SEEING THE LIGHT IN BIG SKY COUNTRY
The Rev. Mark Sherwindt, Pastor
Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church
Lent IV: March 5-6, 2005
I must admit that I am a huge fan of this long text from the Gospel of John. I cannot help but think of that classic Gospel song penned by Hank Williams, Sr. back in 1948 entitled I Saw the Light. I've included a copy with the revised Gospel Reading at the end of this sermon. We've got Margaret Reichenbach on the piano, and Brian Walters on lead vocals. Let's give it a go.... This song takes me back more than thirty years, to the crossroads of the wild, wild west in Big Sky country where Interstates 15 and 90 intersect in Missoula, Montana. That's where I first heard young people my age singing Hank Williams' classic to give voice to how God had changed their lives through the love of His Son. It was 1970, and Missoula, oddly enough, was a haven for folks wondering aimlessly through life. It was a University town at the intersection of two major interstates, one heading west for folks escaping from congestion in the east, and the other leading north, for folks on the west coast escaping from the influx of easterners moving into their increasingly crowded backyards.
So, when I landed at a Christian Coffeehouse in the center of Missoula, I ran into young drifters and dropouts from all over the country, from New York, Massachusetts, the greater Chicago area, Washington State and Southern California - kids my age and a little older, who had one thing in common, they had found Jesus. The Jesus Movement had found a home in Big Sky country, and points south through Denver into New Mexico, and then east from there all the way to the Atlantic Ocean. The "Byrds", whose previous claim to fame had been their huge psychedelic hit Eight Miles High, had just turned country and Christian, with a track called "The Christian Life" on the not so classic Sweetheart of the Rodeo. Perhaps some of you remember another of those Christian hits from the 70's, "Put Your Hand in the Hand of the Man who Stilled the Water", a popular tune, which a Canadian group called "Ocean" rode all the way to the top in 1972. There was "Day by Day" from Godspell in 1972, following right on the heels of "I Don't Know How to Love Him" from Jesus Christ Superstar the year before.
Usually it's LA and Southern California that forecast trends by being two to three years ahead of the country. But this time it was the small towns and cities of the Rocky Mountain West that wound up predicting that faith was going to become less formal and more personal, less liturgical and more country, less about tradition and more about life-changing relationships. Jimmy Carter got himself elected to the Presidency in 1976, and that meant that Bible-believing, born-again, Southern Baptists were in the mainstream of American culture. Rick Warren was getting ready to migrate from his native south in Texas to Orange County at just about that time when Southern California was catching up with the rest of the country. It sure had been a long and interesting road from the Jesus Movement 1970's to the Church Growth era of today; but the inclusion of country classics like I Saw the Light in many contemporary worship services today makes it as clear for us as it was for the man born blind in our Gospel Lesson that Jesus is more about changing lives than preserving traditions.
There are a lot of interesting dynamics going on in our Gospel, but the one that I find most interesting is the Pharisees' criticism of Jesus. Their chief complaint against Jesus is that he's breaking the rules of tradition. "This man is not from God, for he is working on the Sabbath. [John 9:16] We don't care about the good he's doing. It doesn't matter that someone was cured of an incurable disease. He's breaking the rules! Where's the respect for tradition? Where the reverence for God?" It reminds me of some of those mainstream complaints we heard back in the 70's. "Kids are wearing jeans in church ... and sneakers, too! Where's the reverence for God and respect for tradition?" You see, that's what happens when countless rules and unspoken traditions take the life from the heart of true religion, which isn't about our rules but God's grace; and God's grace is bent on celebrating the new life, the fresh start, that is offered with the gift of forgiveness, not following the same-old same-old of the blind leading the blind because of self-imposed blinders that blind us to what God wants us to see and to do.
That's death, not life, and isn't that what Jesus is saying about the Pharisees? "If you were really blind, then you wouldn't be guilty of refusing to open your eyes to what God's love is doing right here among us . [John 9:41] The man who was blind from birth now sees God's love because he's experienced it; but you who claim to know God best deny the truth of what is so obvious to others because you close your eyes to the presence and the power of the love that God so graciously gives." It's not about your rules. It's about God's grace, God's love, God's life. That was the meaning of the quote that Jesus offered with the promise of John 3:16. "The light has come into the world, but people loved darkness...." [John 3:19] John's Gospel is saying that they chose their own darkness over God's light. It remains true to our own experience that folks prefer their own blindness to a clear view of God's truth.
I can recall from those days when I first arrived here at Zion, and we were studying the Gospel of Mark. We came across one of Jesus' sayings in Chapter 4: "To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside everything is in riddles, so that they may see but not really see, that they may hear but not really hear, lest they turn and repent..." Fred wondered why God would want some to remain in the dark. But the truth is that it is not about what God wants, but what some choose. The light has come into the world, but some chose their blindness to the light of God's life, the sight of God's love. It's sad, I know, but there are times when even we choose the self-imposed blindness of our own narrow-minded judgmentalism, rather than open our eyes to the wideness in God's mercy, the goodness of God's grace, and the freedom that flows through the gift of forgiveness.
This totally baffles the man born blind, who now clearly sees that those who claim to know God best don't see the evidence of God's love, which is so clearly evident in Jesus' willingness, in spite of the rules, to reach out and respond to the needs of those around him. This man did more than see the light, he enjoyed a journey that led to the formation of faith. First, he saw Jesus as the man he encountered who sent him to the Pool of Siloam. Then, he began to see Jesus as a prophet with special power from above. Then, there was talk of his being the Messiah, the Savior sent to fulfill the hopes of God's people. And finally, he learns to call Jesus "Lord", the very presence of God's love alive among us. This journey of conversion to faith is another of the interesting dynamics going on in the text. In my case, like many of you, I knew Jesus as Lord long before I thought of him as a man, or a prophet, or even as my Savior.
As one who grew up in the church, I knew the language of faith, but it was so formal, so cloaked in the ritual of tradition, that I never really thought of it as something that was supposed to affect me personally. I thought of faith as something that our community believed, as an understanding involving creeds and constitutions, not as a personal relationship. Sure, that might have been conveniently shallow on my part, but it certainly wasn't uncommon. I think that is why I was so intrigued and interested when people my age were talking with feeling about the difference Jesus' love made for their lives. I knew about Jesus; but Larry, Terry and Arnie helped me to see that this Christianity-thing involved more than knowing about Jesus: it was about knowing Jesus, as a friend as well as the Lord. Their interest in knowing Jesus interested me. It made it personal, and that was the beginning of my life-changing journey in faith. That's what Rick Warren was talking about when he said that what attracts people to faith is seeing lives change and changed lives. Somehow, we've got to see more than our history and tradition when we gather in this familiar place. We've got to see the light of God's love changing lives.
The signs of God's life-changing love are everywhere: in the songs that we sing, the lessons we read, the worship we bring, and the service we offer. Sometimes the journey of faith is as simple as taking the lofty language and abstract concepts of complicated creeds, and turning them into first-person singular statements about having a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. Sometimes, as with the song-writer who wrote about the Amazing Grace that followed him in life as he sailed the seven seas, John Newton knew the language of faith from childhood, but never felt the need to take it personally. God's grace followed him, then found him, and saved him from disaster, and finally changed his life, by turning him from the slave trade he served, to following the way of another master, the Master we call the Lord, Jesus Christ. "Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost but now am found, was blind but now I see." What a story! That's our story. The details may be different, the sins of blindness our own; but God still gives sight to the blind, and life to all who are found ... by God's grace ... and in Jesus' Name. Amen