We Can Do Hard Things
Notes
Transcript
Occasionally I take a moment to just sit back and marvel at the reality of what it takes to do things in our world. Like do you ever think about stuff like how much engineering goes into you flipping a switch in your house and the light coming on?
For most of the world that journey begins in some kind of factory where the machinery is made that we need to mine and extract the raw materials that are used in your closest power plant. Then those raw materials are burned or enriched and sent into a reactor or whatever. Then that power moves through a complex system of substations, transformers and power lines before it gets to your house.
Once at your house it runs through a breaker box and into really strictly coded systems of wires and then into a switch which acts as a gateway to the socket that holds your lightbulb.
That’s crazy right? I’m just reeling when I think about it, particularly when I think about the people who first decided that we were going to have power grids all over the country that connect every single person to electricity. That’s an incredibly hard thing to accomplish. And yet here we are. Flipping switches left and right, not even thinking about what a hard thing it was and still is to get and keep that juice flowing into our homes.
Why the heck am I talking about electricity? Well because electricity is a consistent reminder that we can do hard things. People have been doing hard things for the entirety of human history, preparing the way for us know know that literally anything is possible. I mean for heaven’s sake… we put human beings on the moon. We were born to do hard things.
We’re at the end of our series “Prepare the way.” Today we will finish up by looking at Luke Chapters 3 and 4 (i know this week is a twofer) and what we are going to see is that sometimes we all need a little reminding that we too can do hard things.
So lets get going here. Last week we left off and Jesus was like 12 years old. We are fast forwarding about 18 years. We are going to pick up with John the Baptist, who is Jesus’s cousin. He’s out in the wilderness and the word of God comes to him, and he responds.
He went into all the region around the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins,
as it is written in the book of the words of the prophet Isaiah, “The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.
Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth;
and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.’ ”
So John is out there calling people to repent, or turn away from whatever sin they have been living in and turn towards God because something big is coming their way. But John, well John wasn’t like out there preaching in order to make friends and influence people… because here’s his sermon
John said to the crowds that came out to be baptized by him, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?
Bear fruits worthy of repentance. Do not begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our ancestor’; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham.
Even now the ax is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.”
Strong words, but what my man John is saying is “don’t rely on your Israelite heritage for salvation. What’s about to happen doesn’t care about the family you were born into. It cares about the condition of your heart.”
And the people are like so what then.
And the crowds asked him, “What then should we do?”
In reply he said to them, “Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none; and whoever has food must do likewise.”
Even tax collectors came to be baptized, and they asked him, “Teacher, what should we do?”
He said to them, “Collect no more than the amount prescribed for you.”
Soldiers also asked him, “And we, what should we do?” He said to them, “Do not extort money from anyone by threats or false accusation, and be satisfied with your wages.”
As the people were filled with expectation, and all were questioning in their hearts concerning John, whether he might be the Messiah,
John answered all of them by saying, “I baptize you with water; but one who is more powerful than I is coming; I am not worthy to untie the thong of his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.
So the people are like ok John, how are we meant to live. And John tells them… live right. Be generous. Don’t cheat people. Don’t abuse your power. Pretty basic human decency stuff but stuff that was hard 2000 years ago and let’s be honest… is still pretty hard today no?
And people are amazed at this and are like “hey maybe this guy is the messiah.” To which John is like oh no. He’s coming and he’s going to blow you away.
Shortly after, Jesus does show up to where John is Baptizing people. And this is the scene:
Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heaven was opened,
and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.”
John’s work here is complete. He’s gathered these people in the wilderness. They have heard about repentance and living justly, and then before their eyes Jesus is commissioned for ministry through the water of baptism, the anointing of the Holy Spirit, and the audible voice of God declaring him to be the Son of God.
Like there’s not much more than this that you need in order to believe that this person is the messiah. There’s also not much more than this that Jesus needs to know that the way has been prepared for him. He is ready. People far and wide have heard about John and this ministry of repentance and baptism, and now it is Jesus’s time to go and do the work of furthering that message.
And then Jesus does like the hardest thing. He goes into the wilderness, doesn’t eat for 40 days and is tempted by the devil, offered the 3 things we all want: food, power, and prestige. And he passes the test. Because why not. He’s Jesus. Then his ministry begins. And when it begins, Luke takes us almost immediately to Jesus’s hometown.
