FREEING JESUS
Rediscovering Jesus as Friend, Teacher, Savior,
Lord, Way, and Presence
by Diana Butler Bass
My sister Liz loaned me a book she recently studied in a church book club - after reading me the introduction over the phone earlier this spring. Looking for a good topic for a worship service later in July, I am going to spend several weeks delving into some of the highlights (she has already underlined!) Eventually I should have a sermon written as well!! And hopefully will have answered the ultimate question for myself....Who do I say that Jesus is?
“My knees hurt. The cushion at the marble altar almost did not matter. I could feel the cold in my legs, the ache of unanswered prayers. “Where are you, God?” I asked. Silence.
I looked up at Jesus in full triptych glory, surrounded by angels, robed in cobalt blue against a gilt background, shimmering sanctity. The small chapel in the great cathedral was one of my favorite places to pray, mostly because of this Jesus. Today, however, I was restless as I gazed intently at the massive icon of Christ. Usually, the image drew me deeper toward God, and the railing where I knelt was a place of awakening and wisdom. “Where are you, God?” I asked again. Silence.
“God?” A quiet please, really, the most incomplete of prayers.
“Get me out of here,” a voice replied.
Was someone speaking to me? I looked behind, around.
“Get me out of here,” the voice said again.
I stared up at the icon. “Jesus? Is that you?”
“Get me OUT OF HERE!” I heard again, more insistent now.
“But Lord…”
The chapel fell silent, but I know I heard a divine demand for freedom. I was not sure what to think, but I also did not want to tell the priest who was wandering up the aisle. I doubted the Washington National Cathedral would take kindly to the Son of God looking for the exit. And I was not sure what to do. Smuggling an altarpiece out of the building was not going to happen. Instead, I got up and nearly bolted out, all the while envisioning how I might rescue Jesus from the cathedral. I felt bad leaving him behind.”
INTRODUCTION
Who do you say that I am?
Matthew 16:15
One of the main tenets of faith is that the church is the body of Christ and that Jesus cannot really be fully known outside of the life of the church. Approved theology will not let you separate Jesus and the church.(xv)
Yet, in our attempts to maintain the relationship between Jesus and the body of Christ, we have locked the essence of Christianity into a church building and a set of rules and 'laws' that demand our all way more than the law of love.
CHAPTER 1: FRIEND
The Son of Man has come eating and drinking, and you say, “Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!”
Luke 7:34
CHAPTER 2 – TEACHER
You call me Teacher and Lord – and you are right, for that is what I am.
John 13:13
CHAPTER 3 – SAVIOR
Do not be afraid...to you is born this day in the city of David, a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord.
Luke 2:10-11
CHAPTER 4 – LORD
Why do you call me “Lord, Lord” and do not do what I tell you? I will show you what someone is like who comes to me, hears my words, and acts on them.
Luke 6:46-47
CHAPTER 5: WAY
I am the way, and the truth, and the life.
John 14:6
CHAPTER 6: PRESENCE
And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.
Matthew 28:20
CONCLUSION: THE UNIVERSAL JESUS
I am the Alpha and Omega, the first and the last,
the beginning and the end.
Revelation 22:13
Covid hit while this book was being written. Church doors closed. Butler-Bass concludes
”If you wanted to find Jesus in a church during Covid, you couldn’t. The doors were shut tight. But as millions have discovered in these many months, Jesus is NOT confined to a building…...I did not liberate Jesus from the cathedral; a pandemic did. Jesus is with us. Here. Everywhere.”
SERMON FREEING JESUS
July 25, 2021
The author writes,
“My knees hurt. The cushion at the marble altar almost did not matter. I could feel the cold in my legs, the ache of unanswered prayers. “Where are you, God?” I asked. Silence.
