Plastic Jesus

Rev. Brian North      Westminster Presbyterian Chehalis, WA        January 14, 2007

Fact or Fiction: Discovering the Real Jesus                                          John 11:1-45

Plastic Jesus

Well, here we are, once again! Last time I was with you I told  you how I kind of felt like a car getting taken for a test-drive by nearly 200 people all at once. Now I feel like I’m the one driving…except it’s an airplane, and I’m blind…and I don’t even know how to fly an airplane. But fortunately, I’m not actually in the pilot’s seat – Amen, right? What a whirl-wind week it has been. Of course, some of you are out there looking at me and saying, “Is he the new pastor? He looks so young, I thought he must be the pastor’s son!” Sorry…I’m the one.

So it seems to me…that as we begin this journey together on the Christian faith that it would be good to make sure that we’re all on the same page about who Jesus is. I mean, Jesus is the reason that I’m here…and whether you realize it or not, He’s the reason you’re here – no one is here by accident this morning – whether this is your church home or you’re just here visiting today. In fact, is there anyone else here this morning besides me who’s here for the first or second time? …Good, we’re in the same boat! You see, God has a purpose, a reason, for our being together. And that reason is Jesus Christ. Scripture tells us that the church is the body of Christ – we don’t always act like it – but it is. Jesus is why we’re here. So beginning today and continuing for the next several weeks, we will engage in a series of sermons designed to help us understand who Jesus is…and who he is not.

I’ve titled the series, “Fact or Fiction: Discovering The Real Jesus” because there are some fallacies about Jesus that float around in people’s heads. We’ve all constructed an image of Jesus, and inevitably the image of Jesus that we each have has some variations from the image that the Bible actually paints. Some of the misunderstandings are exclusively in the heads of those people who really have never heard of Jesus, while other fallacies exist in the heads of Christians. We’ve all got misconceptions of Jesus. So as you look ahead each week to the next sermon – which is printed for you in the bulletin – I encourage you to think of people who might benefit from hearing that week’s message. But in addition to bringing other people…bring yourself each Sunday too, so that at the end we’ve all got a clear picture of who Jesus is, and we can move forward in ministry together here at WPC.

You know, as we journey together we’re going to learn a lot about each other. This morning I want to share something with you about myself: I don’t like country music. Never have, probably never will. But sometimes even country music has some redeeming qualities, and this morning it’s redemption comes in the form of giving me the title of this sermon. There’s a country song called, Plastic Jesus that was written a number of years ago and has been recorded by several different artists over the years. Some of the lyrics are:

I don’t care if it rains or freezes
Long as I got my plastic Jesus
Riding on the dashboard of my car.

Through my trials and tribulations
And my travels through the nations
With my plastic Jesus I’ll go far.
Plastic Jesus plastic Jesus,
Riding on the dashboard of my car[1]

Today we’re going to look at one of the most frequent misunderstandings of who Jesus is: that He’s convenient, that he’s here to make our lives trouble-free, smooth and easy, like the drive-through window at McDonald’s. That’s a misconception of Jesus that I often carry around on the dashboard of my life, and maybe you do too.

In fact, my guess is that many Christians unfortunately have this idea in their heads that Jesus is like a plastic doll riding on the dashboard of life that makes everything peachy-keen, easy, simple, and silky-smooth all the time: As if we can manipulate Jesus like a Barbie Doll to suit our needs. That’s not what Jesus is about. Those song lyrics contain truth, but their truth is in pointing out our misconceptions of Jesus, rather than containing the truth about Jesus.

And if music doesn’t do it for you, check out this video clip and see if this doesn’t strike you as a perversion of the truth…(“My Buddy Jesus” Video clip)

http://www.sermonspice.com/listings/78/misconceptions-of-christianity/popularity/6/

Many of us have this idea in our head that Jesus will just make all our pain, all our sorrow, all our difficulties just go away. But we aren’t the first ones to go for that fallacy.

We see this in the Scripture passage that we read just a moment ago.

