Das Kreuz: es gilt heutzutage für die meisten Menschen nur als Schmuckstück, oder als Abzeichen der christlichen Religion.  Aber das Kreuz ist in Wirklichkeit ein vielseitiges, vielbedeutendes Symbol.  In dieser Predigt schaue ich das Kreuz von 3 Seiten an: das Kreuz als Symbol der menschlichen Brutalität; das Kreuz als kosmisches Symbol von Leben, Tod, und Leben; und das Kreuz als Symbol der Liebe und Gnade Gottes.

1) Zuerst gilt das Kreuz, natürlich, als Symbol für die menschliche Brutalität, besonders für diese Brutalität in Verbindung mit politischer und militärischer Macht.  Falls wir denken die Römer hätten sich diese schreckliche Menschenqual ausgedacht, wurde die Kreuzigung als Hinrichtungsmethode zuerst von den alten Assyrern eingeführt -- in der Zeit als Rom noch ein kleines Bauerndorf am Tiber war.  Die Assyrer waren weit bekannt und gefürchtet für ihre gnadenlose behandlung von Eroberten.  Es waren die Assyrer, welche die 10 nördlichen Stämme Israels in Ketten abführten, zerstreuten, und diese zu den 10 verlorenen Stämme Israels machten.  Bei solchen Massenabführungen wurden die Gefangenen gewöhnlicherweise in Reihen gestellt.  Jeder bekam einen Ring durch die Nase, und ein Band um den Hals.  Die Gefangenen wurden dann zusammen gekettet, vom Halsband des einen zum Nasring des dahinter stehenden; Halsband zu Nasring, Halsband zu Nasring, und der lange Zug der Menschenmiserie abmarschiert.  Das waren die Glücklichen, die sich ohne Kampf ergeben hatten.  Wenn sie den Marsch überlebten, durften sie ihre Jahre irgendwo in einer fernen Ecke des Assyrerreichs ausleben.  Die Wiedersteher, dagegen, die gefangengenommenen wurden,  mußten einen brutalen, langsamen Tod leiden unter verschiedenen Foltermethoden.  Die Kreuzigung gehörte zu diesen Methoden.

Sechshundert Jahre später, guckten die Römer die Kreuzigung von den Nahostvölkern ab.  Aber die römische Machthaber verwendeten die Kreuzigung besonders als Strafe gegen Aufständische und geflohene Sklaven.  So lernen wir, zum Beispiel, dass die überlebenden Sklaven von der Spartakusrevolte vor den Toren Roms gekreuzigt wurden.  Oder, wir erfahren, dass einige Jahre vor dem Jesus seine irdische Arbeit anfing, der Pontius Pilatus 5000 aufständische Judäer beiderseits der Straße nach Jerusalem kreuzigen ließ.  Die 5000 Kreuze mit ihren langsam und qualvoll sterbenden Menschen, streckten sich 12 km lang.  Die stinkenden Leichen ließ der Pilatus wochenlang hängen, als Warnung und als Provokation: die religiösen Gefühle seiner Untertanen waren ihm stink egal.

Dass Jesus gekreuzigt wurde, heisst, dass er irgenwie als Rebelle galt, denn Sklave war er zweifellos nicht.  Ebenso die 2 Verbrecher, die mit ihm gekreuzigt wurden, galten für die Römer, nicht als einfache Verbrecher, sondern irgenwie als Aufständische.  Dass die Tempel Behörden für Jesus die Kreuzigung verlangten, heißt auch, dass sie dem Jesus besonders die Anklage der Untreue gegenüber Rom vorhielten.  Es ist schade, dass die traditionellen Passionsspiele, sowie manche moderne Filme, den Pilatus als ehrenvollen Mann darstellen, der sich gezwungen fühlt, bei der Unehrlichkeit des Hohenrats mitzumachen.  Das historische Bild ist ganz anders.  Rom musste den Pilatus am Schluss eben wegen seiner übertriebenen Brutalität nach Rom zurück rufen und ersetzen.  Nein, als er im biblischen Text behauptet, er finde nichts an Jesus, ist Pilatus nicht dabei, Jesus freizulassen, sondern ist er dabei, seine judäische Untertanen zu foppen und zu irritieren.  Das stimmt eher mit den anderen historischen daten überein.

Ja, das Kreuz erinnert uns an unsere schreckliche, menschliche Tendenz, anderen Menschen Qual und Leid aufzulegen, wenn wir dabei stärker oder reicher sein können.  Kein Volk hat nie zu solchen Methoden gegriffen; alle Völker haben irgendwann einmal oder öfters solche Schrecken angerichtet.  Kein Mensch bleibt total unfähig solches zu Tun.  In friedlichen und wohlhabenden Umständen können wir uns vieleicht einbilden, dass wir so etwas nie machen könnten.  Doch wie viele ehrliche Menschen haben über die Jahrtausende eben solche Schrecklichkeiten angerichtet, weil sie sich bedroht fühlten, oder weil sie dazu befohlen wurden, oder weil es im Moment sinnvoll schien, oder eben weil sie in der Lage waren solches zu tun?  Das Kreuz gilt uns als Warnung vor uns selbst; eine Warnung die wir zu oft vergessen.

2) Das Kreuz ist aber auch ein kosmisches Symbol.  Auf dem Kreuz Jesu kommen Leben und Tod und Leben zusammen.  Der lebendige Gott lässt sich von seiner Schöpfung umbringen.  Aber in seinem Tod ist das neue Leben verhüllt

. Die ganze Schöpfung erzählt uns eine Geschichte von Leben, Tod, und Leben.  Die Löwin jagt die Gazelle.  Die Gazelle stirbt.  Die Löwin und ihre Sippe leben.  Doch der Tod der Gazelle heisst nicht nur Leben für die Löwen, sonder auch Leben und Überleben für die anderen Gazellen.  Wir wissen, dass wenn Raubtiere nicht vorhanden sind die Anzahl der anderen Tieren in Schranken zu halten, so gibt es rasch eine Situation der Überbevölkerung.  Danach folgt bald der Mangel an nötige Närpflanzen, und darauf tritt die Hungersnot ein.  Anstatt alle Paar Tage eine Gazelle, sterben nun tausende auf einen Schlag.  Leben, Tod, und Leben.  Im Gleichgewicht der Schöpfung Gottes, heisst der Tod des einen, Leben für viele, wie auch der Tod Jesu, sinnbildlich gesehen, Leben für alle heisst.

