Rose Colored Glasses

Dan Shelly

Elma United Methodist Church

January 29, 2006

(Mark 1:21-28, Corinthians 8)

Have you ever encountered something that was so incredible that it was really hard to describe or explain? Like the case of a person who’s been in a coma for years and then one day just miraculously wakes up, or someone who was in a house that was completely destroyed by a tornado, yet they walked away without a scratch on them, or the Seattle Seahawks after thirty years of trying, actually going to the Superbowl! Something so incredible that sometimes when you tell someone else about it, they still don’t believe you. Well that’s what our story in the gospel of Mark is like today.

Jesus has gathered some disciples and travels to Capernaum. On the Sabbath, he showed up in the synagogue and he started teaching not just as someone who had studied the Scriptures, but as someone who was uncovering for people what they meant, as if he had first hand knowledge of God’s concerns for people and their lives. And this set everyone abuzz because they’d never heard the Scriptures come alive like this before. It’s as if this Jesus had some kind of special authority or some deep knowledge of what they were meant to contain. But then, while they were all listening, someone who the Bible describes as having an unclean spirit, someone who has probably lived within the community in Capernaum all his life getting agitated and causing trouble came up to Jesus.

As he begins yelling at him, you can imagine that every eye is now on Jesus waiting to see what this teacher from Nazareth is going to do? They’ve seen this happen before and it usually ended in either a huge fight, or in the stranger running away. For many this was probably one of their favorite forms of entertainment and you can almost see them gathering around calling to one another. Alright, here we go, this is gonna be good, Here comes old Levi and this stranger has no idea what he’s getting into…

But that’s when the incredible and the unthinkable happens. The stranger first commands the man to be quiet and then he commands the unclean spirit to leave. And with a convulsion and a shout, old Levi, the man who has been disturbed and causing trouble for as long as anyone can remember, is now standing right in front of them and he’s calm and well. Jesus not only taught with authority, but he healed those who were troubled and sick. Can you imagine how the news of this event spread throughout the community and beyond? We’re told that after this, his fame began to spread throughout the surrounding regions of Galilee. People didn’t know what to make of Jesus, but you can be sure that they knew they were dealing with someone different then they had ever encountered before. He didn’t just know the Scriptures, but he seemed to be teaching and living out of the very power behind the Scriptures themselves – as if he had a direct relationship with God.

And it’s that difference between just knowing something and living it that the Apostle Paul wrote to the Corinthians about as well. In this first letter that Paul wrote to the early church in Corinth, he was addressing more than a few problems that they were experiencing and one of these was a class issue that had to do with their eating together. You see in those days the Lord’s supper was celebrated as much more of a meal than just eating a piece of bread and some grape juice. They were essentially the first pot lucks, but with a twist. While people were supposed to be sharing with one another, the rich folks who didn’t need to work were coming early and bringing their own food. In fact they were bringing wine, and meat, fruit and cheese and having a feast. Later when the laborers arrived, they found some of the congregation drunk from consuming all the wine, and the food all gone, so that they had to go hungry. This was a far cry from Paul’s vision of one Church and one Body where there was neither rich nor poor, neither slave nor free, neither male nor female but all one in the Lord. So Paul’s letter was taking the Corinthians to task on these practices.

In today’s reading he’s answering the question about whether it’s ok to eat meat that had been sacrificed to idols. You see in Corinth, the butchers were part of a special guild and as a standard practice, they sacrificed all of the animals to idols before they were sold as food. So it wasn’t a question of whether you would eat particular meat that had been sacrificed to idols, if you ate meat at all, you KNEW this had been done. And this bothered some of the Corinthian Christians so they asked Paul to weigh in on the subject. And Paul used the idea of knowledge versus love to discuss the issue.

Paul said: we know that ‘all of us possess knowledge.’ Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. Anyone who claims to know something does not yet have the necessary knowledge. And I couldn’t help myself, but that sounded so much like a Cowboy saying that I couldn’t help thinking of some of the knowledge passed on to us by Cowboy Wisdom. For instance:

Don't squat with your spurs on.

If you think you're a person of influence, try orderin' somebody else's dog around.

Always drink upstream from the herd.

Never slap a man who's chewing tobacco.

The biggest troublemaker you'll probably ever have to deal with watches you in the mirror when you comb your hair each morning.

