{"id":3636,"date":"2024-03-24T11:00:28","date_gmt":"2024-03-24T15:00:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/?p=3636"},"modified":"2024-04-05T11:37:24","modified_gmt":"2024-04-05T15:37:24","slug":"breath-of-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/2024\/03\/24\/breath-of-life\/","title":{"rendered":"Breath of Life"},"content":{"rendered":"

Click here to hear the full service<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

Click here to watch the full service<\/a><\/p>\n

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Mark 11:1\u201311<\/a>
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Click here to hear just the sermon<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

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Preface<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

It is not so long ago that we greeted Jesus at his nativity, humming carols at home and lighting candles of hope in winter windows.\u00a0 It is not so long ago that we witnessed his growth in wisdom and stature, in the knowledge and love of God, while as a teenager he taught in the temple.\u00a0 It is not so long ago that this mighty young man Jesus stooped, fully human, for baptism in the surging river Jordan, the river of death and life.\u00a0 It is not so long ago that we saw him take up his ministry among us, preaching and teaching and healing.\u00a0 It is not so long ago that with Peter and James and John we saw him ascend the Mountain of the Transfiguration. \u00a0With him, we have hiked this Lent, step by step.<\/p>\n

Even beset as we are by climate, Ukraine, Gaza, political chaos and all manner of personal challenge, come Sunday we are delivered from captivity, from the power of fear, in the announcement of the Gospel. It is the word of faith that delivers from enslavement to fear. From separation anxiety, survival anxiety, performance anxiety, anxiety about anxiety. The good news carries us home, to the far side of fear.\u00a0 <\/span>It breathes into us yet again the breath of life<\/p>\n

In New England we do not often enough recall the Boston sages, like Holmes: Through our great good fortune, in our youth our hearts were touched with fire. It was given to us to learn at the outset that life is a profound and passionate thing. While we are permitted to scorn nothing but indifference.. <\/em><\/p>\n

Letter<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Life, the breath of life, a passionate thing.\u00a0 <\/span>With passion, today Paul writes, alone in prison. His own missionary work, as we can overhear from the length of Philippians, is under revision and redirection by others who claim he has failed in certain key areas. His own personal future is more than cloudy, including the possibility of death, and again, his ruminations in Philippians bear this out. He acclaims deliverance for the captives, you and me, a saving drumbeat along the river of life, breathing the breath of life. He has a sight line to the far side of fear.<\/p>\n

And, note, he is unafraid, this Apostle to the Gentiles, to quote his opponents.<\/p>\n

Philippians 2 sounds like a Gnostic hymn. Paul may have lifted and used it, because his hearers know it and because it suits his message. It is a plundering of the Egyptians, a use of the cultural language of the day to convey great tidings of good news. You need not fear. You need not fear. God has broken in upon our fear, and invaded this life with liberation to live fully and lastingly! God\u2019s beachhead is the cross. The cross is the presence of God in suffering. The cross is the love of God in suffering. The cross is the power of God in suffering, to free the captives\u2014to free every human being\u2014from fear.<\/p>\n

I wonder if we can recapture, by the imagination, Paul\u2019s decision to recite for himself and for his correspondents, a hymn to the faithful love of God that carries us over, to the far side of fear. Here is Paul.\u00a0 Here is the outspoken leader of a religious movement charged with atheism, with rejecting the gods of the empire. Here he is alone in prison. Here he affirms what can only be affirmed by faith,<\/em> the victory of the invisible over the visible, of God beyond the many gods, of Christ the failed messiah over the cross of his failure. He does so in measured, nearly serene tones.<\/p>\n

His attention is captured by the servant Christ, here so like the figure in Isaiah. To be a human being, for Paul, is to be captive under the control of malignant powers, to live in a world in which the human being has too often fallen prey to powers that are aligned and arranged against what is truly human. Yet, as one himself immersed in fear, Paul, seized by Christ, is set to singing in his prison cell. Maybe today, given our fears, we may hear something of his happy news. <\/em>Meditate this Palm Sunday on what in the past has brought you strength, what brings you home, what breathes life, brings the breath of life.<\/p>\n

In New England we do not often enough recall the Boston Poets like Whittier:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