Leben, Tod, und Leben spielen sich auf den kleinsten, und auf den größten Ebenen aus; in der Welt der Mikroben, und im Universum der Galaxen.  Sowie Tiere und Pflanzen, so auch Sternensysteme und Gaswolken im All.  Alles spielt seine Rolle im kosmischen Drama von Leben, Tod, und Leben.  Das Kreuz bringt all dieses zusammen auf symbolischer Weise.  Die 2 Balken des Kreuzes wirken als Kreuzung von Leben und Tod.  Der Lebensfaden wird plötzlich vom Tode unterbrochen, doch hört er nicht endgültig auf, sondern läuft auf der anderen Seite des Todes weiter.  Leben, Tod, und Leben.

3) Zum dritten steht das Kreuz als Symbol für Gottes Liebe und Gnade.  In Jesus geschah das große Mysterium des Kosmos, nämlich, der ewige, endlose, allgegenwärtige Gott, nahm unsere zeitgebundene, beschränkte, körperliche Form auf sich, und wohnte unter uns, wie einer von uns.  Das war kein Trick, keine Teuschung, kein Schein, sondern eben das unerklärliche Wunder des Gottes der alles wagt um unsere freie Willen zu sich zu ziehen.

Leute fragen oft, "Wie kann ein liebender Gott dies und jenes zulassen?"  Aber bevor diese Frage mit Intelligenz beantwortet werden kann, müssen andere Fragen zuerst beantwortet werden.  Gott schuf uns, und gab uns unsere eigene, freie Willen.  Aus Liebe für uns, zwingt Gott uns nichts auf, und, im Grunde genommen, verbietet uns auch nichts.  Wir können so handlen wie wir wollen, und leider heisst das allzuoft, dass wir einander mit Krieg, mit Folter, mit Enthaltung von nötigen Närmitteln, und der gleichen belasten.  Das ist unsere Wahl.  Wir richten das an.  Wir erfinden und bauen Maschinen die wunderbares und schreckliches ermöglichen.  Und wenn uns unsere Technologie entsagt oder gar zu gut funktioniert, so schreien wir, "Wie kann ein liebender Gott dieses und jenes zulassen?"  Unsere Autos bringen uns um.  Unsere Flugzeuge stürtzen ab.  Unsere Bomben bringen Menschen um.  Wo hat Gott je gesagt, "gehet hin und vernichtet einander durch eure Technologie"?  Das ist unsere freie Wahl, und nur wir tragen die Schuld für unseren Unsinn.

Aber Gott weiss einen besseren Weg.  Er ruft uns zur Umkehr.  Sein Wille bricht sachte durch unser Bewußtsein, und versucht unseren freien Willen von diesem Unsinn abzulenken, und auf einer anderen Bahn zu setzen.  Das Kreuz wirkt als Symbol für das Kreuzen von unserem menschlichen Willen, und den Willen Gottes.  Jesus hängt da, wo diese 2 Willen sich begegnen.  Obwohl wir die Anstifter des Leids sind, nimmt Gott diese Schuld auf sich.  Er ist nicht bereit uns zum Gehorsam zu zwingen, aber erweist uns seine Liebe, und sein Ernst in dieser Sache, in dem er selbst an diesem Kreuze stirbt.  In anderen Worten kommt uns Gott mit der verwandelnden Kraft der Liebe entgegen.

Die Liebe ist vor allem geduldig, und der ewige Gott ist äußerst geduldig mit uns.  Er übersieht die Menge der Sünden die wir einander anrichten, und beharrt auf das Gute das hier und da von uns betrieben wird.  Wo wir durch unser Handeln und unsere Technologien Leid anrichten, da sind auch wir Menschen und bringen Hilfe.  Nothelfer, Lebensretter, unbekannte Helden; Eltern und Kinder, Fremde und Nachbarn die versuchen einander das Leiden zu mindern und zu lindern.  Ja, diese Menschen verkörpern den Willen Gottes, ob sie es wissen oder nicht.  Gott ist die Liebe, und wo die Liebe gelebt wird, da ist auch Gott.

Im Kreuz sehen wir wie es hier und da dem lieben Gott gelingt, in unseren stuhren, selbstbesessenen Willen einzubrechen, und uns zu öffnen die Tiefen seiner Liebe und seinem Sehnen nach uns.

Das Kreuz ist wirklich ein vielseitiges und vielbedeutendes Symbol.  Es ist das richtige Zeichen für uns in dieser modernen Welt, wo so viel angerichtet wird, böses und gutes, und wo Gottes Liebe uns aus uns heraus ruft zum Leben in der Gnade und Liebe Gottes, so dass wir bei Gottes Programm mitmachen, aus dem Tod Leben hervorzurufen.  Amen.

Today is a day of paradox.  Today is a day of conflict.  Today is a day of hidden destiny and deceptive reality.  Today is the day when Jesus came one last time to Jerusalem to participate in the great Passover celebrations with thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands of pilgrims from across the Mediterranean world.

The three synoptic Gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, have set up their narratives so that this last entry of Jesus into Jerusalem marks a significant ratcheting up of the tension between Jesus and the religious authorities which will lead to his arrest and execution not many days after.

Underneath this is the historical reality of that time: Israel was a land occupied by an unpopular foreign power (Rome), ruled by puppet high priests and kings put there by Rome, and removed just as easily.   It was a nation divided: those who wanted to find some way to have a peaceful coexistence with Rome, those who considered cooperation a form of treason and blasphemy, and every possible position in between.  The common people, oppressed by high taxes, high debt because of those taxes, corrupt officials, and an absentee landowning class that seemed indifferent to their plight, were looking for a leader, a champion, someone to get them out of their bind and restore Israel the way God meant it to be: an Israel where every tribe and clan got its fair share of the land given to them by God.

