Immigrant Story

Just a couple of weeks ago I finished my summer course Christian Leadership and Administration. One of the books I read for the class was written by a pastor who talked about the pastor as a church leader. Naturally, coming from a pastor, talking about pastors, the author threw in a chapter about preparing and preaching sermons. Since I just completed two classes on preaching over two semesters, I believed I had learned everything to know about preaching, so I skimmed over the chapter instead of reading it in depth. Through my skimming, I did notice one piece of advice he gave that I liked, I have adapted, and I will use right now. He said that any time a pastor preaches a sermon out of the ordinary, the pastor should give a disclaimer, just in case if any visitors were present, they would not get the wrong idea about the church or the pastor. So let me put my disclaimer in here. I do not preach politics from the pulpit. I do not like pastors that do preach politics from the pulpit. I do not attend churches that preach politics from the pulpit. I seek only to speak biblical, theological and spiritual truths from the Word of God. Due to current events in the world of politics, however, I can see this message coming across as a political statement. I want to make clear this in no way is a political statement. In fact, when the current event came out, I considered totally scrapping this sermon and starting anew. After thinking about it, I chose not to, however, because maybe the current event will make this sermon more relevant and more applicable.

If you are unaware of what current event I’m referring to, let me fill you in. One of the televisions at work is set to CNN. CNN has informed me that the 2016 Presidential race is well under way…even though it’s only 2015. On the Republican side, one of the first men to announce his candidacy is Donald Trump, a man famous for building skyscrapers and firing celebrities on his reality show. Trump decided to kick off his presidential bid by announcing his plan for immigration reform. In his speech, he said this about Mexican immigrants (and once again, I will add a disclaimer that many television networks say: the views of Mr. Trump do not reflect my views)-

“The U.S. has become a dumping ground for everybody else’s problems... It’s true, and these are the best and the finest. When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best. They’re not sending you. They’re not sending you. They’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with us. They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.”

 

Naturally, comments like that will result in fall out. Upon hearing the comments, the U.S. territory Puerto Rico dropped out of the Donald Trump’s Miss Universe beauty pageant. Soon after, many Latin American countries followed suit. At the same time, since Donald Trump has announced his presidential run, his rating rises every day. Some polls even have ranked Donald Trump has the number one choice for Republicans in the presidential race. Some political analysts give Donald Trump’s comments credit for shooting him up in the political race. How does someone make such comments, and yet still remain so popular?

But as the preacher in Ecclesiastes said, there is nothing new under the sun. This current event reminded me of a personal experience I had in fall 2009, as I began my third year at Lancaster Bible College. The past summer I decided to change my major from Bible Ministry to Bible Education. While all my Bible credits transferred without any problem, because I had to start brand new in the education department, I found myself, a junior, sitting in many education classes with first-semester freshman. One such class was The Teaching Profession, the fancy name that LBC gave its Intro to Teaching class. A few weeks into the class, we came across the chapter in our textbook called “Race and Ethnicity in the Classroom.” While the textbook was a few years old, my professor did an excellent job keeping the statistics up to date. She reported that by the 2020s decade, even by the year 2020 itself, that the races and ethnic groups that have been defined as the “minorities” in the U.S. will become the majority, quantity-wise, in the classroom. It’s also possible that by 2020, 50% of students will speak English as a secondary language, and 10% will not even know English at all. My professor asked the classroom for any reaction; any thoughts or feels this news provoked. My reaction was surprise, not at what the teacher taught, but how my classmate reacted. Their reaction was shock, fear, anger, horror, terror. It was as if some great evil had fell upon this country and something needing to be done about it. Now, granted, these students were freshmen in their first semester of college. They had not received their Bible or theology courses yet. But from hearing their testimonies the opening week of class, I knew most of the students were your “typical church kids.” They have attended church since one week old, attended Sunday School and Vacation Bible School since 3 years old, and both regularly attended and been actively involved in both Jr. High and Sr. High youth group. Not once did a pastor, youth pastor, youth group leader, Sunday School teacher or Bible School teacher present what the Bible said. For the Lord talks about it at least five times explicitly in the Bible. Luckily for them, the professor had me doing devotions next class. Since devotions had to do with what we were learning in class, I had the perfect opportunity to share what God had say about race, ethnicity and immigrants. Today, I would like to share them with you. Back then, I only got a few minutes, so all I could do was simple present a couple verses and tie them together. Now, I want to expand on these verse. From a literal, plain reading of the verses, it will be clear where God stands on this. But when we look back on the original context, the historical context and the cultural context, the meaning behind these verses become even stronger.

Let’s take our first look at the first appearance in Exodus 22:21. While you’re turning there, since I know many of you use different Bible translations, let me explain the one word that will appear different depending on your translation. The Hebrew manuscripts have the word ger. The New American Standard Bible (NASB), the King James Version (KJV), the New King James Version (NKJV) and the Revised Standard Version (RSV) all choose to translate the word as “stranger.” This translation is a little out of date, and it makes sense, if you think about it logically. Later on, the verses call the Israelites ger in the land of Egypt. After residing in Egypt over 400 years, it’s hard to call any person a stranger. Heck, the Israelites might have even known the land better than the Egpytians knew it! So the Israelites are far from strangers. The 1984 edition of the New International Version (NIV, 1984 ed.) calls them aliens. But thanks to the rising popularity of science fiction, which you can thank the space race in the late 20^th century for that, the modern-day reader could confuse the Israelites for Martians or extraterrestrials. Talk about the confusing theology that would produce! So the 2011 edition changed the word from “aliens” to “foreigners,” which most other Bible translations also choose. I personally think this is arguing semantics. They could say the word “alien” makes people think that the Isarelites or Martians or extraterrestrials, but I could say that the word “foreigner” makes people think the Israelites were in a 70’s rock band. (And then when I read the Israelites were on a journey, I could think the Israelites were in an 80’s rock band.) The best translation is probably what the English Standard Version (ESV) chooses, the word “sojourner.” But you will hear me use stranger, sojourner, alien and foreigner all interchangeably. Just promise when you hear “alien,” you won’t think of Martians or extraterrestrials, and when I say “foreigner” you won’t think of any 70’s rock band (although, for your entertainment, I will later make a bunch of Foreigner references. See you if can catch them all.)

The Lord first mentions how to treat foreigners in Exodus. Actually, God mentions twice. In Exodus 22:21, the Lord commands, “You shall not wrong a sojourner or oppress him, for you were sojourners in the land of Egypt.” God commands it again in Exodus 23:9, “You shall not oppress a sojourner. You know the heart of a sojourner, for you were sojourners in the land of Egypt.” You’ll notice many similarities in these verses. So why would the Lord repeat the command, so close to one another? The literary context, on its spot within the text, might explain. Since Exodus 22:21 is so close to the Ten Commandments, Exodus 22:21 might be seen as an expansion of the Ten Commandments. If the Ten Commandments can be summed up as, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might” and “Love your neighbor as yourself,” then Exodus 22 explain in detail how to love the Lord your God with all your heart and soul and might and how to love your neighbor as yourself. Then Exodus 22:21 reminds us that the sojourner is our neighbor, and we need to love the sojourner as our neighbor. In Exodus 23:1-9, God teaches Israel how to execute justice in the court systems. Exodus 23:9 teaches Israel that justice must extend to the foreigners living among them, even though they are not Israelites.

But take a close long at the big, glaring similarity, Every time the Lord says, “for you were sojourners in the land in the Egypt.” The Lord calls the Israelites back to remember their history.

Do you remember Israel’s history? I bet many of you do because you grew up in church. So for you, I will quickly fast forward with an abridged version of Israel’s history, only highlighting the important details that led up to God giving Israel this commandment. But if you haven’t, please do, for it’s a wonderful story of God blessing his people Israel as they struggle to comprehend God’s holiness for their lives. The story of how Israel got to God giving them commandments on Mount Sinai begins in the book of Genesis, with a man name Joseph. At the age of 17, Joseph starting having weird dreams that told him that his brothers would bow down to him. As you older siblings can imagine, these dreams did not go over well with Joseph’s brothers. They wanted to kill him, but Reuben, the firstborn, did not want that bloodshed on his hands, so they sell into slavery in Egypt. Long story short, Joseph lands in jail. There, he uses his experience with dreams to help interpret the dreams of those in jail with him. News of experience in dreams reaches Pharaoh, who is having some pretty crazy dreams himself. He brings Joseph to him and says to him, “I’ve been having some pretty weird dreams. I’ve seen 7 skinny cows eat 7 fat cows, and I’ve seen 7 sick heads of grain eat 7 healthy heads of grain. And it’s starting to freak me out, since cows don’t eat each other and heads of grain don’t eat each other. What does it mean?” Joseph explains to Pharaoh, “Oh, this is easy! 7 fat cows and 7 healthy heads of grain mean 7 years of plentiful harvest. 7 skinny cows and 7 sickly heads of grain mean 7 years of famine. When the skinny cows eat the fat cows, and the sickly heads of grain eat the healthy heads of grain, it means the famine years will be so bad, it will be like the plentiful years did not even happen! If I were you know, I would save and store up all your extra in the plentiful years so you will be alright during the famine years. Pharaoh replies, “You sound like you know what you’re doing, so I’ll put you second in change of all Egypt so you will have all the power to do what you need to do to save Egypt.” Sure enough, Joseph’s planning saves Egypt from starving to death. But from the story in Genesis, we learn that the famine affected all the Middle East, including Joseph’s family back in Canaan. Joseph’s brothers, hearing how Egypt is surviving, decide to go to Egypt to see if they can get any food. Once again abriding the story, Joseph eventually reveals to his brothers his identity, and he says to them, “No more of this going back and forth for food. You come live with me in Egypt, and I will take care of you.” While the book of Genesis ends with the death of Jacob and Joseph, it ends on a fairly happen. Jacob’s descendants are living in peace and happiness in Egypt, enjoying plentiful blessings.

