Prophets, Priests, & Kings

Prophets, Priests, & Kings - Acts 2:14a, 22-23 Bascomb UMC / April 19, 2020 / 9AM Live stream Focus: Jesus serving in the offices of Prophet (life), Priest (death), and King (resurrection). Function: A way for believers to best function in God’s service as prophets, priests, and ambassadors of the King of Kings. 5 Purpose Outcomes of the Church: Worship, Fellowship, Discipleship, Evangelism, Service Acts 2:14a, 22-32 (CEB) 14 Peter stood with the other eleven apostles. He raised his voice and declared, 22 “Fellow Israelites, listen to these words! Jesus the Nazarene was a man whose credentials God proved to you through miracles, wonders, and signs, which God performed through him among you. You yourselves know this. 23 In accordance with God’s established plan and foreknowledge, he was betrayed. You, with the help of wicked men, had Jesus killed by nailing him to a cross. 24 God raised him up! God freed him from death’s dreadful grip, since it was impossible for death to hang on to him. 25 David says about him, I foresaw that the Lord was always with me; because he is at my right hand - I won’t be shaken. 26 Therefore, my heart was glad and my tongue rejoiced. Moreover, my body will live in hope, 27 because you won’t abandon me to the grave, nor permit your holy one to experience decay. 28 You have shown me the paths of life; your presence will fill me with happiness. 29 “Brothers and sisters, I can speak confidently about the patriarch David. He died and was buried, and his tomb is with us to this very day. 30 Because he was a prophet, he knew that God promised him with a solemn pledge to seat one of his descendants on his throne. 31 Having seen this beforehand, David spoke about the resurrection of Christ, that he wasn’t abandoned to the grave, nor did his body experience decay. 32 This Jesus God raised up. We are all witnesses to that fact. A Time for Children Do you remember that we used to take trips – in Planes, Trains, and Automobiles (look at that Logo and tell me you get the movie reference) we would travel. Oh, but once you set off on a journey there are hidden snags. You get to the airport and the flight is delayed. You have to get a different train at the other end of the station going a different route. It was dark and you miss your exit on the interstate and the next exit is 40 miles away. Then you wonder, is this our destination? Is this the right town, the right hotel? Does it look like we’d thought it would? It’s only a comedy IF you’re watching – not going through it! What if, with a sigh of relief you see a man with our sign (we call him Peter – a former fisherman turned prophet), he’s collecting these tired Jewish stragglers and putting them (and us) on the bus. Peter says, “we have arrived.” Was it the end of the journey? Had the promises of God come true? Can the holiday really begin? This concept of journey has been projected onto a large, 2,000-year long timescale. A Jewish moment, long promised, dreamed of, planned for, prayed for, agonized over: a moment when God would work things out right - at last - hopes would be realized and good times begin - a moment when a huge sigh of relief would give way to a huge sense of new possibilities: now, at last, good things could really start! That is how the Jews of the first century read their scriptures. That was their “travel brochure” moving them forwards: just keep going long enough and they would surely, eventually, arrive at God’s destination! In this text it seems that Peter says YES! You are here! Messiah has come and begins a time when all would be reversed for the Jews. God would bring them to a new place and do new things with them. And some of the texts spoke of the signs that they would see when they arrived at that new moment, the signals that would say, ‘You’re here! This is where you were going!’ What signals? First, Peter quotes the prophet Joel: In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy. Your young will see visions. Your elders will dream dreams. Acts 2:17 (CEB). In the last days…..what? Pentecost, Messiah, God’s Spirit is poured out – here we are! And Jerusalem was full of people who were eager for signs that maybe the people of Israel had at last arrived at their destination, even if it didn’t look like they thought it was going to do. Yes, says Peter. We’ve got to the point where all that the brochures said is starting to come true. These are indeed “the last days.” Wait! I should say, THEIR last days – because each generation has our own “last days” to deal with! Let me explain, it was NOT the destination they thought! What God was doing was a HUGE disappointment for their NATIONISTIC dreams for King David’s throne. Not ONE of these people understood what was coming - the sacking of Jerusalem and the diaspora – the scattering of the Jewish people all over Europe. THAT was not their plan, not their expected destination. They went through a BIG disappointment. And when I say each generation has their own “last days” to deal with, follow me to 1831. Because in 1831, William Miller began to preach that the Second Coming of Jesus would occur somewhere between March 1843 and March 1844, based on his interpretation of Daniel 8:14. A following gathered around Miller and in the summer of 1844, some of Miller's followers locked onto the date of October 22. This event was unique because over 100,000 people came to believe in what Miller had called the "Blessed Hope". So, on October 22 they gathered up high (on mountains and rooftops) late into the night watching, waiting for Christ to return and found themselves bitterly disappointed when both sunset and midnight passed with NO second coming of Jesus. This event later became known as the Great Disappointment. We all have our “last days” before God finally ends time as we know it. The sad part in this case? They kept altering the date, trying again and again to second guess GOD. My point today? It’s a HUGE Distraction! A Rabbit Trail and run down it; fall victim to a LIE! It’s the secondary quest of the Evil One – if I can’t keep humans from a relationship with