Meanwhile, those who held power by the grace of Rome didn't want to bite the hand that fed them.  They knew what a revolt against Rome would mean.  It had happened only a few decades before: thousands of people nailed to crosses lining the road from the coast to Jerusalem.  Anyone suspected of stirring things up had to be neutralized as quickly as possible, without at the same time provoking the ire of those who were looking to that person as a potential Messiah.  It was a tricky, dangerous political game to save their own skins, and that of their loved ones as well.

If we see Palm Sunday only as a happy moment, a triumphal moment, then we have only seen the deceptive superficial side of it.  It is rather Jesus' entry into the jaws of the lion.  Jerusalem will destroy him.  He knows this.  For some time he has been warning his disciples that bad things are going to happen, but they don't understand.  But he also knows that he cannot sit on the sidelines and hide from confronting the powers that be.  In the battle of Good and Evil, Good must face its enemy, or it is not the Good, only the Scared.

But if we see in Palm Sunday only as a tragic mistake or maybe a tragically heroic choice, then again we have seen only human destiny in it.  It is rather also the working of God in the midst of the complicated world of our human politics, human power struggles, human choices, both passive and active.  Jesus knew that he was sent by God, knew he had to confront the Evil which caused so much suffering to his people, indeed, by extension, to the world.  But he did not come as a conquering hero, with sword in hand, and army at his command.  He came as the simple pilgrim, a teacher, a healer, a person of the Spirit.  This was a battle of hearts and minds, a battle of love over hatred, so he entered as only he could.  Yes, his fans tried to build him up, to surround him with honours and welcome as best they could in their poverty: palm branches instead of red cloth, their coats instead of a royal carpet, a donkey instead of a bejewelled palanquin.

But the donkey was Jesus' choice, a deliberate reference to the prophet Zechariah (9:9), where it says, "...your king comes to you, triumphant and victorious is he, humble and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey."  And then it goes on to say that he will put an end to war and bring peace to the nations, and that his dominion will be from sea to sea and to the ends of the earth.  Jesus chose to signal a mission of peace, but it was interpreted as a signal of war.

So at Palm Sunday we stand on a brink: we stand on the edge.  What Jesus had been doing is about to come to an end, and a terrible miscarriage of justice done for all those reasons we humans as a society do those things, is about to take place.  Palm Sunday is that knife edge, that dividing point, the beginning of a week we call Holy Week, with a day we call Good Friday, because we have learned from the witness of Scripture and the life of Jesus that holiness is found in human weakness, and Goodness triumphs even when it appears to have been defeated.  Come this week to live that story as we observe Maundy Thursday and Good Friday and walk with Jesus to the cross.  Amen.

Last week from John's Gospel we heard the story of the man born blind and how Jesus healed him on the Sabbath and what a kerfuffle that created.  At the beginning of that story, Jesus' disciples asked him, "Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?"  to which Jesus responded, "neither this man nor his parents sinned; he was born blind so that God's works might be revealed in him" (John 9:2-3).  Today we heard the story of the raising of Lazarus.  Near the beginning of this story Jesus says, "This illness does not lead to death; rather it is for God's glory, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it" (John 11:4).

In both cases the people in question (the man born blind and Lazarus) are said to be suffering from something for the purposes of God's self-revelation, or for the purposes of revealing God's glory in Jesus.  This raises an interesting set of questions for me.  What is it like to be chosen by God for a special purpose?  Is it wonderful and glorious, or is chosenness something that must lead to suffering?

Now let me be clear at the start here: I am not talking about the difference between salvation and no salvation.  Rather I am asking, what is it like to be chosen by God for a special purpose?  What does that look like?

As I scan through the long narrative of the Bible, it strikes me that chosenness is not a delight but an awesome and often difficult obligation.  Consider the following thumbnail list:

Abraham and Sarah must leave everything and go to a strange place to live as nomads...

Joseph must be sold into slavery and be imprisoned for trumped up charges...

Moses must leave the good life of herding sheep for his father-in-law to struggle, not only with the likes of Pharaoh, but lead a reluctant people for 40 years in the desert...

Samuel must be the bearer of God's bad news to his teacher Eli, struggle against the demands of the people of Israel for a king, and then end up bringing God's bad news to his first choice for king, Saul...

David must survive years of persecution...

Jeremiah gets imprisoned, beaten, imprisoned, beaten...

Jesus and the Apostles all get executed or exiled...

And of course, the man born blind and Lazarus found themselves in the middle of a very dangerous conflict between Jesus and the religious authorities, not to mention the fact that their chosen involved physical suffering in the form of blindness and temporary death...

It is interesting then that so many rulers, generals, conquerors, dictators, and ordinary people with big egos through the centuries have believed themselves to be chosen by God.  For them this seems to have meant that God was paving the way to them to get what they wanted: to be powerful, influential, highly regarded, prosperous, and so on.  But it seems to me that those who are really chosen become unpopular, weak, persecuted, sometimes downright destitute or dead in the course of following through on their calling.

So when I do a brief scan of the sweep of history since the time of Jesus, who do I see there that might really have be chosen by God?  what are some of the names?  Well, mostly they aren't the big names.  Oh sure, there is St. Francis and there is Mother Theresa who became famous for their simplicity of life and faith, and their integrity and service to the poor.  And there is of course Oscar Romero who was assassinated because of his commitment to the poor of his country.

But have you ever heard of Medardo Gomez, the bishop of the Lutheran Church in El Salvador.  He has not been killed, but he has had to endure harassment and death threats for taking a similar stand to Oscar Romero.

Have you ever heard of Elizabeth of Thuringia?  She was consort of the ruler of Thuringia at the time of the Black Death in Europe.  She used all her resources to build a hospital for the sick where she worked tending victims of the plague.  She contracted the plague herself and died.

But even those are the famous ones, leaders whose names get into history books.  I'm thinking that there must be thousands or millions of people whose names we will never know, whom God chooses to bring hope and help to places of suffering and despair, which means that they themselves suffer; or whom God chooses to challenge the powerful to see how they create misery, and who in turn become targets of the powerful; or who are chosen to proclaim Jesus in places where this means imprisonment or worse.  Those are the chosen.  We can see it by how hard their lives are.

So Lazarus is chosen to be someone through whom God's glory is revealed, someone through who's circumstances God works.  He is to die from his illness and then after four days, when his body has already begin to decompose, be resuscitated.  And, as we read, many came to believe in Jesus because of this amazing thing.  But as we read later, so many people came to believe in Jesus because of Lazarus, that the authorities decided that Lazarus also had to be put to death (John 12:9-11).

So is chosenness something that a normal person would seek?  Not really.  Like Jonah, it is something most of us would run from.  To quote Tevye from "Fiddler on the Roof": "Good Lord, I know that we are the chosen people, but every once in a while couldn't you choose someone else?"

On the other hand, sometimes when chosenness is put before someone, like Isaiah, they can also say, "Here I am LORD; send me."  It is the ability to set aside one's personal preferences and embrace the eternal; to see beyond individual desires to the transcendent movement of God through time and history, not only in the past, but right now.  May God raise up faithful workers to transform our world, and when God does, let us pray for them, because they will need all the support they can get.  Amen.

I am the man born blind, and I am the Pharisees.  I am the one who had to have my eyes opened to see Jesus, the Son of Man, and I am the one who will not see because I am already convinced of the rightness of my thinking.

In this powerful story of blindness and sight, we see John's Gospel at its best: using an incident out of the ministry of Jesus having to do with physical sight to teach a lesson about spiritual sight.  I think the story works on at least three levels:  It is compelling on its own, simply as a story, as a powerful piece of narrative; it is inspiring as a testimony to Jesus as the Son of Man; and it is a piercing critique of all of us who claim to have spiritual sight.

 It is on this last level that I want to reflect.  As I said, I am the man born blind and I am the Pharisees.  I am or was the man born blind when my eyes were opened and I first began to see Jesus.  When I was a child I had no formal Christian instruction.  My only training was watching the movie "The King of Kings" on TV at Easter time, and the odd reference to God made by my mother or grandmother.  I do remember one time, when I slept over at my friend Teddy's house, going with him to a Sunday School at a church on his block.  The teacher asked us to draw a picture of what we imagined God to look like.  I drew a man with long white hair and a long white beard (sort of like the wizard Gandalf) on a throne in the clouds, with yellow rays of light radiating out from him.  Another time, my Jewish friend Jac and I were sitting on his front step and he asked me if I believed "in that Jesus guy."  I said (based on the movie "The King of Kings" I think) that he was only the son of God, so he wasn't as important as God.

 I was blind.  I hadn't seen Jesus yet.  Then, one day, when childhood was about to turn to adolescence, my eyes were opened.  But you know, in retrospect, I don't think they really were.  Certainly I got more content about Jesus, and I learned that Jesus was central to Christianity, but I hadn't really seen him yet.  In fact, I think I didn't really begin to see Jesus until I was in my late thirties, and then only gradually.  I thought I saw, but really I was blind.  Was I worse off before or after that time in my youth when I convinced myself that I had come to see?  And so I am forced to realize that I am also one of the Pharisees -- those who claim to see but are really blind.

Jesus is always turning the world on its head in his teaching.  The first will be last; the forsaken are God's chosen; the religious people are the problem; hypocrisy is worse than just about any other moral vice.  So here too, those who claim spiritual sight are the ones who can't see, while those who think they can't see are the ones to whom sight is given.

This is a strong warning to me and to anyone who at all imagines that they, we, I have any kind of corner on truth, especially spiritual truth.  Once I've decided what I see or want to see, I have become blind.  One brain researcher once pointed out that the human eye and the camera are not at all the same.  A camera sees uncritically.  The shutter opens, the lens focuses, the image is burned onto the film or receptive surface.  The human eye, however, does not actually do the seeing; rather it merely focuses the image onto receptors that turn the light into signals which are relayed to the sight area of the brain where the signals are interpreted.  We do not see with our eyes, we see with our brains.  So when your brain has already decided what it sees or wants to see, you become blind to anything else -- no matter how good your eyes are.

That's what has happened to the Pharisees in the story.  They have made some theological judgments: Jesus has no status, no credentials, and does not hail from any known place of spiritual respectability.  He is a nobody, and therefore what he does is outside the pale: it is sin.  The man born blind who now sees must be a charlatan, a deceiver, who could actually see, but pretended he couldn't, because the nobody Jesus could not possibly have done the impossible.

Well, how often have I excluded a possibility, a spiritual possibility because I had already decided how things were?  How often did I write someone off because I couldn't see their side of things?  How often have I been blind to the working of Jesus in the lives of others, especially in others who don't see the world the way I do?

Yes, I am the man born blind, and I am the Pharisees.  I have needed to see Jesus, and I still need to see Jesus, because I don't think I have yet seen all there is to see about this Son of Man, this Anointed One of God.  To paraphrase Jesus, "If I were blind, I would have no sin, but because I claim to see, my sin remains."

Do you see what I'm getting at?  Amen.

This sermon is not so much about answers as it is about questions.  I'm going to be asking a lot of questions in order to get us thinking about how we read and use the Bible; about what we see in the Bible and what we get out of it.

Today's long reading from John is the story of Jesus and his encounter with the Samaritan woman at the well of Jacob.  It is a story that is full of meaning, full of symbols and metaphors and subtle allusions.  So how do you know that you've understood this passage?  How do you know that you've gotten at the meaning or the meanings in the text?