Then comes the book of Exodus. In the first chapter of Exodus, verse 8, the tides begin to turn. Verses 8 to 10 read, “Now there arose a new king over Egypt, who did not know Joseph. And he said to his people, ‘Behold, the people of Israel are too many and too mighty for us. Come, let us deal shrewdly with them, lest they multiply, and, if war breaks out, they join our enemies and fight against us and escape from the land.’” How could this new king not about the man who single-handedly, with God’s help, save a whole nation? It’s not that he does not have knowledge about what Joseph did, but he does not recognize Joseph for what he did, and here’s why. Now what I about to say does not appear in the Bible, per se, but Old Testament scholars have teamed up with historians who specialize in Ancient Egyptian history and archaeologists who specialize in ancient Egyptian archaeology. Together, they have matched up their timelines, and they believe what is happening here is not just a change in kings, but also a change in dynasty. They believe that previous king was half-Egyptian, half-semetic, or half of him was Middle Eastern. So when Joseph, another semite, asks for permission to move his family into Egypt, he has no problem letting another semite like him into the country, for he’s partially blood related. But then a new king, from a new dynasty comes into power. He’s pure-bred, 100% full Egyptian. After a tumultuous change of power between the two families in the Egyptian kingdom, the new king does not like semites, nor does he like any foreigner for that matter. So when calls together his people, the other pure-bred, 100% full Egyptians, I can imagine him saying to his people, “Look, this is a great nation. But do you know what’s ruining this country? Immigrants. Egypt is for Egyptians, not for any foreigner to steal from our success. We’re better than them, so let them work to give to us, instead of us working to give to them.” I think that’s why the new Pharaoh enslaves them instead of kicking them out. Pharaoh sees they are a blessed people, Pharaoh wants that blessing, but Pharaoh knows losing the people of Israel means losing the blessing. So he enslaves them. Even through their enslavement, Israel continues to receive blessing after blessing from God, making the people of Israel even greater, and making the new Pharaoh even more nervous. So he then proceeds to kill the baby boys.

But God hears the Israelites crying out in their oppression, and He has compassion on them. So God sends Moses to tell Pharaoh, “Let my people go!” Pharaoh says no, so God sends 10 plagues to change Pharaoh’s mind. After the first 9 plagues, Pharaoh remained as cold as ice. Sometimes he was even hot blooded. But after the 10^th plague, on that blue morning,blue day, Pharaoh finally got the message at let the people go. But Pharaoh wasn’t happy about that. He became cold as ice yet again. So Pharaoh sent the whole Egyptian army to retrieve the Israelites and bring them back. The army was so big, when the Israelites saw them, they must have thought they had double vision! Moses thought fast and prayed, “Lord, this is urgent!” and God answered their prayers. If Israel wanted to know what love is, they found out what love is from God on that day, when God showed compassion on them yet again and rescued them from the Egyptians yet again. It must have felt like the first time, when the Lord first took them out of Egypt. (Did you catch them all? J )

So God brings them to Mount Sinai, and the first thing the Lord reminds them at Mount Sinai is what just happened. It is as if the Lord is saying to his people, “Remember what was it was like to be an alien in a foreign land? Remember how they worked you from sunrise to sunset, every day of the week? Remember how they work you harshly and brutally until you were sick and dying? Remember how you wished that someone showed you compassion, and if on the rare occasion someone did, how happy and relieved you were? I want you to remember those feelings. Then remember that’s the heart, too. You wish you were treated with love and compassion, so treat the foreigners among you with love and compassion.” The Israelites would need to practice their compassion to foreigners right away. Exodus 12 informs that not only did the Israelites leave, but also a mixed multitude of Egyptians and other foreigners. I can imagine the foreigners from other nations coming to Moses, saying, “We prayed to our gods to save us, and they never did. Your God came and saved you, so we want to follow your god, for he saves his people.” The Israelites would need to remember give the same rights and respect as any Israelite. The Israelites would need to especially practice this for the Egyptian among the multitude that went with them. Once again, I imagine Egyptians coming to Moses, saying to him, “We clearly saw our gods defeated by your god with the 10 plagues. Our gods are weak, but your God is strong. We want to worship him.” The Israelites might be tempted to seek revenge. They might want enslave the Egyptians, for the Egyptians enslaved them. They might want to kill their Egyptian baby boys, for the Egyptians killed the Israelite boys. The Lord ends the desire for revenge right here. The Egyptians living among them get treated with the same right and respect as any Israelites. They are to be treated with love and compassion, not revenge. If any Israelite wants to object to God’s command, God will keep calling them to remember their history.

On the same Mount Sinai, the Lord present to the Moses and the Israelites the laws found in the book of Leviticus. In Leviticus, God commands Israel once again, “When a stranger sojourns with you in your land, you shall not do him wrong. You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God.” Once again, God reminds Israel of their history, strengthening the command through the historical context, but God also strengths through the literary context and the cultural context. The book of Leviticus is all about holiness. The word “holy” (or some form of it) is the most repeated word in book, probably due to God repeatedly commanding Israel, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.” I’ve already given you your Hebrew word for the day, so I’m not going to give you another one, but the root of the Hebrew word is derived from the root meaning “set apart.” What makes God so holy, so righteous, so good is that he thinks, speaks and acts differently than the other gods of the other nations. Therefore, it makes logical sense that if the Israelites are to be holy like God is holy, and if Yahweh is holy because he thinks, speaks and acts differently than the other gods, then the worshippers of Yahweh must also think, speak and act differently than the worshippers of the other gods. One of those ways they can act differently than the other nations is to treat the alien within their land differently.

To fully appreciate how this commandment does that, you have to understand how most nations of the ancient Middle East treated its foreigners. An alien in a foreign land was given no rights, nor was a native given any obligation to treat an alien with respect. On the contrary, it was common for the sojourner to be exploited and extorted. If a sojourner dared to attempt to go to court over such injustice, rarely would a judge hear the case. If he did, the judge would most often favor the native over the foreigner. More often, the native would bring the foreigner to court, and the foreigner would fight a uphill battle, only to lose. If anyone showed any charity to a sojourner, it was out of the kindness of his or her heart. The Holy God, Yahweh, wanted his people, Israel, to be holy by living contrary to this culture. Notice how Leviticus 19:34 contains a form of that famous 2^nd greatest command, “Love them as yourself.” The Israelites would have known that command and would have made the connection that the foreigner living in their land is still their neighbor. Therefore, God commands them to love the foreigner. In a world that exploited and extorted the foreigner, the Lord commands his people to love and to show compassion to the foreigner. In a world that showed favoritism to the native over the sojourner in the courts, the Lord wants Israel to reflect God’s justice by bring equality and fairness in the court. By doing so, Israel will love the foreigner like God loves the foreigner, and therefore, Israel will be holy like God is holy.

And might I quickly add a tidbit of application for the 21^st century American. If you are anything like me, you might start to get nervous when people start talking about holiness. You worry it might lead to legalism, and people will start judging other people for not following do’s and do not’s to the letter. But note here how God links up holiness and love. If Israel wants to pursue holiness, they have to learn to love everyone, including the sojourner. So the pursuit of holiness involves the pursuit of love. If in your pursuit of holiness, you are not loving, then you’re not pursuing holiness.

The Lord repeats the command again in Deuteronomy. If you know the original audience, then it becomes clear why God has to repeat the command. The name of the book, Deuteronomy, literally means “second law.” The Lord has to give the Law a second time because this is the second generation of Israelites after the Israelites who came out of Egypt. The new generation of Israelites might be tempted to say, “Lord, I understand why our parents had to be kind to the sojourner. I get that. But I was never a slave. Therefore, you can’t use that defense against me.” The Lord would disagree. The Lord once again says, “You shall remember that you were a slave in Egypt and the Lord your God redeemed you from there.” God even uses in the Hebrew the plural version of you. Our brothers and sister in Christ down south would read it “y’all shall remember that y’all were a slave in Egypt and the Lord your God redeemed y’all from there.” It is a part of Israel’s history for all generations, so all generations must obey this command. But I want to look at Deuteronomy for another reason. The Lord expands on how to love the sojourner among them. Take a look at Deuteronomy 24:14-15,17-22-

“¹⁴ “You shall not oppress a hired worker who is poor and needy, whether he is one of your brothers or one of the sojourners who are in your land within your towns. ¹⁵ You shall give him his wages on the same day, before the sun sets (for he is poor and counts on it), lest he cry against you to the Lord, and you be guilty of sin. ¹⁷ “You shall not pervert the justice due to the sojourner or to the fatherless, or take a widow’s garment in pledge, ¹⁸ but you shall remember that you were a slave in Egypt and the Lord your God redeemed you from there; therefore I command you to do this. ¹⁹ “When you reap your harvest in your field and forget a sheaf in the field, you shall not go back to get it. It shall be for the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow, that the Lord your God may bless you in all the work of your hands. ²⁰ When you beat your olive trees, you shall not go over them again. It shall be for the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow. ²¹ When you gather the grapes of your vineyard, you shall not strip it afterward. It shall be for the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow. ²² You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt; therefore I command you to do this.
 

