Context is Decisive

Jesus answered them, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. 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. John 12:23-24

Dear Friends,

In the sermon on Sunday, I used the phrase, “Context is decisive.” I feel this is a key insight so I want to spend a little bit of time exploring it…

Looking back, one of the first times I remember being surprised by the way someone viewed their “work” and how their context informed and impacted what they were doing was when I heard a talk by Tony Campolo (author and preacher):

Tony Campolo said that when his wife, Peggy, was at home full time with their children and someone would ask, “And what is it that you do, my dear?” she would respond, “I am socializing two Homo sapiens into the dominant values of the Judeo-Christian tradition in order that they might be instruments for the transformation of the social order into the kind of eschatological utopia that God willed from the beginning of creation.”

Then Peggy would ask the other person, “And what do you do?”

Though quite humorous, it is also insightful. For those of us who have survived raising children, “parenting” can end up being a series of diaper changes & bottle feeding and then, as they get older, being chauffer, preparing meals, cleaning up after meals, dealing with “owies,” etc. It can be exhausting and tedious and—when we are tired—sheer drudgery. When we catch ourselves in the what-was-I-thinking-when-we-decided-to-have-children? mindset, pausing to remember the bigger picture of participating in the nurturing and development of tiny humans and the gift and responsibility that they are…can bring us back to a more life-giving attitude. Context is decisive.

One of the curious things about the Gospel of John is the way Jesus talks about his crucifixion. In all of the gospels, Jesus predicts and knows that his journey is leading to the cross. In the Gospel of John, Jesus refers to his death on the cross as the time when he and the Father are glorified. The context for the Romans is that when they crucify someone, the Roman Empire was being glorified and its power proclaimed. The person being crucified was shown to be powerless and humiliated.  To claim Jesus’ crucifixion as the time when he was glorified is a completely different context! Yet, we trust this was God’s context. God’s power and love were revealed in Jesus’ death and resurrection.

Jesus’ resurrection gives us a different context for us to live our lives. We don’t have to buy into and just join into the self-focused context that today’s society so aggressively encourages. We can live in and remember that Jesus has shown us the way of love and choose to live our lives out of that context. This has the ability to transform our experience and perception of every aspect of our lives. Remembering the resurrection, we can shift our mindset from drudgery to purposefulness; from have to to get to; from obligation to opportunity; from burden to mundane, loving service to our neighbour.

Allow the resurrection to bring life to all aspects of your life!

Peace,

Pastor Phil