. And this is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed. But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God.”
From May Sarton
Help us to be the always hopeful
Gardners of the spirit
Who know that without darkness
Nothing comes to birth
As without light
Nothing flowers