I looked up at Jesus in full triptych glory, surrounded by angels, robed in cobalt blue against a gilt background, shimmering sanctity. The small chapel in the great cathedral was one of my favorite places to pray, mostly because of this Jesus. Today, however, I was restless as I gazed intently at the massive icon of Christ. Usually, the image drew me deeper toward God, and the railing where I knelt was a place of awakening and wisdom. “Where are you, God?” I asked again. Silence.
“God?” A quiet please, really, the most incomplete of prayers.
“Get me out of here,” a voice replied.
Was someone speaking to me? I looked behind, around.
“Get me out of here,” the voice said again.
I stared up at the icon. “Jesus? Is that you?”
“Get me OUT OF HERE!” I heard again, more insistent now.
“But Lord…”
The chapel fell silent, but I know I heard a divine demand for freedom. I was not sure what to think, but I also did not want to tell the priest who was wandering up the aisle. I doubted the Washington National Cathedral would take kindly to the Son of God looking for the exit. And I was not sure what to do. Smuggling an altarpiece out of the building was not going to happen. Instead, I got up and nearly bolted out, all the while envisioning how I might rescue Jesus from the cathedral. I felt bad leaving him behind.”
These are the opening lines from Diana Butler Bass’s new book, Freeing Jesus, and if this morning’s sermon sounds something like a book review, well, I suppose it might be! My sister loaned me the book in early June and I have used it for my daily prayer drawings over the past month or so. In doing so I realized it asks a couple very important questions for all of us...questions I may not present answers to this morning, but questions we all need to answer individually for ourselves.
In this morning’s scripture from Matthew 16, Jesus asks the question, “Who do YOU say that I am?” How we answer that question, the language and perhaps creed that we use, can confine Jesus and us. But WHO is a relationship word – an invitation that opens us to companionship, friendship, and perhaps love. It can really only be answered in how we EXPERIENCE Jesus for ourselves, not based on an ancient creed that perhaps has boxed Jesus into the church building throughout history. Yes...that is why we recited the Apostles Creed this morning. More on that later.
So...here are my two questions for you to mull around in your head….
Have we as a church people put Jesus into a box, confined him to the church building and Sunday worship? And secondly,
How would you personally answer Jesus’s question, “Who do YOU say that I am?”
The author shares six forms of Jesus that have been REAL to her in her life experiences. For the sake of brevity I am just going to touch on each one, somewhat to illustrate the many different relationships we can establish with Jesus throughout our lives.
FRIEND.
“I do not call you servants any longer,” Jesus said to his followers, “but I have called you friends.” (John 15:15)
Friend is perhaps our earliest introduction to Jesus as a child. Jesus loves me this I know. Jesus - our invisible companion. Friendship as children is the friendship relationship in its purest form. It is an intimate bond of trust, mutual exchange, love without conditions. The concept of friend or divine companionship collapses the sacred distance between God and us. “What a Friend We Have in Jesus!”
TEACHER
You call me Teacher and Lord – and you are right, for that is what I am. John 13:13
Of the ninety or so times Jesus is addressed directly in the NT, roughly sixty refer to him as ‘teacher’, ‘rabbi’ ‘great one’ or ‘master’ (as in the British sense of schoolmaster). In the gospels the preponderance of action that occurs is Jesus teaching….at the temple, on hillsides, by lakes, in fields and campfires, at wedding and dinner tables. He teaches individuals, his disciples, crowds, smallgroups, friend and foes. Today we think of rabbi as a Jewish clergyman, but in Jesus’ time, it simply referred to one who taught with authority.
Jesus taught with stories, parables intended to come alongside our current understanding and then expand or upset it. Theologian Marcus Borg writes, “Jesus was not primarily a teacher of either correct beliefs or right morals. Rather he was a teacher of a way or path, specifically a way of transformation.”
SAVIOR
Do not be afraid...to you is born this day in the city of David, a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord. Luke 2:10-11
Butler-Bass writes, “Savior” may well be the most ubiquitous term that Christians use to describe Jesus...Yet, oddly enough, the term only appears twice in the gospels to describe Jesus.” (I had to look ubiquitous up – it means commonly used!) And the term salvation comes from Latin salvus, which originally referred to being made whole, safe, or in good health. Salvus was not about being taken out of this life; it was about this life being healed.
