Pastor Jonah Sage preached Hebrews 4:15b. The humanity of Jesus frees us to pray honestly and wait patiently. Lector: Lindsey Blair
Pastor Jonah Sage preached Hebrews 4:15b. The humanity of Jesus frees us to pray honestly and wait patiently.
Lector: Lindsey Blair
Over the Rhine is a band that means a great deal to me.
In many ways, their music is part of the sound track of my life.
Wonderfully melancholy Christmas record for those interested.
One line from their song “all my favorite people” has always stuck with me…
“All my favorite people are broken, believe me, my heart should know…All my friends are part saint and part sinner, we lean on each other, try to rise above.”
This has been for me a coincidence, not a strategy.
I named my favorite room of my house after Eugene Peterson…the Peterson Center for Coffee and Contemplation. It’s my back porch.
I recently read in Eugene’s biography that one of his great regrets in life was that he was never able to give up his second glass of bourbon before bed.
As he got older, he recognized how it dulled his thinking and made it hard for him to pray the next morning…but he could never give it up.
Brennan Manning’s book The Ragamuffin Gospel changed my life.
Profoundly shaped my late teens and early 20s.
I was devastated to learn he became an alcoholic late in life, and died drunk and alone in a hotel room.
Rich Mullins’ music helped me find words to the angst I felt in my soul several years into my journey with Christ…his songs helped me learn how to doubt honestly.
Many years after his death I would learn how he was often high performing music at churches.
I could keep doing this, but I think you understand.
All my favorite people, it turns out, are broken.
Realizing this about myself has been both profoundly comforting and depressing.
The depressing part is obvious. Don’t you want a hero? Someone to look up to?
And don’t you want to come near to the person, and learn they are as they seem?
But what inevitably happens…?
Perhaps you’ve heard the phrase “don’t meet your heroes”?
Do you remember where you were when you realized your father was just a man, your mom just a woman? Influential, powerful, meaningful presence in your life, yes…but…do you remember discovering their humanity?
Maybe it was when you realize they were going to die, or when they failed you, or the first time you ran faster…
When our heroes turn out to be humans, it can be so painful for us.
The comforting part of my favorite people’s brokenness is that I feel less alone, less misunderstood.
The pain, the realness of their writings and music and lives feel familiar.
None of us enjoy feeling like an academic project for someone, like they can read something and suddenly know what it’s like to be in this skin.
When someone comes near who knows what it’s like to be you, isn’t it glorious?
When someone puts words to what you’ve been trying to say, when someone has walked the same roads you have, isn’t it so wonderful?
How you talk to someone that knows you is different that how you talk to a stranger.
How you talk to someone about your pain is different when they’ve gone through something similar.
How you talk to a hero when they’re perfect is different than how you talk to a hero who is human…do you understand?
As I get older, as I watch more of my heroes and mentors fail, fall, or simply die…I long more and more for a human hero. One who knows me, who struggles like me, but without all the baggage of brokenness and disappointment.
I want someone who knows what it’s like to be me, to be us, but who doesn’t fail in the end! Who doesn’t fall apart…who never crashes to the ground into a million pieces
I think I know what it would have felt like to be one of Jesus’ friends watching him hang lifeless on a cross, beaten beyond recognition.
I think I understand some of the desperation of the women trying to sneak into his grave to wrap his poor body in funeral spices.
And I spend much of my free time wondering what it would have been like to see him, shining and beautiful, walking outside of that grave.
See, this Jesus of ours understands our weaknesses. It’s not academic. It’s personal and experiential.
And listen…
He faced all of the same testings we do
-Hebrews 4:15b
I wondered what this meant for a long time. All the same testings/temptations?
Testings here can mean entice or allure, and one place I saw defined the word as “that pull of improper behavior.”
Think of what that means…Jesus felt that same pull of improper behavior we did.
Whatever let Eugene to want that second bourbon at night, Jesus felt that pull too
Whatever made Rich feel like he needed to numb himself to go to church, Jesus felt that pull too
Whatever you feel that pulls you into those broken places in your life, Jesus felt that same pull.
He does not come to you as a God looking down on you from up high, not as a god who understands you because he’s a god who understands everything.