Notice how God keeps pairing the sojourner with the widows and the fatherless (orphans in the NIV). God puts them in the category of the poor and helpless. This is a helpful reminder for us Americans, who are the 1% wealthiest in the world. When we move from one country to another, it’s because we love the geography or the culture of the new nation over the old nation. That was rarely the case back then. Back then people moved from country to country because of some great disaster or tragedy back in their home country. It could be famine, war or political unrest. The disaster would destroy their homeland, leaving them nothing. They are left with no other choice than to start brand new in a country and a new homeland. And they didn’t have U-Haul back then. If they could afford a cart, they fill the cart to maximum capacity, and that’s all they took. If they could only afford one horse, donkey or camel, they loaded its back to maximum capacity, and that’s all they took. But if they could not afford either a cart or an animal, all they took with them is what they could load on their back. They had to start in their new land with little to nothing. They came to the new land poor and helpless. God wants his people to recognize this. Therefore, showing the sojourner love is to show the foreigner grace. The Israelites can show the sojourner by providing the foreigner the leftovers of his harvest.

Now when Pastor Rob Bell reads this passage, he imagines the Israelites saying, “That’s not fair! I planted the crops, I watered the crops, I took care of the crops, therefore, I should get the fullest of the harvest!” Therefore, Rob Bell concludes that grace is unfair (in a positive connotation). I’m not sure I would call it unfair. Maybe undeserving, but not unfair. Rather, I would say that grace returns the unfair to the fair. God questions the Israelite who thinks this is unfair, “Do you think it’s fair that the widow lost her husband and now has no income? Do you think it’s fair that the orphans have no parents, who can’t provide the basic necessities from food and water to love and support? Do you think it’s fair that the sojourner had to leave his home and most of his possessions to travel to a new a strange land?” That Israelite has to quietly answer “No.” God calls Israel to show grace to share the pain. The Israelite can say, “Here, I will give to you, taking loss, so I can feel the pain of loss like you are feeling.” The Israelite can relate, and then will truly show love.

So we looked at 4 different verses, from 3 different books, in 3 different contexts. Just through a literal, plain reading of the text, it’s clear what God wants us to do. He wouldn’t have repeated it so much if he didn’t want us to take it too seriously. Then we looked at the 3 contexts, and we saw how the 3 contexts further strengthened the meaning of the verse. So how do we as Americans apply in the 21^st century?

First, to fully and truly reach out to someone, we must reach out to them in their culture. I’ve traveled abroad twice. Once I spent 1 ½ weeks on a missions trip in Honduras after 8^th grade. A second time, I 3 ½ weeks in a semester abroad in Israel, learning the history, geography and culture of Israel. Both times, in Honduras and Israel, they would always speak English! Sometimes, both Israel and Honduras would even bring out American food for our meals. In Honduras, no one forced me to speak Spanish, eat the local food, and wear clothes like everyone else in the country. In Israel, no one forced me to speak Hebrew, eat like an Israeli or dress like a Middle Eastern man. They showed me love and compassion by reaching out to me in my culture and showing hospitality. Therefore, when I know someone from a different culture enters my world, I try to show them love and compassion through hospitality. The warehouse I work in is like the future classroom of 2020. I am in the minority by being white and speaking English. One guy I worked with spoke Spanish primarily, and he spoke a broken English secondarily. I would struggle to do my job because I struggled to understand him! Then I remembered my experiences in Honduras and Israel, so I decided to reach out to him. I dusted off my notes from my 3 years of high school Spanish and re-learned my Spanish. My Spanish is as broken as his English. But between my broken English and his broken Spanish, we begin to understand each other better. We even connected better, to the point I could ask him, “Como estas tu famila?” (“How is your family?”) If you want to reach out the foreigner living near you, reach out to their world and culture.
 

Second, think of your identity in Christ. We often explain our relation as the church to God in metaphors. The more popular ones are bride of Christ, the body of Christ, and the family of God. One of our identities we don’t often talk about is that we our citizens of the kingdom of God. That as national implications. I would even go as far as say that our citizenship in the kingdom of God supersedes any other national identity, whether we are citizens, or dual citizens or are the alien living in the foreign land. Therefore, a Christian living in the United States of America is an alien in a foreign land. Sometimes it’s easy to feel like an alien in a foreign land when Congress makes a law, the President passes a law or the Supreme Court upholds a law that is contrary to the Bible. But sometimes Congress makes a law, the President passes a law or the Supreme Court upholds a law that agrees with Biblical teaching. That I see as God’s grace. So we know what it’s like to be an alien in a foreign land. We know how hard it can sometimes be, and we know the feelings of pure joy and relief when we get grace. That feeling should be our motivator, and it should motivate us to show love, compassion and grace to a sojourner adjusting to the local culture.

And just another quick side thought. I’m slow to say this because I’m still developing it. Another current event happening is that relations between the U.S.A. and Cuba are finally beginning to warm up. The first sign of such healing happening is that Cuba has allowed the U.S. embassy to reopen. The cool thing about an embassy is that no matter how big or small the plot of land is, even it’s just one acre, that land is considered land of the embassy’s nation, not the land of the nation where it resides. So the U.S. embassy in Cuba is considered U.S. territory, not Cuba territory, and U.S. laws, not Cuba laws, apply. As Christians, we believe church is the people, not the building, yet we struggle with what to do with the building. What if we decided that the building was like the embassy of the kingdom of God in the U.S.A.? What if we decided to live out the kingdom of God in the church instead of living out the American culture within these walls? When a non-Christian, someone not native to the kingdom of God, enters here, do we show them love and compassion, or do we judge them for not living our lifestyle? The verses I presented to you should motivate you to do the former!

But maybe I haven’t won you over on that identity as a citizen of the kingdom of God, living as an alien in a foreign land. Maybe you still believe that when the foreigner comes to live in a new culture, he has to adjust to the culture. Then may I present to you a third application. I know sometimes Christians don’t always consistently decided on which Old Testament Laws to follow literally and to follow figuratively. So when it comes reading Old Testament Law, the first question I ask is, “What does this law say about God, and how can I reflect it?” With all these verses, I see God as compassionate. He wants Israel to be compassionate towards sojourners because he compassionate to sojourners. God always sides with the weak, so if we really want to be on God’s side, we must side with the weak, such as the foreigner. Therefore, we as Christians, living in the United States in the 21^st century, need to show compassion. This one, I believe, Christians in America need to work on the most. Once again, let me put in here one last disclaimer. I heard both political parties’ immigration policy. I understand where both sides come from. I believe both sides have pros and cons. But too often have I seen both sides lack compassion! No matter what policy you side with, you must never ever lose compassion! They are people, they have rights as human beings made in the image of God, and therefore you must love them and you must have compassion! So if you want to the follow this law in the best way, show the sojourner compassion.

As I close, my prayer is for you that no matter where you stand politically, you will show love and compassion to everyone, including the sojourner. I pray your love and compassion will lead to display hospitality and a willingness to reach out to another’s culture. When you can get your heart, your mind, and your hands to do, so will truly reflect God in both his love and his holiness. Remember, God showed you compassions when you were estranged from him, so you too must show compassion to the strangers among you.

If I Only Had A Heart (Ezekiel 36:26)

After my last sermon at my church, as I shook hands with the congregation members exiting, the pastor’s wife approached me. She thanked me for the sermon, and she commented about how I always use culture, or more specifically, pop culture, in my sermons, which she liked. Indeed, I do commonly mention some kind of culture as a sermon illustration. In my church, we’re talking about what being spiritually passionate looks like, and how we can become spiritually passionate. From what I noticed among my generation, my generation becomes spiritually passionate when they realized their faith is relevant to their lives and to their world, and they become less spiritually passionate when they cannot make that connection between their faith and their world. I fully believe in a saying that both C.S. Lewis and J.R.R Tolkien lived by: “In Jesus Christ all the myths come true.” What this means, simply, is that God has written the gospel on our hearts, and therefore, sometimes some of the gospel appears in our stories. This is why I can so easily use culture as sermon illustrations. I have used the 90’s children’s show Mighty Morphin Power Rangers to show how people desire to be transformed, as Paul wrote in Romans 12:2. I have used a Johnny Cash song to demonstrate that the heart longs for social justice, the social justice Isaiah prophesied in Isaiah 1. I have used the sitcom the Office to display how everyone wants a second chance, like the second chance Jesus gave Peter in John 21. All these cultural artifacts, as I and many others like to call them, contain bits and pieces of the gospel, which reflect our yearning for the gospel.

