Preached for Church of the Good Shepherd, Federal Way, WA.
“Who do you say that I am?” Jesus asks his disciples. Peter, whose faith frequently falters, gets the right answer, “You’re the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”
Peter’s answer, even if he might not know what it means, even if it’s an answer of faith rather than evidence (yet), has me thinking it’s probably important for us to be able to name who Jesus is as well. As his disciples in the 21st century. As followers of a living God, whose story is still unfolding.
There is power in putting words to who we know Jesus to be. When we find language to describe an experience or a relationship, our understanding of it and ourselves deepens. Our confidence grows as we practice explaining how we know Jesus to be the Messiah, the living God who comes to bear our burdens, to unbind us and set us free to live life fully.
In finding our confidence and language about who we know Jesus to be, we may find our faith deepens as well. And, yet, the point of Jesus being the Messiah isn’t just for us personally.
Our ability to say who Jesus is is also for the world. We become better evangelists, better bearers of the good news of God’s love and grace and forgiveness for us and for all people. Our ability to proclaim Jesus strengthens our life of faith, and, in turn, our ministry as disciples of the Christ. It is, as Jesus says, about what we bind up and what we loose in this world. These are powerful promises Jesus makes, particularly in these days when our lives in this country and this world are forever changed by the pandemics of COVID and racism.
Binding up, and loosing. Jesus puts them in that order, actions we are empowered to take as a matter of our faith.
I wonder if it is useful to think first about what binds us, what holds us hostage or captive in this world. Another way to ask this is what do we need to be released from? What about...
Our pride and self-focus
Our prejudice and selfishness
Our shame and fear
What else do we allow or use to confine us, to belittle us or others? To make us less than fully-alive and wholly-beloved reflections of a forgiving, generous, and holy God? Or to see others as less deserving, less whole and holy?
And what are we being unbound or freed to?
Health and self-acceptance
Love, grace, wholeness
Forgiving others and mending relationships
Courage, fullness of life
Joy and gratitude
Jesus is the Messiah, the Liberator, the one who comes to know us, to feel our pain, to bear it with us. So that we know we are not alone, that we can be free. And, in the grace and joy of our own freedom, we are empowered be that same presence with others. As disciples, our faith necessitates action. We are unbound so that we can continue Jesus’ ministry of binding up evil and loosing people with love.
In these days when we feel cut off from what used to be our usual life. When we cannot gather for church or any other group activity, when we work and school from our kitchens and bedrooms. When the news cycle more often reminds us of death and suffering, prejudice and hate, than the triumphs of love and caring for others. It is easy to feel isolated and confined.
Jesus challenges us to name the ways God’s love binds up and holds the parts of us that hurt and feel alone. Jesus also reminds us that we are loosed from those bonds to name and proclaim the power of God’s love to liberate us all to live life fully. If we are not proclaiming freedom, the loosing of the bindings of hate and fear, of race and gender, then we continue to participate in them.
Our faith calls us to bind up hate and prejudice, to stand against the forces that belittle and demean the humanity of every human being. We set justice loose when we use our voices, our bodies, our emails and Zoom calls to reach out to one another, to those who look and think like us - and those who don’t - to proclaim our common humanity. This is a proclamation of our faith in Jesus the Messiah, who came to show us how a world governed by love can be a place of freedom and life for all people.
Like Peter, we are on a journey of learning more about how to talk about who Jesus is. And, also like Peter, we can draw on the gifts of faith and grace and hope that God gives us to bind up evil and proclaim the power of love to free and heal and reconcile people to one another.
Who do you say Jesus is?
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