I know not what the future hath of marvel or surprise<\/em><\/p>\n

Assured alone that life and death God\u2019s mercy underlies<\/em><\/p>\n

And so, beside the silent sea<\/em><\/p>\n

I wait the muffled oar<\/em><\/p>\n

No harm from Him can come to me<\/em><\/p>\n

On ocean or on shore<\/em><\/p>\n

I know not where His islands lift<\/em><\/p>\n

Their fronded palms in air<\/em><\/p>\n

I only know I cannot drift<\/em><\/p>\n

Beyond His love and care<\/em><\/p>\n

Gospel<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

It is not so long ago that we greeting Jesus at his nativity, humming carols at home and lighting candles of hope in winter windows. And now it is time to come down from Galilee and to face Jerusalem, to take the full measure of this Man, the Son of Man, and to have the courage to let Him take our full measure, too.\u00a0 The crisp air and vistas of the north country have fed our souls.\u00a0 But now it is time to head home, and turn our face to Jerusalem.<\/p>\n

The road home can tax the traveler.\u00a0 It reminds us of earlier homecomings.<\/p>\n

Odysseus walking the last few miles to Thebes.\u00a0 Socrates walking to the center of Athens and the cup of hemlock.\u00a0 Richard the Lionhearted sailing the English Channel, heading home.\u00a0 A prodigal son, scuffling up the last mile of country road toward a dreaded homecoming.\u00a0 You, returning at last to whatever you have long avoided, wandering as you have in the Galilee of the rest of life.\u00a0 For at last, there is the road home.<\/p>\n

What was Jesus\u2019 state of mind, what was on his mind and heart, as he entered the Holy City?<\/p>\n

It is perilous, even arrogant, at this late date and from this great distance, to try to imagine Jesus\u2019 state of mind as he descends the Mountain and enters the City.<\/p>\n

Albert Schweitzer, before he went of to heal the jungle sick, showed convincingly how inevitably errant are all such attempts.\u00a0For we paint our own inner lives into the life of Jesus, when so we try to see what cannot be seen in Scripture.\u00a0 Still, particularly at this point in his journey, on Palm Sunday, at the entrance into the Holy City, and on the threshold of his own death,\u00a0we are haunted, (are we not?) by the desire to see what Jesus saw and feel what he felt and sense what he did sense, coming home.<\/p>\n

Now Jesus is walking down into the city, down off the mountain, and down into the heart of his destiny.\u00a0 He is going to his grave.\u00a0 <\/span>He has the breath of life, but only for a moment. Like you and me.<\/p>\n

Some of the Gospel today, as Jesus heads home, is too true to be good.\u00a0 For He is not at home, not at home, in a world of injustice, abuse, violence, and death.\u00a0 For him, in such a benighted world, there is really no place like home.<\/p>\n

Jesus is heading home. As are we all, though, it seems sometimes to be a conspiratorially well-kept secret.\u00a0 We all are walking down the Lenten mountain and into our lasting, our last future.\u00a0 Every one of us is mortal.\u00a0 <\/span>We are going home.\u00a0 <\/span>We might want to balance our attention to identity with our awareness of mortality. We might want to balance our attention to identity with our awareness of mortality.<\/em><\/p>\n

Here are two possible but unverifiable sentiments in Jesus\u2019 heart and mind as he enters the city.\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

On one hand, it may be, he looks back upon his ministry and feels that he is homeless. He has found no lasting nest on earth, no lasting crib, no lasting domicile.\u00a0\u00a0 He has found opposition and rejection.\u00a0 He has encountered misunderstanding and criticism.\u00a0 To a harsh world he has brought a gentle manner.\u00a0 To a wolfish world he has brought the labor of love.\u00a0 To a selfish community he has brought the summons to service.\u00a0 To an inconsistent dozen disciples, he has brought the steady presence of peace.\u00a0\u00a0 He has not found a home, no home for Jesus, descending the Mount of Olives.\u00a0\u00a0 He has even said of himself, \u201cfoxes have their holes, and birds of the air their nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.\u201d<\/p>\n

And those of us who have been shot out of the saddle, riding for a righteous cause, as we dust ourselves off and bind our wounds, we do so in the best of company, in the company of the crucified, for whom, on this green earth, as yet, there is no place like home.\u00a0\u00a0 Today you may feel shot right out of the saddle.\u00a0 But let me ask you something.\u00a0 What other saddle would have rather ridden?\u00a0 Some losing causes are worth support even in defeat.\u00a0 I would rather be shot out of the right saddle than to canter comfortably all the live long day in the wrong one.\u00a0 So, dust off, bind the wound, and get ready to ride again.<\/p>\n

On the other hand, it may be, Jesus looks forward to his passion and feels that he is going home. \u00a0He is not yet home, but going home. He has the breath of life, yet, briefly. \u00a0<\/span>He has come and now he must go.\u00a0 He tarries for a while, but he is going home.\u00a0 There is something else alive in this homeless homecoming.\u00a0 Frederick Buechner compares the feeling of faith to the feeling homesickness, that longing for the feeling of home.\u00a0 Faith is a heartfelt longing for the comforts of home.<\/p>\n

