Text: Matthew 5:21-37

When I was in college, I made a discovery about the Bible that I thought was going to be revolutionary.  I thought this thing that I had stumbled upon was going to change the way people read their Bibles and thought about Jesus and generally just blow people’s minds.  I was ready to accept my honorary PhD in Biblical Studies for my contribution to the field and sit among teachers like the young Jesus fielding questions. 

Ok, so maybe that’s a bit of hyperbole, but I did come across something that, at the time, made me think differently about the way I read the Bible. 

Before I can fill you in on this life-changing discovery, we need to back up a little bit. 

Last week we started this new series that will run through February up to the beginning of Lent: We are Sermon on the Mount People.  The Sermon on the Mount, three solid chapters of Matthew’s gospel containing the longest continuous teaching by Jesus in the New Testament.  As Joel said last week, these three chapters make up a sort of Christianity- or Discipleship-101 course that covers a lot of ground for those who want to understand what this whole “following Jesus” thing is all about. 

And we are Sermon on the Mount people.  Or at least we aspire to be. 

And still, before we can get to my amazing discovery, we need to back up to just a few verses before the passage that was read this morning.  Even though Joel covered them last week, those few preceding verses form an important bridge into the section for today. 

Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill.  For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth…

Text: Matthew 5:13-20

Tuesday evening this space was full to overflowing for a teach-in led by the Central Ohio Worker Center.  The event was called Sanctuary for Immigrants 101: Theory, Data, and Action.  It was kind of a rally, but moreso a class.  It was designed to teach the basics of how the immigration system functions in the United States, how it’s changed especially over the last 15 years, the relationship between federal departments and local law enforcement, and how cities like Columbus fit into the mix these days.  Mark blogged about this Wednesday and included a link to the power point that Austin Kocher presented.

I think the genius of the event was that it was both a timely response to a very specific situation, and a deeper look at a decades old system.  It was a 101 class.  It was an introduction, a foundation, a teaching of basic concepts.  Personally, I left feeling more grounded, with a better sense of history, and community.

By way of holy coincidence, during the month of February, 2017, the lectionary is gifting us with another kind of 101 class.  The texts throughout the month come from the gospel of Matthew, chapters 5-7, otherwise known as the Sermon on the Mount.  This solid block of teaching from Jesus was one of the most valued guides for the early church.  It was one of the most often cited passages among our spiritual ancestors, the 16th century Anabaptists and Mennonites.  In other words, if there’s such a thing as Christianity 101, or Discipleship 101, or If- you- want- to- follow- Jesus- you- should- really- pay- attention- to- this 101, it is the Sermon on the Mount.

And so, the four weeks of February, the remaining Sundays before the season of Lent, we will be focusing on parts…

Text: Esther

When do you stop being a child and start being something else?

It’s a question cultures around the world have found important to answer.  Throughout time, human groups have created practices and rituals to mark that otherwise fuzzy boundary between childhood and adulthood.  And it’s done for the benefit of the young person and the community.  We need to know together that the child has become something else.  Childhood was a time of dependence, of protection and growth under the careful and loving watch of family.  Adulthood is a time of independence, increased responsibility and leadership, a time when one will ultimately grow into being a protector, a caring presence for the following generations.

Our culture has developed a third category of development between childhood and adulthood.  Adolescence.  It’s a period of tremendous growth and formation when you are no longer a child, yet not quite an adult.  So the question for us remains: when do you stop being a child, and start being something else?

Our congregation has created its own Coming of Age ritual to mark this transition out of childhood.   We’re in the middle of it right now.  This year we honor the Coming of Age of Elise, Gideon, Stella, and Dakota.  We’ve been preparing for this.  You helped create parts of the service.  A number of us have written blessings and naming of gifts for you.  Those have been compiled in notebooks that you’ll soon receive.  You’ve been matched with a mentor who will walk with you in the upcoming years.

Our hope is that you can experience today as a marker in your life.  A boundary marker.  On one side of the boundary is childhood.  Today we celebrate your cross over into adolescence.

As people of faith who value the role of community, we recommit ourselves to…

Text: James 1:19-27

You must understand this, my beloved: let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger; for your anger does not produce God’s righteousness. Therefore rid yourselves of all sordidness and rank growth of wickedness, and welcome with meekness the implanted word that has the power to save your souls.

But be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves.  For if any are hearers of the word and not doers, they are like those who look at themselves in a mirror; for they look at themselves and, on going away, immediately forget what they were like.  But those who look into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and persevere, being not hearers who forget but doers who act—they will be blessed in their doing.

If any think they are religious, and do not bridle their tongues but deceive their hearts, their religion is worthless.  Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to care for orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.

(Text of sermon unavailable.)

…

https://joelssermons.files.wordpress.com/2017/01/20170115sermon.mp3           

Text: John 15:1-12

At a young age we’re taught about the five senses: sight, smell, taste, touch, and hearing.  We’ve come to speak of a sixth sense as intuitive perceptions, intuition.  There was also a pretty good movie called “The Sixth Sense” way back in 1999.  It had a surprise twist at the ending that my dull sixth sense wasn’t expecting the first time I saw it.  Although I was expecting it the second time.

Joshua Cooper Ramo is now proposing a seventh sense, essential for survival in our time.  Last year he wrote a book called The Seventh Sense.  The catchy subtitle is “Power, Fortune, and Survival in the Age of Networks.”  In an increasingly networked and interconnected world, Ramo suggests that a seventh sense is “the ability to look at any object and see the way it is changed by connection.” (Quoted HERE)  That’s the seventh sense.  Sensing, perceiving the web of relationships embedded in everything and everyone we come into contact with.  Ramo is especially interested in how this applies on the global scale to politics, terrorist cells, networks of trade and finance, and, of course, how technology and social networking change the dynamics of power and the ability to spread ideas and organize.

I’ve only read a couple reviews and summaries of the book and not the book itself, so can’t say a whole lot more about it.  But I imagine that if each of us were to exercise our seventh sense when it comes to something as simple as the clothes we’re wearing this morning, we would be mindful of where the cotton in our shirts might have been grown, the engineers and firms that designed the machines that separated the useable parts of the plant, where in the world and…