Scripture:

Although we have heard our political leaders make use of the term "new covenant" on numerous occasions over the past few years, in all of the Hebrew Scriptures, the term is mentioned only once. Hear now God's profound promises, as recorded in the 31st chapter of the Prophet Jeremiah, verses 31-34:

The days are surely coming, says the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. [32] It will not be like the covenant that I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt a covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, says the LORD. [33] But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. [34] No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, "Know the LORD," for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the LORD; for I will forgive their iniquity, and remember their sin no more.

As we approach Palm Sunday, we are given a text which marks the end of Jesus' public ministry. It is also the watershed of the Fourth Gospel. Jesus' comments are precipitated by the arrival of two Greeks who wish to see him. In the symbolic world of John's Gospel, these Greeks represent the arrival of the world at Jesus' doorstep. His response will be the focus of my sermon. Hear now a reading from the 12th chapter of the Gospel of John, verses 20-33:

Now among those who went up to worship at the festival were some Greeks. [21] They came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and said to him, "Sir, we wish to see Jesus." [22] Philip went and told Andrew; then Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus. [23] Jesus answered them, "The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. [24] Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. [25] Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. [26] Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also. Whoever serves me, the Father will honor.

[27] "Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say 'Father, save me from this hour'? No, it is for this reason that I have come to this hour. [28] Father, glorify your name." Then a voice came from heaven, "I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again." [29] The crowd standing there heard it and said that it was thunder. Others said, "An angel has spoken to him." [30] Jesus answered, "This voice has come for your sake, not for mine. [31] Now is the judgment of this world; now the ruler of this world will be driven out. [32] And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself." [33] He said this to indicate the kind of death he was to die.

SERMON:

Perhaps you have heard the brief story about a man who has just graduated from seminary, and has moved into the parsonage of his first church. Throughout the summer, each Sunday, he stands at the pulpit and offers a sermon which demonstrates to his new congregation what he learned in seminary. After a few months of this, one Sunday after fellowship hour he returns to his office and finds on his chair a simple request in the form of a note from a member of his congregation. It reads: "Sir: we wish to see Jesus." In truth, there are minister's desks throughout the world with these words carved into them as admonition to the would be preacher.

Hearing this anecdote got me thinking about a related theme. In most of my preaching, not only do I assume that you wish to see Jesus, but along with that, I assume that Jesus' story is our story. Now that's not to say that I think we succeed in living out his teachings. Much of what I focus on from this pulpit are the choices we make as we live out our story the choices we make which cause our story-line to depart from Jesus'. But if His story is our story, then my role is to explicate, inspire, exemplify and encourage ways in which each of us can live out His story more fully. This morning, I want to move back a step a big step. As we are proceeding with Jesus and the disciples towards Jerusalem as we anticipate the great arrival next Sunday when palm branches and hails of "Hosanna!" will greet Him and us this morning I want to break that momentum because I feel the need to examine the assumption: Do we accept that His story is our story?

Or are we like Peter: who follows Jesus much of the time, but when Jesus challenges his most foundational realities, Peter says to him: "No! That's going too far. That's asking too much! No one would accept such an assignment or obey such a request." And when because of His faithfulness to God, Jesus comes into unavoidable and humiliating conflict with the powers that be, and is led off to his execution, with Peter we disassociate ourselves from Him, and deny our affiliation again and again and again. What is it about His story that is so challenging? What is it about our stories which cause us to resist His call for each of us to make our story His story?

Consider today's reading. Just before it begins, we learn that "the world" is running after Jesus. That is what the two Greeks who ask to see Jesus symbolize: they are the world. Their arrival signals that the world has discovered Jesus; and Jesus' immediate response is to declare that now, the hour has come: not to provide a stunning exhibit of power and healing so convincing that every knee would bow. But the hour has come for him to live out the law of fruitfulness which is found throughout nature: the law that demands death if there is to be more life. Jesus failed to communicate to his disciples what this meant. How could death how could the death of their master and friend how could the death of the one who came to save how could death bring about more life?

And if it made little sense to his disciples, it makes less sense to many of us. For we live in an age and a society which promote progress as the ultimate end of civilization, and exalts worldly, material success as the measure of a man or a woman. Of course we can find exceptions to this. There are plenty of individuals who have jettisoned the mantle of progress and success and replaced it with a commitment to simplicity, or downward mobility, or caring, or self-sacrifice. And there are even some examples in our collective life where we have tentatively explored the possibility of redefining progress. The national energy policies of the late seventies which were a failure when measured by the standards of an Enlightenment definition of progress are one such example. The current struggle to deal with the coming cataclysm of world-wide atmospheric pollution is another example in which our usual understanding of progress is being reexamined. But these are aberrations in a world so wed to progress that those who advocate an alternative approach are immediately relegated to the side lines.

