Acts 1:1-11; Psalm 47; Ephesians 1:15-23; Luke 24:44-53
I’m glad to see that many of you have come home today to be with your mothers and grandmothers. I’m glad you are here on Mother’s day. It is a special time when you come home. There is something about home that is special – and it will be special to you simply because it is home.
As many of you know, my home town is St. Marys, WV. My parents moved into their new home a month before I was born, and they still live there. Many things have changed since I was a young child – the big maple had to be cut before it fell on the house, the forsythia bush I played under is gone, replaced by a deck, the pine trees that were planted when I was young grew up and were cut down and made into lumber that became the sun porch, the gravel driveway is now blacktopped, the barbed wire fence I rode my bike into the first day I had learned to ride it, the fence that tore at my chin and caused Dr West to give me three stitches – that fence is long gone. Even the volunteer peach tree that gave us peaches my sister and I ate off the tree when we came home from school is gone. But the big fence that separates the property from the Wilson farm is still there, the hardwood floors are still there under the carpet, and my room, looking much neater, is still in the basement.
When I walk around that property and that home, I feel more in control. I have a certain freedom there I don’t have anywhere else. If I were to dig a hole, my father might ask why, but no one would be upset. If I wanted to cut a dead limb off a tree, it’s my choice. If I choose to lie in my old room and take a nap, no one disturbs me. I have a certain power and a certain freedom when I’m back home that I don’t have anywhere else. It is like the soil and the weather and the air are just right and I am recharged with energy. It is where I was first planted, like a tree planted in the right soil, and everything is right there. It is where I feel comfortable and at peace.
And it’s more than just the property. When I visit St Marys, I run into people I knew years ago. There are my friends from my class in school, and they mostly remember me because we only graduated 105 people. I even run into my old teachers, some of whom are now in their 90’s.
I’m sure you have such a place. It may be where you grew up, or it may be where you live now. It may just be your bedroom. It is a place where you have a certain freedom, a certain power to do things your way, a place where the soil is right and you can thrive.
In our readings, we have two readings that were written by the same man. The first reading from the Book of Acts, was written by Luke, as well as the Gospel reading, also written by Luke. Both readings describe a day about 40 days after the Resurrection, when Jesus chose to leave us here on earth and return home to His Father, to His home.
Jesus had spent much of this time teaching His disciples. One day, He was eating with his disciples – have you noticed how important eating together is in the Gospel stories? That was because in those days you did not eat with people you didn’t trust and love. Even today, we see that some people don’t feel comfortable eating around other people. But this was even stronger then, in a time when the cost of food was more than half your income, you needed to trust the people you were eating with, for you were sharing food, you were sharing your wealth, and those other people might eat all your precious food. It’s like my little dog Brownie, who won’t ever share food, she growls, she might even bite if you tried to pick up that piece of bread that fell on the floor in front of her. I’m sure your dog is equally friendly to other dogs when food is concerned.
Well, one day Jesus was eating with His disciples and “he gave them this command:“Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the gift my Father promised, which you have heard me speak about. For John baptized with water, but in a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.”
This woke up the disciples. They became excited. “Are you ready to restore Israel’s kingdom?” The disciples wanted to know if Jesus was ready to become king, to drive out the Romans, to remove Herod the outsider from power and restore Israel to her former glory that she had when David and Solomon ruled her! The disciples still did not understand what Jesus was doing!
By their question, it is clear that they thought in terms of political and military power. “If we just had control of the government, everything would be great!” they thought, and they had the ideal candidate to run the government. Jesus would make the perfect warrior king – and they were right about this. But Jesus had a longer term plan for His kingdom, He wanted to change the hearts and minds and souls of people, He wanted to change the entire moral basis of government, He wanted to completely change the entire world, and if He became a normal king in 33 AD, the only things that would happen would be the suffering and death and destruction of men and women and children and cities and homes.
And so Jesus says back to the disciples: “It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by his own authority. 8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”
Only God the Father knows when the kingdom will be restored on earth. But you will receive the Holy Spirit, and the Spirit brings power, the power to change the world, the power to bring justice and righteousness to the world, the power to bring hurting and suffering and dying souls into a relationship with God and Jesus, and find healing and hope and life.
And disciples? You will be the witnesses of what Jesus has taught and said and done, including his sacrificial death and his resurrection. First, they are to go to their local surroundings – the city of Jerusalem and tell what they have seen. Next, they are to go to the county-sized area of Judea. Third, they are to go to the people nearby who disgusted the disciples, the Samarians. And finally, they are to go to the ends of the earth.
This is a lesson for us. We are to spread the Gospel close to home, in Quiet Dell, in Bridgeport, in Romine’s Mills. Then we are to move throughout Harrison and Barbour Counties. Next, we are to make sure we share the Gospel with people we don’t like or understand very well. And then, we are to go to the ends of the earth.