God, then I’ll distract them into ineffectiveness. Are you binge watching during this self-isolation? Pam and I are watching “The Plot Against America” together. The most popular show on Netflix has something to do with Tigers! The Huffington Post suggests 30 Rock, the Gilmore Girls, or The Good Place (now that would be distracting). David Austin might loan you the first five seasons of Andy Griffith or you may enjoy histories, baking shows, we even have reruns of sports. But today’s sermon was influenced by a series called “The Leftovers” created by the same guys who brought us LOST a few years back. The premise is… 2% of the world population is raptured! They suddenly, all at the same time, vanish without a trace and they weren’t all Christians and they weren’t even all good people. Now I haven’t finished, so NO spoilers, but season 3 began with a song – I song I remember as a teenager. “I wish we’d all been ready” by Larry Norman. It was 1884 again and William Miller was leading the Christians of his day into preparations for the Rapture. Three times it didn’t happen and each time it didn’t happen there were fewer and fewer people on top of their houses. But even in my day, our youth group would have “Rapture Practice” by jumping up and down. It’s still around and still distracting us from God’s purpose – the journey, the mission, not the destination. You know I love the English (Anglican) priest N.T Wright. He says, In the West we have been so seduced by [a Greek understanding] the Platonic vision of ‘heaven’ that the resurrection of Jesus is seen simply as the “happy ending” after the crucifixion, and as the prelude to his “going to heaven” so that we can go and join him there later. This misses the central point that the resurrection of Jesus is the beginning of the new creation, in which we are to share already in the power of the Spirit. This affects everything, from prayer and the sacraments - to mission and service to the poor. ….we realize that new creation is now happening because the dark powers that have kept the world enslaved to sin and death have been defeated. So Peter is pointing to three signposts: PROPHETS who told us Jesus was coming, the work of the PRIESTS who sacrifice for and represent the people in the temple is now understood as the FINAL sacrifice of Jesus – our High Priest, and finally the Kings, especially King David, a forerunner of the King of Kings – the true King and Lord of this world – THE authority over how we live. But the purpose is for the mission, NOT the destination. Don’t get distracted! Don’t let the Evil One act like a cheerleader who inflates our worst impulses for control, our most selfish outcomes of faith until we run down the hill so fast, SO FAST that we stumble and fall. Here’s what Peter saw, not a destination, but a journey, a mission, a quest. The work of new creation was beginning in that upper room, where friends and family of Jesus have gathered: not in the Temple, not in the rabbinic schools, not in the back rooms where the revolutionaries plot violence, but here, where those who had been with Jesus, and had seen him alive again after his resurrection, find themselves overwhelmed with the fresh wind of the spirit. How will it affect our way of being in the world? Well first, it’s not about escaping the world, NO – we are the community of the royal priest and pascal lamb who overcomes the authorities like Egypt – we are servants of THE KING (I must always ask myself, am I a Christian who happens to be American or am I an American who calls himself a Christian – I should live and act as a citizen of heaven). Oh, and Jesus leads us as his royal priesthood, his holy nation. We are a temple of the Holy Spirit marching to the Promised Land. And where is that? Don’t we pray that God’s heavenly kingdom will come to earth? That God’s will should be on Earth? And we are unable to stop speaking about our Jesus, his gospel, what Peter and the others have seen and heard. We are now God’s prophets and this work of God is wonderfully inclusive, because there is no category of people which is left out: both genders, all ages, all social classes. So when I speak of prophets, priests, and kings – it should be US! We are the markers! The crucial point is FOCUS – on the mission and not distracted by diversions and rabbit trails. Vice Admiral James Stockdale flew combat missions in Vietnam until he was shot down in 1965 and became a POW in the infamous Hanoi Hilton where was tortured and spent four years in isolation. In the book, “Good to Great” Stockdale offers this advice (which has been picked up again in the news during this Pandemic). “You must never confuse faith that you will prevail in the end — which you can never afford to lose — with the discipline to confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be,” Dr. Anthony Fauci, the voice of this pandemic, repeatedly says, “You don’t make the timeline, the virus makes the timeline.” And the church must understand that WE don’t make God’s timeline. One KEY fruit of God’s Holy Spirit is patience! One DARK side to impatience are those who become so despondent at the desired results not happening in their expected timeframe. They lose heart and give up. In Stockdale’s world, these were the POWs who didn’t make it. “…those who believed “‘we’re going to be out by Christmas.’ And Christmas would come, and Christmas would go. Then they’d say, ‘We’re going to be out by Easter.’ And Easter would come, and Easter would go. And then Thanksgiving, and then it would be Christmas again. And they died of a broken heart.” This is not an easy word to hear! Staying calm and persistent, accepting the uncertainty of life gracefully for as long as it takes – is the fruit of the Spirit we understand as patience. Patience is not minimizing the pain; it’s holding the pain. Let’s pray Reinhold Niebuhr’s great serenity prayer: “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference.” Jesus, Messiah - Name above All names Blessed Redeemer – Emmanuel The Rescue for sinners The Ransom from heaven Jesus Messiah Prophet, Priest, King! & Lord of all