The task of the modern Biblical scholar is to understand everything there is to understand about the original language of the passage, the historical, cultural, sociological, anthropological, and archaeological background to the story.  And not just the story as such, but also the person who is likely to have written down the story, and that person's probable audience, and the specific period in which that person wrote all of  it down, and how far removed that was from the events described in the account, and therefore the difference in the historical circumstances between when the described event probably happened, and the historical setting of when the author wrote it down.  In other words, is there a difference between what the story meant to the disciples when it happened, and later when Jesus had been crucified and risen, and later yet when the church was coming under persecution by the Roman authorities?

It is a gargantuan task, and you can see how people can devote their entire professional lives to digging ever deeper and gathering ever more information (and hopefully also insight) in order to try to get at the original meaning, if we can ever really get at that.  But is the "original meaning" the only meaning?  Is any meaning that can't be pinned down to the original setting invalid, wrong, deceptive?  Does the Bible only "mean" to those who wrote it, but only indirectly to those who read it later?  Or does the Bible also mean without the reader knowing what the original setting was?  Can an ordinary person, without any scholarly background, sit down and read the Bible and have their understanding of it also be valid, correct, truthful, even if it might clash with the meaning agreed upon by scholars?  Is the meaning project the exclusive domain of the specialists, or can you and I read and be touched by the words of the Bible even if we lack the specialist's expertise?

I think a piece that often gets overlooked in all this is what the reader, what the interpreter brings to the text.  In other words, we often obsess on the question, "What is this text saying?" but forget to ask the question, "What is the reader, what is the interpreter bringing to the text?"  If I'm happy with life, won't I read text optimistically?  If life is a burden, won't I understand things darkly and despairingly?  Won't the farmer or the fisherman read the text differently from the nurse or the mother of a child with Down's Syndrome?  What do we bring to the text?

I'd like to share an interpretation of the first part of today's reading from John made by an anonymous commentator of the 10th Century (about 1,100 year ago!).  He lived in what we now call the Byzantine Empire.  He saw the following in this text:

Jacob's well is Scripture.  The water is the spiritual knowledge found in Scripture.  The depth of the well is the meaning, only to be attained with great difficulty, of the obscure sayings in Scripture.  The bucket is learning gained from the written text of the word of God, which the Lord did not possess because he is the Logos (Word) Himself; and so He does not give believers the knowledge that comes from learning and study, but grants to those found worthy the ever-flowing waters of wisdom that spill from the fountain of spiritual grace and never run dry.  For the bucket -- that is to say, learning -- can only grasp a very small amount of knowledge and leaves behind all that it cannot lay hold of, however it tries.  But the knowledge which is received through grace, without study, contains all the wisdom that man (sic) can attain, springing forth in different ways according to his (sic) needs. (Attributed to Maximos the Confessor, 580-662, but probably the work of  an anonymous "scholiast" of the 10th century who edited the works of Maximos.  Source: "Various Texts on Theology, the Divine Economy, Virtue and Vice" The Philokalia vol. 2)

The first thing you may have noticed about this interpretation is that it uses analogy to create meaning.  It was the favoured method of that time.  The second is that the main theme is all about knowledge and learning.  The person who wrote this was most likely a Greek monk steeped in the mystical tradition called hesychasm, with its emphasis on the direct experience of God through ascetical practice and contemplation.  One of the big assumptions of this tradition is that ordinary knowledge, what they called "discursive knowledge", the kind of knowledge we get from discussion, debate, study, and so on, is a lesser knowledge compared to the kind of "knowing", what they called "noetic knowledge", that we get from knowing God directly through contemplation.

So you'll notice that his whole interpretation of those first few verses from today's Gospel reading is all about this way of thinking.  From our perspective, he has read his worldview into the text.  I picked this interpretation because it is so different from what any of us would normally get out of this passage.  I picked it because it highlights how much a person's assumptions, a person's agendas, a person's preferences, a person's cultural context shapes how they read the Bible, and what they get out of it.

Now, was this 10th century interpreter wrong?  Did he miss the point because he didn't have the benefit of all the scholarship we are so fortunate to have today?  Or was this the right interpretation for him and for his time?  Was it only right for his time and context, or could it still be right today for us?  Or, does the actual meaning of the text of the Bible change through the ages, responding to each age according to its needs?

Martin Luther always insisted that one should first read any Biblical text for its simple meaning.  In other words, before you jump to analogies and symbols, just let the text say what it says, and receive it simply and plainly.  Then, when it seems that the text is speaking in symbols or images, you can move to that next level.   Well, it's pretty clear that Jesus is speaking in metaphors here.  He tells the woman that those who drink of the water that he (Jesus) will give them, "will never be thirsty" because it "will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life."  Now unless you think that Jesus literally meant that people will have fountains of water gushing up inside of them forever, then it is most likely that Jesus is referring to spiritual realities and not physical realities.  The water represents or points to something, and the drinking of the water that Jesus gives represents or points to something, and the spring gushing up to eternal life represents or points to something.

But in our time, our understanding of what we might call "spiritual realities" has become rather nebulous.  In the time of the anonymous commentator and in the time of Luther, the world and the universe were filled with spiritual realities, spiritual entities who had a real, concrete impact on people's lives.  And of all these, the most potent and powerful spiritual reality was God, present to people in the Holy Spirit.

Today we're mostly not sure what to do with the notion of "spirit."  When most people use the words "spiritual" or "spirituality" today, they seem to be referring to some vague emotional sensation, often derived from being in nature or being part of this or that group or movement or discipline.

So we are far more likely to interpret Jesus' symbolic or metaphorical words in psychological terms, even if we use the language of spirit.  "Spirit" becomes a kind of modern religious code word for "feelings" or "emotional health" or "stress management".  So, our interpretation might sound something like this: The water is what nourishes us.  Physical water nourishes us temporarily, but then we have to go back for more.  The water that Jesus refers to is the nourishment for our spirits which he provides.  His presence with us in our prayers and in our study of him brings life to our spirits; a life which never goes away. But the real meaning behind our words might be:  Prayer and the wisdom found in the words of Jesus can help you to be a healthier person; can help you feel better about yourself and others.

