Playing Offense for God (sermon, June 6, 2010)

Our second reading today is from the first chapter of Paul’s letter to the Galatians. You may have noticed that I rarely preach from Paul’s letters. I usually find that there is a lot of explanation required when you take a brief section from a letter that is best understood as a whole, which makes it difficult to preach from a letter on just one Sunday. So when I looked at the lectionary texts for the summer--the texts for preaching predetermined by a committee of pastors and theologians--I got excited when I saw that there were several consecutive weeks dedicated to Paul’s letter to the Galatians. It seems to me that this is the best way to approach Paul’s letters, to pick one and work through it over several weeks, which is what we’ll do with Galatians.

First, some background. The apostle Paul started multiple churches in the Roman province of Galatia. Paul had received a special call from God to preach the gospel to the Gentiles, people who had no connection to Judaism. He believed that the gospel was extended to all people solely by the grace of God, not by anything they had done or could do. In other words, his gospel was a gospel of grace, not a gospel of works or law. This meant that Paul firmly believed that the Gentiles did not need to follow any of the Jewish laws or customs in order to become Christians. They simply need to walk through the door of faith, a door Paul clearly showed them, a door that was always opened, never locked.

Apparently, though, after Paul left Galatia, some other followers of Jesus, those who might call themselves Jewish Christians, came to the Galatian churches and shared with the new converts what Paul calls “a different gospel.” These missionaries argued that the next step for Gentiles who have come to believe in Jesus as the Messiah is to become circumcised as a sign of their inclusion in God’s covenant. Essentially, they told the Galatians that they had to have a key to open that door of faith Paul had showed them, and the key was circumcision.

In his letter to the Galatians, Paul emphatically and passionately lays out his argument for why circumcision is unnecessary for Gentiles who have become Christian. Although Paul’s passion for the gospel is not unusual, what sets Galatians apart from his other New Testament letters is that Paul is on the defensive. He feels that his authority and his understanding of the gospel has been threatened by the missionaries who came to Galatia after him, and he is infuriated that the Galatian churches were so easily persuaded by a gospel based on law rather than grace. As a result, Paul’s letter to the Galatians is one of the clearest explanations we have of Paul’s theology.

Now a reading from Galatians chapter 1, verses 11-24:

Galatians 1:11-24

For I want you to know, brothers and sisters, that the gospel that was proclaimed by me is not of human origin; for I did not receive it from a human source, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ.

You have heard, no doubt, of my earlier life in Judaism. I was violently persecuting the church of God and was trying to destroy it. I advanced in Judaism beyond many among my people of the same age, for I was far more zealous for the traditions of my ancestors. But when God, who had set me apart before I was born and called me through his grace, was pleased to reveal his Son to me, so that I might proclaim him among the Gentiles, I did not confer with any human being, nor did I go up to Jerusalem to those who were already apostles before me, but I went away at once into Arabia, and afterwards I returned to Damascus. Then after three years I did go up to Jerusalem to visit Cephas and stayed with him fifteen days; but I did not see any other apostle except James the Lord’s brother. In what I am writing to you, before God, I do not lie! Then I went into the regions of Syria and Cilicia, and I was still unknown by sight to the churches of Judea that are in Christ; they only heard it said, “The one who formerly was persecuting us is now proclaiming the faith he once tried to destroy.” And they glorified God because of me.

*****

Today marks the church’s entry into what is known as “ordinary time.” I don’t know who decided to call it that or exactly why, but surely it has something to do with the fact that during this time there are no major church festivals or holy days. During this time, things at church certainly become a little more ordinary. We don’t have acolytes lighting the candles, the choir doesn’t sing--although we do have the extraordinary gifts of our solo musicians--but still, things often feel a little more laid back, a little more casual, a little more ordinary.

So it’s kind of interesting that on this first day of ordinary time, we have this letter which Paul opens with an extraordinary story of how he first heard and believed the gospel. To emphasize how truly extraordinary this event was, Paul begins by recalling his background: he had fully embraced the Judaism of his ancestors, studying theology and gaining notoriety among his teachers and peers. Not only that, he was one of the foremost persecutors of the earliest followers of Jesus, doing everything he could to prevent the spread of the gospel.

Then it happened. Our translation calls it “a revelation of Jesus Christ,” but the Greek word for revelation is “apocalypse.” This means that when God revealed to Paul the truth of who Jesus was it was an apocalyptic moment, one that turned Paul’s entire life--his entire world--upside-down.

In retelling his conversion story, Paul is trying to convince the Galatians that what he taught them was revealed directly to him by Jesus Christ himself. Paul’s authority as a preacher comes from God and God alone.

Just weeks after the explosion on the Deepwater Horizon that triggered our country’s largest ever oil spill, representatives from the three companies responsible came to Congress to testify about what happened. There were executives from BP, Transocean, and Halliburton, and in their testimonies it seemed they did little more than point fingers at each other. “It wasn’t my company’s fault,” they kept saying, “because his company had the authority over that particular thing that caused the accident.” What these hearings revealed was that, as one reporter put it, “The command structure on the Deepwater Horizon seems to have been completely muddled, with officials from BP, Transocean and Halliburton hopelessly tangled in confusing lines of authority and blurred definitions of who was ultimately responsible for what.” (1)

When it’s not clear who’s in charge, things get confusing really fast, which is exactly what happened in Galatia. First came Paul, preaching the gospel he claimed to have received from a direct encounter with the risen Christ. Then some other followers of Jesus came along, people who had actually known him in life or had at least known the apostles who had known him. So they too claimed to have a certain authority, but the gospel they preached was different from Paul’s, since they recommended that the Galatians be circumcised to demonstrate their full conversion to the Christian faith. No wonder the Galatians were confused!