 

I’ve already used televisions show and music, so this time, let’s use a movie. I know a lot of the previous examples I gave might be more relatable to young audiences because they are more recent, so let’s use a classic. It doesn’t get any more classic than The Wizard of Oz. My dad and his brothers, AKA my uncles, are very much into movies. They are always watching the lastest movies, either in the theatre or at home on DVD. Even after 50 years of watching movies, they still come back to The Wizard of Oz as a favorite. Just in case you’re not familiar with the book turned into a movie, Dorothy is a teenager living in rural Kansas. Not far into the movie, Dorothy realizes she’s not in Kansas anymore, but she finds herself in the land of Oz, thanks to a tornado. After a nasty encounter with a witch who wants her ruby red slippers, she feels quite unwelcomed and longs to go back home, but the only one who can bring her home is the Wizard of Oz, residing in Emerald City. The munchkins of Munchkin land inform Dorothy that she’ll get to Emerald City as long follows the yellow brick road.

On her travels along the yellow brick road, she meets three men who also need to see the Wizard of Oz for various needs. One of these men, the second, is the tin man. The tin man informs Dorothy that he was made without a heart, and he needs a heart. At first, the audience must assume the tin man is talking about a literal heart, the muscle that pumps blood. This might leave the audience scratching their heard. After all, why would a tin man need a muscle that pumps blood? But as the tin man sings his hit song for which this sermon is named, “If I Only A Heart,” the audience realizes the tin man is not talking about a literal heart. The tin man sings that he could be “tender, gentle, and awfully sentimental,” he could, “register emotion, jealousy and devotion, and he could be “kind of human,” if he only had a heart. Clearly, this isn’t the literal, physical heart. Instead, this is a metaphor, a symbol to represent emotions.

The tin man is not the only one to talk about the heart as a metaphor and a symbol. In fact, we use the heart as an expression and idiom a lot in the English language. You can have an aching heart, a big heart, a broken heart, a cold heart, a cowardly heart, an empty heart, an evil heart, a generous heart, a hard heart, a kind heart, a loving heart, a pure heart, a soft heart, a tender heart, a warm heart, a heart of glass, a heart of gold, a heart of a lion, a heart of stone, or the heart of a warrior. Furthermore, you can be half-hearted or whole-hearted, you can cross your heart and hope to die, eat your heart out, follow your heart, get to the heart of the matter, have your heart set on something, have a change of heart, have your heart in the right or wrong place, have a heart-to-heart talk, you can know something by heart, leave your heart somewhere, mean something from the bottom of your heart, pour your heart out and wear your heart on your sleeve. These are just some of the idioms and expressions, and there’s probably a lot more you can think of that I missed. After seeing this long list, I can’t help but wonder if we in the English language talk about the heart figuratively more than literally!

The Bible does the same thing. In the Old Testament, the Hebrew word for heart, lev, appears 252 times. In the New Testament, the Greek word for heart is kardia. For those in work in the medical field, that should be no surprise, as any medical term that involves the heart has kardia somewhere in it. For example, cardiac arrest is when the heart fails to pump blood. The Greek word kardia appears 156 times in the New Testament. That’s a total of 408 times the heart is mentioned in the Bible, and not a single one of those talks about the heart literally. Instead, they all talk about the heart figuratively. The heart symbolically represent emotions, attitudes, motives, intent, will and thought.

The Bible also is full of metaphors of the heart. The Bible talks about a blackslidden heart, burning heart, clean heart, closed heart, crooked heart, dark heart, deceitful heart, discerning heart, faint heart, faithful heart, foolish heart, glad heart, honest heart, humble heart, merry heart, open heart, overflowing heart, proud heart, renewed heart, righteous heart, silent heart and an uncircumcised heart. Furthermore, the Bible commands us to guard our heart, keep our heart, nourish our heart and strengthen our heart. The list goes on and on!

There’s one metaphor that I left out. That’s a new heart. That’s our metaphor for today, and that’s the metaphor that comes from our Scripture verse, Ezekiel 36:26.

Let me set the context on Ezekiel 36:26 by giving the whole context of Ezekiel 36. From our reading of the Old Testament, God has entered into a covenant with Israel. If Israel fulfills the conditions of the covenant by obeying the Law, Israel will receive blessings of land, seed (descendants) and many other blessings on top of that. If Israel did not fulfill the covenant, and they disobeyed the Law, God will remove his blessings and Israel will stand cursed. In the time of Ezekiel, we find just that. Israel has not fulfilled its end of the covenant, it has not obeyed the Law, it has sinned. They have not shown love to God because they have worshipped idols. They have not shown love to their neighbors, but have become quite violent towards each other. In Ezekiel 36:16,17, God confronts Israel about its sin. God blessed Israel with a land of their own, but Israel ruined their blessing by defiling it with idol worship and violated bloodshed. Therefore, in a covenant of obedience producing blessings and disobedience resulting in curses, God exiled Israel from the land he gave them into the lands of the gods they worshipped, as recorded in Ezekiel 36:18,19, for they did not hold up their end of the covenant. Sounds simple, right? But it’s not so simple. God entered a covenant with Israel in order to be a witness on how God loves his people, cares for his people, wants to be in a relationship and bless the people he’s created. While Israel sinned, thus deserving their punishment, it might seem like God has turned his back on his people, ruining the witness, as stated in Ezekiel 36:20,21. God, in his infinite omniscience, can imagine the people from other nations saying, “How can the God of Israel call himself loving and caring, yet will allow his people to be conquered and lose their land?” Ladies and gentlemen, as the Preacher in Ecclesiastes says, there is nothing new under the sun. How many times have we heard those critical of Christianity say, “How can a good and loving God allow this suffering to happen to those people?” While this might be a question humans struggle with, the omniscient God has the answer. The Lord has the solution. God’s solution to this problem is to vindicate, or avenge, his name. How God will vindicate his name extends all the way to the end of the chapter, but we’re going to focus in on verses 22  to 32, since that paragraph contains our verse.

Ezekiel 36:22-32 

22 Therefore say to the house of Israel, Thus says the Lord GOD: It is not for your sake, O house of Israel, that I am about to act, but for the sake of my holy name, which you have profaned among the nations to which you came. 23 And I will vindicate the holiness of my great name, which has been profaned among the nations, and which you have profaned among them. And the nations will know that I am the LORD, declares the Lord GOD, when through you I vindicate my holiness before their eyes. 24 I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the countries and bring you into your own land. 25 I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. 26 And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. 27 And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules. 28 You shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers, and you shall be my people, and I will be your God. 29 And I will deliver you from all your uncleannesses. And I will summon the grain and make it abundant and lay no famine upon you. 30 I will make the fruit of the tree and the increase of the field abundant, that you may never again suffer the disgrace of famine among the nations. 31 Then you will remember your evil ways, and your deeds that were not good, and you will loathe yourselves for your iniquities and your abominations. 32 It is not for your sake that I will act, declares the Lord GOD; let that be known to you. Be ashamed and confounded for your ways, O house of Israel.

In seminary, I typically have to read about four or five books, averaging about 300 pages, per class. If I have two classes, you can double that workload. And I have to do get that done in four months. So sometimes reading every line of every pages just isn’t feasible. So my seminary professors taught me how to speed read. Perhaps you are familiar with the method. You read the first line and the last line of each paragraph because those lines have the main point of the author. Everything in between is details that reinforce that main point. God really wants to make his point clear, for he pretty much repeats his main point at the beginning, verse 22, and the end, verse 32. Verse 22 reads, “Therefore say to the house of Israel, Thus says the Lord God: It is not for your sake, O house of Israel, that I am about to act, but for the sake of my holy name, which you have profaned among the nations to which you came,” and verse 32 reads, “It is not for your sake that I will act, declares the Lord God; let that be known to you. Be ashamed and confounded for your ways, O house of Israel.” Notice the similarities? God wants Israel to know that they did nothing to deserve the blessings they will receive. Rather, God merely blesses Israel to hold up his end of the covenant and demonstrate his love and faithfulness to his people. Instead of waiting for Israel’s obedience, God’s love and blessings should motivate Israel to fulfill their end of the covenant and obey! Perhaps our verse will help Israel do just that.
 

God will help Israel do just that by giving them a new heart, a heart of flesh. Now the flesh in “heart of flesh” does not have the same weight as the New Testament term for flesh (sarx, if you’re familiar with the Greek) does. In the New Testament, flesh means corrupt or fallen, but not in this Old Testament context. The “heart of flesh” contrasts the “heart of stone” earlier in the verse. Note the irony in this text. The Israelites have worshipped gods of stone, and therefore the Israelites’ hearts had become like that gods they worshipped: hard like stone. Therefore, God will give them “hearts of flesh,” hearts less like the idols and more like the true God. God will will soften their hearts. How will God soften their hearts? He will give them his spirit, the Holy Spirit. Once the Holy Spirit gets in there and gives Israel a new heart, a heart made of flesh, everything else will come naturally, as natural as the flowing of the paragraph the verse is in. Once Israel gets a new heart, a heart of flesh with the Holy Spirit inside, the Holy Spirit will help them obey the Law given to them. Once Israel obeys the Law, the condition of the covenant, Israel will once again receive the blessing promised, such as the Promised Land of Israel, and not just the land, but the a healthy and fruitful land. Then a cycle will begin. The blessings Israel receives will remind Israel of God’s faithfulness to the covenant, which will cause them to be faithful to the covenant. When Israel is faithful to the covenant, they will be blessed even more. The cycle goes on and on.
 