Only the greatest of the Gospels, that of John, fully and resoundingly displays this sentiment.\u00a0 But it is present, muted, in Mark as well.\u00a0 Jesus must endure the cross, just as we inevitably must endure tragedy, accident, betrayal, injustice, failure and death.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 We have the finest of company, the Lord Jesus Christ himself, when we endure life\u2019s damaging darkness.<\/em><\/p>\n

Some have lost loved ones to death, this past year.\u00a0 Some of lost beloved institutions to death, this past year.\u00a0 Some have lost beloved dreams to death, this past year.\u00a0 Jesus walks beside you.\u00a0 Jesus walks beside you. In fact, this is his peculiarly chosen path, his way, his way of the cross.\u00a0 All of the passion, all of the passion music of Lent, all of it, all the way to the cross itself, acclaims, in passion, the compassion of God in Christ our Lord.\u00a0 God has a passion for compassion.\u00a0 God has a passion for compassion.<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0 So Jesus looks forward\u2014does he not?\u2014to the completion of his mission, to the last word in the soliloquy, to the transition to glory.\u00a0 Again, only John has fully held this diamond.\u00a0 Only he sees the cross as glory, without remainder.\u00a0 Only he has Jesus say, on the cross, \u201cit is completed\u201d.\u00a0 But Mark too senses Jesus\u2019 homesickness at his homeless homecoming.\u00a0 His longing for God.\u00a0 And we sense it too, because we feel it, too.<\/p>\n

Jesus on Palm Sunday, both homeless and going home.<\/p>\n

Some of the Gospel today, as Jesus heads home, seems too good to be true.\u00a0 This greatest of passionate tragedies, the cross of Christ our Lord, is the passageway, strangely, wonderfully, to our heavenly home.\u00a0 He dies as we die.\u00a0 And we die with Him.\u00a0 We all die.\u00a0 We are not even temporarily immortal.\u00a0 Yet, attendant upon this road down the mountain and into the city, there resounds, softly at first, a carol of grace, a carol of love, a carol for all, like we, who are going home.\u00a0\u00a0 And we are.\u00a0 Going home.\u00a0 <\/span>As my friend said, \u2018we may tarry here awhile, but we are going home\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n

This homesickness, this spirited sense that home is over the next street, up the winding trail to the cross, this hunger for home<\/em>, this is what Paul meant elsewhere:\u00a0 this slight momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison\u2026this slight momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison.\u00a0 <\/em><\/p>\n

Coda<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

So let us lift up our hearts. While we have breath, breath by breath, let us praise God with the very breath of life.<\/p>\n

To the question of evil let us live our answer by choosing the cruciform path of faith.<\/em><\/p>\n

Let us meet evil with honesty, grief with grace, failure with faith, and death with dignity. (Let us carry ourselves in belief).<\/em><\/p>\n

Let us affirm the faith of Christ which empowers us to withstand what we cannot understand.<\/em><\/p>\n

Let us remember that it is not the passion of Christ that defines the Person of Christ, but the Person that defines the passion.<\/em><\/p>\n

Let us remember that it is not suffering that bears meaning, but a sense of meaning that bears up under suffering.<\/em><\/p>\n

Let us remember that it is not the cross that carries the love but the love that carries the cross.<\/em><\/p>\n

Let us remember that it is not crucifixion that encompasses salvation, but salvation that encompasses even the tragedy of crucifixion.<\/em><\/p>\n

Let us remember that it is not the long sentence of Holy week, with all its phrases, dependent clauses and semi\u2010colons that completes the gospel, but it is the punctuation to come in seven days, the last mark of the week to come in 168 hours, whether it be the exclamation point of Peter, the full stop period of Paul or the question mark of Mary\u2014Easter defines Holy Week, and not the other way around. The resurrection follows but does not replace the cross. The cross precedes but does not overshadow the resurrection. It is Life, the Breath of Life, that has the last word and there is a God to whom we may pray, in the assurance of being heard: \u201cDeliver us from evil\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Click here to hear the full service Click here to watch the full service Mark 11:1\u201311 Click here to hear just the sermon   Preface It is not so long ago that we greeted Jesus at his nativity, humming carols at home and lighting candles of hope in winter windows.\u00a0 It is not so long […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2679,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[22],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3636"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2679"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3636"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3636\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3640,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3636\/revisions\/3640"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3636"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3636"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3636"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}