Listen to Him

Listen to Him

Rev. Dr. Tom Sorenson, Pastor

February 26, 2017

Scripture: Matthew 17:1-9

Let us pray: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all of our hearts be acceptable in your sight O God, our strength and our redeemer. Amen.

We’ve all heard it: “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.” It’s a quote of Acts 16:31, and for some reason it’s usually recited in that archaic, King James language. It’s been posted on a billboard on I-5 down north of Vancouver at least since 1970 when I first moved to the Seattle area. It is what became Christianity’s most common message throughout most of its history: Believe on (or in) Jesus. That’s what’s required for salvation. That’s what God wants from us. Just believe in Jesus. That’s the thing you need to do. Christians have proclaimed this message so loudly for so long that it has virtually drowned out any other message the faith might have. It says that just believing in Jesus is what is important in our relationship with Jesus. “Believe in him” here usually means take as factually correct that he is who the faith has long said he is, believe the right things about his identity. Accept as fact that he is the Son of God Incarnate. Accept as fact that he is your personal Lord and Savior. That’s it. Believe. Just believe.

Now, of course there’s nothing wrong with believing that Jesus is the Son of God Incarnate and that he is our personal Lord and Savior. I believe those things too. I take them as correct and as full of meaning for my life and for yours. My confession that those things are true connects me with God. It gives my life meaning. It gives me hope in a world that can so lead us only to despair. It gives me courage in the face of illness and pain, and it gives me courage even in the face of death. So yes, indeed. Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. It’s doing that which makes us Christians.

Now, that is indeed all very well and good. It is nothing less than divine, but there’s something else about that I always feel compelled to say. See, if Christianity is only about believing in Jesus, then Christianity isn’t about anything else. If all our faith asks of us is to believe in Jesus, then nothing about Jesus really matters other than that we believe that he is who our faith says he is. If believing in him is all there is to Christianity, then it really doesn’t matter what he said or did. It only matters who he was. Folks, I am convinced that if we really understand our faith we will find that there is a lot more to it than just believing in Jesus’ divine identity. What he had to say really does matter.

Which, for me at least, makes the story of the Transfiguration, which appears in all three Synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke), particularly striking. In that story, as Jesus is transfigured and talks with Moses and Elijah, a voice comes out of a cloud. Pretty clearly we are to understand that it is the voice of God. It says: “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased….” Matthew 17:5 NIV And then it says one more thing. The voice issues a directive to Jesus disciples, represented by the three who went up the mountain with him in the story, and through them to us. What does that divine voice say? Does it say “believe in him”? No. To what I imagine must be the chagrin of a great many Christians it doesn’t say “believe in him.” It says: “Listen to him.” Listen to him. In this story, and I believe in truth, what God wants from us is not only that we believe in Jesus but also that we listen to him.

And here’s the problem: Believing in him is so much easier than listening to him, at least if we mean by “listen” not merely hear but heed, which I am sure is what the voice in the story means. Believing in him is something that we can do just with our minds. Believing as it is usually understood here means merely giving intellectual assent to what the Christian religion says about him. That’s easy, once you make the decision to do it. You say: OK. I agree. I believe in him. And you’re done. You’re saved. No problem.

Listening to him, hearing and heeding him, now that’s another matter altogether. It’s another matter altogether because what he says is really radical. It’s really difficult. Here’s one big thing he said. He said that God is a God of justice. Not justice as due process. Justice as caring about and for all people. Justice as every person having the necessities of life. Not just a privileged few having them. Everyone having them. That means no one having too much. When some have too much, some don’t have enough. That’s what Jesus said. That’s one of the things God wants us to hear him saying.

Jesus also said that God is a God of radical nonviolence. We heard the primary texts on divine nonviolence in Matthew in our service last week. There are others, but I think we all know that Jesus taught nonviolence as God’s way. Jesus taught nonviolence because violence always hurts at least some of God’s people. Jesus taught nonviolence because people who resist evil violently usually become evil themselves. The voice on that mountain in the Transfiguration story said “listen to him.” That means, among other things, listen to his proclamation of nonviolence as God’s way.

Jesus said other things that we need to listen to too. He said God loves you. He said God loves each and every one of you. He said God forgives you. He said God forgives each and every one of you. Always. No matter what. Most of us probably find that part of what Jesus said easier to listen to than his calls to justice and nonviolence, but not everyone does. Some people are so trapped in self-doubt and even self-loathing that they can’t believe God loves them. That God loves them unconditionally. They can’t hear Jesus saying that, and they can’t accept it. They’re the ones we need to say it to most of all. Maybe some of you are among those who need to hear it most of all. Maybe I am too. So let’s listen to Jesus speak of God’s love as much as hear him speak of God’s challenge. Listening to him the way the divine voice says we’re called to involves hearing all he had to say, what we find easy and what we find hard.

Our world today needs Christians who will listen to Jesus and not just believe in him as much as it ever has. Our world needs to hear his call to justice. We need to hear his call to care for the poor and the marginalized. We need to hear and follow his call to love our neighbor, even when our neighbor is an alien or a stranger. We need to hear his call to peace, for the world is so torn by violence and conflict.

And we need to hear his word of God’s love. Far too many people today can’t love themselves. They can’t love themselves, so they lose themselves in a vain search for worldly success. Or in alcohol. Or in drugs. Or even in suicide. They can’t love themselves so they can’t truly love anyone else either. So they hate people who are different from them. They hate foreigners. They hate people of different faiths. They hate people who love differently than they do. They hate people who look different from them. The world’s great spiritual traditions all say that if you want to transform the world, start by transforming yourself. Jesus says that too, and God calls us to listen to him when he does. Start by loving yourself the way God does, for the Great Commandment says “love your neighbor as yourself.” Jesus taught and showed us that God is love. Let’s start listening to him, shall we?

This coming week we enter the season of Lent, starting with Ash Wednesday three days from now. Lent is a time of preparation for Holy Week, especially Good Friday, and then, only after Good Friday, Easter. This year may our Lent be a time in which we prepare not just to believe in Jesus but to listen to him. That’s what God told Peter, James, and John to do on that hilltop so long ago. That’s what God calls us to do today. So yes, we believe in Jesus. I believe in Jesus with all my heart and soul, and I hope you do too. But there’s more to being a Christian than that. There’s also listening to him. There’s listening to his call to justice, peace, and love. May God give us the wisdom and the courage to listen and to follow. Amen.