(Homily for Gayton Road Christian Church's Worship on May 7, 2017, Easter IV)
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Before There Were Christians…
Today we’re breaking with tradition. Normally at this point we read a scripture from the lectionary, the Christian calendar of scripture readings. Today’s lectionary scripture is in 1 Peter, where we were last week. A little bit like Columbus, who sailed west in order to go east, I’m going to read soon a couple of other scriptures in order to talk about the world of 1 Peter.
We don’t know too much about 1 Peter. It may have been written by Peter himself, or it may have been written by a personal friend or follower of Peter. In either case, it was written in the earliest of days, before Christianity had been systematized into a distinct religion. At this point in time, there were not card-carrying Christians so much as there were Christ-followers: people who had heard about Jesus and who decided that they wanted to follow him.
…There Were Christ-Followers
What were these Christ-followers like? How did people see them?
Imagine with me for a moment that we are just your typical, run-of-the-mill Roman citizens. And one of our friends, Marcus, has been acting a bit funny lately. In the past, we saw him a lot. If ever there were an execution, he’d be there to watch along with the rest of the town. On the festival days, when sacrifices were offered to the local gods and folks would gather around for a festive barbeque afterwards, Marcus would be there with everyone else. But now he’s nowhere to be seen at these events. He has been seen, however, going into the homes of people below his class, people he has no connection with—sometimes really early in the morning, before the sun has risen. Recently some of Marcus’ friends have started to spread vicious rumors about him. The remarkable thing is that Marcus hasn’t called them out or tried to avenge his honor as any self-respecting citizen would do. It’s really odd. It’s like he’s not one of us anymore.
A Most Curious Species
This imagined scenario affords us a brief glimpse into the world of 1 Peter. The earliest followers of Christ attracted suspicion and mistrust because they had stopped living like the rest of the world. They had thrown off their cultural inheritance and were starting to live differently. As the writer of 1 Peter says at one point, “[The rest of the world] are surprised that you no longer join them…and so they speak evil [about you]” (4:4).[1]
So we know a little bit now about what the Christ-followers are not doing. They’re not living like the rest of the world around them.
But the question remains: what are they doing? Of course, we have many letters in the Bible that tell us what they are doing. But before we go there, let’s remain a moment longer in the world, the Roman world.
Twenty or thirty years after the ink of 1 Peter had dried, there is a Roman governor, Pliny, who writes to the Roman emperor Trajan, asking how to deal with these Christ-followers. Pliny talks about the Christ-followers as though they’re exotic specimens, a newly discovered species around which there are plenty of rumors but few known facts. When I read his words, I imagine him speaking in the voice of a nature documentary narrator—you know, the kind who whispers in a sophisticated British accent, treating every detail like it’s the most curious thing in the world. Pliny remarks first upon the Christ-followers’ stubbornness and “mental instability,” for they did the unthinkable: they refused to sacrifice to the emperor. But beyond this, he sees little harm in them. “They insisted,” he says, “that this was the sum of their fault and error, that they were accustomed to convene of a given day before dawn and sing a hymn…to Christ as if to a god, and to bind themselves by oath not for the purpose of some crime, but so as not to commit theft, or [fraud], or adultery, or to betray an oath, or to withhold something held in trust. It was thereupon their custom to disperse and to join together again to breakfast, but on common and harmless food.”[2]
In other words, as far as Pliny can tell, these Christ-followers are guilty of nothing more than “mental instability” and a quaint habit of gathering, singing, promising to do good, and then eating breakfast together. A most curious species.
Gathering Because of Jesus Christ
What we find in the New Testament largely confirms this picture of the early Christ-followers. I’ve selected just a couple of texts as evidence.
Exhibit A is 1 Corinthians 14:26, in which Paul paints with one broad brush-stroke what Christ-followers do together: “When you come together, each one has a hymn, a lesson, a revelation, a tongue, or an interpretation. Let all things be done for building up.”
Exhibit B is Hebrews 10:24-25, in which the writer urges the Christ-followers to keep meeting together: “And let us consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the day approaching.”
As you may be guessing, there is no single blueprint in the Bible for how early Christ-followers should gather. What does not change, however, is this: from the first day, Christ-followers have gathered together. To sing, to pray, to read, to talk, to eat. But whatever they gather to do, they do it because of Jesus Christ. They gather in his memory, in his name, in his spirit, in his body, in the faith that Christ is risen and alive and reconciling all creation.
