It feels like advertisements for lawyers are inescapable these days. They’re all over television. There’s lots on billboards along the road. I used to laugh last year on Route 31 coming from Lyons into Newark that there were multiple billboards within view all at once with competing messages from lawyers. There don’t seem to be as many ads on the internet though.
Based on how many ads there are you’d think every third person you meet is the victim of a jobsite accident, car crash, asbestos exposure, or some other sort of tragedy. The ads have all sorts of clever sayings and catchy jingles. You can probably easily run a handful of them through your head right now! All of these legal ads promise the same thing – lots of money.
Pharmaceutical companies spend their share on advertisements too! While they don’t promise lots of money, they do also have catchy ads and sayings. Everyone looks happy and vibrant; as if the medicine has cured all their life’s problems. It is funny though that the ads for pharmaceuticals also have to list the side effects, which can be just has horrible as the original condition; or may even cause death. Notice they don’t have scenes of funerals in their ads though.
And that takes us to Jesus’ message of, “Take up your cross and follow me.” It’s hard to put a jingle to that one, and it’s hard to create a picture for a billboard that has someone looking vibrant and happy!
The children’s sermon today focused on John 10:24, “Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.” And now we continue with the very next verse, “Those who love their life will lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life.”
Ironic, isn’t it. It’s as if Jesus’ main ads would say that life is going to be difficult, painful even. And then the fine print at the bottom would say, “Side effects are an eternal life of bliss.”
But that is not why we follow Jesus. Jesus never intended his message to be one of suffer now in order to be rewarded later. That’s not how God works. That’s just scheming and leveraging God. I’d like to see the lawyer who things he or she can take God to court and win!
If you’ve been in worship a lot these last months you’ve realized that John’s gospel feels very different from the other gospels. One thing that is noticeably different is that they’re aren’t exorcisms. We don’t meet demon possessed people. There are miracle stories, yes. And some of them are great miracles! But, for the most part, John’s gospel is quite at home in our worldview today. With the issue of demon possession and exorcisms, it is notable that there is only one exorcism in the entire story. That exorcism is at the crucifixion when Jesus delivers the world from the power of evil. Jesus himself says in verse 31 of our gospel reading for today, “Now is the judgment of this world: now the ruler of this world will be driven out. And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.”
There you have it. The only exorcism.
John’s gospel gives us a very important perspective when it comes to what has become known as atonement theory. Atonement theory is how does Jesus’ crucifixion actually take away the effect of sin. How does it connect to our lives today. Atonement theory is a tough territory. It is fine to say Jesus died for your sins. Or that Jesus sacrificed himself for you as an act of love. But how do they connect? We haven’t met Jesus in full literal form. We have not done bad things and Jesus literally stepped in and said, “I’ll take the punishment instead.”
Over the centuries many have said that in order for there to be justice in the universe, in order to make up for the brokenness of humanity, Jesus had to suffer and die. But is there some great eternal judge beyond God that needs to be satisfied somehow? God created this universe. God created the ideas of cause and effect, and fairness, and justice. Why would God create something where God himself would have to suffer for the sake of God’s own justice? You can see how that quickly gets us into a logical trap.
John’s gospel helps us out. Why does Jesus have to die? And how does Jesus’ life and death impact our own lives today, and our relationship with God?
First of all, Jesus does not have to die, even though he knew he would from the very beginning. Jesus’ death in John’s gospel is not about making up for the world’s sins. It’s about God showing such abundant selfless love that God is willing to die for the world that has turned its back on God and gone astray.
And as Jesus dies he is not setting some moral example that we are to follow. Jesus does not say, “Do what I do. Here’s an example for you to build your morality from.”
No, the death of Jesus is an expression of love that, ironically, leads to wholeness of life.
The lawyers ads are lies. A big payout will not lead to wholeness of life. Although I will say that a highly developed threat of civil lawsuits does keep powerful people and companies from becoming too careless. And the pharmaceutical companies are not giving wholeness of life either. Although any number of medications do significantly improve the quality of life. But Jesus does give wholeness of life. It is not wholeness of life by being sacrificial in life; although it may take that form. It is wholeness of life because Jesus is revealing the enormity of God’s love for you and for the world around you. And he invites you to live in that love.
In other words, the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus invites you into relationship with God every step through life. It invites you to look to God as the example of love and trust that living in that love will indeed bring you value.
That love is counter to the way the world works. And that love is counter to the way our minds think.
Sure, I can’t help but imagine what my life would be like if suddenly a vast fortune were dumped into my lap. What would I buy? What trips would I take? It’s easy to imagine joy at knowing that you could spend a lot on happiness today and still have plenty to spend on happiness tomorrow and the next day and the day after that forever. Yet that would lead to emptiness.
The failure of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden story is that they thought they could find fulfillment on their own terms apart from God. The success of Jesus is that he shows how fulfillment comes by turning back to God and realizing that God already made you good.
How does living that love look in real life? It is seeing problems and challenges and then being willing to work to engage them.
I don’t know where all I’ve come across this fact, but the truth is the greatest satisfaction comes from seeing a task you don’t know how to accomplish but then learning the skills to accomplish it, and then doing it. If everything is too easy all the time life gets boring. If everything is too hard all the time then you suffer burnout. But when you do not shy away from problems, and when you approach tasks with God’s love in your mind, you will succeed at them, and you will feel truly good.
The grain of wheat cracks open and a new life sprouts from it. We do not wait until we die and our bodies decompose or are burnt in order to have that new life sprout. Jesus wants us to know that the new life sprouts right now, and here in this world. A life of self-gift in relationship with God is true life. It is available to all. It is available right now.
We don’t run TV ads or pop-ups on the internet, or put up billboards along the side of the road. But we do let the light of Christ shine from our own lives into the world. Perhaps we aren’t exorcists, but we do drive the darkness and the demons of ignorance away so that all may know true life.
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