Jesus understands you because he’s a human who felt the same pulls we do
He’s felt the same pains we do, be it the pain of hunger or death or long walks on dusty roads
Some of you here are really confused, I know.
For some, you’re heading to your first Christmas without a loved one or after the accident or something.
I’ve lost track of the number of people who have told me over the last few months that they don’t know how to pray anymore.
How would you talk to a friend who feels the same pulls that you do?
How would you talk to a friend that knew what it was like to go through what you’re going through?
How would you talk to a friend who is just as excited about your success as you are?
How would you talk to Jesus if you saw him in all of his humanness, as one who understands your weakness because he felt it like you did?
and how would you listen to him if you saw how the first ends?
…yet he did not sin.
-Hebrews 4:15b
He felt the same pulls, but he didn’t give in.
All my favorite people are broken…except Jesus.
Satan tried to shake him and the Roman’s tried to break him…but he held fast.
So you can pray to him knowing he understands you and will never let you down.
If we understand the sympathy of Christ brought near through the humanity of Christ, I think the way we pray will change.
And if I could just give you one word to describe the change it would be honesty.
Honesty is simply telling it like it is rather than like it should be.
So, how would you talk to a friend that understood what you’re going through?
You know the phrase “church it up”? Means to make something sound nicer than it is
So what do we pray? “Oh Lord of heaven grant me serenity for the trials ahead and patience to trust your…” and we say all these church-sounding-words.
What’s an honest prayer?
How long, O Lord, must I call for help? But you do not listen! “Violence is everywhere!” I cry, but you do not come to save.
-Habakkuk 1:2
You hear the difference, right? Can you hear the accusation even?
It’s not an accurate prayer here, ok? It’s an honest one.
And, because he’s been tempted in every way, because he understands our weakness, he can handle it.
Hear my prayer, O Lord; listen to my plea! My enemy has chased me. He has knocked me to the ground and forces me to live in darkness like those in the grave. I am losing all hope; i am paralyzed with fear.
-Psalm 143:1-4
Honest prayers. How do you pray honestly? Tell god like it is.
That’s it. Tell him something real, not something ideal.
Something real about what you want, about how you are doing, what you need.
Speak plainly and directly, don’t be so worried about if what you’re saying is true or even if it’s good! It’s not good to tell God he’s forgotten you, or to question his faithfulness! But those prayers are in the Bible!
Because God is more interested in your honesty than your accuracy.
So say something real to him. Something honest to him.
And then the pattern of the scriptures is to wait.
Wait on the Lord. Wait to hear his voice.
In a few minutes, we’ll celebrate communion together.
I wonder what might happen if we imagined Jesus speaking to us as we took the bread and wine? If we imagined him whispering “I understand, I know…remember what I’ve done for you. Remember who you are to me.”
Maybe take a few minutes to reflect on the words of Christ on the screen during communion.
Maybe simply say “speak to me Lord” or “help me” or “I’m listening” and then listen.
We cry out to the Lord, then we wait on the Lord, and eventually we will rejoice in the Lord.
After crying out with honest prayers and waiting for hundreds of years, Moses and Miriam end up on the shores of the Red Sea singing:
I will sing tot he Lord, for he has triumphed gloriously; he has hurled both horse and rider into the sea. The Lord is my strength and my song; he has given me victory. This is my God, and I will praise him—my father’s God, and I will exalt him!
-Exodus 15:1-2
After waiting for years for a child, crying out with honest prayers, and being given a sweet boy named Samuel, Hannah returned him to the Lord and sang:
My heart rejoices in the Lord! The Lord has made me strong. Now I have an answer for my enemies; I rejoice because you rescued me. No one is holy like the Lord! There is no one besides you; there is no Rock like our God.
-1 Samuel 1:1-2
After crying out for centuries and waiting on the Lord, an angel comes to a young teenager and tells her their prayers have been answered. Unto them a son will be given who will be called Immanuel, Christ the Lord. And in response Mary sang:
Oh, how my soul praises the Lord. How my spirit rejoices in God my Savior! For he took notice of his lowly servant girl, and from now on all generations will call me blessed. For the Mighty One is holy, and he has done great things for me.
-Luke 1:46-48
He has come near to you. He understands you. Cry out to him, wait and listen for him, and soon we will rejoice together with him.