Endings and Beginnings.
Life is full of them.
You return from a funeral and have witnessed that for those grieving – an ending is a new beginning. When you come to a door – is that an ending or a beginning?
You finish school or university… or even confirmation and you walk away from those classes knowing that an ending is a new beginning. What about retirement? Relocation?
Whether we deal with endings or beginnings of relationships or other kinds of chapters in our lives – we are reminded to day that God is also there. God says in the Book of Revelation “I am the beginning and the end.” The beginning and the end.
So, when things seem like they are over – take a deep breath and look for that new beginning.
Jesus Did
I remember a rickety old screen door on a house that I once lived in. It had a big long spring attached to it. When anyone went out the spring stretched and then pulled the door back closed. It would go WHACK, Whack, whack, whack, whack…
In our Gospel reading Judas has just gone out the back door. They were having the last supper and Judas, knowing he was the betrayer went to go and do what he had to do. He left and before the screen door quit its whacking – Jesus began talking to his disciples about a new beginning in this ending. It is important not to drown in feelings, but to see things for what they are…
What was about to happen was an ending:
- He would soon be arrested.
- He would go to the cross out of love for us.
- He would bring forgiveness to us in a way that we could never accomplish ourselves.
- He would no longer be physically present with them.
But there is a new beginning. Now – you will step forward – is his message to the disciples. Now is your time. You have learned – now you will lead. How? By loving one another.
There was a time when I thought that Christians could be spotted because they had to wear white shirts and thin ties… and they would have thick lenses in their black-rimmed glasses… and they always had short well-groomed hair and wore those pants that stopped before the socks got started.
But I was wrong. I met people who didn't look like that at all – and they had time for me. They put up with me. They loved me and each other in such a way that God reached me through the way they were.
That – makes a world of difference to some people. What you do says something about who you are. That's why Jesus said that people would know that we are his disciples by our love.
To step forward and have time for someone…
To step forward and care for someone without getting anything out of it…
To step forward and help again even when they have hurt your feelings…
… is to love. And in order to DO that kind of love we need the support of others along the way. So Jesus tells his disciples to “love one another.” Because it is so important and because it is an action – he makes it his COMMANDMENT.
That kind of active love is only possible because the Spirit is with us – God dwelling among us.
An ending for Jesus was a new beginning.
Peter also had this experience
Peter had been travelling around and along the way had his own encounter with an ending and beginning.
The “church” at this point was mostly filled with Jewish people who had found their Messiah, their Christ. These were folks from a common background and tradition. They had certain ways of doing things that had been in place since Moses' time – like only eating certain foods that were called kosher. This remains true today for Jewish people.
Peter's vision showed him that he needed to stop seeing life in terms of “clean” and “unclean”... of “us” and “them.” This had to come to an end. And it did. He became involved with a Roman Centurion and his friends and family. These people had an entirely different background and totally different ways of seeing life – but were also spiritually searching. And Peter had Good News for them.
But when he got back to Jerusalem he was criticized for going to and eating with “them.” When he told his story, others realized that God was doing something special. This wasn't just an end to what they were used to – it was a new beginning. And they praised God.
Today we struggle...
In our Lutheran Church we are trying to meet people's needs. While we do this, life changes rapidly around us.
For example, the other day I sent out the draft Social Statement on Sexuality that the ELCIC has been working on. For some it may be alarming because some of our understandings of family, marriage, sexuality and so on are changing. But is this an ending... or is it a new beginning?
It depends on how we look at life around us. It depends what God might be doing.
The only way that we can ever have new beginnings with people is by meeting them where they are at. This is certainly true with former prisoners, with those who struggle with mental illness, the lonely, the shut-in, those in hospices.
Few people will have the energy or courage to try and measure up to whatever standards that they think we might have.
So instead – we meet people where they are at – like Jesus did, like Peter did -- we love one another, support each other, and….
- Love takes us to them
- Love helps us to listen
- Love creates safe space for others
- Love helps us to laugh
- Love joins our hands with them on their journey
Peter knew this when he walked into that Roman officer's home.
“I am the beginning and the end” God says. Where we are (end or beginning) depends on how you look at it. Every end can be a new beginning.
Remember the cross? Amen.