Making it in life is kind of like busting broncos. You're going to get thrown a lot. The simple secret is to keep getting back on.

Never kick a cow chip on a hot day

Learn to speak kind words—nobody resents them.”

Letting the cat out of the bag is a whole lot easier than putting it back in.

You can't unsay a cruel thing.

Some people grin and bear it. Other people smile and change it.

Keep skunks and bankers at a distance.

The quickest way to double your money is to fold it over and put it back in your pocket.

When you wallow with pigs, expect to get dirty.

If you find yourself in a hole, the first thing to do is stop digging.

Most people are like a barbed wire fence, they have their good points.

The best sermons are lived, not preached.

We can get a lot of knowledge through our daily living, and there’s nothing really wrong with that. But Paul’s warning us, don’t use knowledge to make decisions for how you act unless you also use love. Paul told the Corinthians “many of you understand that there really are no such things as idols or other gods, there’s only One true God, so you have no problem eating meat sacrificed to an idol. But others of you who have just come out of that environment would feel like they were defiled if they ate that same meat. If you with your greater knowledge of Christian freedom cause a weaker member’s faith to be destroyed, by your actions you sin against Christ.

Paul cautions that while our own knowledge may justify our actions, we still need to make sure that we don’t cause another person harm. In this case, he says, “If food is a cause of their falling, I will never eat meat, so that I may not cause one of them to fall.”

And that same thing applies to us today. There may be people who would say, “Oh I’m a Christian now so I would never drink, or smoke, or gamble, go to ‘R’ rated movies…” You fill in the blank, the list goes on and on. The bottom line is that many who have a knowledge of Christian Scripture could easily argue that through Christ Jesus we are set free of these black and white rules and laws. As long as we are not doing something to excess or to the harm of another, it really is ok. But Paul today reminds us that there’s a second part to this in Scripture as well. If our actions cause another who is struggling to slip or even worse to lose their faith, then our actions are not justified at all.

That’s why, while I understand that there is no harm to me in having a glass of wine with dinner, you will never see me do that out at a restaurant here in Elma. Because I never know who is sitting at the next table, and whether they are struggling with their recovery, living day-to-day to remain clean and sober. And while I don’t know them, in a town this size, it’s a good bet that some of them at least know of me. And if were OK for Pastor Dan to have a glass of wine, then wouldn’t it be OK for them too? I never want to be responsible for harm to others, so not out of any law, but out of love, I choose not to do that.

And this is a test that can really help us when we’re making all of those day-to-day decisions. Just like the kids who wear the WWJD bracelets to remind them, What Would Jesus Do? It’s also helpful to flip that around and instead imagine that the person next to you, or the person you’re getting angry with were Jesus. How would that change your actions?

We have a really good friend who we’re in a small group with. And she shared with us that one of her biggest challenges occurs when she’s driving and she’s late for work. Inevitably this is the time when someone in front of her will be going really slow and holding her up. It’s then that she wants to flash her lights at them, or hit her horn. She even finds herself yelling at them and gesturing through the windshield.

So to help her out, Nona suggested that perhaps it would help if she imagined that the person in front of her driving that car were Jesus. Well that made me laugh and I had to tell her that this did not give her permission to roll down the window and yell, “Jesus! Will you get out of the way?!?” That is NOT what she had in mind.

But what she DID have in mind is a wonderful way to consider our actions. And you don’t even have to imagine. Instead of imagining that Jesus is right in front of us, we can look to see Jesus in that other person. Then the question becomes, how will we treat Jesus? Does it change the way I act in a restaurant or a store if Jesus is on the other side of the counter? Could we walk across the street to avoid meeting Jesus when he’s headed right for us? Wouldn’t we run to greet him instead?

There’s a saying that we have for people when they first fall in love, we say that they’re seeing the world through rose colored glasses. Everything looks beautiful and special to them. Well today, God is inviting us to put on rose colored glasses. God is inviting us to put on glasses of love that help us see Jesus in everyone we meet. And God is inviting us to treat everyone as if they were beautiful and special, because they are within the eyes of God. It’s a simple concept but a powerful and life changing concept as well. And in this case I believe that Cowboy Wisdom is correct.

The best sermons ARE lived, not preached.