But is that a wrong interpretation?  Did we miss the mark because we no longer have the sense of the real presence of genuine spirit beings, influencing and shaping our lives?  Or does the Bible mean for us today in this way because it is able to speak to every generation in a way that makes sense?

Now I would be remiss if I did not include an interpretation of this text based on the assumptions of modern Evangelical Christianity.  This line of Christian thinking sees the primary purpose of God's revelation in Jesus as being the means by which we escape damnation and find salvation.  It is the line of thinking which first brought me into the church in an active way, even if it is a line of thinking I no longer embrace; or let's say, the words "salvation" and "damnation" do not mean for mean what they once did.

In this line of thinking, our text would be saying that if you accept Jesus as your personal Lord and Saviour, then Jesus, or the Holy Spirit, will become of source of spiritual life within you which will lead to eternal life.  Now again, I have to ask myself, is this a wrong line of thinking?  Is this a wrong interpretation?  Or is it right in the context of those who see the world in this way?  On the other hand, is it the only right interpretation, or is it one of many possible and equally legitimate interpretations?

I think it is here where we often stumble over each other: when we insist that we have interpreted the Scriptures correctly, and that all other understandings are wrong.  On the other had, are all interpretations right, or do some really miss the mark, regardless of the period in history or the social context?  Were, for example, the Crusaders right to read the Bible as a call to arms?  Or did they betray the spirit of Jesus?   Were the factions in the Reformation and in the century following, right to take up arms against each other, or did they make themselves into hypocrites by doing so?

Obviously to someone it seemed so right at the time; it seemed like the consequences of being faithful, even if today we shake our heads and wonder how they could have been so blind.  I can't help but think that somewhere there are outer limits of interpretive leeway, but where are those outer limits?  How do I discern them?  Who is my guide?

I said that this sermon was more about questions than answers, so I will leave you with the questions.  But I also realize that some of you will want something to take with you, some anchor to hold the ship, or some tent peg to keep the whole thing from blowing away.  For you I will offer this:

Christian doctrine at its best, and for me especially the Lutheran Confessions, is a guide, a lens to reading Scripture.  It is a corrective to keep us from going off the deep end.  It is the wisdom tested over centuries and found to have staying power.  It is the discussion of the community handed down through the generations.  If the questions are too unnerving and you need some answers, that's where I'll send you.  But when you're ready, please come back to the questions because too much certainty make a person haughty, but a good dose of uncertainty helps to make a person humble; and I think humility goes a long way to bringing us together as Christians and as humans.  Amen.

Recently I watched a documentary on TV about life in a typical factory in China.  It followed a young woman from a small village who, with her parents' blessing, heads off to the big city to find work.  It was a disturbing study in the nature of the Industrial Revolution, and the tremendous disconnect between factory workers and factory owners.  It really was like watching an adaptation of a Charles Dickens novel, set now in 21st Century China instead of 19th Century England.

There were many parts which I found disturbing, not least the fact that the workers, who normally worked about 16 hours a day, were often forced to work 20 hours in a day to meet the delivery deadline set by a clothing company in one of the prosperous western democracies (that would be us), and that because of the ridiculously low per piece price of the contract, the owner of the factory would often delay paying the workers for months on end.  China needs labour unions, but unions are illegal there.

But the moment which bothered me the most was when the owner of the factory, a former police chief turned industrialist, decided to have slogans put up all around the factory to prod the workers on to be more productive, slogans which said things like "Work harder at your job or you will be working hard to find a job."  The owner said he was doing what Jesus did, using slogans to urge his followers on.

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The Pharisee named Nicodemus came to Jesus at night.  He affirmed that Jesus was from God, but when Jesus began to speak about the things of God, Nicodemus could not understand what Jesus was talking about.  Jesus said to him, "What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit."

That moment with the factory owner comparing himself to Jesus because of his supposed use of slogans, hammered home for me the difference between knowing a little about Jesus and Christianity and God, and knowing Jesus, knowing Christianity "in your bones" so to speak, and knowing God.  It highlighted for me the deep division between knowledge as the storing of information, sometimes superficial, sometimes more extensive, and knowing someone, knowing something from living it, knowing God through having experienced God's presence in one's life.

What is born of the flesh is flesh.  What is born of the Spirit is spirit.  I think this difference has huge ramifications for any kind of dialogue or treatment of matters of faith.  Abraham, when he was first called by God to leave his home and clan and set out toward an unknown country didn't know very much about God.  The book of Joshua (24:2) tells us that when this invisible God, the one who later would appear to Moses as the God named "I AM," when this invisible God set Abraham on the path of coming to know God, Abraham and his father were serving other gods (we would assume the Mesopotamian gods worshipped on the tops of the great ziggurats).  God was an unknown, but Abraham came to know God.  Abraham probably had no theology or doctrine about God, but did come to know God.

In the tradition of the Greek Fathers, this way of knowing God is held up as being far superior to knowing things about God.  In fact faith, they will say (cf. Maximos the Confessor "Various Texts on Theology, the Divine Economy, Virtue and Vice" 111-113), is knowing God at a deep inner level, while knowing things about God, (in other words, theories and debates about the nature of God), actually distract or get in the way of this faith, this deep personal connexion to God.

I think sometimes terrible damage and disservice has been done when people have held forth about God and taken their stand on doctrinal matters when they haven't first come to know God in this intimate, personal, inner way.  But sometimes there is a breakthrough.  The great medieval theologian, Thomas Aquinas, who wrote the famous Summa Theologica, the grand systematic treatment of theology which now serves as the official theological foundation for the Roman Catholic Church, when he finished writing this work about God, he realized that all such speculation misses the point.  He said that his work was "all straw".  He set it aside and devoted himself for the rest of his life to prayer and the simple chores of monastic life -- to following Jesus as best he knew how.