Jesus was not killed so his death would save people; he was killed because he was already saving them. He threatened a world based in fear, not love. Salvation is about living beyond fear.
LORD
Why do you call me “Lord, Lord” and do not do what I tell you? I will show you what someone is like who comes to me, hears my words, and acts on them. Luke 6:46-47
The word LORD held multiple meanings in the Biblical world, meanings that were personal, political, and theological. In the NT Greek the term used is kyrios – meaning Lord, Master, Ruler/King – each signifying dominion over the lives and fates of those under him. To say ‘Jesus is Lord’ was both subversive and empowering. Yet the priorities of Jesus’ kingdom would be exactly opposite of those in the world we know today – Jesus’ kingdom is one where holy generosity and true peace replace militarism, capitalism, and the me-first attitude so prevalent.
Jesus can be Lord of our hearts, but must also be Lord of the whole earth in the most redemptive of ways.
THE WAY
I am the way, the truth, and the life. John 14:6
Jesus as The Way does not hand us a map when we are born and then disappear. For the map is constantly changing and there is no single road to follow for everyone. Bass writes, “But when you dare leave the map behind, Jesus emerges as the road itself and the Light that guides. I learned that Jesus as Way includes both joy and loss – not as separate roads, but more like companion routes. The ways of affirmation and abandonment were not easy, but they sometimes merged.” But always, if we stop to “breathe God in, breathe love out” we will find the Light marking the path to follow in that time and place.
PRESENCE
And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age. Matthew 28:20
The Trinity – God, Jesus, Holy Spirit. As much as philosophical theology tries to separate the threads of the Three-in-One, Jesus is known as the presence of God, made alive through the Spirit. Jesus is present near and far, here and there, completely with us yet absolutely beyond imagining.
Bass writes, “The Christian faith is not ‘seeing is believing’ but rather ‘believing is seeing’. We must open our eyes and hearts and see Jesus’ presence in our lives. We need to see him in the places that we dare not to look and dare not to think about.” When we do, we will discover a God who is always on the move urging us to participate in his new creations.
UNIVERSAL JESUS
Friend.Teacher.Savior.Lord.Way.Presence. These are just six forms of Jesus the author has experienced for herself over the years – a continuum of encountering Jesus in new ways during her life journey. She concludes with the Universal Jesus – the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end. A Jesus of Oneness, of welcoming and inclusion, the Jesus that connects ALL of us. A Jesus not defined by dogma or creeds, by church polity, but a Jesus within a circle with all of us, working to bring the Kin-dom of God to life.
To return to our two questions…
Do we need to unwrap Jesus? Free Jesus from the bondage of church polity? “There is a line – often a very thin one, between knowledge and dogmatism, between clarity and certainty – and far too many people fail to distinguish between being able to share the Good News of Jesus and zealous preoccupation with correct doctrine.” It seems the modern church may have some of the same difficulties the Jewish Sanhedran had two millenium ago when they tried to reign in this rabble-rousing rabbi who didn’t follow strict Jewish law. Do we as a church need to free Jesus today from confining dogma today?
Secondly, ponder this week how you have experienced Jesus in your life. Who do YOU say that he is? Which form of Jesus defines your relationship now, at this moment in your life? Have you encountered Jesus in other ways? Do you personally need to release Jesus into a more active and real presence?
Covid hit while this book was being written. Church doors closed. Butler-Bass concludes,”If you wanted to find Jesus in a church during Covid, you couldn’t. The doors were shut tight. But as millions have discovered in these many months, Jesus is NOT confined to a building…...I did not liberate Jesus from the cathedral; a pandemic did. Jesus is with us. Here. Now. Everywhere. Always.”
AMEN.
