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KING OF KINGS?

April 22, 2007

Pastoral Intern Brent James

              In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth, and the earth was formless and void.  Perhaps, one of the most important sentences in the history of Western civilization, a sentence which still evokes powerful emotions about what it means, what its consequences are, but there is one certain assertion which we, as Christians, must make when interpreting this most important passage; that all of creation, the earth, the skies, and seas came into being by the very Word and Will of God.  In the beginning God created the Heavens and the earth, and the earth was Tohu vaBohu, it says in the Hebrew – it was primordial chaos.  Christian theologians use the Latin term “nihilo,” the nothingness, to describe the nature of reality before creation.  God simply speaks, “Let there be,” and water is separated from the land; “Let there be,” and trees and animals are brought into being.  It is out of God’s sovereign will that out of this primordial chaos comes beautiful order, which God calls “good.”  And when I think of that beautiful order, I see that powerful image taken from Apollo 8 called “earthrise” from the dusty dead surface of the moon, and in the distance this beautiful blue marble sits in the darkness of space.  Out of the chaos and the nothingness comes order and life.  It is our Christian worldview, but Christians aren’t the only ones who have constructed meaning out of this passage.

              Fredrich Nietzsche also found this text to be highly informative of his own worldview.  And I know even as I say the name Nietzsche, some of you are having nightmare flashbacks of Philosophy 101, and some are saying, “oh great, we get Mr. Seminarian.”  Nietzche looked at Genesis 1, and appealed to it, except Nietzsche had one problem; Nietzsche said we don’t experience God in a rational way – we don’t hear him (at least not in an audible way that those around us can verify), we don’t see him, we can’t touch him, we can’t taste him, there’s no rational, verifiable experience of God, – which, if we’re rational people, should lead us to one of two conclusions:  either God never existed and someone made him up, or God is dead.  And he said, if God is dead then there is no order, no ordering of creation, all that exists still is the chaos, the nihilo, the nothingness, hence the term, “Nihilist.”  For Nietzsche it is only those brave souls who are willing to accept the reality of the chaos, who bravely step into that nothingness, and like the Hebrew God, create order by their own sovereign will, and say, “let there be” and create their own sense of meaning, the values which they choose to live by.  And Nietzsche thought has continued to live on and it’s not uncommon to find him being taught in Philosophy classes throughout the west today.  I think you find Nietzsche subtlety all over the popular American landscape today, but I also think you find him increasingly within Christianity as well – what people refer to as cafeteria Christianity (i.e., “I really like what the Bible says about helping the poor, and I like Jesus, but I’m not a real big fan of what it says about marriage or money, and I really like the idea of kharma from Buddhism, and reincarnation sounds better the final judgment”), and so we craft personalized temporary religious meanings that work for us when we need them to.

              I think if you were to find a hymn like the Te Deum, for the Nietzschean view of life, printed in your bulletin is this poem called Invictus by William Ernest Henley.  Invictus is Latin for unconquered; and the poem reads,   

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years,
Finds, and shall find me, unafraid.
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate: I am the captain of my soul.

 I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul.  I am sovereign; I will create my own meaning.  These were the last words of Timothy McVeigh before he was lethally injected for the bombing of the Oklahoma City Federal Building, where 19 children died, 168 human beings died, because he decided his creation of meaning, his sense of right and wrong was justified; he was the master of his fate, he was the captain of his soul.  And we saw the tragedy this week in Virginia, and obviously a troubled soul, but I don’t know how one can pull off the trigger and kill 33 human beings without saying, “It matters not how charged with punishments the scroll.”  I know these are dramatic examples, but you don’t have to look to Oklahoma City or Virginia Tech for destruction with this kind of world view.  How many of us know families who have been utterly destroyed because someone said, “I am the captain of my soul?”  How many wives and husbands have been bruised so deeply because someone said, “I’m going to construct my own meaning of right and wrong?”  How much destruction has been wrought in this world because of those who have said, “I will live invictus, unconquered?”1

              As we turn to our main scripture, Philippians 2:5-11; listen to a different poem, a different song.  Hear a contrast to a life unconquered; hear the word of the Lord this morning: Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness.  And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death— even death on a cross.  Therefore God also highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

              Paul is writing from prison (probably Rome, with his physical death by execution seeming immanent), there was some kind of commotion, distention, disunity going on within the church at Philippi.  The two women leaders who helped Paul start this small church seem to be having a serious disagreement.  The church has come underneath oppression which seems to be coming from Jews in the area who are insisting that those coming to Christ continue with the ritual conditions of the Hebrew law.  The possibility exists that all of Paul’s hard work is crumbling to pieces, and he’s not even free to go and salvage these people into whom he has poured his life.  And in the middle of addressing these problems, Paul breaks into a hymn.

              It may surprise some of you to learn that I’m not, perhaps, the most patient person on the face of the earth.  When I find myself sitting in traffic, or stuck at a traffic light when I’m running late to a meeting, sometimes in that situation I might be tempted to use language which could be construed as harsh, angry, not necessarily marked by joy and grace, or when I find myself needing to go to the DMV I don’t find the waiting process to be a gift of God for meditation or contemplation, and sometimes when my brow is furrowed, and my lips are pursed, and I’m about ready to explode, sometimes, my wife (my lovely wife) will take my hand and begin to sing these words, “Have patience, have patience, don’t be in such a hurry,” it doesn’t really help my mood at all, but it does make a subtle point.  And Paul is making a subtle point to this tiny Philippian church.

