What Parade Are You Going To Be A Part Of?
“As [Jesus] was now approaching the path down from the Mount of Olives, the whole multitude of the disciples began to praise God joyfully with a loud voice for all the deeds of power that they had seen, 38 saying,“Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!”
Rev. Vivian L. Rodeffer
Palm Sunday, April 2, 2023
Luke 19: 28-40
28 After [Jesus] had said this, he went on ahead, going up to Jerusalem. 29 When he had come near Bethphage and Bethany, at the place called the Mount of Olives, he sent two of the disciples, 30 saying, “Go into the village ahead of you, and as you enter it you will find tied there a colt that has never been ridden. Untie it and bring it here. 31 If anyone asks you, ‘Why are you untying it?’ just say this, ‘The Lord needs it.’” 32 So those who were sent departed and found it as he had told them. 33 As they were untying the colt, its owners asked them, “Why are you untying the colt?” 34 They said, “The Lord needs it.” 35 Then they brought it to Jesus; and after throwing their cloaks on the colt, they set Jesus on it. 36 As he rode along, people kept spreading their cloaks on the road. 37 As he was now approaching the path down from the Mount of Olives, the whole multitude of the disciples began to praise God joyfully with a loud voice for all the deeds of power that they had seen, 38 saying,“Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven, and glory in the highest heaven!” 39 Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, order your disciples to stop.” 40 He answered, “I tell you, if these were silent, the stones would shout out.”
Let’s think about parades for a few moments. Aren’t parades fun? Do you have a favorite parade? For some it’s the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. For others the Rose Bowl Parade. In Phildelphia on New Year’s Day it is the Mummers Parade. Some of you or your children or grandchildren may have marched in a parade with their school band. When I was in grade school all the Safety Patrol students went to Washington DC and marched with other children from across the nation. There are endless types of parades. Military parades, Memorial Day and 4th of July parades, Parades celebrating all nationalities. All around the world a parade is an opportunity to join in a celebration.
This morning we’ll start with some background information about this familiar Palm Sunday scripture because it too is about parades. In their book, The Last Week [In Jesus Life], scholars Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan help us discover that there were two parades occurring in Jerusalem on that very first Palm Sunday. We are all familiar with the first parade. The first was the “parade” where Jesus came riding into Jerusalem on a donkey.
The second parade is less familiar to us. It was the parade when governor Pontius Pilate entered the city with a full military procession. This was standard operation for Roman governors of Judea like Pontius Pilate. To come into Jerusalem for high Jewish holidays in case any trouble broke out and needed to be stopped.
These two parades had some things in common – they both had certain beliefs surrounding them. Did you know that the Roman emperor was thought to be the “Son of God,” “Lord,” and “Savior” within Roman imperial religion? These divine claims were reinforced by a show of power such as weaponry, soldiers, and displays of wealth.
Jesus’s followers and sympathizers had religious beliefs about who he was too. Teacher, prophet, and Messiah. And also Son of God, Lord and Savior. Borg and Crossan in their book suggest that Jesus deliberately planned a very different kind of procession as shown by him arranging for his disciples to go ahead of him to bring him a donkey on which to ride into Jerusalem. It is essentially a parody of the Roman imperial parade that Jesus uses to make a point.
The Roman parade put their full power on display with the strength and might of military force. Jesus rode in on a humble colt who had never been ridden before. As Christians, we are called to model Jesus’ humble way in the face of how the world still operates according to strength and might.
Jesus’s choice of parade has special meaning in today’s scripture as well. The reference is to the kind of king Prophet Zechariah predicted would save Jerusalem. [Zech. 9:9-10]. In that passage, the prophet says, the king “will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the war horse from Jerusalem; and the battle bow shall be cut off, and he shall command peace to the nations…”. Jesus does not achieve peace through war, like the Romans did, but rather, through humility, non-violence, giving of oneself, and trusting in God’s direction. The world gives us a certain idea of what it means to be strong and powerful. However, those same traits can so easily be - and often are - used to do evil. Jesus turns them upside down and shows how real strength and power lie in loving and serving each other.
Christianity understands Jesus to be special because he is the only person to be both fully divine and fully human. He is truly God’s Son though in a different sense than the rest of us are God’s sons and daughters. While those who ascribed to Roman imperial religion at the time also believed Roman emperors were divine, Jesus’ way teaches us about the true God.
Finally, let’s look ahead to what Holy Week will bring. The Roman empire uses force to brutally end Jesus’ life. But in the end, God is victorious but not through a show of force, but by raising Jesus from the dead, bringing life from death. When we follow Jesus, we are saying we trust the God who has power over life and death. This frees us to live life differently than how the world would have us live–fighting, harming, and competing for power.