A Divine Twist on Provocation
I love the way that the writer of Hebrews puts it: “Let us consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds” (10:24). In the Greek, that word “provoke” has the same negative connotation as it does in English. To provoke is usually to make angry or upset or hostile. When we look at our world today, we see people provoking each other all over the place. We see it in the media, where what matters most is making your point in a loud voice—if you offend a few people, so much the better. We see it in the workplace, where what matters most is asserting yourself and making sure you’re not lost among the competition. We see it in our relationships, where—as silly as it sounds—what matters most sometimes is simply being right or winning an argument or looking better than others.
In our world today, there is much provoking. But according to the gospel, Christ is doing something different, something opposite. Christ is reconciling all of creation—twisting you and me and everything back into goodness and love. When the writer of Hebrews says, “Let’s consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds,” he’s putting a divine twist on that word “provoke.” Whereas the world provokes towards division, Christ-followers “provoke” towards reconciliation. Paul talks about things a bit more plainly in 1 Corinthians, where he says that Christ-followers gather together in order to “build up.” In a world that brings others and us down in so many ways, Christ-followers gather with God to “build up.”
Whereas the world gathers to get ahead, these curious Christ-followers gather with the left-behind. Whereas the world gathers in an us-against-them mentality, these strange Christ-followers gather in an us-for-them mentality. Whereas the world gathers to feel good, these mentally unstable Christ-followers gather even amid difficulty and disagreement in order to do good.[3]
These Christ-followers are a most curious species, indeed.
Christ in Small Groups
During Lent, a few small groups from our church met weekly in homes and at church. They did different things. Some read the Bible. Some studied a book and discussed it. Some shared their lives and prayed together. The common thread in all these things is that they met because of Jesus Christ; in a world that provokes division and hurt, they met to provoke the love and goodness and reconciliation of Christ.
We see it the earliest Christ-followers and we see it today. Christ becomes alive and real in our world not simply through the bedside prayers of a privatized faith, but through our flesh-and-blood provoking of one another. Christ becomes alive and real where two or three are gathered, where bread is broken, where the least is loved.[4] In our families, here at church on Sunday morning, and in our small gatherings with one another, we learn and practice and are transformed by the most curious of way of Christ.
Small Group Questionnaire
I heard wonderful reports from our Lenten small groups, and so I am eager that we continue to offer space for such meetings. Worship happens for one hour in the week. But the week is long, and we long to be drawn together in Christ more often than this once. For some of us, we already have many opportunities to gather in Christ in our families and in other groups outside this church. But for others of us, there are few opportunities for life together in Christ. I’m keen that we as a church are always offering these opportunities.
In the middle of your bulletin, you’ll find a questionnaire regarding your preferences for small groups. For the next few moments, you’re invited to fill this questionnaire out. If you’ll leave it on your seat when you leave worship today, it will be collected then. Soon there will be more information about the possibilities of another round of small group meetings.
Prayer
Risen Christ,
In whom we live and move and become,
Whose body gathers us
Into the provoking movements
Of love and goodness and reconciliation:
Open our eyes to redemption;
Inspire us
In the steady and sometimes difficult work
Of blessing your world.
In the name of him in whom we gather, Jesus Christ. Amen.
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[1] The imagined scenario attempts to draw out a common theme of 1 Peter: the spiritual experience of “exile” in the world. Cf. Scot McKnight, 1 Peter (NIV Application Commentary Series; Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1996), ebook locs. 373-486, in which McKnight remarks upon a certain “homelessness” of Christ-followers.
[2] Pliny, Epistles 10.96-97, tr. Richard Hooper.
[3] McKnight, ebook loc. 2841, locates the theme of “self-denial” in 1 Peter’s discourse on suffering. Self-denial helps to distinguish the way of Christ from the way of the world: one is giving, one is taking; one is oppositional, one is cooperative; one is self-concerned, the other is selfless.
[4] Cf. Tripp Fuller’s maxim as found in The Homebrewed Christianity Guide to Jesus: Lord, Liar, Lunatic, or Awesome (Minneapolies: Fortress, 2015), ebook loc. 2102-2103: “Christ explicitly promised to be in three places: in community, at the communion table, and among the oppressed.”
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