WHAT’S TRUE & WHAT’S NOT - Sermon

John 21:1-19    WHAT’S TRUE & WHAT’S NOT & DOES JESUS’ RESURRECTION MAKE A DIFFERENCE?

Ray is a corn farmer. He and his wife Annie and small daughter Karin live on farm in Iowa. Ray is a good husband and dad perhaps because he made up his mind to be different from his own father John who was seldom around when Ray was a boy. Their relationship was always troubled and then John died. 

Year later Ray began to hear a voice telling him to build a baseball diamond and an outfield on his farmland. The voice told him, "If you build it he will come." Ray doesn’t understand the persistent message and unable to ignore it he believes it and he persuades Annie let him build a baseball field with spectator seats. One evening some uniformed players begin to emerge from out of the cornfield and they begin to play ball. They appear so happy to play. The game ends as the sun sets and the players withdraw into the corn. Neighbours hear about it and at first think Ray has lost his mind. A game happens night after night as these ghostly players come from the corn and the neighbours show up to watch one night, and return each following night. 

If you haven’t recognized it, Ray is the protagonist in a novel called ‘Shoeless Joe’ written by Canadian author W.P. Kinsella, a novel that was turned into the movie called ‘Field of Dreams.’ In this fantasy drama Ray doesn’t know that the voice belongs to Joe Jackson, nicknamed “Shoeless Joe,” who was an outfielder with the 1919 Chicago White Sox. That team became known as the Black Sox because of a dreadful scandal, when seven players all dead and gone now, were disgraced and banned from baseball because they accepted bribe money for intentionally losing the 1919 World Series to the Cincinnati Reds. 

Near the end of the story as the players return into the corn stalks, only the catcher remains on the field. He removes his mask and a handsome face appears that Ray recognizes as his father John when he was a young aspiring ball player. Ray says to Annie, "It's my father... I-I only saw him years later when he was worn down by life. Look at him. He's got his whole life in front of him, and I'm not even a glint in his eye. What do I say to him?" Ray introduces John to Annie and Karin and choking with emotion Ray asks, "Hey Dad? Do you want to have a catch?" The two enjoy a game of catch between father and son one more time as the sun sets. Then dad waves goodbye and moves into the corn stalks. 

Kinsella story is an inspired piece of literature about the themes of faith and redemption. He writes fiction. He deals in make believeand it’s entertaining and we are okay with that because we understand the genre. 

However, those themes of Faith and redemptionare customary themes in church too. Here in this place we are uninterested in fiction. We want and we expect truth in our conversations and in our teaching. We certainly want the truth about faith and redemption.  

EASTER SUNDAY 2011

It is Easter Sunday morning. There are so many fine paintings from which to choose one that depicts the the intelligent movement from conjecture and hypothesis to conviction and faith. Many great paintings illustrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Most show Christ with scarred hands outstretched, or the risen Christ standing outside the now empty tomb, or otherwise revealing his victory over the grave and death. Perhaps no artist has captured the bewilderment and the emotion associated with human intellect coming to terms with the truth of Jesus' supernatural identity than this beautiful painting by Caravaggio called “Doubting Thomas.” It is an outstanding piece. Caravaggio makes flesh come to life. He brilliantly and dramatically stages the scene. This is Christ living and breathing despite his mortal and still open wounds, standing with his disciples eye to eye. Thomas had expressed his doubt about the report of the other disciples that Jesus was alive again. He said he would not believe unless he himself touched Jesus' wound, actually put his finger in Jesus' gaping side wound. Jesus permitted Thomas to do this, and in this moment, Thomas, astounded and convinced said, "My Lord and My God."

Caravaggio lived from 1573 – 1610. His Christ lives forever. And his visualized victory here is shared. The promise to us is this. Whoever believes in him will not utterly perish but will have everlasting life. 

RESURRECTION SUNDAY

A NEW LEARNING
Resurrection Sunday
On Easter Sunday, Christians celebrate the resurrection of the Lord, Jesus Christ. Christians believe according to Scripture, that Jesus came back to life, or was raised from the dead, three days after his death on the cross. As part of the Easter season, the death of Jesus Christ by crucifixion, is commemorated on Good Friday, always the Friday just before Easter. Through his death, burial and resurrection, Jesus paid the penalty for sin, thus purchasing for all who believe in him, eternal life in Christ Jesus.

Because of Easter's pagan origins, and also because of the commercialization of Easter, many Christian churches have begun to refer to it as Resurrection Day. The biblical account of Jesus' death on the cross, or crucifixion, his burial and his resurrection, or raising from the dead, can be found in the following passages of Scripture: Matthew 27:27-28:8; Mark 15:16-16:19; Luke 23:26-24:35; and John 19:16-20:30.

When Jesus entered into Jerusalem for the final week of his life, he came into a city crammed with people who were present for the observance of the feast of the Passover. At one point Jesus gathered his disciples into an upper room where he communicated with them at length. Much of what he said to them is recorded in John chapters 13-16. In this borrowed upper chamber Jesus observed the paschal meal with them and it was virtually his last supper. This Passover meal was given a new significance and meaning as he took bread and wine and identified these items as symbols of his body that would soon be injured and his blood that would soon be spilled out. Following his death he was hastily placed without the customary burial treatment into a cave tomb which was sealed by rolling a large carved stone against the entrance. The Gospels’ account describes a scene on resurrection morning when the stone was discovered to have been rolled away, and Jesus body was gone. The linens that had surrounded his corpse lay in where his body had been placed. A succession of confirmations of his resurrection from death are then expressed by people who were first hand witnesses who walked and talked with Him. They ate food that he prepared for them. They touched him and they saw Him appear and vanish and forty days later ascend into the heavens.

Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved.