"Listening as Discipleship"

So…

After you come to church on Sunday or go to bible study perhaps mid-week, what happens next?

One might hope that somehow what you’ve learned would result in a change in your thinking or behavior.

But is that really what happens? 

Example: How many of you based on last week’s sermon either started to learn Spanish or went right out and bought cereal for the food pantry?

I mean the sermon was about listening to do, so one might expect that the kind of natural response would be to do something, kind of as a way to seal in the learning.

I mean if you went to a seminar on flyfishing one would expect that you would then at your earliest opportunity go fly fishing so as to test out and perhaps perfect your fishing technique.

But sometimes as followers of Jesus we kind of let the teachings we find in scripture kind of flow over us with very little impact at all!

Which is why Jesus so often took his disciples on an adventure while he was teaching them. Nothing quite like saying God loves lost sheep - and is actively searching in order to bring them home – and then encountering the leper, the Samaritan woman, the paralytic.

What did Jesus say last week? 

Something to Philip about if you have seen me, you have seen the Father.

And, if you don’t believe what I say, believe because of what I do!

I know this sometimes is controversial, but hear me out…

What you do as a follower of Jesus…

Reveals whether you really are one of his disciples.

James the Apostle, whom most biblical scholars believe was the brother of Jesus, suggests here in his letter that listening to the word and then not doing anything about it is a waste of time.

He says, “Obey God's message! Don't fool yourselves by just listening to it. If you hear the message and don't obey it, you are like people who stare at themselves in a mirror and forget what they look like as soon as they leave.”

Okay.

Not really been my experience, but I get what he is saying. What is the point of listen to God’s word and then go home and do nothing about it, as if you have completely forgotten the message.

You know who are the most amazing people on the planet as far as I am concerned? People who week’s after I have preached a sermon can tell me all about what that sermon was about, what I said and what it meant.
Of course, what is even cooler is when they then tell me what they did about it. How what they heard changed their actions.

You see, we are invited to Listen as Disciples. To listen to the word and then do it, just as Jesus’ disciples were expected to do.

I know I tell you this a lot, but you might as well just settle in and accept the fact that the TV show The Chosen is going to be part of a whole lot of sermons.

Not because it is better than scripture. It isn’t. Rather it is a way of seeing the bible stories as if you were an eyewitness. You can and should compare the way the stories are presented with the scripture yourself.

That is the way people of real faith operate.

But seeing the stories acted out sometimes opens our eyes to what really was happening in the story.

Like when Jesus invites Mary Magdalene into the group, or for that matter, Matthew the tax collector. 

To say that Jesus accepted sinners and tax collectors into his followers is really different that seeing Jesus do that.

It challenges us in a visceral way, as we see the disciple’s recoil at these notorious sinners being loved on by Jesus. 

They know that they can’t reject them. 

That would be rejecting Jesus and they know it!
But that doesn’t mean they aren’t struggling, just like we do when we finally come to realize what Jesus is inviting us, commanding us to do.

To not just love the folks we like loving on, but to love those we have been taught by our culture, even sometimes our religious communities to reject, to be separate from, to assume are unwelcome in the kingdom of God, if not just in “our” community.

Jesus, it turns out, will have none of it, and they know it – and so do we.

And when Jesus touches a leper, even embraces him and heals him, their brains explode!

Fourth of July fireworks!

Jesus’ invitation to do as he did, is hard, scary, and so amazing!

Because changing the world, making it the Kingdom of God, means inviting, welcoming, and being in fellowship with all the folks Jesus welcomed to be his followers.

And invited to the table, the table of the Lord!

You are invited to attend the feast of the lamb. 

And you are command to go and get others.

Listening as discipleship. 
Amen.