This Palm Sunday we have a choice to make. Which parade do we want to be a part of? Will we live like Pontius Pilate and his followers (e.g., upholding oppressive systems, using violence to make a point, needing to prove themselves to be better than others). Or, will we choose to live like Jesus and his followers (e.g., on the side of those who have the least, committed to making peace, serving, and loving others, humility).
As the Lenten season comes to an end, and Easter and new life is on the horizon, let’s chose the steps we can take to become less Pilate-like and more Christ-like.
Let us pray.
Good and Gracious God, Help us to chose to be a part of the great parade of people of faith down through the ages that follows the way of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
[1] For the full chapter, see Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan, The Last Week: What the Gospels Really Teach About Jesus’s Final Days in Jerusalem, New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2006, pp. 1-30.
“QUESTIONS” SERMON SERIES: WHO IS GOD?
Rev. Vivian L. Rodeffer
Sunday, February 26, 2023
SCRIPTURE 1 John 4: 7-1
7 Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. 8 Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love. 9 God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him. 10 In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11 Beloved, since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us, and his love is perfected in us.
13 By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. 14 And we have seen and do testify that the Father has sent his Son as the Savior of the world. 15 God abides in those who confess that Jesus is the Son of God, and they abide in God. 16 So we have known and believe the love that God has for us.
God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them. 17 Love has been perfected among us in this: that we may have boldness on the day of judgment, because as he is, so are we in this world. 18 There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear; for fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not reached perfection in love. 19 We love because he first loved us.
I remember the Sunday when a new family came to church for the very first time. A little girl, kind of the female version of Young Sheldon on TV, came striding up the center aisle looking all around her like she is searching for something. Maybe her mom or dad told her they were going to God’s house because finally, she looks at me and says “Where’s God? Isn’t God supposed to be here?” I could sense her disappointment.
During this season of Lent we will be exploring questions about faith. This first Sunday of Lent we begin with “Who is God?” People from time to time can’t help but wonder where is God? Or, who God is or if God even exists? And if you have ever wondered about this too, it is perfectly normal. It is normal and natural to have periods of questioning or doubt about who God is or if God even exists. Where is God?
You may have experienced something really bad, and you may very well ask,
- if there is a God, where was God when I needed Him?
- You may have lost a loved one before you were ready to say goodbye. Where were you God when I prayed for you to heal my loved one?
- You may know someone good who had something really bad happen to them.
- There may be something that you have really hoped and prayed for that just isn’t happening. Where is God? “I don’t seem to have seen much of God lately” you may be thinking.
Over the millenia that humans have existed on this planet people have attempted to answer these question “who and where and what is God” in many ways across cultures, places, and disciplines. Even a brief overview of world religions lifts up innumerable ways that the divine is understood and portrayed. And, if there was one clear answer, we would probably all believe the same thing! And we would no longer need the kind of faith that belief requires.
Today’s passage offers a very helpful way to think about God’s existence and nature. The passage starts with the obvious: “No one has ever seen God.” [v. 12a] But then it continues that even though we have not seen God we can know God. When we choose to love, that choice means we are “born of God and know God.” [v. 7] The passage continues by explaining “Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love. God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him.”
The life of Jesus is the way that God’s love is made known to us. How we see God is through the life of Jesus. Of course, it is possible to love without believing in Jesus or never hearing the message that Jesus is God’s son. But with Jesus, something completely new and transformative happened – the creation of a new way of being human and a new community characterized by love – something much deeper than just a feel good emotion.
Just like we cannot prove God’s existence, we cannot prove Jesus is God’s son. However, biblical scholar Luke Johnson writes that after Jesus’ death on the cross, something happened. It is historical fact that a new community of people started who lived differently [Acts 4:32-36], a community born of love and characterized by love. And the community itself (the early church) described the something that happened as the resurrection of Jesus, God’s Son, from the dead. This new community and new way of being human points to the reality and character of a loving God as revealed in Jesus.
That community (now called the church) and that new way of being human continues to this day. The church’s continued existence and our participation in it, most especially our loving and being loved, are evidence of God’s existence. God, who was revealed in Jesus, is now present with us by the Spirit (v. 13) to continue this transformation in and by love.
This does not mean the church always gets it right. There are lots of people who follow Jesus but do not like the church because they have been hurt by people in it or have experienced the hypocrisy of people who claim to be Christian. They have a sense that if there is a God, God probably looks more like the love Jesus stood for than what they see happening in churches at times.
Our take away this morning is that as people who claim to be followers of Jesus, we have a responsibility to be the evidence of God’s existence for others by loving them. We are to be “as [Jesus] is … in this world,” shaped and perfected by the love that we have receive from God.
This week I’d like us to think how we might share and show that love to others. There is so much in the world that can make us feel jaded, depressed, cynical, angry, etc. – what does it look like to instead to “abide in love,” to choose love as our dwelling place and home? Will you give it a try in these days ahead?
