Refreshed

For the last two and a half weeks my family has been on vacation. As I shared with everyone before we left we took a roadtrip through the Northwest of our country. We spent the majority of our time in Washington, Oregon, and California. We split our time on the trip between seeing nature and seeing friends and family. While the times in the car seemed to drag on for a long time, those long car rides gave us the opportunity to see some pretty incredible things and spend some time with some special people in our lives. We saw rivers and lakes, we saw snow covered mountains and flower covered fields, we saw oceans and rivers, and a whole host of animals. Seeing the beauty of the earth and the animals all doing what God created them to do reminded me of several of the psalms.

Here are a couple that come to mind. Psalm 66:4 “All the earth worships you, sings praises to you, sings praises to your name!” Psalm 96:1 “Sing to the Lord a new song! Sing to the Lord, all the earth!” Psalm 148:9–10 “Do the same, you mountains, every single hill, fruit trees, and every single cedar! Do the same, you animals— wild or tame— you creatures that creep along and you birds that fly!” All psalms about recognizing that nature both needs to and does praise God. The deer grazing on the side of the road was them praising God. The whales feeding in the San Juan Islands were praising God. The wildflowers covering sides of roads and fields were praising God. The sea lions barking at each other and the otters playing in the kelp were praising God.

And thinking about the reason they are praising God is because they were living exactly as God had created them to live and be. They are fully being who they were made to be. They are living out who God created them to be and doing what Good created them to do in this world. Now since they are animals and flowers and mountains, we might not typically think of this terminology, but they were, in their own way, being fully alive in Christ. They were fully living into who God created them to be. I think deep down that is what it means for all of us to be fully alive in Christ, which is the topic that we are exploring today.

The problem is that so many different things get in the way of doing that. While I was gone you heard some of the most prominent ways that that happens. From Anna Marie you heard about the shadow self and how that prevents us or even in some cases takes over who we really are because of fear and doubt that the real self will be loved. Then Sharon talked about shame an healing from it. Too often we live in shame or fear and it prevents us from doing all kinds of things including the right thing or the thing that will be make us and God really happy with ourselves and this world. So in order to be fully alive in Christ as our scriptures point out today we must fully embrace that God created us, and who God created us to be. With all the imperfections, with all the fears and doubts, we step past them to now that we are a beloved child of God.

The main scripture we have this week from Luke 13 shows us a woman who had been bent over for 18 years. I am sure that since the woman is at the Synagogue she has come to terms with her disability, but something inside Jesus tells him that this woman needs to be made whole, so he heals her. Now the big controversy is that Jesus heals this woman on the Sabbath. Six days he could have done this but he had to chose the Sabbath to do it. I have to tell you that I love that Jesus heals on the Sabbath. It gets me so excited every time he does it. Not because he is a rule breaker. Not because he wants to stick it to the leadership, but that Jesus literally can’t wait one more day to bring a person back to wholeness. He wants this woman to experience life in a way that it was meant to be lived. He wants all of us to be freed from those things that bend us over and keep us from standing up straight and praising God. Jesus as he says in John 10:10 “The thief enters only to steal, kill, and destroy. I came so that they could have life—indeed, so that they could live life to the fullest.” Life to the fullest. To be fully alive in Christ. Freed from shame and shadow. To love ourselves fully in the way that God loves us. To know that in our imperfections God wants us to live a life that is fully alive, fully complete, that fully embraces God.

Some of the friends that we visited on our trip are pastors. I thought that perhaps this sermon could be preached from not just one but multiple pastors. So I posed a question to them and asked them to share their thoughts. I shared with them our theme for the summer: Deepening our love for God, our neighbors and ourselves. Then I asked them this: Care to share any thoughts on how love of self and being fully alive in Christ relate to one another? I loved their responses and so I want to share them all with you. Here’s what they said:

Being fully alive in Christ and learning to love ourselves are deeply connected. Often, our emphasis on faithfulness relates to outward action: to serve, to share, to follow. And yet, the inward journey of knowing ourselves and learning to see ourselves with the same love and compassion God already does is just as important.When we slow down, start to notice what's happening within us, tend to the places that are weary or wounded, and truly begin to accept God's love there, we become more present to God, to ourselves, and to the people around us. Loving ourselves isn't selfish. It's from this place of wholeness that love naturally flows outward, bringing healing, grace, and kindness to others. It's what I call the ripple effect. 

The first thing that comes to mind is Frederick Bueckner’s statement, “The place where God calls you is that place where your great joy meets the world’s great need.” If and when I find “that place”, (which I refer to as “x marks the spot”), I discover that I’m fully alive, I love what I’m doing, and I even love myself. When I depart from doing that which gives me joy, and gives God joy, it doesn’t take long to discover that I’m disliking myself more and more. So being truly “alive”, especially alive in Christ, seems to go hand in hand with doing that which pleases Christ. And what pleases Christ? Doing that which God implanted in me in the first place as my joyful duty. Took awhile to discover it. Tried lots of different things. Debated with myself over multiple possibilities - but it was only when I truly said (and meant it), “God, I will step through whatever door you open”, and actually did, that I discovered what I was meant to be and do. Doing what gives me great joy leads to loving self. And when I sense it’s also what God wants of me, then I am truly “alive” in Christ. The other thing that comes to mind is “in Christ there is a new creation, the old has passed way and the new has come.” When I soak in that verse and apply it in certain situations, it definitely leads to hope and a renewal of love for self, and a sense that I have new life, a new start, because of Christ — “being alive in Christ”. Also…being alive in Christ means doing what’s right, embracing kindness, and letting Christ guide me. Also, recognizing the humanness and possibilities in each person. Oh, one more thing. My mother once told me the key to being truly alive is embracing the three F’s: faith, family and friends. 

As you know….Love in scripture has a hundred or more definitions. By the time we get to the MANDATED loves…i.e., love God - love one another…love neighbor - as self… we meet a literal implosion. This is where thoughts of love and the actions of love are disruptive, even volatile, and intentionally problematic. Often love appears as ‘lovely’, ‘exciting’, erotic’, deeply compassionate’, ‘a terminal commitment’.  Our cadence of scripture reveals that love is hard work, not a fantasy, not frivolous, not poetic, not the cover of a hallmark card, not even sentimental…it is raw and uncompromising hard work. Love of God, neighbor, and self means that we need to contend with a concept of love that embraces death. Period. There is not some formula, just a raw daily workout of LAYING MYSELF DOWN to acknowledge, render, and make room regarding love that acts FOR and TOWARD the other. I don’t like dying to self, but that is the call, the task and the challenge. How do I lay down my stuff to embrace and act on the needs of others? How do I sublimate my ego to lift up others? How do I put to death the need…the raw need for compliments, acclimation, appreciation? Am I any good at it? Insufferably no. So I start small…what does Melissa need from me today, what do my kids need from me today, what do my neighbors / friends need from me today? The list grows really fast…and by noon the list is long on support, care, encouragement, even action items. Love God, others, self …categorically means laying down my shit/stuff to make room for all else. Call it self-less-ness.

So there you have it. To let go of ego, or shadows, of shame, to let Christ in is the path to truly loving ourselves. When we truly love ourselves we see the kind of person Christ sees…we become fully alive in Christ we meet Christ where he needs us most in this world. When we do that we find as they all pointed out that we are more joyful and more complete than we ever thought possible because we are at the X where we and Christ meet to share the joyful wonderful news of God’s love for this world. A love that is meant for all people so all may know the feeling of being fully alive in Christ. Amen.