Scare the Faith Out of You
The Rev. Amy Morgan
August 7, 2011
1 Kings 19:9-18
At that place he came to a cave, and spent the night there.
Then the word of the Lord came to him, saying, ‘What are you doing here, Elijah?’ He answered, ‘I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of hosts; for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away.’
He said, ‘Go out and stand on the mountain before the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.’ Now there was a great wind, so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces before the Lord, but theLord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lordwas not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lordwas not in the fire; and after the fire a sound of sheer silence. When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. Then there came a voice to him that said, ‘What are you doing here, Elijah?’ He answered, ‘I have been very zealous for theLord, the God of hosts; for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away.’ Then the Lord said to him, ‘Go, return on your way to the wilderness of Damascus; when you arrive, you shall anoint Hazael as king over Aram. Also you shall anoint Jehu son of Nimshi as king over Israel; and you shall anoint Elisha son of Shaphat of Abel-meholah as prophet in your place. Whoever escapes from the sword of Hazael, Jehu shall kill; and whoever escapes from the sword of Jehu, Elisha shall kill. Yet I will leave seven thousand in Israel, all the knees that have not bowed to Baal, and every mouth that has not kissed him.’
Romans 10:5-15
Moses writes concerning the righteousness that comes from the law, that ‘the person who does these things will live by them.’ But the righteousness that comes from faith says, ‘Do not say in your heart, “Who will ascend into heaven?” ’ (that is, to bring Christ down) ‘or “Who will descend into the abyss?” ’ (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). But what does it say?
‘The word is near you,
on your lips and in your heart’
(that is, the word of faith that we proclaim); because if you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For one believes with the heart and so is justified, and one confesses with the mouth and so is saved. The scripture says, ‘No one who believes in him will be put to shame.’ For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; the same Lord is Lord of all and is generous to all who call on him. For, ‘Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.’
‘The word is near you,
on your lips and in your heart’
(that is, the word of faith that we proclaim); because if you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For one believes with the heart and so is justified, and one confesses with the mouth and so is saved. The scripture says, ‘No one who believes in him will be put to shame.’ For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; the same Lord is Lord of all and is generous to all who call on him. For, ‘Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.’
But how are they to call on one in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in one of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone to proclaim him? And how are they to proclaim him unless they are sent? As it is written, ‘How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!’
They teased her.
Not because she looked different.
Not because she had a Michigan accent in rural Kentucky.
Not because she came from the most prosperous family in the area in the midst of the Great Depression.
The Southern Baptist children teased June because she wasn’t baptized. They told her she was going to hell. They told her she wasn’t part of God’s family.
June never did get baptized. Her family was what people might call “spiritual but not religious.” They thanked the land for producing good food to eat. They loaned money and never asked for repayment. They sheltered those who wandered the country, looking for work. They worshipped at the lakeshore. But they didn’t go to church much. And they didn’t get baptized.
For June, baptism became associated with bad news. The message she got from those who teased her in her childhood was, “get baptized – or else!” Getting baptized meant you belonged to an exclusive group. Maybe that was good news for those on the inside of the group, but it was bad news for everybody else.
It isn’t all that surprising that the good news of Jesus Christ somewhere along the way became bad news. As human beings, we’re drawn to bad news. From the great tragic plays of ancient Greece to the spectator sport of public hangings, humans have seemingly always been attracted to the terrifying, the shocking, the catastrophic. The Greek philosopher Aristotle felt it is natural to be drawn to that which arouses in us fear and pity so that we can purge ourselves of these undesirable feelings. If Aristotle was right, it may be all well and good that we’ve mangled the gospel into a story of fear. It plays to our natural human needs and desires.
But it still isn’t the gospel.
In fact, our relationship with God was never intended to be based in fear. In the story of Adam and Eve, fear of God enters the relationship because the humans want to be like God and realize they aren’t. The “fear of God” the Old Testament talks about is a reverence for the difference between God and humanity. The kind of fear we experience around tragedy or catastrophe is not the same Hebrew word used for the fear of God. When we fear God, we recognize that we are finite and God is infinite. We recognize that we are flawed and God is perfect. We recognize that we are dependent and God is sovereign.
When Elijah encounters God in the story we heard from 1 Kings, God is not in the wind or the earthquake or the fire. God is not in the devastating or calamitous. God is in the sound of silence. God is the calm after the storm, not the storm itself.
The unfortunate effect of some of the more prominent evangelists of the last few decades has been to portray Christians very much the way Paul portrays his fellow first-century Jews. Paul says that those who believe righteousness comes from the law – meaning that it comes from what we as humans do – live or die by how well they follow the law. They are hung up on who’s going to heaven and who’s going to hell (or the Jewish theological equivalent, anyway). Likewise, if you listen to those who identify themselves as “evangelicals,” you’ll hear about what you should and shouldn’t do to gain or lose God’s favor. You’ll hear about who’s going to heaven and who’s going to hell.
“Evangelical” comes from the Greek word meaning “good news,” but much of what I hear from those who consider themselves to be evangelical doesn’t really sound like good news to me. It sounds like some are in and some are out. It sounds like fear mongering. It sounds like someone is trying to scare the faith into me. And unfortunately, it seems to be scaring the faith out of many people.