The preacher George Buttrick tells a story of riding on an airplane after attending a conference. As soon as the airplane took off, he pulled out a pad of paper and started working on Sunday’s sermon. The man sitting next to him kept looking over his shoulder and finally he couldn’t stand it any longer.

“I’m sorry to interrupt you,” he said, “I can see how hard you working there and I just have to ask: what are you doing?”

“I’m a minister,” Buttrick replied, “and I’m writing my sermon for Sunday.”

“Ah, religion,” said the man. “I can’t say I’m much into the complexities of religion myself. ‘Do unto others as you would have them do unto you’--the Golden Rule. That’s about all the religion I need.”

“I see,” said Buttrick. “And what do you do?”

“I’m an astronomy professor,” said the man. “I teach at the university.”

“Ah, astronomy,” said Buttrick. “I can’t say I know much about the complexities of astronomy. ‘Twinkle, twinkle little star’--that’s about all the astronomy I need.” (2)

Wouldn’t it be nice if everything in life, from the stars in the sky to our religious beliefs, could actually be boiled down to a simple saying or a child’s song? Paul went to the Galatians and preached a gospel of grace -- there was nothing they had to do to enter into God’s kingdom other than believe and seek to faithfully follow Jesus. It sounded almost too simple, so when others, some who had actually known Jesus, came along and recommended that the Galatians be circumcised to show their faith, it made sense. It gave them something tangible they could do, something extraordinary that would permanently mark them as Christians, something they could use to defend themselves against anyone who might suggest that they weren’t true believers.

But it turns out that when it comes to our faith, there are no simple answers, there is no one thing we can do, one key we can use to open the door to salvation. Paul was convinced that he had it on the highest authority that the gospel was a gift of grace alone. Yet the missionaries who came after Paul were also convinced that their belief in circumcision also came from the authority of God.

The same challenges constantly play out in churches today when different preachers and denominations claim that there are various requirements for being a “true” follower of Jesus. It’s enough to make you wonder: How are any of us supposed to know what to believe?

The letter to Galatians reminds us that our struggles with authority in the life of faith and the business of the church are nothing new. And although it appears that in this portion of his letter Paul is bending over backwards to defend himself and his authority, we will see over the next few weeks that in the grand scheme of things, Paul isn’t playing defense, he is playing offense for God. He is setting up an argument to show the Galatians that no matter how many other Christians they might encounter who each have a slightly different experience of God or understanding of the gospel, the only true authority is God. That means the Galatians must continually look to God as they figure out what it means for them to be faithful followers of Jesus Christ.

As a young, newly ordained Catholic priest, the Reverend Gregory Boyle was assigned to serve the Dolores Mission Church in Los Angeles in the mid-1980’s. The church was nestled in the middle of two public-housing projects which together made up the largest grouping of public housing west of the Mississippi. When Boyle arrived, there were eight active gangs in the neighborhood, the highest concentration of gang activity in the entire city of Los Angeles.

In 1992, Boyle left his position as priest of the Dolores Mission Church to focus on helping ex-gang members find jobs. With help from others in the neighborhood who were committed to keeping the young people safe and helping them find meaningful work, Boyle started several businesses--including a bakery, a cafe, and a silkscreen shop--that employed ex-gang members. Eventually, this grew into an organization called Homeboy Industries, which soon served over a thousand gang members a month from 800 gangs all over the city, who came to Homeboy Industries seeking employment, tattoo removal, counseling, case management, and legal services. Mostly, though, these young people were trying to find meaning in their lives apart from the violence and self-destruction of gang life.

You could argue that Boyle has literally saved the lives of thousands of young people, but he doesn’t see it that way. “I don’t save people,” he says. “God saves people. I can point them in the right direction. I can say, ‘There’s that door. I think if you walked through it, you’d be happier than you are.’” (3)

Ultimately, any of us who have heard and believed the good news of the gospel have authority to witness to that gospel, to tell others the good news of God’s grace in Jesus Christ. But we do that not on our own authority. We cannot force people to believe and we certainly cannot save people ourselves. we can’t even claim that there is one thing people must do to be marked as a Christian, but we can point to the one true authority, the one who is far more capable than us of loving and receiving and redeeming another human being. We can point to the door--to which there is no secret or hidden key--and hope that they choose to walk through it and experience the extraordinary grace of God. Amen.

Endnotes:

1. David Brooks, New York Times op-ed, May 27, 2010.

2. I heard Tom Long tell this story in his sermon “Deeper” which can be heard online here; scroll down until you see “Mark 4” in the reference column.

3. Rev. Boyle was interviewed by Terri Gross for the program “Fresh Air.” The interview can be read or heard online here.