When he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, he went to the synagogue on the sabbath day, as was his custom. He stood up to read,
and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written:
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”
And he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant, and sat down. The eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him.
Then he began to say to them, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”
All spoke well of him and were amazed at the gracious words that came from his mouth. They said, “Is not this Joseph’s son?”
Ok so this seems like it’s gone well. But its about to get unwell because Jesus essentially tells them that the work that he came to do includes people outside of the Israelite family tree — the same thing John was saying out in the wilderness — and this is the response of Jesus’s home town:
When they heard this, all in the synagogue were filled with rage.
They got up, drove him out of the town, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so that they might hurl him off the cliff.
But he passed through the midst of them and went on his way.
And so here we have this incredible irony that Luke has set us up to see. Jesus’s way is prepared for him and you could even say cleared for him by basically a bunch of random strangers and a weird guy who wears camel skins in the wilderness. His identity is confirmed and celebrated. He is anointed and sent out to do the hard things that he’s been called to do.
But then when he goes home, his way is blocked. When he tells people that he’s got a hard thing to do, they try to kill him. These people who have known him his whole life try to end his ministry before he even has a chance, just because they can’t stomach the idea that the hard thing that Jesus is about to go and do might change the world, and it might mean that they too will have to open their eyes to the fact that they too are called to do hard things.
And this makes me think of all of the people in this world who come from homes or from backgrounds that aren’t nurturing. Who will prepare the way for these people, for these children? Not everyone in this world was given a chance. Not everyone gets the spiritual encouragement at home that maybe you or I got.
I’ve told this story before, but this seems like an appropriate time to tell it again.
Crystal Jones is a teacher whose first class of first-graders included students who couldn’t even hold a pencil and didn’t know their letters or numbers. Her goal? To have these children attain third-grade-level skills by the end of the school year. A lofty and seemingly impossible goal. But Crystal understood something: we can do hard things.
Ms. Jones realized early on that her first graders looked up to third graders. They wanted to be third graders. And she leveraged that. She told her class that by the end of the year they would be third graders.
She started By calling her students scholars. Every day they would stand up and say the scholar’s pledge:
“I am a scholar. A scholar is someone who loves to learn and is really good at it!”
By mid-term most of her class was reading at a second grade reading level and by the end of the year 90% of these children were reading at or above a third-grade level. They were, for all intents and purposes, third graders.
What Ms. Jones realized was that she might be the only person who ever prepared the way for these children to succeed. Whatever the circumstances were within the homes of these inner city LA kids, they didn’t come to first grade knowing that they could do hard things. But they sure left her class knowing what they were capable of.
When we look at who we are as a church, when we look at where we are in our life cycle as we seek to revitalize, its pretty clear that we’re going to have to do hard things. We’re going to have to take chances and risks and pivot and adjust and accept new realities.
But I know that we can do these hard things… because look at all of the hard things we’ve already done. Ask Bernie Mcbee if starting that garden across the street was easy. Ask Judi Miller if writing that quarter million grant to expand the garden’s ministry was easy. Ask Arlene, and Greg, and Martha, and Sue, and Peggy, and everyone else if it was easy to run this church after Kathy and Tim passed away. Ask Liz and the whole gang on Saturday if the shower ministry is easy. Ask Greg Rosslow if getting our new sign permitted and keeping our air conditioning running is easy. The list goes on an on.
It’s hard. We can do hard things. I’m watching hard things get done literally every day. It’s what we do. You all do these things because it’s second nature. Like flipping on the light switch. It’s automatic. And we do them because someone has shown us that we can do hard things. And we get to be people who tell kids and those struggling with addiction, and whoever might have never heard — you can do hard things.
Maybe you’re here and no one’s ever told you that you can do hard things. Well guess what, you can. You can do hard things because Jesus did the hardest thing for you. Jesus prepared the way for you and for me to do the hard work of ministry because he did the hardest thing by taking on the cross and overcoming death. And that my friends is all the proof that we need. The way has been prepared. It’s now time for us to begin the lifelong work of following him.