Now, I’m not here to beat up on evangelicals. I was raised in the south and got saved at least a couple of times. What I want to do is help us reclaim evangelism. I want to talk about what Paul meant by evangelism. I want us to understand the gospel of Jesus Christ as good news worth sharing. Paul says, “beautiful are the feet of those good news bringers!” Well, who doesn’t want beautiful feet? Particularly in the summer! So, it’s important that we learn how to be “good news bringers.” The word “evangelical” has been so politicized in our country that I’m going to stick with the term “good news bringer,” even if it’s a little clunky.
So what do we have to do be “good news bringers?”
Let’s walk backwards for a minute through this text. Good news bringers are, to begin with, those who have been sent. This means sent by God. It’s a movement of God, not of humans. That “fear of God” – that reverence because God is different from us – is a key characteristic of good news bringers. Good news bringers aren’t meant to “put the fear of God” into others. Instead, they already have the fear of God in them, and that allows them to see how God is active in the world, sending them out to bring good news.
Now, good news bringers are sent, Paul says, in order to proclaim Jesus as Lord. This is an especially tricky one for many of us. What does it mean to proclaim Jesus as Lord? I think Paul gives us a hint when he says, “For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; the same Lord is Lord of all and is generous to all who call on him.“ The same Lord is Lord of all. God lays claim to all of humanity in Jesus Christ. As John talked about last week, biology has nothing to do with it. God claims us, loves us, desires to be in relationship with us, no matter who we are. And yes, that means we must say that God in Christ claims Jews and Muslims and Hindus and Atheists. And when good news bringers proclaim Jesus as Lord to those who don’t acknowledge Jesus as Lord, it is still good news. Because the Christian faith is not defined by its boundaries – who is in and who is out. It is defined by its center – Jesus Christ, who creates an infinite circle of inclusion. Radical inclusion is at the heart of the good news of Jesus Christ. That is the message that good news bringers proclaim.
And they can proclaim that message because they’ve heard it. The translation of this passage we read today says “how are they to believe in one of whom they have never heard?” But, in the Greek text, there is no “of.” It reads “how are they to believe in one whom they have never heard.” Paul is talking about hearing Jesus himself. Now let’s remember that listening and hearing can be two different things. Jesus said numerous times, “those who have ears to hear, listen!” Not just those who have ears. Having ears is not enough. You have to have ears willing and able to hear. And not, of course, in a simply auditory sense. Those who hear the good news of Jesus Christ do so because they listen in a way that is open and vulnerable. They listen with reverence but without fear. Fear makes us listen but keeps us from hearing. So if your ears – meaning your whole self – weren’t ready to hear, Jesus didn’t really want you to listen. Because when we just listen, we misinterpret and misconstrue the message. And that isn’t what Jesus wanted.
Jesus wanted people to hear him so that they could believe in him. And that is what happens with good news bringers. They hear him – hear his message of radical inclusion, of God’s love and justice, of God’s desire to redeem the creation –and they believe in him. Because that is a message worth believing. It’s a message that speaks to our deepest human longing: our longing to belong.
This whole section of Paul’s letter to the Romans has been about belonging, in a certain sense. Who belongs to God? The Jews? The Christians? And what it comes down to is that we can’t believe God is really perfectly loving if God can’t figure out a way to love everyone. It’s much easier to believe in someone if they first believe in you. And God does. The good news bringers believe in Jesus as Lord because Jesus showed us that God believes in us. God believes humanity is worth the trouble of saving.
If we believe that message – if we believe we’re worth saving – we know that we can call on God. We know that God’s desire is to save and not to destroy. We know that God is different and sovereign, but also loved us enough to become one of us. Our dependence on God is ultimately what saves us.
Paul sets up this massive chain reaction. Good news bringers are sent to proclaim Jesus as Lord because they have heard him and because they have heard him, they have believed in him and because they believe in him, they call upon him. This, in a nutshell, is God’s grand scheme for salvation.
God has done God’s part. God has come to us. Just as God came to Elijah in the sound of sheer silence, God comes to us in the quiet of our hearts. There, in our hearts, we’re invited to believe in the good news of Jesus Christ. And we are sent out to proclaim that good news. We are sent to encourage, nurture, guide. We are sent to celebrate, tell stories, praise God. We are sent in the knowledge that God has already laid claim to everyone we encounter. That is what it means to be a good news bringer.
So, what do you think? Can we be evangelists – good news bringers? Or should we leave evangelism to those who claim to be evangelical?
I want us to think this week about how we have experienced God in Jesus Christ as good news. Maybe it’s on a personal level – a time when you called on God in a time of trouble, a time when your dependence on God got you through a hard time. Maybe it’s a sense of knowing there has got to be someone to praise for the beauty and goodness you find in this world. Maybe it involves seeing God at work in the world in concrete ways – the impossible made possible through the hand of God.
I want us to search through our memory banks, or perhaps just keep our eyes and ears open this week, seeking out good news to share.
Because maybe if the voices proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ as good news drowns out those who have turned it into bad news, the Janes of our world will find Jesus in the church. Maybe they can be spiritual and religious. Maybe they will want to be baptized. And maybe they will call on God, knowing that God’s desire is to love them and not to condemn them.
And maybe they will call our feet beautiful.
To God be all glory forever. Amen.
