October 12, 2003 - Youth Sunday
Job 23:1-9, 16-17
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Psalm 22:1-15
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Hebrews 4:12-16
    NRSV KJV CEV

“The Bare Grace”

Would you please pray with me:

God, our Creator and Judge, please open our hearts and minds that we may be open to your Word on this morning.  In the name of the one who came to save us, Amen.

The “naked dream” is one most of us have had at some point in our lives.  We wake up with only the memory of having stood completely naked in New York City’s Time Square, arriving to take a test in only our underclothes, or standing before one’s congregation the first time she preaches without her, and I quote, “robe.”

When I have this dream it leaves me shaken.  I am not so much ashamed because of my nakedness, but because of my venerability in nakedness.  Standing in only my underclothes in the center of Time Square leaves me with nothing but who I really am – without the clothes I use to cover my imperfections – physical or otherwise.  First, I am embarrassed that I was so dumb as to leave the house without my clothes on!  And second, I find myself unprotected from the stares, judgments, criticisms, and laughter of all those around me.  When I wake up it is with the fear of everyone knowing who I really am through my mistake. 

Whether our writer of Hebrews ever experienced this dream, we will likely never know.  However, our Scripture from Hebrews provides a similar situation.  Written as a sermon to a group of men and women, the author tackles many of the issues this early Christian community was facing.  In a time period when persecution for one’s faith was a daily possibility, the community encountered the true cost of discipleship.  This morning’s text is both intimidating and hopeful. 

The author begins with a graphic image of the word of God as a two-edged sword.  The sword cuts right down to the bone, moving even further to the marrow within the bone.  The joints are separated and the soul and spirit divided.  The author’s mention of body parts here is not intended to ‘gross us out’ with the violent act.  Instead, reference to the body is made symbolically, clarifying the range in which the word will reach.  No part of our body and life is beyond God.  Each piece of us is opened to the inquiring eye of God.   In this context, exposure to the word of Scripture is directly related to exposure to God.  When we read Scripture in worship or in personal devotion or study Scripture in a Bible Study, we are exposing ourselves to our Creator and Judge.  We deceive ourselves if we think we can escape the living and active word of God.

Talk about standing completely naked in Time Square.  The word of God strips us right to the core of our being – exposing our fears, our dreams, our thoughts, our loves, and, heaven forbid, our sins.  And, it gets worse.  Not only are we vulnerable in the most incredible way, but we are vulnerable before the One to whom we must give our account of our human actions and ask for total and undeserved forgiveness.  We are completely bare.

This ‘bareness’ hits home for me in a very deep and personal way.  I, as well as you, live in a very ‘stuff’ oriented society.  My ‘stuff’ includes the titles I hold, …

I am a student at Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary.

I am a pastoral intern at First Congregational Church in Wauwatosa, Wisconsin.

I am the chaplain assistant at Congregational Homes in Brookfield, Wisconsin.

I am a daughter.

I am a sister to two siblings.

I am a Christian Clown.

I am…. Etc, etc, etc.

My stuff includes the things I own, … I own a car, a stereo, more books than is possible to read in a lifetime, a computer, a cell phone, and, even, yes I know, Tickle Me Elmo.

It includes the person I want to be…

A professor.  I would like to teach Inter-religious dialogue in a University.

A wife.  I plan to marry next summer.

And further, until even the ‘stuff’ under the surface is revealed by God’s sword. 

My love of traveling

My excitement over reading a good book or studying something like the eschalogical reasons for Christian marriage. 

My perfectionism and my desire to please others. 

These, among so many other categories we could come up with during a congregational brainstorming event make up our ‘stuff’.  My life is filled with stuff.

In the Gospel of Mark, we have an account of a man who ran up to Jesus with a very important question, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”  He was seeking confirmation that what he was doing was good and he would be rewarded.

Jesus gave him the typical answer of the day, follow the Ten Commandments, listing them as a reminder, “do not murder, commit adultery, steal, bear false witness, defraud, and honor your mother and father.”

But, the man was still concerned, I have done all of these things, since I was a little kid, he says.

Okay, then, Jesus answers, do this one last thing.  Get rid of all of your stuff – sell your house, your car, your computer, cancel your cell phone, sell your books, even the ones you have not read, give Tickle Me Elmo to the child down the street, give all of your money to the poor, and then you will have treasure in heaven.  Oh, and come, follow me.  And for that, you will need to give up your job, your family, your leadership positions in the community, all of your dreams, and all of the stuff under the surface.  My word will open you completely and you will be striped bare.  Come follow me

And the man walked away, in great sorrow, “for he had great” stuff. 

This story is an excellent example in that we, as the readers, do not know what the man decided.  Did he sell all of his possessions and follow Jesus?  Did he decide leaving everything was not what he could do at this moment in time?  The story is unfinished as the man walks away.  We know that he struggles with the message – “His countenance fell, and he went way sorrowful,” the author of Mark tells us.  This man is asked to bare all things within and without and stand before God, his judge and creator.  He stands, subject to the living and active word of God.

In Hebrews it says, “And before him no creature is hidden, but all are open and laid bare to the eyes of him with whom we have to do.”

But, there is hope!

In this depressing and intimidating text, there is hope.  In the Jewish faith, during biblical times, the high priest was one who made the sacrifices to God on behalf of the Israelites.  The priests observed an incredible standard of ritual cleanliness in order to be able to perform these acts, as laid out in the laws of the Hebrew Scriptures. 

In verse 14, of our chapter in Hebrews, the author names Jesus as the “great high priest” of the Christians.  As Christians, they are no longer bound by the sacrifice rituals of the high priests in the Jewish temple.  Jesus served as the final sacrifice, eliminating the need for the ‘middle-man,’ to use a business term.   The fact that we have Jesus, the Son of God, on our side, offers unbelievable hope.

“For we have not a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet is without sin.”  Jesus was here on earth, understands our weaknesses, was tempted, and yet remained unwavering in his faithfulness to God.  For this permanent faithfulness, Jesus is sinless.  As some could imagine, Jesus’ sinlessness does not affect his ability to help us, as sinful creatures.  As the ancients expressed it, “he was as we are, and therefore he will help; he was not as we are, and therefore he can.” 

Jesus is willing to be our access to God.  He is willing to clothe our nakedness with himself, in order that we might have the confidence to “draw near to the throne of grace,” and receive the mercy, which is available to us there, and to find the grace, which is free to all. 

We are exposed, opened, laid bare to be rescued by Jesus, who understands our position, and is willing to offer us grace and mercy.  “Let us, then, [my brothers and sisters in Christ] with confidence, draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”  Let us experience the living and active word of God, so that Jesus may be our high priest and we may receive mercy and grace in our times of need.

And let the people celebrate by saying, “Amen.”