So the irony is that the more one comes to know Jesus, to know God, the less one is likely to say about Jesus and God, at least in terms of insisting what other people should think about Jesus and God.  I think there is a shift in one's approach to evangelism, to proclamation, from wanting to get other people to buy into the information about God, to simply wanting to introduce people to God; from wanting to get people to "accept" Jesus as the Son of God, to simply wanting people to get to know this Jesus, and then to let that relationship run its course.  It's a subtle shift, but it makes all the difference in the world.

Because, as Jesus said to Nicodemus, what is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit.  Ordinary knowledge is just ordinary knowledge, but knowing God is an extraordinary kind of knowing.  Amen.

The story of temptation in the Garden of Eden: it is a fascinating story that carries so much meaning that after 2500 years of analyzing and interpreting it, the story still yields new wisdom to each new generation of readers and interpreters.  It is like a vein of precious ore which has been mined for millennia, and though now and again it looks like it's just about to run out, it suddenly produces more riches.

I find myself coming back to it again and again, mulling over its internal dynamics, discovering new details, finding nuances I had missed before.   When I read it in the original Hebrew it is clear that the authors and editors of this story chose their words very carefully, very intentionally.  There is no doctrine here, no simplified, systematized portrayal of some two-dimensional teaching.  This story is deep with the complexity and ambiguity of reality.

I would like to take another run at this story with you, but I must make one thing clear at the outset.  I do not believe that this is a story of two literal people who lived at some exact moment in our history.  I see this story primarily as a parable, like the parables that Jesus told.  Jesus' parables were not factual stories; they were not newspaper accounts of something that happened.  Rather they were stories, inspired by everyday life, but stylized and adapted to teach and unpack the truth of relationships: the relationship of God to us and of us to God and to each other.  I think this story of the man and the woman in the Garden is a story about the truth of being human.  To get at one aspect of that, I would like to begin with some paleontology and physiology.

We humans have the unique distinction of having by far the largest brain to body ratio of any creature on earth.  Our brain-body ratio is seven times the average for animals.  The next largest group of brains is found, not among the great apes, as you might expect, but among the dolphinid family of animals that includes the dolphins, porpoises, and orcas.  Their brain-body ratio runs about four to five times the animal average; the same ratio, roughly, which our ancient ancestors and relatives the homo erectus and Cro-Magnons seem to have had.

Our big brains are relative newcomers on planet earth, however.  The dolphinids I mentioned earlier, and their ancestors, have had this large brain-body ration for about 35 million years.  We have only had ours for about 2 million.  An interesting clue from the fossil record suggests that the dolphinids had a sudden increase in brain size about 35 million years ago, just as their bodies developed echolocation.  Given that other animals with echo location, such as bats, do not have especially large brains, it has been suggested that it wasn't the echolocation by itself that made having large brains advantageous, but the fact that dolphinds use their echolocation for communication.  A larger brain allows for more complex connexions in the brain, and therefore more sophisticated forms of communication, interaction, and thought.

About 2 million years ago, our species experienced a sudden jump in brain size, allowing for peculiarly complex connexions, communication, interaction, and thought.  This sudden jump in complexity meant that we could think thoughts that were literally unthinkable by other creatures, including the dolphinids.

In the story of the Garden of Eden, the humans have a choice set before them.  They can either remain as they are, and live in animal bliss in the midst of the abundance of the earth, or they can eat of the Tree of the Fruit of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.  The Knowledge of Good and Evil seems a good choice because it makes one wise and makes one like God.  However, the consequences of knowing good and evil are that life is no longer blissful, but rather life is complicated.  One no longer lives off the earth just as it is, but rather always imagines an earth that might be more abundant, food that might come more easily, life with less toil and more leisure.  As the book of Ecclesiastes puts it, "In much wisdom there is much vexation, and those who increase knowledge increase sorrow." (Ecclesiastes 1:18)  Or, as the modern proverb goes, "Ignorance is bliss."

It is interesting that the first outcome of gaining the knowledge of good and evil is that the two humans become ashamed or embarrassed in front of each other; which leads to the second outcome: they make clothing.  This, to me, is about human culture.  We have mores, cultural norms, and rules about dress, behaviour, and expectations.  The flip side of these is that there is always the possibility that we will not measure up.  Shame is the sense of not having measured up.  The story of the man and the woman in the Garden is a story about moving from an animal existence to a human existence.  It is the story of moving from naïveté to knowledge, and therefore to responsibility.  It is, in a sense, the story of going from a homo erectus or cro-magnon sized brain to a homo sapiens sized brain.

But this story also functions at other levels at the same time.  You see, the Biblical writers were wise not to try to tell a newspaper account of how the world came to be.  One doesn't learn a lot for daily living from that.  Far more important for daily living is the knowledge of ourselves and what makes us tick.  That's what this story is about: about us and what makes us tick.

If we can reason complexly, that means that we can also hope and dream complexly.  The serpent comes to the woman with carefully worded questions and assertions based on half-true assumptions.  "Did God say, ŒYou shall not eat from any tree in the garden?'"  Well, of course not, says the woman.  We just can't eat from that one over there, because if we do, we'll die.  "You will not die; for God knows that when you eat of it, your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."

Indeed, that was all mostly true.  What the serpent failed to relate, however, were the real consequences for having such knowledge.  Indeed, the man and the woman did die on that day, because how they were after the acquisition of the knowledge of good and evil was no longer the simple, animal-like, trusting couple who communed with the Divine in nature.  Instead they became complex creatures, tormented by questions of meaning and purpose, sensing the possibilities for something more and better, but somehow never quite being able to get there.

