September 5, 1999

Douglas S. Long

North Raleigh United Church

We have tackled some fairly heavy theological issues the past several weeks as we've continued to move towards our covenanting writing event next Saturday: how we view the Bible differently from the fundamentalists who crowd the airways and aisleways of our marketplace and media; the boundaries of the church, inclusivity, welcoming diversity; the economics of the Gospel which challenge us to reign in the rampant and too often self-centered practices of the Church… and today we have another major issue before us: the relationship of Christianity to the other religions of the world.

All of this 'seriousness' is an attempt to help move us along, but I want to say, as a word of introduction, that I wish we had one more Sunday prior to our covenant writing, …one more Sunday to focus on the freeing nature of the Gospel… on the life-affirming, deep peace producing, awareness of the Holy and Oneness-with-All-shalom that the true community grounded in the love of God affords us. Perhaps that is an aspect of the Church that cannot be articulated, but only felt. I have felt glimpses of it already among us. …and I am grateful. I trust that some of you have as well.

I'll start out confessionally-

I was ordained into the Christian ministry when I was 24 years old. It was 1981 (I'll save you the math… 18 years later, I'm now 42.) In the interval of time since, I have preached, as ministers are want to do, hundreds of sermons. …a few, more than once, and certainly more than once on particular passages and themes… but the point I now make is that I have spoken, in those 18 years, in the context of worship, on whatever my faith, my heart, and my understanding of God has led me to.

I have never before spoken on my subject for today. Not that it is a new concern, and not that I have received any here-to-fore unknown revelation. The congregation I have been most recently associated with, The First Church In Oberlin, UCC, in Oberlin, Ohio would certainly have welcomed my attempts in these matters. …while some other congregations I have served would not have been so welcoming.

I say this to you at the outset because I believe what we are doing here at North Raleigh United is breaking new ground for a number of us. We are struggling and proclaiming publicly what we know deep in our souls already, but have not had or have not taken the opportunity to try to articulate.

You quoted Kathleen Norris, a couple of weeks ago, Harding… "We build worlds in the words that we use…"

We are articulating a new community.

In many of my sermons I am content to let those hearing, or those I hope are hearing, wonder where I am headed until I try to lead them there. This morning I do not want to keep you in the dark for fear you will misunderstand the first part of what I say as you try to anticipate where I'm headed.

So… I want to tell you, up front, of my centeredness in the God of love revealed by Jesus, an understanding of God that is as compelling and true as any that I could hope to know …

…AND I want to try to articulate my understanding that that God cannot ultimately be confined to any single expression of faith. God is intimately bound into the fabric of Christianity, of that I have no doubt, but my deepest soul also knows that God cannot be cloaked by any one garment.

If this sounds heretical to you, it is possible that it is outside what you find acceptable… but hear me out, and then I invite your feedback.

Since my teenage years, I have never been able to escape a profound connection, a deep spiritual relationship, with the man of Nazareth, Jesus.

Though I had grown up in the church from my earliest recollections and had been nurtured by the songs and scriptures of a loving fundamental perspective, it was not until, as a teenager that I was introduced to the Jesus who confronted the status quo religion of his day, the Jesus who embraced the outcast and disenfranchised, a Jesus intimately tied to justice, the radical Jesus, suffering servant, who preached a God so loving and compassionate that all were embraced, affirmed, and freed, a Jesus that was so controversial and subversive to the power structures of his day that those in power arranged his crucifixion… It was not until I began to understand the man of Nazareth in these ways that faith rooted like a fire in my soul.

It was this Jesus that freed me to follow God.

Something deep within connected. Something about the God of this Jesus stirred within me an awakening that I have never been able to escape. I was liberated to love.

In the years since I have pursued God through the life and lens of this Jesus, but more importantly I believe that this God has pursued me. There is a love at the basis of all things, a holy mystery at the ground of all being, a sacred center in the midst of each moment…

…a holiness that is God, embracing us.

The church has been both a help and a hindrance in this pursuit, for in institutionalizing our faith, we make the mistake of thinking we can institutionalize God. In truth, the Church can occasionally speak the words of God but it can never truly completely contain God. God is far too wild, far too much the Holy-Other for any human construction, whether a human institution or book of human words… God is far too 'other' to fully contain him, her, them …

Our language is itself so limiting to articulate accurately this God.

Which is exactly why, for me, the man of Nazareth is central.

Jesus captured the spirit of God as completely as the human spirit and body can… The Word became flesh, and this Living Word was too loving, too compassionate, too counter-cultural, too hot to handle. We killed the manifestation of God among us. Which wasn't the end of the story… God's affirmation of the life of Jesus is the on-going spirit and presence of the Christ. Jesus the Christ lives!

Yes, I believe the Christ can be present with us now. I have felt that presence. I claim it as central in my life. ..and in no way this morning do I mean to detract from its importance.

I am hopelessly in love with the radically hopeful God of Jesus and therefore with the Christ himself.

I steal away to Jesus with regularity, for the Jesus of the Gospels, now known in the present Spirit of the Christ, is, for me, the undeniably central and wonderful window to see and experience God.

That being said, and to cut to the chase for our purposes this morning, do I believe that the Christ is the only path to God? I'll give you the short answer once again… and then further explain. The short answer is this… No. I do not believe Jesus is the only path to God. To believe so would limit God's presence to a specific culture, in a specific slice of history. To believe so would be to assert that God can only work in one way… which is, conveniently, our way. (How good of God, to reveal Godself to us, and only us, of all peoples in time and space.)