Let us pray:
Gracious God, Help us in this Lenten Season to allow your love to abide within our hearts so that we might be your presence for those to whom love is a stranger. Amen.
[1] Johnson, Luke Timothy. The Writings of the New Testament. Third Edition. Minneapolis: Fortress Press (2010), pp. 89-93.
What’s Next?
Rev. Vivian L. Rodeffer
I Corinthians 3: 1-9
“So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything,
but only God who gives the growth” 1 Cor. 3:7
And so, brothers and sisters, I could not speak to you as spiritual people but rather as fleshly, as infants in Christ. 2 I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for solid food. Even now you are still not ready, 3 for you are still fleshly. For as long as there is jealousy and quarreling among you, are you not fleshly and behaving according to human inclinations? 4 For when one says, “I belong to Paul,” and another, “I belong to Apollos,” are you not all too human?
5 What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you came to believe, as the Lord assigned to each. 6 I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. 7 So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth. 8 The one who plants and the one who waters have one purpose, and each will receive wages according to their own labor. 9 For we are God’s coworkers, working together; you are God’s field, God’s building.
Well, we got the news today, what we have been wondering about and praying for and thinking about since my retirement was announced a few weeks ago. This morning the Staff Parish Committee shared with you the appointment of Rev. Kil Jae Park. As the weeks go by you will be learning more about your new pastor and he will be learning about you.
He and I had a wonderful chat the day after the appointment and look forward to speaking in person. His sister Rev. Grace Pak and I have worked on many worship projects together in past years. The church’s newly formed Welcoming Committee will be working on providing a warm and inviting beginning to his ministry among you. Just as Robb and I were warmly welcomed.
It just so happens that the lectionary passage assigned to this morning informs what we are experiencing now with this new appointment. And, what I and you have gone through on numerous occasions as United Methodists. If you are unfamiliar with the Methodist system of deploying clergy, it goes like this.
Methodist clergy are unlike, for example, Presbyterian ministers who are interviewed, hired and ordained at the specific church where they will serve. Methodist elders are ordained with the understanding that they are willing to serve anywhere in the entire annual conference–the group of 700 some churches throughout New Jersey and a few in Pennsylvania and New York.
The Bishop and the District Superintendents appoint clergy as needed to the various churches. Most of us have served various charges throughout the state and sometimes we serve Extension Ministries elsewhere as army chaplains, district superintendents, counselors, teachers and professors at Christian schools and seminaries, etc.
But every one of us pastors is always available to serve our annual conference at the Bishop and Cabinet’s beckoning. You can leave an appointment three ways currently, you can be moved, you can die, you can retire. I chose retirement because I am right at the mandatory age for Methodist Clergy to retire.
Here are some ways this morning’s passage ties in to what often happens in congregations when change takes place. It mainly has to do with the ways that people mistakenly understand the relationship between pastors and churches. I remember arriving at one new church appointment only to discover that some some have left because “we’ve already had one of those” meaning we’ve had a woman pastor, we don’t need another. I always wondered if they would leave a church that had a second man appointed because they “already have had one”? Don’t think so.
Somehow those persons overlooked that the church is a body of people. No one person or one pastor represents any particular body of Christ. And, God is active and alive in the process of the deployment of clergy. I know this for a fact having taken at least 60 pastors in to their new churches. Paul clearly states in this passage that he and a fellow apostle may have worked with the church “planting and watering” but it is God who causes the growth. It is God whose Holy Spirit enlivens the congregation for ministry.
Another thing that happens during appointment season is that people connect their membership in a church with the pastor instead of with the church. Every single one of us pastors who has served Caldwell United Methodist Church since 1893 was part of this body of believers. It is not uncommon that people will follow a pastor to a new church or refuse to accept a new pastor. It is nothing new. St. Paul experienced this in the earliest years of the Christian Church and in the passage you heard read earlier shared this:
“For as long as there is jealousy and quarreling among you, are you not fleshly and behaving according to human inclinations? 4 For when one says, “I belong to Paul,” and another, “I belong to Apollos,” are you not all too human? 5 What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you came to believe, as the Lord assigned to each. 6 I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth.” 1 Cor. 3: 3-6
- Pastor Gyun planted and watered but God supplied the growth.
- Pastor Klein planted and watered but God supplied the growth.
- Pastor Markay planted and watered but God supplied the growth.
- Pastor Rodeffer planted and watered but God supplied the growth.
And why is that? It is because just like Paul and Apollos, pastors are merely implements in God’s hands. Preparing the soil of minds and hearts to receive God’s blessings and to thrive.