But the story goes further.  If we can reason complexly, that means that we can also fear and dread complexly.  The man and the woman become ashamed of themselves in front of each other, and they come to fear God.  They hide themselves in the bushes, hoping to avoid God's discerning eye.  And so an ugly game begins that we play all the time: the blame game.  When God asks the man where he is, the man betrays himself by immediately blaming the woman, even though God had only asked where he was.  The woman repeats the new pattern.  I'm sure you recognize the pattern in young children.  When you enter a room of children and ask, "Who spilled this?" they all shout, "Not me!" or "He made me do it!"  As adults we continue the pattern, though sometimes in a more sophisticated manner.  We hide behind ideologies or bureaucracies or work or circumstance or claim good intentions: anything to avoid taking the heat.  But all God asks for is "Yes, I did it.  I am responsible for my part in it.  I will go to those who have been affected and offer to make make amends.  Forgive me, O God.  Help me to forgive.  I pray that others might forgive me too."  Of course, that requires humility, a virtue that is often in short supply today.

But the story goes further yet.  If we can reason complexly, that means that we can also rationalize complexly.  The woman ate despite the explicit prohibition, because it seemed like a good thing.  The man ate, despite the explicit prohibition because he was afraid to say "no".  We will often make very wrong decisions or take very hurtful courses of action because we can rationalize to ourselves that it is all for a good cause, or that the consequences of saying "no" are worse than the deed.  The great genocides of the twentieth century were all done in the name of causes that seemed right and noble to the people who perpetrated them.  Many Turks thought they were saving their homeland from dismemberment by leading hundreds of thousands of Armenians to their deaths.  Many Japanese thought they were spreading their superior culture by slaughtering millions of Chinese.  Many Germans thought they were building a noble future for their nation by exterminating millions of Jews.  Many Hutus thought they were laying the foundations for a new order by hacking Tutsis and their sympathizers to death.  Many Serbs thought they were engaged in a righteous cause when they slaughtered those they called Muslims.  It happened in the centuries before.  It continues to happen.  It is likely to happen in the future.  Why?  For the same reason that we can do great things: our complex brains.  Really, the Bible already tells us that.

But where the story of the Garden of Eden lays out the challenge of being human, the story of Jesus in the wilderness, lays out the hope of a powerful and positive response to that challenge.  Jesus is confronted by three temptations or tests, which each in their own way echo and move forward what happened in the Eden story.

First, Jesus, who is fasting and praying, is tempted to prove he is the Son of God by performing a miracle which would also feed his hungry stomach: turning stones to bread.  But Jesus remembers that we do not live only on our stomachs, but also in our spirits.  This is the temptation of the easy way out.  We often look for the easiest way out of a difficult situation, or we look for ways to avoid the commitments we have made.  Turning stones to bread is a kind of picture of taking something that is really not meant for our consumption and rationalizing it to fill the perceived need.  For example, when students in university find that they have spent too much time partying and not enough time studying, they will look for quick and easy ways to get around having to read or write what they should have: summaries of books, pre-written papers off the net, some quick fix.  Rather than understand the importance of learning, they see only the grade.  But grades are not learning, and stones are not bread.  How often have you fallen into this trap?  But if you are self-aware, and understand that every decision you make adds or detracts from your spirit, your character, you may also be able to find the resolve to say, "I do not live by easy answers, but by God's presence."

Second, Jesus is tempted to prove he is the Son of God by making a spectacular showing of being rescued by angels.  But Jesus remembers that putting anyone to the test is arrogant, and most of all, putting God to the test.  This is the temptation of being important.  We often want to be valued and esteemed by others, and will do sometimes outlandish things in this quest.  Jumping from the pinnacle of the Temple is a kind of picture of an act of desperation in the drive to be taken seriously.  For example, I remember a situation many years ago when a young woman was writing love letters to someone I knew.  She poured out her soul to him, but he was really not interested.  Finally she threatened to commit suicide if he did not love her.  Fortunately for him, he was astute enough not to get sucked in.  She did not commit suicide, and he stayed single for several more years until the right person came along.  She wanted so desperately to be important to him that she was prepared to put him to a nasty little test.  How often have you put others to a test to see how much you meant to them?  But if you are self-aware, and understand that every decision you make adds or detracts from your spirit, your character, you may also be able to find the resolve to say, "God knows who I am and who you are, we do not need to test each other."

Finally, Jesus is offered all the power and wealth in the world in exchange for one simple little thing: turning his back on God.  But Jesus remembers that there is only one true God, and anything else that claims our loyalty is a false god.  This is the temptation of making the temporary, sometimes glitzy things of our physical existence into our god.  It is interesting that in this account the reward should be all the kingdoms of this world and their riches, because nationalism and the desire for riches are probably the two most common idolatries in the history of the world.  The problem with idolatry is that it puts you into a skewed relationship system with the universe.  When you make something in or of the creation into God, the interests and demands of that thing contaminate all your other relationships.  If it's nationalism, anyone who is not of your nation or friendly to your nation will be an enemy.  If it's money, anyone who gets in the way of you making money is your enemy, and only those who help you make money are your friends.  This carries over into any other kind of idolatry.  When God is really God in your life, then you keep being brought back to the realization that you and everyone else are of equal importance in the big scheme of things.  All are equal before God.  I know that many over the centuries who claimed to worship God gave quite a different impression, but I think if you examine their work carefully, you will see that though they said that God was their God, and though in their minds they really believed it was so, really something else functioned as God for them, such as power or influence or tradition or certainty or wealth or even their own egos.  As Paul Tillich, one of the twentieth century's most important theologians put it, "Your God is that which has ultimate importance in your life."  What have you made into your God, and how does that skew your relationships?  But if you are self-aware, and understand that every decision you make adds or detracts from your spirit, your character, you may also be able to find the resolve to say, "I put my ultimate trust only in God, the creator of all."

This story of Jesus in the wilderness shows that there is a way of being, a way of responding that addresses the complex reality of being human.  Because our brains are bigger, our relational challenges are bigger.  We can have a terrible destructive impact on people and the planet, but we also have the God-given capacity to transcend this and have a miraculously good impact as well.  The turning point for all of this is our relationship to God.  We know ourselves truly only insofar as we come to know God.  Self-awareness is key, and self-awareness is grounded in opening ourselves to the Divine.

Isn't it amazing what the story of the Garden of Eden reveals to us about ourselves?  Thanks be to God.  Amen.