At this point, you might be thinking, “But I’m not Israel, and so this is not my covenant. What does this have to do with me?” Ah, but it is your covenant. I agree with many scholars when I say that I believe this is a prophecy of the New Covenant, the covenant that Jesus established with the church. In the New Covenant, Jesus offers a new heart! In the medical field, what you call it when a new heart replaces the old, bad heart? A heart transplant! A heart transplant, or cardiac transplant, is a surgery a working heart of a recently deceased donor heart is placed is the body of someone who needs a new heart. The first heart transplant was performed in 1967. In the first ten years of heart transplants, only 300 were performed. Now, almost ten times as many, about 3,500, heart transplants happen every year worldwide. Maybe you know one of those people who had a heart transplant. If you don’t former vice president Dick Cheny had a heart transplant. But this isn’t a physical heart transplant. This is a spiritual heart transplant. If you do not believe in Jesus, Jesus is offering you a spiritual heart transplant. If you believe in Jesus, Jesus has already performed a spiritual heart transplant, and he has given you a new heart!

What does this new heart look like in the believer?  First, the new heart brings about restoration and reconciliation. When the exiles finally returned home, the exiles knew God restored his relationship with the people. The evidence God provides Christians of a new heart is a spiritual change. Just like visitors of a foreign land coming home, we leave behind the desires of the world and the rebellion that demands we have it our way in order to seek God for forgiveness, reconciliation and restoration. Second, a new heart has been washed clean from sin. Note in verse 25 of Ezekiel 36 that God wants to generally clean Israel of all its uncleanliness, but He also wants to cleanse Israel of specific sins they have committed, like idol worship. When Jesus gives you a spiritual heart transplant, he cleanses you not only in general, like your sinful nature, but he also cleanses you specifically of each and every sin. It doesn’t matter if that sin is past, present or future. Know for certain that when Jesus gives you a spiritual heart transplant, each and every sin has been scrubbed clean from your heart. Not a sin has been missed. Third, as I mentioned before and I will mention again, a new heart has the Holy Spirit within it. Radical spiritual change cannot happen without the Holy Spirit. Cleansing of sin cannot happen without the Holy Spirit. Ezekiel 36:27 tells that the Holy Spirit is the only way we can even have a hope in following the Law. All this is only possible with the Holy Spirit. So naturally, it only make sense that a new heart has the Holy Spirit. Know that the Holy Spirit is there to guide you and to help you. Fourth, the new heart brings about a whole new relationship with God. Israel’s exile into a foreign land has deep symbolism. If Israel wanted to worship the idols of the enemy, then Israel would become part of the enemy and be exiled into their land. When God brings them back to their land, they are no longer the enemy, but rather, God’s people and God’s children. Paul in Romans makes it clear that when we are in sin, we are enemies of the holy God. When Jesus gives us a spiritual heart transplant, we are no longer enemies of God’ but you are a child of God. Finally, when Jesus gives us a spiritual heart transplant, that new heart hates to sin. As I said earlier, when Israel would see God’s faithfulness to the covenant, it would encourage them to fulfill their end of the covenant by not sinning. Similarly, when Jesus gives us a spiritual heart transplant, the new heart should hate sin. Our hearts should look always to avoid sin. When our heart faces temptation to sin, it fights it. When we do accidently mess up and sin, our heart immediately sets out to seek repentance. Just like eating something disgusting, sin should cause such a bitterness in us that we would wish to spit it out.

 

The truth is we all need spiritual heart transplant. Some of us still have dirty hearts, tainted from sin. Some of us have rebellious hearts, not wanting to submit to the lordship of our heavenly father. Some of us have a broken heart, still broken from broken relationships, which have hurt our relationship with God. If you have never have believed in Jesus as your lord and savior, your heart is dying in sin. You need a spiritual heart plant. Only Jesus is the surgeon who can take out that old, sinful heart and give you a new, clean heart. If you have never made the decision to believe in Jesus, make that decision today. If you have made that decision, Jesus has performed the spiritual heart transplant, and He has given you a new heart. But transformation and restoration isn’t a once and done thing. Our hearts are still in repair. Let that Holy Spirit inside your new heart convict you, and ask God for what needs to still be made new within you. If you lack evangelism, ask Jesus for a heart for the lost. If you need to spiritual grow, or see a need for spiritual growth in others, ask for a heart of discipleship and mentorship. If you find yourself apathetic to a person in need, ask for a loving a caring heart. If you find yourself struggling to practice your faith beyond Sunday, ask for a passionate heart.

Earlier, I mentioned Dick Cheny as the example of a heart transplant. Dick Cheny’s heart transplant was a peculiar one. Dick Cheny had to wait 20 months to get his new heart, over twice the waiting time for a heart transplant. Perhaps Cheny had to wait for so long due to his condition. At the time, Dick Cheny was seventy-one years old. He was in frail health, due to five heart attacks spanning over forty years. His heart transplant caused much controversy. Shouldn’t a heart transplant be given to someone younger and in better health? The heart transplant Jesus offers is nothing like that. There’s age limit or health check-up; God gives a spiritual heart transplant to anyone! There’s no waiting list; God gives anyone a spiritual heart transplant immediately upon asking for one. So come, ask for a new heart, and then embrace it.

Acknowledgements: I am grateful and thankful to Pastor John Blackburn, Spiritual Formation Pastor at Olathe Bible Church in Olathe, Kansas, for his sermon "A New Heart Within You," which he originally preached at Olathe Bible Church in Olathe, Kansas on April 15, 2012, for it gave me ideas for this sermon.

The Parable of the Cheerleader and Tim Dietrich

The Parable of the Cheerleader and Tim Dietrich: A Contemporary, Modern-Day Re-Telling of the Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus (Luke 16:19-31)

There are two types of teenagers in this world. The teenagers who puberty is friendly towards, and the teenagers who puberty is not so friendly towards.

Sherry McQueen was one of the teenagers who puberty was friendly towards. Almost literally overnight, puberty had turned this girl into a woman. She sprouted up to six feet tall, a height that made both boys and girls jealous of her. She had curves in all the right places, giving her that perfect hourglass-shaped body. Her naturally blonde hair now had a bright shine to it. Her teeth came in straight and shined a radiant pearly white, like she was wearing a set of bleached dentures. And somehow, her skin remained blemish free. In fact, she could easily get a light bronze tan, one that would last for days. All in all, anyone who didn’t know Sherry McQueen, but saw a photo of her, would have thought that her picture was a photoshopped cover of a Seventeen magazine.

Sherry’s new looks gave her new confidence. With her new confidence, Sherry tried out for the high school cheerleading team. Not only did Sherry make the squad, she was soon elected by her fellow cheerleaders as the cheer captain. Her new status, on top of her new looks, quickly shot up her popularity in her high school, until she was the most popular girl in school. She quickly found out that her popularity got her privileges. She got to sit anywhere in the cafeteria. Sometimes people would bring her lunch to her, and some would even pay for her lunch! Every boy would flirt with her, so she got first pick of what boys to date. Each boy, flirting in his own special way, would give Sherry special treatment. Jock boys would carry her books for her from class to class. Nerdy boys would do her homework for her. Prep boys would buy her expensive gifts. Greaser boys would fix her car for her. Even the teachers liked Sherry so much, Sherry got special treatment from them, too! Sherry could easily get excused for showing up late for class, and she sometimes even got to leave early for no reason at all. As if the nerdy boys doing her homework wasn’t enough, some teachers would grade her on a curve or round up her grades, because, let’s face it, the football team and basketball team have no hope of winning of unless the cheerleading captain can lead the cheerleading squad in cheering on the fans. While at first the attention creeped her out, Sherry loved it and gladly accepted it. While Sherry hated school for the usual reasons teenagers hate school, she loved the social life she had there.

But alas, as I said earlier, there’s also the teenagers who puberty is not so friendly towards. Meet Tim Dietrich. Puberty indeed was not too friendly towards him. His growth spurt gave him a whole inch only. The freshman fifteen didn’t wait until college; Tim got it in his freshman year of high school. Being short, chubby, and on top of that, Italian American, would eventually earn him the nickname “Meatball.” The worst part was the acne, for it broke out as if he was having a second round of chicken pox. While Sherry’s good looks gave her confidence and positive attention, Tim’s looks gave him little attention, if any, and it was attention he did not want. Therefore, Tim kept to himself. Instead of spending time with people, he spent time with things. He became fascinated with flying, not just making model airplanes and model rockets, but also sending them into the air. Tim’s unique hobby, however, did not gain him any more friends in school. It just brought him more mocking and more ridicule from his classmates.

Sherry and Tim did know each other. They had a lot of classes together. Tim had once had reached out to Sherry. He had hoped if he could even become friends, his fellow classmates would be nicer to him. Perhaps it would have worked, if Tim would have given Sherry the homework answers that Sherry expected, just like all of her nerdy classmates. Tim may have not been the most moral person out there, but something felt unfair to him that he would do all the hard work to get the same grade as Sherry did. Sherry didn’t take too kindly to Tim’s refusal to do her homework. She joined in on the mocking and ridicule. The other teenagers at the school, not wanting to appear against Sherry, also joined in on her mocking and ridiculing, making Tim’s life even worse.

But alas, high school only takes up four years of a person’s life. Although those four years progressed differently for Sherry and Tim, both had the same end results. Both Sherry and Tim graduated.

