Renewal Series: First Glory Sighting

Sermon given at Sydenstricker UMC 1/28/18

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^NRS Acts 7:51 "You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you are forever opposing the Holy Spirit, just as your ancestors used to do. ⁵² Which of the prophets did your ancestors not persecute? They killed those who foretold the coming of the Righteous One, and now you have become his betrayers and murderers. ⁵³ You are the ones that received the law as ordained by angels, and yet you have not kept it." ⁵⁴ When they heard these things, they became enraged and ground their teeth at Stephen. ⁵⁵ But filled with the Holy Spirit, he gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. ⁵⁶ "Look," he said, "I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God!" ⁵⁷ But they covered their ears, and with a loud shout all rushed together against him. ⁵⁸ Then they dragged him out of the city and began to stone him; and the witnesses laid their coats at the feet of a young man named Saul. ⁵⁹ While they were stoning Stephen, he prayed, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit." ⁶⁰ Then he knelt down and cried out in a loud voice, "Lord, do not hold this sin against them." When he had said this, he died. ^NRS Acts 8:1 And Saul approved of their killing him. That day a severe persecution began against the church in Jerusalem, and all except the apostles were scattered throughout the countryside of Judea and Samaria.

As we gather here, we come to this place and this time seeking to be renewed. Renewed in spirit and we seek a renewal of the church. Most scholars consider Stephen as the first martyr for Christianity. This story follows the reports that the disciples numbers were increasing and the message of Christ was spreading throughout the land and having a great impact on the life of those who came to believe. But we should also remember that the increase in faith meant a decrease in control for those in the Jewish and Roman communities. Stephen was one of seven who were set apart through the laying on of hands to take care of widows, to share the message of Christ in a local setting and to lead the people to faith. Stephen was a person of great faith, great tenacity to share the message of Jesus Christ and strong enough to stand against the world of his day.

On this particular day, Stephen stood against the high priest and Jewish leadership who accused him of blasphemy, a crime punishable by stoning. His response, which is very eloquent found in the seventh chapter of Acts, was to share the story of Moses and the Hebrew people in captivity in Egypt. How the people after seeing the amazing things they saw God do still perverted back to sacred idols and fell away from God. With faith, he stands before them and then attacks their own blasphemy in that they have ignored the teaching of God. There they take him out to stone him. However, in that moment he looks up into the heavens and sees Christ standing next to God. What a wonderful sight that must have been. To see the glory of God and to know that the promise is real and that his faith has set him free from the tortures and life in this world. In that moment, he receives a gift of sight that allows him to see what we can only imagine. Wouldn’t you love to see the glory of God and share in that glory of resurrection one day? What if it was offered to you right this moment? Would you take it?

An American journalist in 1993 interviewed a group of children from a Sunday school in southern Sudan where Arab Muslims regularly raided their village and slaughtered Christians. Many of their relatives had already been killed. The journalist asked, "Would you turn to Islam? Or would you prefer to die for Christ! And if so, why?" The children replied, "We will remain Christians because that is the truth." As they spoke, their faces seemed to glow with light, just like Stephan’s, Christianity’s first martyr. (From a sermon by David E. Watters, Breaking the Law...For God’s Sake, 8/14/2011) These children, just like Stephen, understood that to seek glory meant that you had to deal with the difficulties of life. However, to deny glory meant that life won. Not only would we suffer in life but the loss of glory means that we would suffer in eternity as well.

Jesus reminds us that we need to die to self in order to be renewed in the spirit. Last week I talked about how the disciples prepared themselves through prayer and emptying their own desires and will to be filled with the Holy Spirit. We must do the same in order to receive completely the glory we have been promised. However, when I speak of glory most of you will begin to connect with personal achievement, personal acclamation and the rewards you feel when those around you lift you up. That personal glory is dangerous. Roman victors would often be brought into Rome on a grand chariot, paraded around the track as thousands threw palm leaves and other rewards at them. In the chariot was a man whose sole purpose was to whisper, glory is fleeting my friend. Our own personal glory must be set aside to receive the full promise of the Holy Spirit. Did you hear that message? Our own self must be put away in order to receive the promise we desire from God for renewal. Hear these words from Ephesians.

^NRS Ephesians 4:1 For surely you have heard about him and were taught in him, as truth is in Jesus. ²² You were taught to put away your former way of life, your old self, corrupt and deluded by its lusts, ²³ and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, ²⁴ and to clothe yourselves with the new self, created according to the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.

Christ following glory seekers live in a different kind of world, don’t we? You are here today seeking glory, are you not? So what does a glory seeker do? Well they give up their time whenever someone else needs it. They give up their desire for success focusing instead on assuring that someone else has their needs satisfied. Glory seekers decided that what happens in this life is inconsequential to what happens in the next, so our focus becomes on the future possibility rather than the present reality. Glory seekers are people who find joy in the midst of adversity. So you want to be a glory seeker do you? Let me remind you that people will look at you differently. They will wonder about you when you least expect it. Why is she smiling? She ought to be crying and she is smiling, is she crazy? Why is he giving me that sandwich? What does he want of me for surely no one would just give away food? Why would that person do a random act of kindness? They must want something from me, no-one does this out of kindness anymore. Again, why are they smiling, don’t they know that it is cold and ugly outside? Christ following glory seekers may not hear these questions lifted up but they are there. In addition, they are the questions that you set yourself up for hearing. Since we are entering into Lent let us focus on Lent questions. Why would you fast? Why would you give up something perfectly suited for you just for a time to remind you to pray? Can’t you get a cue card to do that or something? Why would you go around wearing those ashes on your forehead? Makes you look like a dirty little urchin that forgot to wash their face? Why would you do that with joy and there is that smile again, what’s with that?

The day was April 20th, 1999. It started out as any other day for Cassie Bernall and her mother. Cassie had spent the night before studying late into the night. However, this morning was a typical morning; she got up, got dressed, ate breakfast and told her mother that she loved her as she dashed off to school. On this day, she was behind in her studies so she went to study hall instead of lunch, arriving at the library about 11:15 AM. She and some of her closest friends had been there maybe five minutes when a teacher ran in saying there were kids in the hall with guns. They did not think much of it, thinking it was just a harmless senior prank. Then they heard the first shots.  They were coming closer and closer. Dylan Kiebold and Eric Harris enter the library at Columbine High School. They are firing round after round screaming, “We’ve been waiting to do this our entire lives”, cheering after each shot. Cassie was hiding under a table. She was praying. Eric and Dylan approached Cassie. One of them asked Cassie, “Do you believe in God?”  With a strong, non-shaking, convicting voice, she answered, “Yes.” They asked her, “Why?” But they didn’t give her a chance to respond.  She was shot to death. Cassie Bernall had the courage to stand up for her faith and honor Christ in her body through the life she lived and through her death.

Did Cassie see glory that day? Did she achieve the prize for living the kind of life that tells others that you are not seeking what they are in this plane of existence but rather something more elusive, more firm in its foundation and something that transcends time itself? What are you seeking in life? Isn’t that the real question here? Do you want to live your life achieving success, having material possessions, moving from place to place and through event after event still searching for that golden ring? Or do you seek glory that Stephen received? At the moment when life no longer matters, when we have lived lives worthy of the calling that God has called us to, when we have put the proper focus on the things of worth and truth, when we have realized that what we desire is not of this world, then we will look to the heavens and see glory.