Again, do not hear this as taking away from my understanding of Jesus as the Christ, God made manifest. Hear it instead as my understanding that God is truly greater than any of us can capture.

I take heart in the teachings of Jesus on this score… Remember when the lawyer approached him and asked the question… What must I do to inherit life eternal?.. or another way of translating the question… What must I do to live life as fully as it is possible to be lived?, .. to live wholly?

If you've come the last couple of months you should remember that question because this is at least the third time I've used that text. Megan read it again this morning.

It's a great text and I would define it as one of the truly central passages of the Gospels…

One Sunday I used it purely for the content of the answer… love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your strength and all your mind… and love your neighbor as yourself. The content is crucial.

Another Sunday I used it to point out that the answer to the question the lawyer put forth was answered by the student of the law himself. Jesus merely confirmed the answer and then expounded upon it. We each, I believe, often know truth deep within us.

And today, for the purposes of exploring our relationship with other faiths, those outside the Christian fold, I'll point out yet another aspect of this straight-forward question and the resulting answer. Notice what wasn't given as part of the answer. Jesus did not say, when asked point blank about how to live life perfectly, wholly, completely… Jesus did NOT say, "you've got to confess my name as the only one and true Savior"… Jesus did not say "You must believe in me." Jesus did not tell the student of the law that the only way to find life was through him at all. He said (or agreed)… "Love the Lord your God with all your heart soul, strength, and mind, and your neighbor as yourself."

I'm not trying to be legalistic at this point. I am well aware that there are other passages in the Gospels that do say that. I'm simply pointing out that Jesus, when given a perfect opportunity to be exclusionary… wasn't. And there are other similar encounters in the Gospel.

Now some of you may disagree, and I can assure you that there are plenty who call themselves Christian who would label what I'm saying now blasphemous... I am not trying to win them over. I am simply and clearly proclaiming that the Jesus that I know embraces ALL who strive to love God and neighbor, all colors and cultures and creeds and kinds of us who come with humility and love and tolerance to the realm of the Holy.

I know I just shared this story a couple of weeks ago, but it's too pertinent not to repeat under the circumstances.

…the story from the Hasidic Jewish tradition:

"It is a day of rejoicing in heaven, there has been a great victory. The children

of Israel have escaped across the Red Sea, whose waters have risen to engulf

the pursuing Egyptians and drown them all. Not only a great victory, but a

Jewish victory to boot, and how many Jewish victories has heaven ever had a

chance to celebrate? So there is much rejoicing in heaven. The angels are

dancing. A feast is being prepared.

And then Raphael, one of the archangels, looks at the divine throne. God is not

only not rejoicing; God is weeping.

The archangel is mystified. So he goes over, kneels before the divine throne,

and says, "Lord God, Creator of the universe, it is a time of celebration, a time

of singing and dancing. Why are you weeping?"

And from the divine throne comes the anguished voice of the Lord God,

Creator of the universe: "Why should I not be weeping, when so many of my

children have drowned?" (from R.M. Brown's, Speaking of Christianity.)

Who are God's people?

Dare we limit God and claim that God cannot work in other ways?

But I DO believe, as the good book says, "There is no God but God." It’s from the Koran, by the way, … chapter 3.

..and I DO believe, "God is truth and light is his shadow." You remember perhaps, that Plato said that.

…and I agree with the Apostle Paul, that the unknown God in some cultures is the same God that we know through Jesus the Christ… but I also believe we have much to learn of God from those outside our culture and tradition.

I remember an exchange that Gandhi had with reporters that had flocked to his small home to learn more about this compelling man. Gandhi was sitting there on the bare floor, at his loom, spinning, in his simple Indian dress, and the reporter representing a major US press corp asked… "Mr. Gandhi, What do you think of Western civilization?"

Gandhi thought briefly and responded… "… I think it would be a good idea."

Are we nothing short of arrogant to assume that our understanding of God is the only possible understanding? Does not such an attitude demean both God and the spiritual capabilities of the rest of humanity?

If the spirit of the Christ is reflected in someone, and I would put Gandhi in that category, then is that not the same God?

Gandhi is a prime example of the wonderful insights we have to gain from other faiths:

You remember his seven deadly social sins?

Let me tell you folks, if that's not consistent with the spirit of Jesus and the God Jesus revealed… then I have missed the boat entirely. And if Gandhi is left off the list in the book of life because he didn't ascribe to a formulaic confession of the Christ, then I don't want to be in that book either.

If that's the kind of God we're dealing with, then deal me out. That's not the God of Jesus.

Is Jesus central? Yes. Is Jesus the Christ? Yes. Is Jesus' spirit known by me today. Yes. Is Jesus the way to God? Yes. Is Jesus a perfect way to God? Yes.

Is Jesus the only way to God? Ahh… to answer yes here would be to limit God.

Is Jesus the only way to God? …..No.

…but…BUT… Jesus IS my path to God, a path that I will share with all who are searching.

So what does all this mean for us a congregation-yet-to-be on the verge of writing our covenant? I hope that we could somehow better articulate what I am fumbling so feebly to say this morning….

…that we will be a congregation centered in the God of Jesus.

…which is the God of love and compassion, the God of liberation and justice,

…AND the God greater than any of us can know completely, individually or collectively.

This God continues to pursue us, and all persons in all places and times. Thanks be to the Christ who draws us into this God's presence.

Amen.