The Visibility Cloak -- FPC sermon excerpt

Harry Potter has his Cloak of Invisibility, which he throws on to make himself disappear at critical points in his magical adventures. It shields him completely from being seen by other people, and it cannot be worn out by time or spells. It becomes such a prized possession that Harry decides to keep it at the end of the seven-book series, and pass it on to his descendents.

Don’t you wish that you were a member of Harry’s family?

There are times when we’d all like to disappear. I do, when I try to say something funny in a sermon, and nobody laughs. Maybe you do, when you work up your courage to ask someone out, and they respond with, “Let’s just be friends.” How about when your mind goes blank in the middle of an oral report at school, or a sales pitch to a client? Or when the ball is passed to you at a critical point in a game, and it goes right through your fingers?

If only we had that Cloak of Invisibility!

At other times, we want to be shielded because we are ashamed of our actions. We don’t want people to see what we are doing. We prefer our privacy, where we can hide our activities from others. In the words of Paul to the Ephesians, we are “following the course of this world, following the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work among those who are disobedient” (2:2).

This is strange and supernatural language, like something out of the magical world of Harry Potter. But we know what Paul is trying to communicate — we are well aware that we often behave in a very worldly way, under the influence of powers and spirits that lead us away from God. We live in “the passions of our flesh,” we follow “the desires of flesh and senses,” we let our ambition, greed, jealously, and anger get the best of us (v. 3). We know that we are heading in the wrong direction, and that we ought to turn around.

But changing direction is tough. We would rather just vanish. Poof! Become invisible.

For those who really want to disappear, science is in the process of providing some help. Researchers have demonstrated that they are now able to cloak three-dimensional objects using artificially-engineered materials that redirect light around an object (FOXNews.com, August 11, 2008). These materials deflect light-waves around a body, like water flowing around a smooth rock in a stream. The key is to keep the light from bouncing back, because if the light is reflected then the object can be seen. This research has been funded by the National Science Foundation and U.S. Army Research Office — the Army, of course, is very interested in gaining a fighting advantage by making its people and equipment invisible.

The bottom line is this: If you want to be invisible, you have to find a way to bend light around yourself. If light is reflected, then you are going to be seen.

It is clear from Paul’s letter to the Ephesians that God wants his divine light to bounce off us, instead of bend around us. Paul says that “God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead through our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ” (v. 4). We become alive with Christ when we are baptized into the Christian community — in the words of Paul, “As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ” (Galatians 3:27). As Christians, we are invited to “put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provisions for the flesh, to gratify its desires” (Romans 13:14).

So we are “clothed” with Christ, writes Paul, and we “put on” the Lord Jesus Christ — this is what it means to be a properly dressed disciple of Christ. Jesus becomes for us a Visibility Cloak, one that reflects the light of God and makes us visible to the world.

Oaths and Offices -- FPC sermon excerpt

It was Inauguration Day, January 20, 2009.

I was standing on the Mall in Washington, DC, as stiff and cold as an ice sculpture. I had been shivering there for four hours, along with about 2 million fellow Americans, anxious for the main event to begin.

Finally, the enormous video screen in front of the Smithsonian showed Barack Obama raising his right hand to take the oath of office. The crowd went wild.

John Roberts, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, laid out the oath, “I, Barack Hussein Obama, do solemnly swear that I will execute the office of President faithfully.”

Problem was, the oath was supposed to say, “I, Barack Hussein Obama, do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the office of President.” The word “faithfully” had somehow flipped out of place, and landed at the end of the phrase.

Barack Obama seemed confused. He followed the Chief Justice’s lead for a few words and then stopped. The justice gave it another shot. They tried together to get back on track, and then the ceremony concluded.

Along with millions of Americans, I wondered what in the world had just happened. Four long hours in the cold, only to witness a botched oath of office.

All kinds of political chatter immediately erupted. Since Senator Obama had voted against John Roberts when he was appointed to the Supreme Court, some said that the mix-up was intentional. Others claimed that Obama would not and could not become President until he said the oath of office correctly.

Just to be safe, Obama and Roberts repeated the oath the next day, in private. And then Barack Obama undertook the much more difficult task of faithfully executing the office of President of the United States.

In the eighth chapter of the Gospel of Mark, Jesus asks his disciples who he is, and Peter answers, “You are the Messiah” (v. 29). He is exactly right in what he says, and doesn’t mess up any of the words of this particular pledge of allegiance. And yet, getting the words right is not all there is to being a faithful disciple. Peter doesn’t fully comprehend the import of what he is saying — for instance, he is quick to rebuke his master just a few verses later, when Jesus begins to teach his followers that he “must undergo great suffering … and be killed” (v. 31).

Peter nails the oath, but not the office. He does a great job pledging his allegiance to Jesus, but he doesn’t grasp what the job of following the Messiah is all about.

This passage challenges us to move away from an obsession with oaths, and focus instead on the specifics of two particular offices: Messiah and Follower. It is only when we understand these roles that we will able to faithfully execute the office of disciple of Jesus Christ.

The Vocabulary of Discipleship -- FPC sermon excerpt

Skedaddle.

You know what the word means: To run away quickly. As in, “When the police showed up at the keg party, the teenagers skedaddled.”

This is nothing new. In the Garden of Gethsemane, Judas led an armed posse to Jesus, and they laid hands on him and arrested him. And what did the disciples do? According to the Gospel of Mark, they skedaddled.

Actually, Mark says that they “deserted him and fled” (14:50). Same thing.

But do you know where the word “skedaddle” comes from? It first appeared during the Civil War, and was used to describe a flight from the battlefield. It may have come from a Scottish word meaning to spill or scatter. The sight of blood being spilled on the battlefield probably caused soldiers to say “skedaddle” when they made a rapid retreat from the fighting.

There are a number of words in our civilian vocabulary that have a military origin. Almost every outbreak of war spawns new words, and this terminology quickly slips into everyday use. According to mental_floss magazine (May-June 2008), warfare is responsible for words such as:

Undermine. You might complain that your colleagues are undermining you, and this can certainly be frustrating and damaging. But in the 14th century, undermining was a military term for digging a secret passage under a building to sneak up on the enemy, or to bring down a castle or some other fortification. So be glad that your coworkers are not undermining you … literally.

Basket case. Today, a basket case is simply a deeply troubled person, and we all know a few of them. Sometimes I feel like one. But during the First World War it meant a living soldier who had lost all his limbs and was carried home in a basket. The US military denies that real baskets were used for this purpose, but the gruesome image remains.

Flak. Celebrities catch a lot of flak for idiotic behavior — and they deserve it. But when the word originated in the 1930s, it was short for an unpronounceable 19-letter German word for anti-aircraft guns. The bursting shells from these guns were a lethal threat to airplane crews, and were infinitely more damaging than the words hurled at people today.

Even the war in Iraq is contributing new vocabulary. Hillbilly armor is a term for the scraps used by resourceful soldiers to make their vehicles bulletproof. And an IED is an improvised explosive device — a homemade bomb created by a terrorist or insurgent. Our soldiers need hillbilly armor to protect them from … you guessed it … IEDs.

In the eighth chapter of Mark, Jesus predicts his suffering and death, rebukes Peter, and challenges his followers to lose their lives for the sake of the gospel. The vocabulary of discipleship is not always peaceful, since it includes calls for self-sacrifice, predictions of suffering, and violent outbursts such as “Get behind me, Satan!” To be a follower of Jesus is a life-and-death battle — challenging, stressful, and painful.

Before we fall into formation behind Jesus, we need to count the cost. We don’t want to be like the original disciples … and skedaddle.