It wouldn’t take long for Sherry to wish she didn’t graduate, for she missed high school more than she thought. At high school, she had a life of ease. After high school, she could not get it back. While classmates did Sherry’s homework, none of that mattered when it came to SAT scores. Sherry got a low SAT score. With low SAT score, combined with barely passing grades, Sherry could not get into any college except community college, and she barely got into that. There she found out fellow classmates would not do her homework and professors would not give her the same grading ease her high school teachers gave her. By the end of her fall semester, she had a 0.7 GPA, and by the end of the spring semester, her GPA was 0.5. Sherry dropped out of community college by the end of her freshman year. With no education and no prior job experience, the only job she could grab was the local burger joint, where she rotated between flipping burgers, washing dishes and working the cash register. She came home every day sweaty, stinky and a mess. She found her job gross and repulsive. Because of all this, a depression set in. She stopped caring for herself. Her hair no longer shined, but had become a dirty blonde, matted and knotted. Her teeth turned from white to the yellow her hair use to be. Working in a greasy environment, blemishes broke out, as if the acne part of puberty finally arrived. Without the looks, no men freely handed out gifts or services. The few who did would only use and abuse her. In fact, one such man got her pregnant, and he ran away from her immediately upon finding out. Now on top of all the adult responsibilities she had to learn to take on, she now had to be a single mother, too. Adult responsibilities and single motherhood cost a lot. She needed credit cards to keep up with the bills, which only left her with big credit card bills and bigger credit card debt. Sherry became depressed about life, and the best cure she knew of was drinking a few beers at the local bar, which only cured temporarily, but worsened the credit card debt.

One day, as Sherry watched the morning show, eating her breakfast before she drove off to work, the morning show host announced, “It was once thought of as a fantasy of science fiction movies and television shows, but this man has made the fantasy a reality. Ladies and gentlemen, I introduce you to the man who invented the flying car, Tim Dietrich!” Sherry’s head perked as she heard the name. She knew that name! Could it be that one kid from high school? How common could that name be? She watched as the man walked across the stage to shake the host’s hand. That was him! Sure, the body was slimmer and the face was acne free, but besides that, she could clearly tell it was him.

“So let’s start off with where it all began,” the host began. “Where did you get this idea?”

“From the Jetsons and Back to the Future of course!” Tim laughed at his own joke, and the host joined in laughing. “Seriously, though, I had always been fascinated with flying. As a kid, I made things that flew, from model airplanes to model rockets. When I got accepted into a university, I majored in aviation and aerodynamics. I even got my pilot’s license. I enjoyed flying my little plane, but I knew it was hard to get a pilot license, and I wanted everyone to enjoy this experience. So I thought of ways everyone could enjoy it. Since most adults have their driver’s license, why not turn the car into a plane?”

“Now I know many car companies had offered you a job so your patent could be used on their cars. Not only have American companies like Ford, Dodge and Chevy, but also international car companies liked Toyota, Honda and Hyundai. Why did you end up choosing Ford?” the host asked Tim.

“Besides the fact, that Ford offered to make me a billionaire, while all the others just offered to make me a millionaire?” Tim again laughed at himself, and the host laughed, too. “Well, I obviously wanted to keep it in the U.S.A. to keep jobs in the country and keep the American economy flowing. But for which company to choose, I chose Ford because when I think of Ford, I think of the inventor of the car. I think of my job as re-inventing the car, and I just wanted to keep Mr. Ford’s legacy alive.”

What? A billionaire? Sherry was in shock. Yeah, she knew Tim knew his science pretty well from science class, but he didn’t seem to be a nerdy genius, compared to other kids in school. She never thought someone big would come out of her small high school in her small town, either. It must have be nice, though, she thought, to not have to worry about money like she did.

“So how does it feel to be the most eligible bachelor in your home city of Detroit?” the host asked with a smirk. Tim laughed a long time to deal with the awkward question, and then he answered, “I haven’t thought about it. I think about when I land in Detroit this evening in my flying Porsche this afternoon,” Tim said with a wink.

Detroit? He lived in Detroit? Why, Sherry lived in a suburb right outside Detroit! Detroit was just an hour or two away from her home. Despite their old high school being miles away, they had somehow managed to be so close. Then, an idea entered in Sherry’s mind. She had to meet with Tim, or at least talk with him. Perhaps when they talked, a romantic spark might happen between the two. Or maybe they could just be friends, friends enough that Tim would have pity on her to help pay off her credit card debt. All during her work shift, Sherry planned what she would say and what she would do to win Tim over. The second her shift was over, she rushed home. She looked up Tim’s number. Only finding his office number, she gave the office number a call.

“Good day,” a female voice at the end of line spoke. “You’ve reached the office of Tim Dietrich. This is Angela, his secretary and person assistant speaking. How may I assist you?” Sherry was caught off guard by the female voice, expecting to hear Tim’s voice, but once she came to realize it was his administrative assistant, she spoke. “My name is Sherry McQueen.”

“Are you the one with CBS? ABC? NBC? FOX?” Angela quickly chimed in. “Sorry, with all these reporters asking for an interview, it’s hard to keep track of all of you.”

“No,” said Sherry. “I’m not with any news group.”

“Then are you one of the lab assistants working with Mr. Dietrich on one of his projects?” Angela asked.

“No, I’m not a lab assistant, either,” Sherry said. “I know him from high school.”

“Um, ok? Is this about a class reunion or something?” Angela asked, confused.

 
“No, I just want to see him, maybe over coffee?” Sherry said.

“Ma’am,” Angela said politely, “Mr. Dietrich does not have time for ‘coffee.’ If he wants a coffee, he has me run to get him one. He spends most of his time in his lab, inventing technology that will advance the human. When he’s not in the lab, he’s constantly in either in meetings or interviews. He barely has enough time for his hobbies, like going to the gym. If he can’t enjoy hobbies, he definitely does not have time for chit chat.”

“Well, can I at least talk to him over the phone?” Sherry asked. “Just mention it’s Sherry McQueen. He’ll remember!” Sherry insisted.

“Funny,” Angela said, trying to maintain professionalism. “I don’t ever remember Mr. Dietrich ever mentioning a Sherry McQueen in all the years I have worked for him. In fact, every time someone mentions high school, he becomes quiet and ignores the subject. If he doesn’t have any positive memories of high school, I don’t want to bring any bad memories back into his life. It might throw him off from his work.”

 

“Please!” Sherry insisted. “I’m in bad debt and I need help!”

 

“Ugh, not another one of you,” Angela groaned. Then her voice became stern. “Now listen here! I don’t know how many distant relatives or long lost friends have called asking for money, and you’re just another one of them. You should be ashamed of yourself, you…you…shameless hussy! Don’t call again, or I’ll have the police trace the line and arrest you for harassment. But if you need advice, I’ll give you some. Get a job! And if that’s not enough, get another one!” Angela hung up on her.

 

All Sherry could do was hang up the phone and sob uncontrollably.

My Top 4 Favorite Christmas Songs

Last Christmas season, I spent many Facebook statuses trashing bad Christmas carols. Needless to say, it didn't go over too well. I got many negative comments. This Christmas season, I decided to be more positive. Every Advent Sunday, I posted a good Christmas song that really captures the true meaning of Christmas. After the 4 Advent Sundays, I posted my top 4 favorite Christmas songs. So I thought on this last Advent Sunday, I would post all 4 favorite Christmas songs in one blog. So, without further ado, my top 4 favorite Christmas songs.

4. "Lived the Day You Died"

This song comes from that Christian parody band, the ApologetiX.   This song is a parody of "Love the Way You Lie" by Eminem feat. Rihanna. ApologetiX has really redeemed this song about an abusive relationship. J. Jackson takes the little detail of the Christmas story of the wise men bringing baby Jesus myrrh, and he expounds on it, on how it plays in Christ's redemptive plan. It reminds the listener that the Christmas story is not segregated from the Easter story, but has an important role contributing to it.

(I put the master recording first because it's easier to hear and understand, but the live version has better female vocals, no offense to Jana Jackson, so I put that second)

3. "Boy Like Me"

"Boy Like Me" comes from the Singing Christmas Tree album from VeggieTales. I came across this album when Amazon had it as a free download a few years ago. I have never heard the doctrine of the humanity of Jesus sung in a song that well written in both terms of music and lyrics. And from children's Christmas music nonetheless!

2. "Mary Did You Know?"

This song just ask the questions that everyone wonders. How much did Mary understand about the boy she was giving birth to? This song also does a good job of combining the deity and humanity of Jesus.

1. "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing"

 No, it's not my favorite because it's at the end of the Charlie Brown Christmas special. Charles Wesley, composer of both music and lyrics, made sure all the music he wrote was theologically sound (pun somewhat intended). This song is full of theology. It reminds the Christian that the birth is to get the Christian in focus on God's redemptive plan through ...Christ's ministry. Jesus was born so that "God and sinners reconciled." Jesus was "Born to raise the sons of earth, born to give second birth." It also teaches Christians that Jesus is both God and man. "Veiled in flesh, the Godhead see..." Like I said, so much theology in such a short song. This song, equips, edifies, encourages, teaches and worships. It does so much.

Oh, what the heck, let's play the Charlie Brown Christmas version for good measure.