Mary and Martha sent word to Jesus with an expectation that he’s going to make the pain of loss in their lives go away. They’re coming to Jesus with a prayer request in part for Lazarus’s sake, but also for theirs. They want Lazarus to be healed. They’re making this appeal to Jesus. Lazarus is sick, and obviously it’s serious, because Jesus’ response is that “this sickness will not end in death.” Can you imagine going to to the doctor with some sinus congestion and having the doctor say, “Don’t worry, this sickness won’t end with your death.” That wouldn’t be very comforting! So if that’s Jesus’ response, the sickness certainly had the women very concerned, because you don’t give that kind of response if it’s not.

Or maybe you’ve come to Jesus much like Mary and Martha and you expected a certain outcome or a certain response. And maybe what you hoped for isn’t what happened. Oftentimes we want Jesus to work in a certain way in our lives. And initially, that’s what happens to Mary and Martha – they don’t get the response they wanted from Jesus, probably leaving them feeling a bit dejected.

But Jesus has another agenda, because he sees the bigger picture, and he puts them on hold for a bit. This is the first place in this story where we see Jesus resisting an opportunity to be flexible like an Olympic gymnast. The women were certainly disappointed that he wouldn’t follow them to Lazarus and heal him. After all, they’ve heard of and personally witnessed all kinds of miracles of healing that Jesus has done…How hard could it be for him to do one more?

The second place we see Jesus sticking to his agenda at the risk of making things inconvenient for his followers is when he finally does decide to go to Bethany, the town where Lazarus is. It’s in Judea. And after he stayed where he was for two more days Jesus tells his disciples that he wants to go back to Judea. The guys look at him like he’s got some kind of death wish.

“What!” the disciples say. “You’re crazy! Don’t you remember that the last time you were there and they tried to stone you?” Then Jesus gives this totally cryptic response about walking in the daylight and not stumbling and walking at night and that’s when you stumble…And then he says, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep; but I am going there to wake him up.”

Of course, as usual, the disciples are as dull as a butter knife and they just don’t get it. “Well if he’s asleep, why do we need to go and wake him up? Seems kind of ridiculous in light of the risk of being stoned to death…” So Jesus explains in plain language that Lazarus has died – which, notice that the gospels don’t record for us that anyone actually told him this, and judging by the disciples’ response, they obviously didn’t know. And so Jesus is going to go and wake Lazarus from the dead. He’s going to perform not just a healing on the man, but a complete and total resurrection.

But apparently, Thomas doesn’t really understand Jesus even speaking in plain language, and so he goes completely Peter on us. Know what I mean? He decides that Peter shouldn’t be the only one of the twelve who gets to put his foot in his mouth, and he comes up with this incredibly ridiculous statement: “Let us also go, that we may die with him.” Great. Let’s just all go and get ourselves dead and see if Jesus will wake us too. Though I don’t think that Thomas even meant that. He just completely missed the part about Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead.

I mean talk about a bunch of characters with whom you can identify. The twelve are so confused they couldn’t find their way out of a fishing boat right now. Sometimes I feel like that. Confused, not sure what God is doing in my life…but just like the disciples, God simply asks us to follow him. And then there’s Mary and Martha, waiting with bated breath that maybe Jesus  would heal their brother. Maybe you’ve been in their shoes, too.

So Jesus goes to Bethany, and the women hear that he’s arrived. Martha comes out first, and then a little later Mary. And both of them – the first thing out of their mouths is: “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”

How many times have we told Jesus something just like that? “Lord, I know you could have done this…Lord, where were you?…Lord, why is this going like this?…Lord, you’re not making things easy here…Lord, this feels like more than I want to handle…Lord, this hurts…Lord, where are you!” Man! “God, couldn’t you have intervened in some way so I wouldn’t have lost my job?…God where were you as my child or my grandchild slipped into habitual drug use?…God why did my brother or my sister or my parent or my child die so unexpectedly?” Haven’t we all said those kinds of things at some point in our lives? Haven’t we all wondered, “Where are you, Jesus?”  And haven’t we all at some point wanted to try and control Jesus, to manipulate him into doing what we thought was best and the only way of accomplishing His and our purposes?

Kind of like in the Superman movies from the 1980′s or so when something bad happens, like someone falling into a river, and Clark Kent can’t get changed into his spiffy red and blue outfit, and everyone starts complaining: “Where’s Superman! What’s up! He’s not doing what we want!” So he takes care of things discretely as Clark the newspaper reporter or whatever it is he does, by using his laser-beam eyes when no one is looking and causes a branch to fall off a tree so the person can grab onto it and float down the river safely. But no one sees it, and they’re all hacked off that Superman didn’t come and save the person.