And then, Jesus went home. He went back to be with God the Father. As Paul told us in the Ephesians reading, Jesus went back to where God the Father “seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked, not only in the present age but also in the one to come.
And God placed all things under Jesus’ feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.”
Jesus went to where His true power could be used. He returned to His home.
When Jesus came to earth, He had voluntarily given up almost all of His divine power, choosing to come to earth as a weak human infant. We see that as He grew, He rarely exercised His God-powers, choosing only to heal in various ways – curing blindness, chasing demons out of people, healing lepers, raising dead people to life. In each case, Jesus demonstrated His life-giving powers. He did not blast people with flames of fire from His hands. He did not destroy cities with lightning bolts. He did not kill people with rays from his eyes.
He healed and brought life to people. He helped them to grow again, to be restored to health, to come to life. His touch was like fertilizer for the body and the soul. He helped dying people to come to life and thrive.
And as the disciples learned to listen to the Holy Spirit, they also began to thrive. In a few short days, the Holy Spirit was poured upon all the disciples, both the Twelve and the greater group of 120 disciples, both men and women. Pentecost arrived and 3000 people were baptized. Now called apostles, the Twelve and the seven Deacons spoke to people in Jerusalem and more people came to know the life-giving touch of Jesus and the Holy Spirit.
The Deacons and then the Apostles went throughout Judea, spreading the Good News, then some actually went to Samaria and they brought the Good News and the Holy Spirit to the Samarians whom they detested. And soon after that, even hated Romans and a foreigner from Ethiopia received the Holy Spirit and were baptized. More people became apostles, proclaimers of the Good News and the Holy Spirit and the story of Jesus spread throughout the Roman Empire and beyond, to Europe, to India, to China, to Ireland, and eventually to the Americas and deep into Africa.
And how about you?
Have you heard the Good News of Jesus Christ? Have you heard that Jesus Christ taught an entirely new way of living, a way of life, a way that values all people just as much as the wealthy and the powerful? Have you heard that Jesus Christ claimed many times to be God Himself walking on this earth? Have you heard that Jesus died to pay all the penalties for all the crimes against God and other people you have committed, both the crimes the world recognizes and the crimes that only you and God know about? Have you heard that Jesus rose from the dead after His death upon the cross to prove that He was God Himself and He holds the power over life and death itself?
Your life may be a struggle today. This world and our culture do things to us which drive us to despair because we have mixed up what is good and what is evil, what is important and what is trivial, what is wonderful and what is destructive. In our attempts to live, we slowly kill ourselves because we do not have the power to defeat death, and just like a fish caught on a fishing line, the more we try to fight our death enemy, the quicker we exhaust ourselves and the quicker we die, hopeless, gasping for clean water as we are hauled out of the life-giving water and dry out in the hot sun by the enemy’s boots.
But everything that Jesus brought to us and taught us and showed us was how to live a more abundant life, an eternal life, a life filled with wonder. The more we learn about Jesus’ teachings, both His words and His example, the more we find that His path is the way to life, not despair, not imprisonment, not trouble.
But we are often like the bunny that my wife Saundra once saw, a bunny that had lived his entire life in a 2 foot by 2 foot by 2 foot cage, and when he was released onto an open floor and could run for his life, he chose to hop 2 ft, turn, then he hopped 2 ft, turned, then hopped 2 ft in a tight little square and then he sat there, because all of his life, just like ours, he had lived in that tight cage. Our cages are of our own making, they are made of steel called sin and despair which are supplied by Satan, and Jesus is ready to remove your cage. Will you run for the open pasture, as a freed bunny should? Will you thrive in the freedom from sin, in the open air of God’s forgiveness, in the sunlight of the Holy Spirit that Jesus offers? Or will you stay in your cage, hopping around in your 2 ft square life?
When you become a Christian, we baptize you with the water of life. That water comes along with the Holy Spirit, and fertilizes your life – if you choose to let the Holy Spirit and the Living Water of Christ into your life. If you listen to the Holy Spirit, if you read the Word of God, your life will change.
Where you had almost died, your leaves will turn green and you will grow, you will spring up, you will thrive as though you were once again at home in the perfect soil of your home, in the place where you are free to live and experiment, when you are able to be filled with the energy of home because, you see, you are once again back in the good soil of humanities home, you are walking with God once more in the cool of the evening, just as Adam and Eve walked with God in the Garden of Eden, because, you see, the Garden of Eden was fruitful and wonderful and beautiful not because of anything it naturally had – but it was fruitful and wonderful and beautiful because it was the place where God walked in the cool of the evening, and when you read the Word of God, Holy Scripture, and hear the words of Jesus Christ, the Word of God, when you listen to God the Holy Spirit, when you talk to God the Father through prayer, then you are walking with God in the cool of the evening and God is walking with you and you are home, you have come to your true home, the place where peace and beauty await you, the place where you can thrive.
Join in this song:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3jNJ59o4QgE
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