              Paul is facing death! What will happen to this fragile Philippian church, to all the small, fragile churches that he’s been responsible for setting up? The churches all seem to be facing huge problems, some on the verge of extinction.  This community which he had started was beginning to come apart, and Paul begins to hum this familiar tune, (sing)...let this mind be in you which was in Christ Jesus: and the words of that hymn calmed everyone’s soul and reminded them again, what the Christian life is all about.  They remind us that Sovereign God, who at the beginning of creation shaped and ordered the world, was also that same God who in the form of Jesus Christ, emptied himself, gave up the power and the authority which was his right.  He, who was in the form of God, took on the form of a slave and became obedient unto death – even death on a cross.

              Some scholars have made the case that this oldest hymn had its inspiration in the story of the foot washing by Christ, that this is a poetic portrayal of a God come in flesh, in full knowledge that a horrible death – 19 hours of being beaten, spit on, humiliated, having the flesh ripped off his back, having nail drove through his wrist – this kind of death is at his door; time with his disciples is fleeting; what does he do?  This Rabbi, this honored teacher strips down to his underwear, practically naked in his culture, wrapping a towel around him, lowering himself to the bottom of the bottom of household responsibilities, begins the humbling task of washing his disciples’ feet.  He who was in the form of God took the form of a slave, telling them, “If I, your Master and teacher, do this to you, so you also ought to wash one another’s feet.  It’s as if he is saying “don’t you get it, disciples?  It’s not about playing King of the Hill, it’s not about about being the captain of one’s soul, because that’s a real lonely place, only one person can be on top of the hill.  I didn’t come to build a Kingdom of the Hill, but I came to build a new community where people love another and care for one another.  In Jesus, we see this God who created the heavens and earth, is in fact, the same God who is willing to gently touch and wash our dirty and blistered feet and calls us to do the same.  This God, who values community so much that he is willing to face the cross, in likewise manner calls us to value community.  Jesus Christ did not die on a cross so that we could go to church on Sunday, but he came to show us another way of life, another way of relating one to another.  Jesus Christ came so that we might be the Community of God; that we might live with this mind of Christ.

              I recently had the opportunity to watch the story of Jim Elliott in the documentary, Beyond the Gates of Splendor.  A lot of you will know the story.  Jim grew up here in Portland, and in the 1950’s felt called to witness this extravagant love of God to the Huaorani people of Ecuador.  The Huaorani culture had a lot similarities to American culture today.  As a people they were highly individualistic, they valued individual autonomy as one of the highest ethics of their culture, very Nitzschean.  They were also people of the spear – if you offend me, if you hurt me, if it seems good to me, I’ll spear you, I’ll take away your life.  If you try to take my spot on the hill, I’ll kill you.  And Jim Elliott and four of his friends went down to share this new way of being, this new kind of community; knowing that they might indeed lose their lives in the process.  As Jim was preparing for this missionary work, a man who could have lived a very successful life in the States, wrote this phrase; “He is no fool who gives up that which he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose.”  Jim did give up his life and was brutally speared to death, but through circumstances of his death, the Huaorani people came to hear the loving and saving message of Jesus Christ, and they became a new community.  Were you to talk to a Huaorani person today, they would tell you that had it not been for Jim and Elizabeth Elliott coming to share this new way of being, they would have killed each other off into extinction.  The story behind the documentary was that when the Huaorani tribe was originally asked if it would be alright to film their story, at first they said no, but it was only after they heard about the school shootings at Columbine, that they said we must share our testimony because those in the United States are beginning to live like we used to.

              So let me ask you today, what is the worldview that you are going to live by?  Will you live unconquered?  Will you be the master of your fate, the captain of your soul?  What hope will you cling to?  Is life 70 to 80 shots around the sun spent trying to climb and claw to the top of that hill, trying to call forth meaning from the chaos, knowing that one day you will slip away into oblivion?  Or will you hold on to the hope that there is a divine order to this creation, that though the wrong seem oft so strong, God is the ruler yet, and that one day the Heavens are going to break open and that rider on a white horse, who was in the form of God but chose to be made into the form of a slave – who died on the cross, wearing a robe dipped in blood, the one whom God has highly exalted – will come with an army of Jim Elliotts, and Mother Teresas, and Martin Luther King Jr.s and William Wilberforces.  And when they call out his name, “Jesus Christ,” every person in heaven and on earth’s knee will bow and every person will proclaim him Lord, not out of the fear of his domination or power, but they will call him Lord because of the overwhelming goodness and mercy and grace that they will experience when they see him.  Because the order of this sick world will be overturned, and He who gave up the form of God, who became the greatest servant of all, will finally be the Lord of all.  Every form of oppression, every instrument of slavery, every demonic impulse to sin will go down in slaughter, and a lion will lay down by a lamb, and that servant who died upon a Roman cross will be recognized as the King of Kings, unlike any other King this world has ever known.  And he will lead a different kind of community this world has ever known.

              Maybe today you are sitting here and saying to yourself; I am so tired of trying to be the captain of my soul, I am so weary from trying to figure out right and wrong in a world that seems upside down.  You know, if you’re saying that, you’d be joining your voice to mine. I have to continuously work at saying, “God I’m not the master of my fate, but you are, I’m not the Captain of my soul, but you are, help me to recognize that.”  Maybe today is the day you want to finally say to God, “Be the captain of my soul.”  Maybe today is the day you want to finally place your trust in God.  Let me direct you to the last lines of the Te Deum....

1. This section starting with Nietzsche until this point owes much to Dr. Richard Mouw’s course PH504 Christian Worldview & Contemporary Challenges.  Fuller Seminary, Pasadena, CA.

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