Is the issue any different in regard to our personal lives? Are our highest aspirations rooted in spiritually sound hopes? Or after all is said and done, is our self-esteem linked with a sense that overall, our lives are progressing as they should, and that that progress is measured in the currency of material security and success?

Let me say explicitly and for the record, early in this reflection, that if a person chooses to live a life of discipleship, centering his or her life in faithfulness and obedience, that commitment, that orientation, will not necessarily rule out success as measured in worldly terms. Security and status, respect and applause, power and promotion may be accorded to a faithful disciple. But these achievements are not our goal. Neither are they the end. And our worldly success can certainly never be described as a fruit of faithfulness. Furthermore, these values are not featured, or even mentioned, in a disciple's personal mission statement. As by-products, these values can be celebrated. But if our story is to become like his story, then our lives must be guided by faithfulness and obedience, whether that leads to the promised land, or to the garden of Gesthemene.

Jesus' comments in today's reading offer a challenging invitation to understand his story, that we might conform our lives to his. When the world finally catches up to Jesus, he tells his disciples that the hour has come the hour which he has persistently told them is coming, but not just yet finally, when the world recognizes Jesus, THIS IS THE MOMENT for his glorification.

And the world has a clear picture of what glorification looks like, a picture that hasn't changed very much in 4,000 years. From the pyramids of Egypt to the theme in the new movie Jerry McGuire: "Show me the money!" worldly glorification looks pretty much the same.

But Jesus has something else in mind. As soon as he mentions being glorified, he immediately links it to his death, and enlarges our understanding of death so that we begin to see the ways in which death is needed to bring about fruitfulness. With the world having arrived at his doorstep, ready to worship him, he pulls the plug, and declares to all that serving him, and honoring God, and bearing fruit require that we lose our lives, and like a grain of wheat, die.

Die to what? Die to a world ruled by success, and driven by progress measured in material terms. The world accords to these things a kind of glory. But the glory which is God's which we recall with each saying of The Lord's Prayer the glory which is God's is of another kind.

Just as the hour came for Jesus, the hour comes for us as well, when the world arrives at OUR doorstep, and the one whom Jesus refers to as "the ruler of the world" suddenly becomes our companion. Often too often we succumb to the tantalizing temptations which are regally displayed before us: an opportunity to cheat on our taxes; or to exaggerate on our resume; or to act on our sexual attraction towards an acquaintance; or to abandon a commitment we have made. Glory, however short-lived, is tempting. Ask anyone with a drinking problem; ask anyone who is drawn into the vortex of pornography; ask anyone who has made a moral mistake which has cost them, or almost cost them, their job, or their marriage, or their self-respect. Not a week goes by that I don't speak with someone at this level of being.

But when we honestly confront our imperfection and our proclivity to sin, when we face our dark side and accept the flaws which permeate our nature, it is then that we gain access to glory of another kind. It is the glory that is ours because we are redeemed. It is the glory that comes because: there is One who has gone before us, who was tempted by the "ruler of the world" in all ways, but did not sin; One who experienced the rush which came when the world beat a path to his door, but turned from that understanding of success so that he might leave the earth behind, and "draw all people to" himself.

There is a choice which we make not a "once and for all" kind of choice, but a choice which comes many times each week there is a choice which we make between the glory of the world and the glory which Jesus offers. If we choose the glory of the world, we may utilize the gifts we have been given to bring ourselves success, and in the eyes of many, achieve great heights. But when (not if, but when) we fall to temptation, does that glory have the power to redeem? And when we face what the Apostle Paul calls the final enemy when we face death in the form of the death of a loved one, the loss of our job, the need to let go a long-cherished dream when we face death, and in particular our own death, will the glory of the world offer us sufficient strength and hope to transcend our fear, insecurity and emptiness?

Jesus' story is a story of freedom expressed in the choice to be obedient to God. In the abundance of our freedom, over and over again life offers us opportunities to make this choice our own. If we are to make his story our story, we must orient our lives toward faithfulness and obedience rather than success and progress. If we are successful by the standards of the world that is, if we have gained the whole world then this reorientation offers us an opportunity not to lose our soul. And if we have been slapped in the face by life's harsh realities, the more attention we give to Jesus' story, the more we realize that he has preceded us on this path, and even now is by our side in our frustration, despair or suffering.

The hope that is ours is not linked to material success and failure. Nor is it deferred to "the great by and by" a time and a place beyond what we know. God in Christ offers us abundant hope for the here and now. God in Christ invites us to enter the kingdom ON EARTH, even as it is in heaven. By embracing his story as our story, we will no doubt have to reevaluate much of what drives us. But if we welcome this change, and in that way die to the self, our lives will manifest fruitfulness beyond our wildest dreams. Amen.