Merry Christmas everyone! :)

The Really Real Jesus

Introduction

A few years ago, I came across a discussion between teens and college-aged young adults, doubting if the Pilgrims arrived in Plymouth, Massachusetts on the Mayflower in 1620. At first thought, this conversation might provoke someone to shake his or her head, thinking how stupid this generation is for not believing a historical event important to the American nation. After further thought, however, no one can really blame this generation for questioning history. College students today, when they went through elementary school, heard a story of George Washington cutting down a cherry tree and then reporting to his father, “I cannot tell a lie. I cut down the cherry tree. In reality, this story never happened. This story circulated when George Washington sat in as President of the United States, in order to teach early Americans that George Washington always spoke the truth in honesty. In elementary school, students learn that Cristopher Columbus discovered America in 1492. Then, in high school, the same students learn the Leif Ericson discovered American about 500 years earlier, and more closely to what we know as [the United States of] America (Leif Ericson landed in present-day Newfoundland; Cristopher Columbus landed in the present-day Caribbean island of Hispanola). No wonder this generation doubts history so much! And that’s history that only happened a few centuries ago. How much more ancient history, where the ancient historians rarely differed between their history and religious myths. For example, the Trojan War really happened between the Spartans and Trojans, but the Iliad records the Trojan War had Greek gods and goddesses appearing to heroes on both sides. A teen or young adult reading the Iliad could doubt the Trojan War happened because Homer mentions Greek gods and goddesses involved in the war.

For if anyone wants to disprove the ancient Greek polytheism, all a person would have to do is take a hike up to Mount Olympus. When that person reaches the summit of Mount Olympus and observes no gods or goddesses there, he or she can easily conclude the Greek gods and goddesses do not exist. If the Greek gods and goddesses do not exist, then anyone can easily conclude that all the Greek myths, like the Iliad (even Greek history, like the Trojan War!), that have the Greek gods and goddesses in them cannot be trusted as historically accurate. Ancient religions, like the ancient Greek polytheism, has turned many people into atheists. Their atheism, which makes people believe God does not exist, makes people believe that any ancient writing mentioning a God must not be historically credible. Going further, if any of those ancient writings calls a person a God, both the writing and the person cannot be considered historically credible. In terms of Christianity, some atheists concludes that since God does not exist, Jesus does not exist, and if the Bible mentions Jesus existed as both God and man, they don’t take the Bible seriously as history. The atheist’s prejudices and presuppositions has led him or her astray. Jesus did exist outside the Bible, for many first century people, including hostile opponents, referenced Jesus. Even if the atheist admits Jesus existed, as some do, they state the Bible does not accurately record who Jesus is or what Jesus did. Therefore, the Christian cannot quit at proving Jesus existed in history. The Christian must insist that Jesus lived just as the Gospels record. This paper will not only prove Jesus existed, as the historical records demonstrate, but also that the Gospels accurately recorded the historical Jesus, using archaeology and the testimony of the early church fathers.

Background of the Need

Throughout history, especially recent history, everyone from atheists to so-called “intellectuals” have doubted if Jesus existed. If they do say Jesus existed, either willingly or reluctantly, they question if the Gospels historically record Jesus as he lived in the first century. The most recent and most famous is the Jesus Seminar. Consisting of Robert Funk and thirty of his friends, the Jesus Seminary sought to sort out the non-fiction Jesus and the fiction Jesus from the four canonical Gospels and the pseudapigraphal Gospel of Thomas. The members of the Jesus Seminar voted on the sayings of Jesus using four colored beads. Red meant Jesus definitely said it or something close to it. Pink represented Jesus probably said it, or said a somewhat similar idea, but multiple transmissions have left a little room for questioning it. Gray denoted that Jesus probably didn’t say it, but maybe it roughly represents an idea Jesus had. Black signified that Jesus never said, but rather the church sometime in history inserted that interpretation about Jesus. When all voting finished, only sixteen percent of events, seventeen percent of parables, and eighteen percent of the sayings of Jesus got the red bead vote to acknowledge them as historically accurate. The Jesus Seminar denied all of Gospels’ miracles, from the virgin birth to the resurrection. When the Jesus Seminary completed, they turned Jesus into a smart teacher and a social revolutionists, and nothing more. Therefore, Christians need apologetics that defend both Jesus as a real person in history and the Gospels as real historical accounts of the real Jesus.

Historical Records

Atheism denies the existence of God, but some atheists go even further and boldly proclaim that Jesus never existed either. Those atheists claim that only the New Testament mentions Jesus, and therefore they quickly conclude that Jesus never existed outside the imagination of the apostles. Such atheists, however, have concluded too quickly, and thus have concluded falsely, for historical records outside the Bible speak of Jesus.

Suetonius

Roman historians wrote about Jesus. Suetonius Tranquillus, an upper class lawyer, wrote a history of twelve Roman emperors after viewing the Roman archives of the emperors. Upon writing about Emperor Claudius, Suetonius records that Claudius removed the Jews from Rome. Suetonius says that Claudius removed the Jews because of their riots due to “the instigation of Chestus.” Christian scholars have good reason to believe that Chestus is a scribal error for Christ. Despite several records carefully recording the name of every Jew in Rome, not a single record writes down a Chestus in Rome. If Chestus did exist as a slave, as some skeptics have suggested, a good Roman historian, like Suetonius, would have provided some kind of biographical sketch explaining the minor character’s importance. No such biographical sketch exists, suggesting every commoner knew about the character. The error probably comes from the term Chrestiani, a profane name Romans gave Christians, including Suetonius. In fact, when Suetonius uses profanity in regards to Christians in an official historical recording, Suetonius displays his disdain towards Christians. Suetonius further demonstrates his hatred towards Christians when he later records that Christians follow an imaginary myth that causes misbehavior. Therefore, the Christian can conclude that Suetonius believed Jesus existed, for Suetonius blames the work of Jesus for upheaval between Jews and Christians in Rome.

Tacticus

In his final work, Roman senator and historian Cornelius Tacticus records Roman history from the fourteenth century A.D. to the sixty-eighth. Tacticus highlights the burning of Rome as an important event in Roman history. Tacticus records Nero started the fire, but blamed Christians as the cause. Tacticus then briefly describes Christians. He explains that Christians followed a Jesus of Nazareth, whom they called the Christ, who got executed by Pontius Pilate. Tacticus also looks down on Christians, for he calls them a people “hated for their abominable crimes” and later calls them “hateful of humanity.” Yet Tacticus too acknowledges Jesus. He calls Jesus a Christ, fully knowing the implications of the title. He recognizes Jesus as the founder of the movement the apostles expounded, commonly known as Christianity. He verifies for the Christian that Pontius Pilate had Jesus crucified. Furthermore, by mentioning Pontius Pilate, who many Roman historians mention, Tacticus puts Jesus in real history. Therefore, the Christian can conclude Tacticus knew Jesus existed, too.

Pliny the Younger

As a Roman senator and governor, Pliny the Younger took the time to investigate Christians in order to know how to deal with them. Pliny even went as far as sending out spies to spy on Christians to learn more about them. In a letter to Trajan, Pliny reports that the Christians recite a creed stating Jesus as Christ and God. Once again, Pliny recognizes the start of the Christian movement that had reached Rome. The movement started with Jesus. Pliny records a style of worship similar to that in Acts. Pliny even goes further and mentions that Christian worship included reciting a creed, declaring Jesus as God. He goes on to say their reverence for Christ as God does not allow them to worship another as God. In conclusion, Pliny not only recognized Jesus as real, but also recognized that some saw Jesus as God. Like Suetonius and Tacticus, Pliny stands as an enemy of Christianity, for he too declares the religion nothing more than a crazy superstition. Not even Pliny’s hostility towards Christianity could prevent him from denying the existence of Jesus.

Josephus

Not only did Roman historians record Jesus in history, but a Jewish historian did as well. Jewish historian Josephus speaks about Jesus in many of his works. Of all the works of Josephus, Testamonium Flavium and Antiquities talks the most about Jesus. The most famous passage comes from Testamonium Flavium. Even subtracting the material that has come into question, Joseph makes bold statements for a Jewish devotee. First, Josephus calls Jesus wise, and he also notes that other people knew Jesus as a wise man. Second, Josephus says Jesus does “surprising works,” possibly nodding at the miracles as supernatural acts. Third, Josephus states that Jesus faced opposition from Jewish leadership and Pontius. Fourth, Josephus confirms Jesus died on the cross at Pilate’s command. Fifth, although Josephus may not have believed it himself, he records the Christians believe Jesus rose from the dead, which led Christians to believe Jesus must be the Messiah. Josephus didn’t just believe Jesus existed, Joseph believed most of the Gospel claims as well.

Josephus mentions Jesus in Antiquities of the Jews, although indirectly. Antiquities of the Jews concludes with the close of Festus’s reign and Annas’s rule in the Sanhedrin. When Festus dies, Annas makes a power grab and starts making executive decisions. In one decision, Annas has James, “the brother of Jesus called Christ,” arrested, along with “certain others.” The certain others probably refers to Christians. To specify a common name such as James, Josephus identifies him as the brother of the Jesus. To specify a common name such as Jesus, Josephus identifies him as Jesus known as Christ. This name and title makes it clear that the original reader could have known about Jesus.

Rabbis

Not only did Jewish historians record Jesus in history, but Jewish rabbis did as well. Two of the most explicit mentions come from the transcripts of the Sanhedrin. These transcripts do more than just acknowledge Jesus existed. They acknowledge Jesus received the death penalty, and the time table matches the one found in the Gospels. Later on in the text, a rabbi declares Jesus practiced magic. This rabbi asserts he saw something supernatural happen, even if he does not call it a divine miracle. Although all the writings criticize and condemn Jesus, they prove Jesus existed nonetheless.

