The Way, the Truth, the Life

I got a strange robocall this week, saying Pastor, you need to urge your parishioners not to vote for Donald Trump because of his pornography problem, his problem with infidelity, that he does not have family values. It was some woman, a mother of 10 kids, who homeschools them all… Never heard of her before. Was all of this true? Or was it a ploy by someone to make sure that Trump didn’t do well in the caucus yesterday? Apparently, it worked, here in Kansas. But it’s hard to know what is truth and what is not, especially in this season of debates.

            Many people will tell you who to vote for. If you’re a Christian, they say, you’ll vote for this person. But let me tell you, it’s important that you first understand the overarching message of Christ’s word and teaching, and then vote in accordance. I’m never going to tell you who to vote for. It’s your job to come here and let the Word of God wash over you, transform your heart and mind… then go home and search scriptures on your own, and understand it’s about how we bow down to our God as the one and only, and how we treat our fellow humankind. All truth is from God. There is some truth in many things, but only God is fully truth. And at the heart of our beliefs is this: Jesus was and is the Son of God, not just some good role model. He died on a cross, in our place, for our sins, a death he did not deserve. And he was buried and he rose again. He came back to life. And he lives, still. He ascended or went up to heaven, where he is seated next to the Father. That is the heart of the Christian message. That is the Good News, what makes us different from other religions. That is the way, the truth and the life for us.

This week, I was thinking about all the conflict in the world, both at home and abroad, and I thought, what if the Lord has allowed all these differences in opinion, and culture, and language, and skin color, and classes, and education levels—just to see how we will get along with each other? Whether we will learn to coexist by wiping each other out, or by listening and getting along, respectfully. By learning what’s important to each other. By honoring the value of each other’s lives. By understanding how much we have in common. At the end of our lives, will he ask us, So, how’d you do? Did you learn to get along? Or were you fighting and bickering and finger pointing, all the time?

We could bully each other, as the politicians are doing. these days. Try to intimidate each other. Call each other names. I wonder what God thinks of that. It’s sad when people feel the need to go down into the gutter with someone, to get on their level. But that seems to be the way of the world.

For some time, now, TV has been filled with shows where people actually say what’s on their mind. There are no consequences, because it’s TV, not reality. We’re confused about what’s reality, and what’s TV. Reality shows are really very far from reality. Because you can’t just go out into the world and say whatever comes to your mind. God gives us a filter, called our conscience, and our brain, and hopefully we THINK before we speak. Because our words have consequences. Just as much as our actions do. I don’t see it anywhere in the Bible where it says, just blurt out whatever comes to mind.

Likewise, we can’t just assume we know what we believe, as followers of Christ. We’ve got to read scripture, for ourselves. Or listen to it, on CD or tape. Because it’s not the most easy thing to understand. Some things are straightforward. Others, are not. And we’ve got to listen or read a BUNCH of it… whole books of the Bible, at a time. To get the big picture. If we focus on one small part, one or two verses, we’re not going to get the the full intent. We may just affirm what it is that we already believe, on our own. Make God into our own image. Now that’s a dangerous prospect. I believe that if we read scripture, and it’s not challenging?? if it doesn’t stretch us, then we may not have not read enough. We need to keep reading.

And don’t take someone else’s word for it. Don’t just listen to someone on the radio, who tells you what you ought to believe. Read it for yourself, then make up your own mind. Or rather, let God make up your mind, for you. If you’re not convicted by it, if the Lord doesn’t tell you what you need to be doing more of, and less of, then you haven’t read enough. So keep reading. We’re never gonna know what it really means to believe and follow, and what the truth is, until we read it for ourselves. And we shouldn’t sit back and rely on what we read 5 or 10 or 20 years ago, because we have surely changed since then, and the Lord may wish to show us something different, this time around. There may yet be another way he wants to fine tune our hearts.

So, don’t grow complacent and let your mind be conformed to evangelists on TV and the radio; let it be conformed to the mind and heart of God, of Jesus. For he is our way, our truth and our life. Go to the source. And then when you hear and see these folks, you’ll be better prepared and armed to say, now that’s not quite right. Now that sounds about right, but this over here, this is just wacky. Become a better informed citizen of the kingdom of God. Spend as much time on that as you do, figuring out who you should vote for. And then you WILL know who best to vote for. You’ll possibly see how far away many of these folks are, from the Truth, even though they might say they are Christian, and of God.

This is why I don’t get too jazzed or upset about politics. It’s necessary, and we ought to be informed, active participants in the process. But so many times, the options we have, just come up so short. And why do they? Because, as we heard last week, the kingdom of God is not of this world. It’s up to us to seek and read God’s Word, to abide in it, to let it take root in our hearts. To understand that this, and things like Holy Communion are how God gives himself to us, through his Holy Spirit. That the Holy Spirit desires to affect, and infect us, so that we can receive it, and take it out into the world. We can’t be looking for the world to give us what we need, folks. For only Jesus is the way, the truth and the life. Amen.