That’s expecting a plastic Superman, and when we do it to Jesus it’s expecting a plastic version of him, too. That’s trying to make Jesus fit into our small box and see him through our limited lenses that can’t see the whole picture. Sometimes God lets things deteriorate so he’s down to the basic ingredients and can build something new and even more glorious and can spread the name of Jesus farther than it ever could have if He’d taken the short-cut.

So the women ask him why he didn’t come sooner, because now Lazarus has passed away. Jesus asks the women where Lazarus is. They take him. See, they don’t realize it yet, but Jesus has something bigger and better in mind. He has a different plan that’s beyond what they can conceive.

Jesus arrives at the tomb, and we’re told that “Jesus wept.” How many of you know that this is the shortest verse in the Bible. Raise your hand. Good! You know some of the details of Scripture. But you’re wrong. How many of you have memorized Job 3:2? If you haven’t you should. The verse is, in its entirety, “He said.” Those two words are shorter than “Jesus wept.” Do you now see the stunning insights God has given me into the Scriptures that led the PNC to select me out of all the intelligent pastors that applied for the position? I’m sure some of you are thinking, “great, out of all the intelligent pastor who applied to come here and our PNC selects the one who teaches us what the shortest verse in the Bible is.”

Ok, back to the story…Jesus comes to the tomb where Lazarus is, and he says to open the tomb. Martha, always the practical one, says, “But Lord, he’s been dead four days, and it’s going to stink in there.” The King James Version has the best translation here I’ve ever seen, and it’s rare that I say that about the King James. It says, “But Lord, by this time he stinketh.” But Jesus persists. He’s not going to let things be easy. If it’s going to stink, then so be it. And if you’ll stick with him through the times that don’t feel so convenient, you’ll see things that will blow you away.

So they open the tomb, and Jesus calls Lazarus by name, and he comes out! Life has come from death. It’s the most amazing transformation that could have ever happened. And if Lazarus hadn’t first died, Jesus couldn’t have resurrected him. The only way to bring about new life, to resurrect something, is for that thing to die first. And because of what Jesus did, we’re told that “Many of the Jews who had come to visit Mary, and had seen what Jesus did, put their faith in him.”

Could Jesus have healed Lazarus before he died? Absolutely. But he had another purpose in all of this: to bring even greater glory to his name.

You see, it’s not about Lazarus. It’s not about Mary. It’s not about Martha. It’s not about taking shortcuts. It’s not about convenience. It’s about Jesus. And it’s not about a plastic version of Jesus, it’s about the real, life-giving, death-conquering Jesus who not only raised Lazarus from the dead but was himself raised from death. It’s about his glory. It’s about his purpose. It’s about his mission. Let’s be honest: The death of Lazarus was not convenient for anyone, most of all for Lazarus. But Jesus isn’t selling faith at the seven-eleven store. This is about a commitment to Jesus Christ, a commitment to following him and his way, even when it’s not what we would want.

Jesus was so sold out to his purpose that he went through the inconvenience of leaving a perfect heaven to dwell on an imperfect earth and then went through a really inconvenient death on the cross so that you and I, our neighbors, our friends, our family members, the person half way around the globe you’ve never met, so that anyone who believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life. That’s why Jesus went through what he did. And his resurrection backs it up.

Lazarus’ resurrection sure doesn’t back it up. Raising Lazarus was a nice little miracle…but Lazarus ended up in the same tomb sometime later. Jesus came out of the tomb and never returned to it. But it wasn’t convenient for him to do that. And it wasn’t convenient for Lazarus to die so that Jesus could raise him up and bring people to faith. And it wasn’t convenient that Jesus made the disciples risk their lives in returning to Judea. And it wasn’t convenient for Mary and Martha to endure the loss of their brother. But Jesus isn’t plastic. He’s Lord of Heaven and earth, of my life and I hope yours. And that means that sometimes his ways might be a little inconvenient for us. But that should be ok: Because our ways sure made things a little inconvenient for him. But he did it all for you, and for his glory anyway. Let’s pray…Amen.