Archaeological Records

Previously, we have explored records and other writings in history that mention a Jesus of Nazareth, whom Christians believed to be the Messiah. Next, this paper will look at the Gospels as historically accurate. Before this paper can look at the Gospels, however, this paper needs to look at the archaeological record. The archaeological will not have any explicit mentions of Jesus by name. Rather, the archaeology will display the history, culture and geography of the first century Israel. In turn, when the Gospels display the same history, culture and geography, the reader can rest assured that the Gospel authors recorded the Gospels as accurate to history.

Coins

In Mark 12:13-17, the Pharisees and Herodians try to trap Jesus with a question about taxes. In this story, Jesus asks for a coin, and then he asks whose inscription is on the coin. They reply Caesar’s. Indeed, archaeology has revealed coins had Caesar’s name stamped on them. In fact, Caesars would use the coins to spread propaganda about themselves. Coin inscriptions would not only have the Caesar’s name, but also a title such as “Son of God” or “Son of a Divine one.” Such titles would remind the citizens that the previous Caesar, the current Caesar’s father, had reached a place among the gods, which verifies the current Caesar as the legitimate Caesar of Rome. Sometimes, if a Caesar pushed to make himself deity before death, he would change the coin inscription to something like “the holy one” or “the revered one.” Caesar Augustus, the emperor during the time of Jesus, had made this change by the time Jesus entered the ministry. Not only does Jesus reference this change in the Gospel of Mark, he might use it to make the Herodians, a political party supporting the Romans, to decide who is God: Jesus or Caesar.

Calendar

Another key inscription comes from a calendar found in Priene, a city located in western Asia Minor. The calendar made the birthday Caesar Augustus the new beginning to the year. The calendar writes that the Caesar’s birth is good news and that people should celebrate with good tidings toward each other. Both terms “good news” and “good tidings” comes the Greek word euanggelia, or gospel. What makes the Caesar’s birthday gospel, or good news, is that a god comes down to earth in human form. The inscription of the word gospel on the Roman calendar helps the Christian understand the use and importance of the word gospel in the four Gospels. Mark roughly borrows this Priene calendar inscription for the start of his Gospel. In Mark 1:1, Mark boldly proclaims that Caesar’s birth does not begin the good news, but rather the ministry of Jesus begins the good news. Altogether, the Romans used the idea of gospel just as much as the Christians living in the Roman Empire.

Urbanization of Galilee

Archaeology reveals that, during the ministry of Jesus, Herod Antipas, the tetrarch of Galilee, began building more in Galilee to make rural Galilee more urban. Antipas started by building two cities. One he named Sepphoris, and the other he named Tiberias. These two cities attracted many rural Galileans into city life, as well attracting many other people from faraway lands. With more people in the land, the demand for food and housing went up. In order to pay for food and housing, people would go into debt and have to work off their debt as tenants working in a farmer’s field. Jesus knew his currents events. Therefore, he taught lessons in Galilee that many Galileans could relate to. Such teachings consist of the parable of the wicked servant, the parable of the workers in the vineyard and the parable of the tenants. All these parables accurately describe life as a tenant farmer in first century Galilee.

Gospel Record

So far, we have explored records and other writings in history that mention a Jesus of Nazareth, whom Christians believed to be the Messiah. Most of these writings come from opponents of Jesus and opponents of Christianity. If Jesus didn’t exist, those opponents would have called the Christians out for believing in an imaginary person. Since these opponents take the time to refute Jesus, he must exist. Christians can use these writings to prove that Jesus existed to atheists. These accounts, however, can only get the Christian to prove Jesus existed. This leaves people to make any claim about Jesus they please. The Christian should not stop at proving the existence of Jesus. If the Christian believes the Bible is the inspired Word of God, then Jesus needs to be real like the Bible says. The Gospels writers took the time to record the words and actions of Jesus just as he lived them. Even as early as the church fathers, they could see the Gospels as historically accurate.

Four Distant Gospel Authors

Due to increased persecution in the 40s A.D., the apostles, including all four Gospel authors, split into four main mission groups to spread the Gospel. Paul and Luke most likely ministered to Greeks in Greece, as all Paul’s epistles hint. John most likely ministered in Asia Minor, as his seven letters in Revelation hints. Peter and Mark probably ministered together to the Romans in Rome. James and Matthew probably ministered to the Jews, wherever they were scattered. Looking at a map, the four Gospel authors wrote their Gospel accounts very far apart from each other, in both distance and time. This means they almost certainly did not collaborate with each other. Still, their stories concur with each other. Therefore, the reader can conclude these stories accurately account what Jesus did on this earth.

Against the Expectations

Some skeptical of the Gospels’ historical accuracy hypothesize the Gospel authors fictionalized Jesus in order to make him the Messiah. If the Gospel writers did fictionalize Jesus to make him the Christ, they did a terrible job. The first century Jews, including the Jewish Gospel writers Matthew, Mark and John, had expectations of the Messiah totally different to the character of Jesus. Still Matthew, Mark and John wrote down that contrary character Jesus displayed instead of writing down their dream Messiah. If the Gospel authors wanted their ideal Messiah, they would showed Jesus as a prophet who agreed with all the respected Pharisees’ and Sadducees’ religious teachings. Instead, they showed Jesus constantly in conflict with the Pharisees’ and Sadducees’ legalistic interpretation of the Law. If the Gospel writers wanted their model Christ, Jesus would heavily support a sovereign Israel and would fight Rome like Joshua fighting the Canaanites. Instead, Jesus never causes Rome any problems. In fact, he even helps a Roman centurion. The Gospel authors could have chosen to fictionalize Jesus to prove to Jews Jesus was truly the Messiah. Instead, they chose to accurately record Jesus as he lived in history, even if it meant losing Jewish followers.

Early Church Fathers

The early church fathers quickly accepted the books of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John as historically accurate accounts of the life of Jesus. The early church fathers had these four Gospels circulated throughout the whole Roman Empire. They quoted them freely in their letters. For example, Clement quotes all three synoptic Gospels in a letter to Corinth. Irenaeus writes that Polycarp, a disciple of John, read and quoted the Gospel of John constantly. When the early church fathers came together to write the creeds of the faith, they heavily relied on the four Gospels. When the creeds record that Pontius Pilate crucified Jesus, they align the crucifixion with history. Upon observing Christians, Pliny writes that the Christians read and recite the Gospels every Sunday. If the Christians read and recite the Gospels, they had to believe them to be true, including Jesus living. Justin the Martyr also observes Christians coming together to read a creed in his First Apology. Justin even writes down some of this creed. The creed not only records Jesus crucified during the time of Pontius Pilate, but also during Tiberius Caesar. All the early church fathers clearly conclude Jesus did exist as a real man in history, just as the four Gospels accurately record.

The Gnostic Gospels

The Gnostic gospels might sound like an odd choice to defend the historicity of the four true Gospels, but comparing the two, the Gnostic gospels reveal themselves to be fiction and the four true Gospels to be historical. The Gospel of Truth, written by the Gnostic Valentinus, does not record any action of Jesus, so it cannot be taken as historically true. The same goes for the Gospel of Thomas. The Gospel of Thomas does not have any narrative. While The Gospel of Thomas has several sayings that anyone can find in the other four canonical Gospels, it also contains saying heretical compared to the other Gospels. All this evidence adds up to a false Gospel. The Unknown Gospel, written in the second century, while free of heresy, consists of a compilation of verses from the other four canonical Gospels. This so-called gospel is merely a harmony of the true Gospels, furthermore attesting to the four Gospels historical accuracy. Same goes for the Gospel of Peter. The Gospel of Peter’s source comes from the three synoptic Gospels. Again, this attests to how the people of second century already saw the synoptic Gospels as historically accurate. The early church fathers quickly and easily rejected these Gnostic Gospels because they knew they were not historically credible. They knew they needed a historical account of the man Jesus, so that’s why they went with the historical Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John over the Gnostic Gospels.

Conclusion

 

Jesus did exist in history. Romans historians such as Suetonius, Tacticus and Pliny the Younger wrote about Jesus. Jewish historian Josephus wrote about Jesus. None of these historians would have sacrificed their credibility as historians for a fictional character, especially a fictional character whom they despised, as well as despising his followers. Jewish rabbis talk about Jesus in the Talmud. If Jesus wouldn’t have existed, they would have wrote down that in order to silence the new Christianity for falsely proclaiming a Messiah. Instead of denying his existence, they denied his words and deeds. Furthermore, Jesus existed in history exactly as the Gospels record it. They early church fathers immediately agreed with the testimony of these books, and they even supplemented it with more history. At the same time, the early church fathers quickly rejected the Gnostic gospels because they knew those books did not agree with Jesus either historically or theologically. All the Gospels match up with the exact same history and culture modern-day archaeology has revealed. The Gospel authors could not have collaborated their Gospels into pieces of fictions. They lived too far apart to collaborate. If they did collaborate, they did a horrible job, for they created a Messiah totally contrasting what the Jews declared the Messiah would be. Therefore, the Gospels must then accurate record the real, historical Jesus. If the atheists still wants to consider themselves intellectual, they must stop denying the existence of Jesus, as stated in the Gospels, for they are not doing themselves any favors.