Pastors teach and preach, we share the sacraments of communion and baptism, we bury the dead and pray for the sick, we administrate and do more things than you can imagine. But we don’t cause your hearts to grow in the fruit of the spirit, God does that because as St. Paul puts it well, but you, you are the field! You are the field. The place where hearts and minds are cultivated by spiritual leaders and become God’s fields at harvest producing the fruits of the Holy Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.” (Galatians 5: 22-23)
The central question this message lifts is “what’s next?” What’s next is up to you and your faithfulness to your church and your trust in God to cause to grow all that has been planted and watered within you. As I wrote in my retirement paragraph for the Greater New Jersey Conference website:” for the successes in my ministry I thank God, for the failures I take credit.” I know Who nurtures what we pastors plant and water.
Be kind to the new pastor. God has asked him to plant and water your fields. Be receptive and open to cultivation and receiving the many blessings he has to offer of experience and wisdom. Welcome Rev. Park warmly.
Let us pray.
Gracious God, Thank you for answering our prayers and sending us someone to plant and water the fields of our hearts. Keep him steady during this season of transition and eager to begin his work here at Caldwell United Methodist Church. Amen.
PASS THE SALT, TURN UP THE LIGHT
Rev. Vivian L. Rodeffer
Sunday, February 5, 2023
Matthew 5: 13-16
Salt and Light
13 “You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything but is thrown out and trampled under foot.
14 “You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. 15 People do not light a lamp and put it under the bushel basket; rather, they put it on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. 16 In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.
Jesus in his teaching makes it clear that we Christians, followers of Christ, are to make a difference in the world wherever we find ourselves. At home, at work, in school, retired, in the hospital, on the driving range. Wherever we find ourselves Jesus commands us to be salt and light. When we sit here or I stand here on Sunday mornings, this sounds pretty easy and not too difficult, doesn’t it? But it is a challenge to pass the salt and turm up the light for our world.
For our day and age maybe one of the most important challenges we have is to acknowlege the things that go against love and to promote the things that do. To address racism, the injustice of poverty, inequalities of housing and health care. And to do so in ways that do not judge, do not place blame, do not seek to free us from responsibility. Jesus clearly teaches that we followers of him are the salt, are the light, the cause agents of change in a hurting world.
Often we adopt the “ain’t it awful” attitude. We hear the stories on the evening news and then proclaim, “ain’t it awful.” Shaking our heads and that’s it. Not following up on why things are the “awful” way they are. A few years ago when I was a district superintendent for the churches on the New Jersey side of the Delaware River across from Philadelphia, I received a phone call one afternoon from one of my most distinguished African American pastors. A pastor who still serves on the Judicial Council of the United Methodist Church.
On the phone call, this pastor, so elegant in the pulpit, could barely speak, could barely share what just happened to him. Here’s what happened. He had left his office at the church to walk across the street to a small mom and pop store to get a snack. Before he even got to go inside, two police officers got out of their cruiser, stopped him, put him against the wall of the store, and frisked him. All this happened in front of some of his flock who happened to be at the store as well, and then the officers took him to the station where he was eventually released after this ordeal.
When he asked WHY? The answer was that the area was under surveillance and they had just picked up a drug related call coming from the direction of the church. Then he appeared, a black man. So, obviously he must be the drug runner.
A week later he and I and some people from his church made an appointment to talk with the local police chief. We crowded into his office and expressed our dismay over what had happened and the humiliation that it caused and asked the chief to assure us this would be addressed. He agreed to our demands.
All of us here today and at home know that policing issues are still a problem to this very day and we must never stop speaking out and trying to promote change. To be salt and light, agents of change in a hurting world.
It doesn’t take much salt at all to change the flavor of a bad situation or institution; it doesn’t take much light at all to illuminate darkness. I was babysitting my grandson a few weeks ago and when we pulled up to their apartment building we could barely even make out the parking lot because they were having a power outage. Then it was difficult to go up the stairs to the third floor in total darkness. We felt our way up the steps. When we finally entered the apartment, one tiny votive candle in the kitchen lit the entire room. One candle flame can bring light to a lot of darkness.
One visit to a person no longer able to get out, one tutoring session for a chid heaving trouble with math, one flat tire changed for someone stranded along the road, one bag of groceries lifted and placed in someone’s trunk, one five dollar bill handed quietly to a person unable to pay for their food, one prayer lifted for a person struggling, you get the idea. As light for the world, we must be visible to those persons and situations in need. All around us, every day are a myriad of opportunities to be the candle that illumines another’s life. The light that brings hope and clarity to another stumbling in darkness.
The take away today is a the same time both simple and complex. Bear witness to the love of God today to someone who needs to experience the flavor of God’s Holy Spirit, bear witness to the love of God in our word who walks in darkness and needs your light for their path.
Let us pray.
Gracious God, Let us never hide our spiritual light or neglect to share it with those in need. And help us to use our saltiness to flavor the situations in our lives that require the ingredient of your own Holy Spirit. Amen.